“What do you mean?”
“How long before our success is achieved? How long till I can settle down and lead a normal life with you and her? We’ve been riding these hidden trails for three years. It seems like thirty.”
“Never, my love. Never. And as a wife I loathe to admit it. But when the angel spoke to you, you became El Murid for all time. So long as the Lord sees fit to leave you among the living, that long must you remain the Disciple.”
“I know. I know. It’s just the mortal within me wishing for something it can’t have.”
They rode without speaking for a while. Then El Murid said, “Meryem, I’m lonely. I don’t have anyone but you.”
“You have half the desert. Who brings us food and water from the settlements? Who carries the Truth into provinces we’ve never seen?”
“I mean a friend. A simple, ordinary, personal friend. Somebody I can just play with, as I did when I was a child. Somebody I can talk to. Somebody who can share the fears and hopes of a man, not somebody smitten by the dreams of El Murid. Surely you’ve felt the same things since Fata died.”
“Yes. Being the woman of El Murid is lonely, too.” After a time, “But you have Nassef.”
“Nassef is your brother. I won’t speak ill of him to you. I do love him as if he were my own brother. I forgive him like a brother. But we’ll never be real friends, Meryem. We’ll just be allies.”
Meryem did not argue. She knew it was true. Nassef, too, had no one else in whom to confide. No friendship would blossom between her husband and brother while they remained unsure of each other.
It had been a long, hard ride. In the end, Nassef had pushed hard. Everyone was tired except Nassef himself, who seemed immune to fatigue.
“There it is,” El Murid whispered in wonder. He forgot the pain in his ankle. “Sebil el Selib.”
The light of a three-quarters moon illuminated the mountain-flanked meadow which was second only to Al Rhemish in the hearts of the Children of Hammad al Nakir. Long ago, it had been second only to Ilkazar in the hearts of their Imperial ancestors.
A very old fortress overlooked the meadow, and the shrine and cloisters it contained. There were no lights to be seen anywhere.
The name Sebil el Selib meant Path of the Cross. It had come into being because of the event memorialized by the shrine.
It was in that meadow that, on the first day of the Year 1 in the common dating, the Empire had been born. The first emperor had made himself secure in his power by crucifying a thousand opponents there. The path of the name was the trail winding through the pass, along which the doomed nobles had had to bear the instruments of their destruction. From the meadow that trail wound on, connecting the old Inner Provinces with the cities along the coast of the Sea of Kotsum.
The weathered fortress, dating from the early Imperial era, guarded the pass, not the shrine and cloisters over which it brooded.
“Here the father of our dream found life,” El Murid told Nassef. “Here the First Empire was born. Let our own gasp its first breath on the same bedclothing.”
Nassef said nothing. He was looking with awe on a place drenched with history. It seemed too plain, too simple, to be so important.
Al Rhemish had given him the same feeling.
It amazed him that ordinary places could, in time, attain such a hold on men’s imaginations.
“Nassef.”
“Yes?”
“Are we ready?”
“Yes. Karim will take the Invincibles down first. They’ll scale the walls and open the gate to the rest. I’ll send smaller forces to seize the shrine and cloisters.”
“Nassef?”
“I hear you.”
“I’m no warrior. No general. I am but the instrument of the Lord. But I’d like to make a small adjustment to your plan. I’d like you to close the road to the coast. And to leave a detachment with me. I don’t want anyone to escape.”
Nassef thought that he had misunderstood. El Murid was always after him to spare and forgive their enemies.
“I thought about it all the way here. The Lord has no friends in this place. They’re soldiers of the King and acolytes of the false path. Moreover, a clear, unequivocal message has to be sent to those who yield to the seductions of the Evil One. Last night I prayed for guidance, and it came to me that our Second Empire must also have its birth in the blood of its enemies, on the site where the First Empire was born.”
Nassef was surprised, but not dismayed. “As you say, so shall it be.”
“Slay them all, Nassef. Even to the babes in arms. Let no man, from this day forth, think that he can evade the wrath of the Lord.”
“As you say.”
“You may begin.” But before Nassef had taken a dozen steps, El Murid called, “Nassef.”
“Yes?”
