Vessel

Jarlath frowned, and he slid his hand around Liyana’s fingers. Liyana wondered if he did so consciously or not. She held his hand. “Clarify, please,” he said.

“Inside!” Mulaf thumped his chest and crowed. “Out of gratitude for the kindness that the empire has shown me, I have come to sever our relationship.”

Liyana, look at him, Bayla said.

The magician looked crazed. He wore the bed shirt of an ill man, and his hair was gnarled and uncombed. He walked in tight knots around the tent.

The emperor raised his voice. “Guards.”

No one entered.

Look inside, Bayla urged.

Liyana absorbed a spurt of magic and spread out to touch the magician’s soul. She felt a swirling vortex, sparking like lightning. Suddenly she was flung backward. Her body blew back across the tent and she smacked into the tarp wall.

“Guards!” Jarlath shouted. He raced to Liyana and crouched in front of her, blocking her from Mulaf. “What did you do?” he demanded.

“Take your army home, boy-emperor,” Mulaf said. “I no longer need you to reach the lake.”

They’re inside him, Bayla said. Horror colored her voice. The others . . . They’re inside him!

Liyana grabbed Jarlath, and he helped her to her feet. She pulled out the sky serpent blade, and she stepped in front of him.

“Equals, remember?” Jarlath said. “You don’t guard me, desert princess.” He stepped beside her. He had his own knife in his hand.

“Dear child, I would never hurt you,” Mulaf said to Liyana. “If not for you, I would never have known the possibilities.” He held out his hand palm up and giggled. “Look!” Air swirled on his palm faster and faster, and a whirlwind bloomed. He tossed it upward. It fed on the air and grew larger and larger. He then spread his hands, and the tornado dispersed. The air stilled. “Don’t fear me, child. I promised you freedom, and I will deliver it. You will call me your hero when this is through.”

He cannot go to the lake, Bayla said.

Liyana felt as if the air stilled around her. The lake . . . It’s real?

It is raw magic, the source of all magic in the world, Bayla said. It is essential to us—without its magic in the world, we cannot exist outside the Dreaming. He cannot be allowed to tamper with it!

“Bayla says you cannot go to the lake,” Liyana said. She asked Bayla, You knew the lake was real and did not tell me? All the gods knew and never told their people?

Speak for me: The lake cannot be used as you and the emperor envision. You cannot control it. You cannot even touch it. A single drop will send your soul to the Dreaming, leaving your body an empty shell that will soon die. It is death water for mortals! Liyana repeated her warning.

“Don’t worry your pretty little head,” Mulaf said. “Using it was never my intent.”

“We had an agreement, Mulaf,” Jarlath said. He drew himself to his full height, towering over the magician. His voice was pitched low but it carried, full of authority and reproach.

“I apologize for deceiving you, Your Imperial Majesty,” Mulaf said with a mocking bow, “but Bayla speaks the truth. Saving your people was never possible.”

Jarlath looked as if he had been stabbed. His stone face broke. For an instant Liyana saw the true Jarlath— the boy behind the emperor’s mask—who only wanted to save his people.

“Then what do you want with the lake?” Liyana asked.

Mulaf smiled. “I want to destroy it, of course. It is time for the gods to die.”

Liyana felt her throat dry. Stunned, she could think of no words to say. Knife in his hand, the emperor lunged forward.

With a rush of wind, Mulaf knocked him backward. “This is courtesy only, Your Imperial Majesty. And you, Liyana. Leave here. Live your lives. Honor me in your stories.”

Liyana helped Jarlath to his feet. “Our stories?”

“Stories are the way people understand the world,” Mulaf said. “And I am about to give the people of the turtle a new world.” He spread his arms, and wind whipped around him in a tight circle. It lifted him up. He rose into the air. “At my command the mountains will fall, the lake will be buried, and the gods will leave this world forever. A new era will begin!”

“Wait!” Liyana called. “Don’t!”

He touched the roof of the tent, and the fabric disintegrated as his palms touched it, as if the threads had instantly aged. The cyclone lifted him through the hole toward the night sky and then swept forward, ripping through the tarp. Tearing through more tents, it gouged a crater in the hard sand.

Around the remnants of the tent, the emperor’s guards were strewn in every direction. Jarlath knelt by one and pressed his fingers to his neck. “He’s unconscious,” Jarlath said. “Mulaf didn’t kill them.”

Only because it is quicker to cause sleep, Bayla said.

How many deities are inside of him? Liyana asked.

She felt Bayla shudder. Six. Somayo of the Falcon Clan, Keleena of the Sparrow Clan, Vakeen of the Wolf Clan . . .

The cyclone stretched into the sky as if it wanted to scrape the moon. Liyana felt her stomach clench, and she wanted to be sick. “The sky serpents will attack once he crosses into the mountains,” she said to Jarlath. “You need to evacuate. Flee east as fast as you can.”

The emperor shouted to the nearest alert soldier, “Mobilize the army! We have to retreat!” He strode over the inert bodies of his guards and began issuing orders.

We have to warn the clans, Liyana said. She ran after the cyclone, following the path of destruction left in Mulaf’s wake.

Climb onto that horse, Bayla said.

Liyana veered toward a saddled horse. She scooped up his reins, and she flung herself into the saddle. The horse sidestepped and snorted. Liyana felt power flow into her. Bayla issued instructions: fill the lungs, stretch the muscles, pump the heart, dry the sweat. And hang on.

The horse thundered out of the camp and into the darkness. Liyana clung to his neck as he pelted the desert. She felt sand hit her face, and the wind slapped her. She poured magic into the horse’s heart, lungs, and legs. He ran faster. As the cyclone swerved, she passed it. She sent more strength into the horse’s muscles, erased his fatigue, and urged him even faster.

In the clans’ camps, the desert people were fleeing the approaching cyclone. It was headed for the mountains, straight through the camp. Grabbing children and animals, they abandoned the tents and ran. Liyana found Korbyn and Sendar in the center of it all, shouting orders. Slowing, Liyana leaped off the horse. She then used a burst of magic to encourage the empire’s horse to flee to safety.

“The emperor’s magician, the one who kidnapped the deities . . . He has six deities inside him.” Liyana gasped between words, and she rested her hands on her knees. “He is headed for the mountains. He wants to destroy the lake.”

“Without the lake, magic cannot exist here,” Korbyn said.

Without the lake, we cannot remain here, Bayla said.

“We must stop him,” Sendar said grimly. He strode forward, hands outstretched, as if he would rend the cyclone from the earth. Liyana chased after him. Korbyn followed her.

“Sendar!” Liyana said.

He is stronger than six, Bayla said, as you are stronger than one.

The cyclone stretched toward the dark sky, smudging the stars. A few yards from the churning wind, Sendar halted. He entered a trance.

“We can’t win on sheer magic!” Liyana shouted to him. “He’s too powerful! Sendar, retreat!” Wind battered against her, and she shielded her face as she pressed forward, trying to reach Sendar.

Before them, the cyclone collapsed. Mulaf plummeted and then landed catlike on his feet. Instantly Mulaf’s