The Heart of the Sands, Book 3 of The Gods Within Read online

  Morgin first noticed the shape of his head; it was enormous and triangular, though that hadn’t been the case when the fellow sat in the shadows within the lean-to. He wore sand yellow breeches tucked into calf length boots, an odd, knee-length robe collected at the waist by a black belt, with a hood thrown up over his strangely shaped head. He bent down over something in the sand with his back to Morgin, and when he stood erect he lifted a small creature in his hand that struggled to escape. He gave its neck a sharp twist and it went limp, then he turned back toward the lean-to. It was then that Morgin understood what made his head appear to be so oddly shaped. He wore some sort of broad, stiff-brimmed hat, over which the hood of his robe had been thrown. The brim of the hat had the effect of making a large tent of the hood, which, in the bright sun, hid the man’s face in a deep and mysterious shadow.

  As the man approached the lean-to Morgin sat up, found that he was still dressed in the torn and battered clothing he’d worn during his escape from the Decouix dungeon. About his neck, someone—he assumed it had been the man—had added a thick ring of intricately braided leather. It was too small to slip over his head, and it had no clasp so he surmised it had been braided in place while he lay unconscious.

  “You’ll grow used to the debt-ring,” a voice said.

  Morgin looked up and found the man standing over the entrance to the lean-to. The timbre of his voice told Morgin he was still a young man, probably in his mid-twenties like Morgin. “Debt-ring?” Morgin asked.

  “Yes,” the young man said. “I saved you from the sands. I gave you water—” he held up the small, reptilian beast in his hand, “—and now I’m about to feed you. You owe me a great debt, and it’s not honorable to be indebted so.”

  Morgin wondered if this made him some sort of slave, and for a moment he considered resisting the young man. But as the fellow threw back the hood and pulled off his hat, Morgin saw the bone-white color of his skin for the first time. With his memories of haunting the soul of the ancient Benesh’ere warrior Morddon still fresh in his mind, he knew this man would be a fearsome warrior. Though, even if he were able to defeat him, they were somewhere out in the middle of the Great Munjarro Waste, and Morgin was wholly dependent upon him for survival.

  The young man stabbed a finger into his own chest. “I am Harriok, your new master. You will address me as Lord Harriok.”

  Morgin decided to play along, then escape at the first opportunity. “Yes, Lord Harriok.”

  “Very good.”

  Harriok bent down, crawled into the lean-to, sat down with his legs crossed opposite Morgin, drew a knife and began gutting the small creature he’d captured. Morgin had been right about his age, a young Benesh’ere warrior with the characteristic bone white skin, and coal-black hair tied into a braid that hung down his back just past his shoulders.

  Morgin cleared his throat. “May I ask a question, Lord Harriok?”

  Harriok nodded. “Go ahead.”

  “How long ago did you find me?”

  “Late yesterday.”

  Morgin ran his fingers through his hair. “I feel much better than I think I should.”

  Harriok held up the creature he’d cleaned. “A few more hours and this cratl and his fellows would have started picking at your flesh. But you weren’t bad off. A little too much heat, not enough water, both easily remedied.”

  Harriok finished gutting the cratl. “Speaking of water,” Harriok said. “You’ve put me a day behind schedule, and you’ve used water I hadn’t counted on. As soon as the sun sets we’ll pack up and leave.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “To join the tribe. I was scouting our northern flank when I came across you lying in the sand. But now that I’ve wasted a day here they’re probably well ahead of us. It won’t be easy catching up. In fact we may not be able to join them until Aelldie.”

  “What’s Aelldie?” Morgin asked.

  “It’s the largest oasis in the Munjarro, and the last oasis before we leave the sands for the summer.”

  “You’re leaving the sands?”

  “Of course we’re leaving the sands. We always leave the sands in summer. It gets too hot to survive so we go to the Lake of Sorrows. And you’re asking too many questions.”

  Morgin nodded meekly and said, “Yes, Lord Harriok.” He smiled inwardly, for though Harriok complained, he clearly enjoyed having someone to talk with.

  Harriok cut the cratl meat into strips and gave half of them to Morgin with a small ration of water. “Raw cratl meat,” Harriok said, holding up a strip. “A good source of water.”

  They dined on raw cratl and hard brown journeycake. Near dusk the temperature dropped and he took Morgin out onto the sand. It was then that Morgin first saw the other, larger lean-to in which Harriok’s horse rested quietly on its haunches in the shade.

  Morgin helped him clear several traps that had snagged other reptilian creatures like the cratl and a few small rodents. Harriok snapped each creature’s neck then tossed it in a sack.

  “Aren’t we going to clean them?” Morgin asked.

  Harriok shook his head. “Not now.” He looked up at the darkening sky. “Now we travel. We’ll stop when the sand starts to heat up at sunrise. There’ll be plenty of time for that then.”

  Both lean-tos folded up into an impressively compact bundle. Harriok gave Morgin a knee length hooded robe like his own, adding, “I have to take care of my property,” and they were on their way.

  Harriok rode while Morgin walked close behind him, and by the stars he could tell they headed due west. A three-quarter moon lit the yellow dunes beautifully, though there was really nothing to see but an endless ocean of sand. It was not easy walking on the sand. It shifted and slid beneath his feet, and it often required two steps just to travel the length of one. Harriok rode a special breed of horse Morgin had heard of but never seen. It had large, broad hooves that didn’t sink far into the sand, with a lean, compact body that didn’t require excessive water or feed. Mounted, Harriok could have pushed Morgin to travel much faster, but instead set a reasonable pace that Morgin maintained without difficulty.

  He trudged along in silence for a good while, was concentrating on keeping his footing in the loose sand when Harriok surprised him. “What’s your name?”

  “Morgin,” he answered, then realized he should have lied. A wanted man shouldn’t use a name others might recognize.

  “What were you doing out on the sands?”

  Morgin knew the Benesh’ere hated the Decouixs, so he decided a common enemy might put him in a better light with this young warrior. “I ran afoul of some Decouixs, and it was either the sands, or get my throat cut.”

  “Are you a clansman?”

  “No. Just a wandering swordsman.”

  “Well, you can’t have wandered all your life. You must have come from somewhere.”

  It would be wise to stay as close to the truth as possible, so Morgin made up a life for himself not unlike that of some of his childhood companions. “I’m the son of an Elhiyne freeman. My father was a soldier and my mother a kitchen maid. I was raised at Elhiyne itself, and taught some soldiering skills.”

  Harriok turned about in the saddle and looked down at Morgin, his voice filled with curiosity. “You grew up in the castle?”

  “Aye,” Morgin answered flatly.

  “What was it like? Was it big? It must be strange to live surrounded by stone like that.”

  Morgin told Harriok about Elhiyne. He described every detail of the place, and the people who lived there, which fascinated the young Benesh’ere warrior. But for himself, he grew sadly homesick.

  “You miss them,” Harriok said. “I can tell.”

  For all his bluster, Harriok treated Morgin almost as an equal. To maintain a good pace they took turns riding the horse, though Harriok tied one end of a good length of rope to Morgin’s debt-ring, and the other to his wrist. If Morgin tried to spur the horse into a run and escape, the young Benesh’ere could easily yank
him from the saddle. And only occasionally did Harriok remember that Morgin was in his debt and demand that he call him “Lord.” They stopped near midnight to eat, then traveled on, continuing at a steady pace until well past dawn since the air remained cool during the first few hours of morning. But as the sands warmed Harriok called a halt. He taught Morgin how to pitch the lean-tos, then how to set traps in the sand. By that time the air had grown thick and hot, so they retired to the shade of the lean-to.

  Morgin wanted to drop instantly into sleep, but first they cleaned their catch from the previous day, cut the meat into strips, ate some of it raw and lay the rest out in the sun to dry. After they lay down in the lean-to, and before sleep took them, Morgin asked, “Do you own me? Am I a slave, or something?”

  “Of course not. You owe me a debt of honor, and until it’s repaid you are mine to do with as I please.”

  The next night went much as the first. They kept up a steady pace while Harriok quizzed Morgin incessantly about life among the clans. But near dawn, just as the sky began to lighten, Harriok stopped abruptly, stood up in his stirrups and sniffed the air.

  “Water,” Harriok said excitedly. Then he climbed down out of the saddle, and with some urgency untied his pack.

  “Help me,” he said.

  Morgin could only provide minimal help since he had no idea what Harriok was trying to do. “What are we doing?” he asked.

  Harriok grinned. “A mist still, for water. Just wait and see.”

  They quickly assembled what appeared to be a strangely shaped and oddly inverted tent. It was a contraption made of wooden stakes and a circular piece of oiled cloth about as wide as the spread of a man’s arms. The stakes supported the outer edges of the cloth about knee high off the sand, while in the middle Harriok placed a small stone that weighted the center of the cloth downward. With that done, they then went about the business of making camp, though it was much earlier than the previous morning.

  As they worked, Morgin noticed a light mist forming just off the surface of the sand. But by the time camp was fully set it was knee deep and as thick as a heavy fog, and Morgin had difficulty seeing through it to set the last trap. Then the sun rose, and the mist dissipated.

  “Quickly now,” Harriok said, and taking up a nearly empty water skin, he stood over his strange contraption. “Come here and help me.”

  As Morgin approached he looked down into the bowl of the little inverted tent, and in it he saw the small rock Harriok had placed there to weight down the center. It now lay beneath the surface of a good-sized puddle of water.

  Harriok pulled the stopper on the water skin, handed it to Morgin, bent down and took hold of one edge of the oiled cloth to support it as he pulled one of the stakes. Morgin didn’t need to be told what to do. He carefully held the water skin in place while Harriok lowered that edge and let the water drain into the skin. With that done, they quickly disassembled the mist still, repacked it, and retired to the lean-to. Again, Morgin dreamt of Shebasha and Aethon’s tomb.

  That night, as they traveled under the star-lit sky, Morgin felt the tug of something arcane, a pull that started out as a faint sensation, but grew stronger with each step. By the time they began erecting the two lean-tos in the morning, he knew they were in the vicinity of something unusual. When the tents were ready and he could take a free moment, Morgin climbed to the top of a nearby dune to scan their surroundings. To the south he caught a glint of something shiny on the horizon, though that didn’t seem to coincide with the direction of the pull he felt. When he shaded his eyes with his hand and squinted, he could just make out a jagged silhouette, like that of a city with tall, glassy spires.

  “Ah,” Harriok said as he joined Morgin at the top of the dune. “The ruins of Kathbeyanne, the phantom city. We call it the city of glass.”

  The words city of glass triggered an old memory. After Csairne Glen, when the archangel Metadan had fought Ellowyn in his dreams and knocked her unconscious, he’d given Morgin a message, something about the Unnamed King and his consort the god-queen Erithnae, and seeking the god-sword, and failing, and asking three questions in the city of glass. Morgin struggled to recall the message in its entirety, but the memory eluded him.

  “Have you gone there?” Morgin asked.

  Harriok shook his head. “That’s a fool’s errand. It’s enchanted. If you walk toward it, it will always remain on the horizon and you’ll never get there. Eventually, you’ll find that you’ve walked in a vast circle. It’s a dangerous trap for the unwary.”

  Morgin, facing the city squarely, closed his eyes and concentrated on that arcane pull that had drawn his attention. With Morddon’s memories he recognized the scent of the fabled city, recalled looking through the ancient warrior’s eyes at the grand palace of the Shahotma for the first time, the spires that reached toward the heavens, balconies and balustrades that soared high above the city, with level upon level of parapets and battlements. In front of it had been a massive parade ground, with the barracks of the Benesh’ere and the twelve legions of angels to one side. It was there, haunting Morddon’s soul, that he’d first met TarnThane, the griffin lord, AnneRhianne, the Benesh’ere princess, and Gilguard, warmaster of the Benesh’ere, all ancient and long since gone.

  Standing atop a dune in the middle of the Munjarro with his eyes closed, he would have sworn the city lay to his left, not straight in front of him. He opened his eyes, and the vision of Kathbeyanne lay on the horizon directly before him. If the gods had left an enchantment on the city so it appeared to be where it was not, one would certainly walk in circles trying to get there. On the other hand, if he ignored the mirage and walked toward the pull of the arcane, might he actually reach the fabled city? Morgin decided to say nothing of this to Harriok. Maybe someday he’d come back and seek out Kathbeyanne, the city of glass, and ask those questions. Though first he’d have to find Metadan and ask him to repeat that message.

  Morgin had drifted off into a light doze in the middle of the heat of the day, when Harriok sat up suddenly and startled him fully awake. The young whiteface cocked his head to one side and appeared to be listening for something, and the look on his face frightened Morgin. “What is it?” he asked.

  “Silence,” Harriok hissed.

  Morgin obeyed without question while Harriok listened further. After several heartbeats of silence, the young Benesh’ere reached for his hooded robe and snapped out, “There’s a storm coming, and we don’t have much time.”

  In the stifling heat of the midday sun, they broke down their small lean-to. Harriok pulled his horse out into the sun to get it out of the way, then led them down into a deep valley between two dunes. They scooped out a depression in the sand and combined the two lean-tos to make a fully enclosed tent. Harriok pressed the already short tent poles deeper into the sand, giving the tent a flat, low profile. “Start tossing sand on top of the tent,” he ordered. “We need at least a full hand’s depth.”

  Harriok climbed into the tent itself, began scooping out more sand. Morgin could now hear a faint roar in the distance, and a dark cloud appeared on the horizon. He frantically tossed handfuls of sand on the cloth of the tent, glancing over his shoulder at the dark shadow that grew higher and closer with each heartbeat. Then one moment the storm appeared on the horizon, and the next it hit them with a fury that threatened to sweep them off their feet. But by that time he and Harriok and the horse were safely sealed within the tent in relative comfort. The storm raged above them, howling out its hatred as if it were a living thing. And though the midday sun burned in the sky above them, in the tent beneath the sand they waited in complete darkness.

  “The Munjarro is angry this day,” Harriok said. “Let us hope it is not angry at us, eh?”

  They carefully arranged their provisions, and then settled down to an uneasy sleep.

  Chapter 2: The Spirit of the Sands

  Rhianne came to the Lake of Sorrows near dusk of a calm, clear day. The trail she followed opened out into a small vi
llage on the eastern side of the lake, but as she nudged her horse forward she realized the huts had been abandoned long ago. The glassy and smooth surface of the lake glistened in the fading light, and a seemingly enchanted stillness hung over all. The huts were in poor condition, there was no wood for a fire, and it had been quite some time since she’d eaten anything more than the few nuts and berries she’d gathered.

  The sword hovered in the back of her thoughts, always there, never to be forgotten. It hungered for death and destruction, a thing of pure chaos and hatred and malevolence. It called to her like a newborn child, obstinately demanding her attention, begging her to take it up and wield it so it could sate its bloodlust on the innocent. No wonder it had nearly driven Morgin to madness, and she understood now what strength he must have possessed to resist its relentless demands.

  Wearily, she sat down on a flat rock near the edge of the water and watched the sun set over the Worshipers, and as the chill of night settled upon her she wondered what she would do for food and shelter, wondered if she could find the strength to resist the sword as Morgin had. She buried her face in her hands and shed the tears she had held back for so long.

  When she ran out of tears she sat up straight and opened her eyes. It was then that she saw the lights on the north end of the lake, and the regularity of their spacing told her there must be an active village there, not just a few campfires. She had heard that some sort of town existed near the lake, so she took her horse’s reins, pulled her cloak tightly about her and began searching her way through the forest toward the lights. A good-sized moon gave her plenty of light, but cautiously she led her horse rather than riding it, and after some time she discovered a trail that hugged the lakeshore. It still took her several hours to reach the village, and by that time the chill of night had cut to the bone, and she hovered on the edge of collapse.