Sandstorm (32 page)

The cinderlord’s ruby eyes held no pupils, so Cephas could not tell which of the prisoners in particular he was looking at when he leaned down, studying them. “There is much news in what you say, son of air. The WeavePasha makes use of the Spider That Waits after keeping it leashed
for a century? A mythic champion troubles us no longer?” The blaze of the lord’s hair roared, and it leaned even closer. “One among our captives is of the Long Lost?”

“Do not trouble yourself, son of fire,” said Shahrokh. “You recognize the kenku. You see there are windsouled here, and one of them is the returned heir of Marod el Arhapan. But he does not require the cleansing you agreed to perform. He escaped the Almraivenar’s city before any traps were set in him.”

The efreeti examined first Cephas, then Ariella, pupil-less eyes flickering up and down. A tongue of fire, somehow immobile, appeared between his white fangs, and the tip of his enormous red nose trembled.

“No,” he agreed. “There is nothing of mortal magic about this pair, except in the armor they both wear and in the one’s paltry blade, which I see you have locked. This pleases me. Participating in your tiresome plots with the Calimien vassals was the most odious part of this business.”

Shahrokh glowered. “Be thankful, son of fire, that we are so close to realizing our shared goal. You are far from Memnon, and my warriors are well practiced at snuffing out flames.”

The cinderlord chuckled, and sparks flew from his mouth. “The pride of the djinn. So vast. So easily injured.”

The djinni growled. “I have suffered your stink in my nostrils long enough. Your role here, since I have no need of your scouring flames, is only to witness the return. Once that is confirmed, you may return to Memnon to ensure the match, and when the moon has turned, we will meet again in the Teshyllal Wastes, each with his half of the manuscript.”

“That is my most fervent wish, son of air, as you well know. If the kenku has done as you say, I trust that you will take steps to ensure you do not lose your half yet again.”

Thunder sounded, but the wind that rose with it held no hint of rain. “There will be no further delays, son of fire,” Shahrokh said. “Corvus Nightfeather, you are released from my bonds. The path to your demi-planar cache is restored.”

Corvus’s shoulders sagged, and Cephas realized that the invisible bonds holding the kenku must have been much tighter than those that held him and the others.

“What is this, Corvus?” he asked. “Am I this missing half?”

Corvus said, “I am sorry,” though he did not seem to be speaking to anyone present.

The kenku walked a few steps away from the others and passed his ebony claws before his breast feathers. His hand darted in, and when it came out, it held an object Cephas recognized. Gripped in the kenku’s taloned hand was Azad the Free’s
Book of Founding Stories
.

“Lords of the Firestorm!” shouted Corvus, using his ringmaster’s voice for the first time since Argentor. “I bring you the artifact stolen by Azad adh Arhapan when he fled the city of Calimport. It is unsullied, protected, and disguised yet by the magic of the djinn. Behold, the Book of Calim! Penned by his holy hand, conceived of the covenant of fire, the sole and sacred source of the Ritual of the Rising Wind. Blessed Calim’s assurance of the restoration that is coming!”

The howls and cries of the efreet and the djinn were not so different from each other. They nearly drowned out the ragged whisper Corvus’s voice dropped to, but Cephas heard him.

“The book,” Corvus said, “that will return your terrible masters to this world.”

S
HAHROKH BUILT A SHIP OUT OF SAND AND SUMMONED
invisible servants to drag it across the endless dunes at terrifying speed. Their pace outstripped Trill’s greatest efforts, and if there were any features that distinguished one part of the Calim Desert from another, they passed so quickly that Cephas did not witness them.

Conversation was impossible, as the djinni made no accommodation for the terrific wind of their passage, and the effect it had on his mortal passengers. Cephas huddled on a gritty bench with Ariella, the couple doing their best to shield each other from the element they ordinarily embraced. Shan found a place in the bucking vessel’s prow that was something like a cave and tucked herself inside.

Corvus stood apart from the others, feathers ruffling wildly, with his taloned hands curled around the low wall that encircled the deck.

Finally, in the first communication any of them had exchanged since the djinni set them aboard the magic craft, Corvus extended his arm, pointing.

Cephas and Ariella looked up, able to fully open their eyes at last because the craft began to slow. Shan rolled from her place beneath the prow and stood as the ship gained altitude, leaving the sandy desert floor far below. They took in the extraordinary view ahead.

Shahrokh flew down from the cloud of djinni escorts who paced them, pausing a moment to speak. “Look on Calimport!” he said. “Faint echo of the lost First City of the Djinn, but still the mightiest city of the mortal world!”

The companions were silent for a moment. “It’s like flowers,” Ariella finally said, “growing from a broken vase.”

A kaleidoscope of color and motion, the palaces, temples, manors, and fountains visible in the distance shamed even the most exotic blossoms of the WeavePasha’s gardens. And the tumult of fallen and shattered structures that spread out beneath floating buildings for leagues in every direction was certainly broken. They even matched the terra-cotta color of pottery. The architectural flowers floated above this broken city with no towers or spires that could be said to be stems. Upper Calimport floated on invisible foundations of magic.

Shahrokh’s vessel of sand began to slow, angling toward a floating palace that was, if anything, more spectacular than all the others. But Cephas’s eyes were not drawn to its towering minarets and airy gardens open to the sky above. Instead, he looked down, to one of the few areas in the city below free of rubble.

The palace they were approaching floated above an arena.

He leaned over the side, anxious to see if there were gladiators at combat, hopeful that there were not. Ariella pulled him back, just as the sand ship floated between two
marble pillars that framed an entryway to a veranda paved with invisible stones.

Dozens of windsouled genasi stood waiting for them, and as Shahrokh’s magical conveyance blew away on the wind, one taller than the rest approached with arms wide open. His voice, familiar to Cephas from his own speech but also from faded memory, boomed across the courtyard.

“Marod yn Marod! Oh, my son, my long-lost son!”

Cephas stood on an invisible balcony, staring down at the Djen Arena far below. There were no gladiators on its sands. Earlier, while he was drying from his bath, there had been a chariot race in the neighboring Sabam Arena. He had walked out onto the balcony and watched the crowds streaming away from the race, realizing the number of people he saw in that one instant was greater than all he had seen before in his life.

He thought about what he had been told so far. The balcony was outside the towering doors of
his
suite of rooms. The bath chamber was staffed by
his
servants—the djinni Shahrokh had been particular on that point; they were servants, not slaves. Whatever their status, he sent the dozen watersouled women away after they had shown him what use he was expected to make of the many soaps, brushes, and perfumes arrayed around the enormous copper cauldron overflowing with steaming water.

These gold-threaded silk trousers and this elaborately stitched brocade vest were
his
, as were the clothes that filled the cedar cabinets, teak armoires, and lavish closets of his rooms.

“You have many questions,” Marod el Arhapan had said, speaking to all of them, but looking at Cephas. “But
you are also exhausted. I have ordered chambers prepared for our guests, Son, and your rooms are appointed with every luxury. I will not pretend we know each other yet, but please allow me to offer such refreshment as is in my power before we begin to correct that terrible lapse.”

The four companions were then separated, each rushed away in the company of at least one djinni and several windsouled attendants—all but Cephas. Only the vizar djinni, Shahrokh, accompanied him on the long walk through high-ceilinged passages and across many open-air courtyards.

“Allow me to anticipate you, Marod yn Marod,” said the djinni. “Both of your companions sent here by the firesouled Memnonar live, and neither your father nor I had any hand in that. The windsouled stablemaster who acted as their agent in the lower city was identified and killed by your father’s order, unfortunately before I was allowed to question him. You will find that your father is sometimes … impetuous. The man had already sold them, and they were turned into the pits below the Djen. My agents seek them there now, and I trust the search will not be long in bearing fruit. There are few goliaths in the pens, and though the halflings are there in numbers, the woman’s talents will no doubt leave an easily followed trail.”

Cephas had to think back over what the djinni had said carefully after the fact, because all he heard at first was that name. Marod yn Marod. Marod, the son of Marod. Son of the master of games, the man who owned this tremendous floating castle, who wielded enormous influence in this ancient, magical city.

The man who owned stables of gladiatorial slaves.

The man who was his father.

While he poured scented water over himself, Cephas went over all he had learned in just the last two days. His mother had died at the hands of Azad the Free. His father
directed the Games she died in—if he believed Corvus Nightfeather. Corvus, it seemed, acted as an agent for at least three different warring factions: the WeavePasha of Almraiven, the djinn of Calimport, and the efreet of Memnon. And learning all that came after he found a way to wear a new body, to express a new
soul
. After he had found Ariella.…

When he finished washing, he discovered that someone had removed the rags his clothing had become from where he’d tossed them in the corner. He walked into the bedchamber and found a light linen robe lying across the curtained bed.

He had left his armor at the foot of that bed and found that it had been freshly oiled, the scale pieces arrayed on a rack along one whitewashed wall. Whoever cleaned the armor had even mended a strap worn near to parting.

The flail was there, too, also displayed on a stand, very much like the one Azad the Free used for the same purpose.

Azad adh Arhapan, he thought.
Was
he owned by the man everyone agrees is my father?
Did
he use this weapon to kill the woman who bore me?

Cephas unconsciously rested one hand on the blacksmelt boss of the flail’s distal end. When he noticed, he jerked his hand away as quickly as if he had seen a scorpion crawling up the chains.