Sanctuary

Gilthas had never felt so alone. In all the years of separation from Kerianseray, while she lived and fought in the greenwood and he played the Puppet King in Qualinost, he always had felt close to her. They shared a connection that went beyond love, beyond proximity. During the terrible march into exile, they were apart for weeks at a time, each knowing the other might be killed at any moment, but still they had been connected. Now she was gone, in every sense of the word. Gone from his house, gone from his city, gone from his life.

He knew he had done his duty by removing her. She had no vision, no understanding of the delicate, dangerous path they must tread if their race was to survive. Her way would lead to total destruction. Yet duty was small comfort to him.

It was a good thing to be alone. No one should see the Speaker of the Sun and Stars weep.

* * * * *

Hytanthas brought the Lioness the news from the parley. The nomads were demanding her and the sorcerer Faeterus as their price for peace. The assembled warriors greeted this broadside with shouts of derision.

“Sounds like a good bargain,” Kerian remarked.

“Commander!” Hytanthas cried.

She stared out over the rolling dunes and at the dust raised by the nomad host on the move. A great deal of dust, from a great many horses. “It would be a fair bargain,” she said, “if they meant it.”

Unfortunately, she was certain they did not mean it. Nomads wouldn’t have come all this way just to avenge the camp massacre. That was nothing more than a convenient excuse, a wedge to pry apart the elves and Sahim- Khan. The nomads had no intention of giving up everything for the heads of two elves. They were on a mission to destroy every elf in Khur.

Still, it sparked an idea. She was confident her warriors could defeat the nomad host, but the war thus started wouldn’t end with this single battle. More and more tribesmen would join the fight, until the elves found themselves swamped by fanatics. Her dreams of retaking the elven homelands would founder beneath a horde of unshod hooves.

She studied the officers clustered around her horse. The longest serving among them was a Qualinesti named Ramacanalas. “Take command, Ramac,” she said. “I’m going to the nomads.”

Shouts erupted, and Hytanthas seized her horse’s bridle to keep her from riding away. She broke his grip and silenced them all with a hard-eyed glare.

“I’m going. Remain here. If the nomads move toward Khurinost, hit them as hard as you can with everything we’ve got.”

“They’ll kill you!” Hytanthas exclaimed.

The Lioness favored him with an ironic smile. “Not today.”

Chapter 16

Eight men abreast, the Khurish royal cavalry rumbled out the city’s north gate. Their armor was a mix of native and Nerakan style, with pointed helmets, angular breast- plates, and Spiky knobs at every bend of knee, elbow, and ankle. Their favored weapon was a very heavy saber, its blade shaped like a crescent moon. Their mantles had started out royal blue, but long exposure to the harsh sun had faded them to the color of the spring sky over Khuri-Khan. The Khurs were among the best soldiers hired by the Dark Knights, but since the arrival of the elves Sahim-Khan had allowed the longstanding contract with Neraka to lapse. He had ample compensation from taxes, fees, and other official extort ions to replace the money paid by the Order.

General Hakkam rode at the head of the column, flanked by standard bearers and heralds. Once the tail of the column cleared the city gate, he halted his men and sent out flankers on both sides and well ahead to scout the situation. The cavalry moved forward at a walk, alert for ambushes. In his long career, Hakkam had fought nomads before. They were fearless, hardy, and addicted to surprise attacks. He had no intention of losing men to (or being humiliated by) a rabble of tribesmen, especially with the laddad as witness.

The scouts soon returned with strange news. A sizable force of mounted laddad were on the north ridge, watching the nomads. The tribesmen were massed in the Lake of Dreams. This dry depression, six miles from Khuri-Khan, had earned its name because travelers commonly saw mirages of water in the broad hollow between dunes. Like the laddad, the nomads were motionless, waiting.

Hakkam uttered an oath. His lieutenants thought he was cursing the nomads or the laddad, but in fact he was abusing the name of Sahim-Khan What had the master of Khur sent him into?

“Forward” he said, facing his horse west. At a leisurely walk, five thousand Khurish horsemen followed their general into the unknown Shafts the clouds, casting beams down on the glittering clanking procession Unlike Adala, Hakkam didn’t take the light as a sign of godly favor. It was shining in his men’s eyes.

* * * * *

Alone of all the nomads gathered on the dune ridge overlooking Khuri-Khan Adala slept. After returning from the tense meeting with the laddad lord, she finished some mending, then lay down in her small tent and went to sleep. Rain and thunder did not disturb her, nor did the presence of eighteen thousand armed laddad.

After midday, the sky grew dark and swollen, as if the heavy clouds would burst of their own weight, soaking the land below. Sentinels galloped back to the nomad camp with peculiar news. A single laddad rider was approaching Bilath had sent a band of bow-armed Weya-Lu to the high sandhill on the north side of the Lake of Dreams. From there they could pick off anyone daring to enter the camp. They might have dealt thus with the rider had not the sharp-eyed warmaster of the Tondoon, Haradi, recognized her. Haradi had been with Adala at the parley and had heard talk of the female laddad warmaster Kerianseray, also called the Lioness. This rider had burnished gold hair, which fell unbound past her shoulders It must be the Lioness.

Etosh dispatched Wapah to waken the Weyadan.

Wapah knelt outside the closed door flap of Adala’s tent and called softly. She bade him enter. He put his head inside, keeping his eyes respectfully on the ground.

“Weyadan, the female laddad warmaster comes. Alone!”

She lay with her back to him. Without moving, she said, “Summon the chiefs and warmasters. They will sit in judgment of the criminal.”

“It is maita,” he said sagely, and then withdrew.

Adala sat up slowly. Her head still ached, as it had ached for the past three days. The sky was responsible. The clouds hung over the desert like a gravid beast. She’d never known air this ponderous. It weighed on her so heavily she felt her skull would crack from the pressure. The usual cure for headache, chewing a leaf of the makadar bush, had provided no relief at all.

She poured tepid water in a copper pan and washed her hands, face, neck, and feet. During her ablutions, she blessed the names of her ancestors and called upon Those on High to judge her deeds this day. If she was found wanting in virtue or truth, she begged the gods to strike her down.

A bundle lay just inside the entrance to her tent. It proved to be a beautiful new robe of red linen, handsomely embroidered in white. The style and skill of the needlework marked it as having come from the women of the Mayakhur tribe. The collar and matching headdress were silk, hand-dyed, and fit for the khan’s consort, but as much as Adala respected the sentiment behind the gift, she couldn’t wear the beautiful robe. This was not a feast day, nor a day of celebration. Justice was to be done, harsh justice. It was not a time for festive clothes.

She put the new clothes aside and retied the sash of the much-mended black robe she wore every day, and