War of the Magi: Azrael's Wrath (Book 2) (6 page)

Zerai shrugged.

“This boat will serve us here. Others may serve us elsewhere. Now, can we go? Unless you think the boat isn’t safe?” Samira asked as her impatience burned a little brighter in her chest.

“Not at the moment.”

“Then do you think I’m not safe?” she asked a bit more sharply. “Do you think I’m going to hurt you? Is that why you’re afraid of the boat?”

“I’m not afraid of the boat,” he said icily.

“What then?”

“The last djinn I met said that an old woman starving to death on her doorstep amused her,” Zerai said loudly. “It
amused
her.”

“Clearly a woman of miserable breeding and poor taste,” Samira said. “Your point?”

“Poor taste?” His hand moved to his sword. “I know what you people really think of us, and I—”

“Zerai.” Veneka spoke in a quiet but stern tone, and though the falconer’s stony gaze never wavered, he did step onto the boat and sit down.

That one is going to be trouble. But a confrontation with him will only alienate the seer and the healer, and thus offend Holy Raziel. I must be patient.

More patient.

Samira went to the rear of the punt, took the pole in both hands, and deftly maneuvered the boat into the center of the channel where the current helped to hurry them on their way downriver.

The humans ate sparingly of the food in their bags, and then arranged themselves in the bottom of the boat to sleep. Zerai sat up the longest, peering out at the dark river with narrow eyes until the stars came out. He gave Samira one last look, which she supposed was meant to be some sort of warning, and then he too went to sleep.

“Stop antagonizing them.” Petra dragged her fingertips through the water, watching the rippling trails they made. She spoke softly, her head turned away from the sleepers. “It’s childish and pointless.”

“And you would be the expert in both,” Samira quipped. Her rising anger from earlier was gone, and now she found the quiet sparring with her sister a comfortable distraction. “I brought you along because you promised not to interfere in my work.”

“I’m not interfering. I’m advising.”

“I don’t need advice from you.”

“Yes, you do.” Petra looked up at her. “You’re so blinded by your duty and devotion.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about. You’re an angry little child trying to spit in God’s eye, and angrier still because you know you never will.”

Petra returned to her ripples in the water. “The clerics should have taken me. I was creating beautiful sculptures when you were still trying to stop stuttering, at twice my age. The things I could have created if Tevad had summoned me…”

“And how much of your life have you wasted, crying and complaining about it?” Samira kept her eyes on the river, focusing on the motion of the pole through her hands as she touched the riverbed and pushed the punt forward, again and again. “We aren’t chosen by the angels for our own gratification. We’re chosen to serve, which is something you still don’t understand.”

“Oh, I understand. I just don’t care.”

“Oh my. You don’t care. Will revelations never cease?”

Petra laughed.

“You should care. There are places in the world where people pray to wooden gods they created from dreams and nightmares, never knowing true grace or peace,” Samira said, repeating an argument she had made at least a dozen times before. “We are immeasurably blessed to live within sight and reach of so many of God’s messengers, knowing the truth of creation, of life and death, and even being allowed to play our parts in the divine symphony. But no. Petra doesn’t care.”

“I care about me. That’s something, isn’t it?” The younger sister smiled. “And God made me, so I’m exactly what he wants me to be. So who are you to question his creation?”

“I’m his instrument. I do his will.”

“You make boats to ferry about filthy little humans.”

Samira tightened her lips for a moment. “I do my duty.”

Petra chuckled softly to herself.

Samira let the debate die, and the forest’s songs filled her ears. Toads and locusts creaked and croaked all around them, and she began to swing her pole in time with the pulsing sound.

After a while she glanced down and saw that, in addition to the humans, both Bashir and Petra were also asleep.

I suppose there is nothing better for them to do. Though it’s a bit odd. I would have thought a man with Bashir’s reputation would never leave himself so vulnerable, especially when surrounded by strangers.

Perhaps he knows something I don’t.

Or perhaps he’s not asleep at all.

Hours passed and Samira contented herself with the simple, repetitive task before her. Lift pole, swing forward, drop pole, push, and repeat. The boat glided smoothly down the center of the shallow river and she occasionally reached down into the sculpted wood to make small adjustments to the shape of the hull to speed them on their way.

Long after midnight had come and gone, she looked down at her sister. Her breathing sounded louder, more labored. Frowning, she focused on her sleeping passengers and realized they were all breathing harder, and murmuring, and shuddering. She peered closer and saw the heavy drops of sweat on their faces. They were shivering.

What is this?

She immediately turned the boat and drove it hard against the river bank. Kneeling down, she shook Petra and shouted her name, but her sister remained senseless and groaning as though in pain, or fear.

Samira checked each of her companions and failed to wake any of them, even when she slapped the falconer repeatedly in the face.

No! I cannot fail in my task, not here, not like this!

With the help of a few nearby tree limbs and a humble word of thanks to Tevad, Samira quickly moved the bodies of all five sleepers to the shore and began checking them for wounds, for signs of poison, for anything that might explain their state.

She found nothing.

Something rustled in the leaves above her, and in a flash she spun around and sent a dozen branches spearing upward into the darkness. A high-pitched shriek blasted down from the canopy and something warm spattered her cheek. Still she peered up into the blackness, waiting.

The leaves rustled again, violently shaking and moving from her left to her right. Again she sent the trees to fight the unseen creature, lancing out into the deep shadows with a dozen more living spears, but this time there was no shriek, no sound at all.

She recoiled and covered her face.

What is that stench!?

A strange odor of rotting fruit burned her nostrils and she touched the blood on her cheek to inspect it. She sniffed her fingers and confirmed the source of the odor. She was about to reach into her bag to strike up a torch when a sickening pain swam through her head, and then the world blurred away as the ground rushed up to meet her falling body.

Her thoughts stumbled through shadows and mists, lurching on unsteady legs as she clutched her aching, throbbing head. Her next coherent moment was an image, a place full of green walls and streets.

Naj Kuvari. I’m dreaming of the green city. And I know that I’m dreaming… something is very wrong here.

Samira began to walk through the vaguely familiar city, wondering if she might find and consult with a dream-shade of Raziel himself, when she turned a corner and found Veneka standing alone in a small courtyard. The healer was staring down at the ground, and when Samira came closer she saw that there was a freshly made grave in the center of the space.

“Who died?”

The healer did not answer.

“Veneka, I know this is a dream, but I don’t know why I would dream of you.”

“She can’t hear you.”

Samira turned and saw Iyasu walking toward her. The young seer looked exhausted, from his shadowed eyes to his uncertain steps, but he gazed steadily at her, and she said, “Are you to be my guide here? Is this a dream, or a vision? A revelation?”

“Neither. This is a shared madness, a trap, a prison for our minds.”

“Are you… are you the real Iyasu?”

“Yes. It took me a while to break out of my delusion and realize that we were all trapped here together. This is the real Veneka, but I don’t know how to help her yet.”

“If this is a prison, who is our jailor?”

“I don’t know.” The seer didn’t appear to be particularly worried about that point. “Probably some demon that needs us to be unconscious in order to eat us, which means it’s probably fairly small and weak.” He knelt down and touched the fresh grave.

“So how do we get out?”

“No idea.” Iyasu shrugged. “Clearly it’s not enough to realize that we’re in a prison, or else you and I would be free of it now. What’s the last thing you remember?”

Samira paused. “I was hunting something in the forest above me. It’s blood fell on my face. I smelled it, and I collapsed.”

“While the rest of us were asleep.” The seer stood up. “This creature needed us to be asleep to trap us here. But you weren’t asleep. You may not even be asleep now. Not really. The smell of the blood may have drugged you. Interesting.”

“Where are the others?”

“Not far.” Iyasu pointed vaguely down the city lanes.

Samira frowned at him. “So what do we do?”

“I don’t know yet.” He squatted down again to consider the grave.

The djinn woman turned and hurried from the courtyard.

I thought he had more sense than the others, but the boy is just as foolish, if not more so. Doesn’t he understand that we could all die at any moment?

She passed a large amphitheater cut into the floor of the city and a figure caught her eye.

Petra!

Her sister was standing on the stage of the theater, alone, silently gazing up at the rows of seats. Thousands of people sat there, but none were looking at Petra. Every person there was speaking to someone beside them, and many of them were sitting with their backs to the stage.

“Petra?” Samira shook her sister to no avail.

She’s being ignored by the crowd. This is her fear, her prison is her fear of being ignored, overlooked, rejected. So obvious, and so petty. This is pointless.

She left the amphitheater and moments later found the falconer staring at a poorly made doll in his hand. Samira hesitated beside him for only a moment, and then moved on.

There’s no telling what that means.

A few streets farther on she came upon the alchemist Bashir sitting in the middle of the street. The gaunt djinn had folded himself up and wrapped his arms around his knees to peer down at a skull sitting on the ground in front of him. As soon as she saw the skull, Samira backed away.

The death-worshipping lunatic is exactly what everyone says he is. Obsessed. And perhaps even insane.

I never should have brought him. No favor is worth having this sort of viper in our midst.

Samira hurried back to the courtyard where Iyasu remained contemplating the grave beside the silent healer. “I’ve seen them. I have no idea what to do. Maybe if I destroy the city, it will force them to realize what is happening.”

“I doubt your gift will work here.”

Frowning, the djinn woman touched the stone wall of the house beside her and for the first time in countless years, nothing happened. Nothing moved. Nothing flowed. She called upon Tevad in her mind, praying more than she had in ages, but still the stone remained unchanged. Her impotence in that moment stunned her.

“It’s all right. I think I have it,” Iyasu said. “I know whose grave it is.”

“Whose? Her lover, the falconer?” Samira tried to focus on the conversation to forget the dizzying sensation of helplessness she was feeling.

“No. If it was Zerai’s grave, it would be decorated with his possessions, and probably some flowers too. Besides, it’s too small.”

“Then whose grave is it?”

“It’s mine.” Iyasu stood up. “Years ago when we first met, I saved her. Now she’s afraid that she won’t save me. She’s doubting her skills, her faith, her strength.”

“You’re sure of that?”

That doesn’t seem quite right, but I suppose he knows her better than I do.

The earth began to shift and crack, and the grave erupted gently to allow four slender fingers to shove up into the warm air.

Samira and Iyasu flinched back and watched in mute fascination as the fingers pulled up a hand, and then an arm from the unmarked grave. The flesh on the arm had shriveled and paled, and the filthy cloth on it hung in shreds, but the face that broke through the crust of the earth was clearly that of the young seer.

Iyasu nodded once. “Very.”

As the corpse continued to emerge from its earthen bed, Veneka began to sob. She covered her face with her hands, but remained where she stood.

“What do we do?” Samira demanded.

If there are corpses coming to life here, there’s no guessing what horrors are appearing near Bashir and the falconer. And if I can’t use my gifts to defend us…

“I think I understand now.” Iyasu stepped in front of Veneka, standing between her and the dead incarnation of himself. “Veneka, look at me.”

The healer continued to cry softly into her hands.

“Veneka.” Iyasu took her hands and gently pried them from her face.

“Behind you!” Samira dashed forward as the dead seer stepped away from its grave and lunged at Iyasu’s back. The djinn cleric tackled the filthy corpse to the ground, but it pushed her back, forcing her away no matter how much she tried to hold it down. She tumbled off to one side, but as the dead youth reached for his living counterpart, Samira hurled herself against it again, forcing it farther away. “Hurry!”

“Veneka, I need you to hear me. I need you to see me.” Iyasu placed his hands on her face, his fingers curled around her cheeks and brows to lift her lids apart. “Look at me, Veneka. Look at Iyasu. He’s alive. He’s very much alive. He didn’t die. You didn’t let him die. You saved him. Iyasu is alive. Look!”

Samira couldn’t see what was happening. All she could see was the dead man trying to shove her away, trying to claw its way toward the healer. She smashed her fist into its dry, thin chest, but it only went on reaching and shoving. Its bony fingers lashed out at her face, two of them catching the edge of her lip and wrenching her face to one side.