Black Jade

'What way?' Maram asked. 'To begin with, it might rain.'

Maram looked up at the sky, at the single cloud floating above the desert toward the north. He said, 'What other miracles do you hope for?'

'Estrella might yet find water.'

'And I,' Maram said, 'might sprout wings like a bird and simply fly out of here. But if I don't, and grow too weak and the worst befalls, please promise me you won't let the Red Priests have me?'

'I won't let them touch you,' I told him. 'Now be quiet. You waste water with every breath.'

There was nothing to do then but to wait. The Zuri and the Red Priests below us dismounted and made camp at the bottom of the ravine. I was sure that whoever Oalo might be, it was the droghul who really commanded Zuri and the priests, and took charge of this siege. I felt his presence like a burning quicksand sucking at my will to oppose him. I found myself wishing that it had been he who had showed himself in the ravine to offer his vile terms. Then Kane would have put an arrow through his heart, truce or no truce.

At last the sun rose over the rim of the mountains behind us, and rained down its killing rays. The cold of night bled from the air with startling quickness as it grew warmer and warmer. After a while the sun heated up the rocks around us like a natural oven. We began to sweat. Soon, I thought, we would all be ready to lick the rocks of the ravine, even as the priest had said.

For a few hours, we waited for our miracle. And then Kane, who had the eyes of an eagle if not the wings, caught sight of a dust plume moving quickly across the desert toward the mouth of the canyon. Soon, another mass of horsemen came into view. There must have been more than a hundred and fifty of them. Upon seeing them pounding up through the canyon, Maram gave up the last of his hope.

'Oh, my Lord!' Maram said. 'More Zuri!'

The arrival of these new warriors, however, did not seem to be welcomed by the Zuri encamped below us. They sprang up from beneath their flapping sun cloths and ran for their horses. I saw sixty sabers flashing in the sunlight. But they were outnumbered more than two to one. The new warriors thundered closer, drawing in more tightly as they rode up through the funnel of the canyon. They came to a halt almost shoulder to shoulder in a long line that completely blocked any exit into the desert. They waited on horseback with their sabers pointing at the Zuri fifty yards away.

'Can you not see?' Yago said to Maram, pointing out details in the garments of the newcomers, particularly the shawls drawn across their faces. 'Those are the Avari.'

He spoke this name as one might that of a werewolf or some other unnatural being.

'So,' Kane growled with a smile, 'now who is trapped?'

As Maram stood with his strung how. peering down the ravine into the canyon at these two groups of warriors, I felt him struggling to take a little cheer in this unexpected turn of events. But then Yago dashed his hopes, saying to Kane, 'Little good that it will do us. Likely the Avari will kill the Zuri, and then turn on us.'

I watched as two Zuri warriors rode out toward the Avari bearing a banner of truce. Two men in red robes rode with them, led by a man wearing a bright yellow tunic. His hair, I saw, shone golden. Now, at this distance, I could just barely make out the red dragon blazing from his tunic. From the Avari line, four men with swaddled faces urged their horses forward to meet them. They, too, bore a banner of truce. I wondered what lies Maslan and the droghul would tell the Avari as they sat holding council beneath the merciless sun.

I did not have to wait long to find out the answer to this question. The tallest of the four Avari, who all seemed to sit much higher on their horses than either the Zuri or the droghul, broke off council. He began riding slowly in the direction of the Zuri's line, which parted before him like a wave of water. He rode straight up into the ravine. Where the way grew too steep, he dismounted and walked beside his great, gray horse, leading it up toward the rocky shelf where Kane and Maram stood aiming arrows at him. Yago waited there, too, with his saber drawn. He had never met an Avari warrior, and was unsure how to greet him.

'May the sun warm your face,' Yago called out to him. 'May the rain fill your wells, Avari.'

'May the rain fill your wells, Masud.' He spoke with a strange accent, which changed the sounds of his words so that 'well' came out as 'weal', and 'rain' was rendered as 'reen'. From the tone of his voice and the deepness of his eyes, I guessed his age to be about thirty, 'From what I've been told, one of your wells has been poisoned by the very outlanders you ride with.'

The warrior climbed up and joined us on the rocky shelf. He stood nearly as tall as I. Silver bracelets encrusted with blue stones flashed from his wrists. Beneath his head covering his eyes shone bright as black onyx. He regarded Kane and me in astonishment.

'I am Sunji,' he informed us. 'Son of Jovayl, who is king of the Avari. My father sent me to discover who has invaded our realm, and why.'

I longed to tell him that I, too, was a prince of a realm far away. I wanted to give him my real name. But as I had relinquished all claim to honors and rank to live the life of a wanderer, I did not. Instead I told him much the same story that I had Yago. When I finished, Sunji stood staring at me as he might a viper.

'The one you call a droghul,' he said to me, pronouncing that name strangely, too, 'claims to be Morjin himself, king of the realm called Sakai. He claims that you are the poisoners of the Masud's well.'

'But why would we poison a well and so deny ourselves water?' I said to him. 'And why would one of the Masud ride with those who had poisoned his own people?'

'I do not know,' Sunji said to me. 'That is to be determined.'

'Determined how?' Maram asked him.

Sunji looked at Maram, with his fly-blown sores, as one might a leper. Then he said, 'There will be a trial. Either this Morjin or Mirustral is lying. And so Mirustral will come with me now, that he might stand face to face with Morjin.'

At the thought of this, my hand moved of its own to grip the hilt of my sword. And Kane pointed down into the canyon as he growled out to Sunji, 'I'll not let my friend go into that dragon's den alone!'

Sunji bowed his head to Kane. 'You may come as a second, then. Rowan Madeus, if that is really your name. And the Masud.'

He looked at Yago, who assented to Sunji's demand. And I said to Sunji, 'And what if we will not stand at trial?'

'Then you may stand here and let the sun determine your fate!'

It seemed that we had no choice. Sunji waited patiently while we made our preparations. Master Juwain came over to me and led me in a meditation, the same one as he had before I fought my duel with Salmelu. Atara, in silence, kissed me on the lips. As I moVed to gather up Altaru's reins, Maram took me aside and said, 'I should come with you, too.'

'No, Maram,' I told him, looking down the ravine into tne canyon. 'You must stay here and guard everyone, in case there is treachery. With your bow, if you can, and with your firestone, if you cannot.'

His eyes blurred with tears, and he nodded at me. 'But how will you stand against Morjin and all his lies?'

'I don't know,' I said. I clasped hands with him and smiled. 'But there will be a way — there is always a way.'

Kane and Yago, leading their horses, came up behind me. Then I pulled gently on Altaru's reins, and we followed Sunji down into the ravine.

Chapter 21

We rode out onto the hardpack between the Avari and Zuri lines. The captain named Oalo waited there along with another Zuri warrior, still under the banner of truce. Next to them, on fine horses, sat Maslan and the droghul. In appearance, this double of Morjin seemed identical to the first droghul who had died so terribly in the forest of Acadu, except that he had two good arms and the sun had burned his fair face red. His hair shone all golden like the sun, as did his eyes. I could see nothing of his own will in these hideous orbs, and everything of Morjin. He radiated an overweening arrogance and the command of a king. The malevolence that poured out of him struck me like a hammer blow to the throat. I found myself bitterly wishing that I had not abandoned my steel mail. I wondered