The Mad God's Muse (The Eye of the Lion Saga Book 2) (9 page)

How can this happen on my
watch? I don't want this job! I Never did!
“
You're
not supposed to know about it!
Nobody
is! We have to stop him! It's
my
duty, Caelwen! I need you to trust me!”

Caelwen turned and looked at
her briefly, trying to keep Aiul in his sight as well. Her bodyguard
seemed moved by whatever he saw on her face.
Yes, Caelwen, I
really am scared now. And I don't understand it either. I just know
what they told me.

Caelwen's
anger softened as he turned back toward Aiul. “Very well,
empress. I doubt we survive this, though.”

“If we don't stop him,
nobody
survives!
”

Caelwen flashed her a look of
shocked admiration before focusing on his enemy once again. “Then
may we both die well today.”

“I don't know how to die
well,” Kariana muttered. “But I'll fake it, like I do
everything else.”

Aiul turned at the sound of her
voice and smiled at her. Blood covered his face, now, and soaked the
rags he wore. “The blood of Tasinal, the city of nothing, as
promised,” he observed. He turned back to the wall and pulled
his fist toward himself. The plaster deformed, cracked, then
exploded outward under pressure. Half of the wall collapsed and fell
to the floor in a rain of debris as he hauled a strong box through
the hole. His fist had penetrated the box as well, and it hung like
a hammer from his arm. Aiul peeled back the metal with casual ease,
the squealing, rending sounds of tortured metal filling the room as
he exposed and withdrew the contents: a thick silver chain, from
which depended a single stone, a simple sphere of amber.

Why my watch?
The question felt rhetorical, now.
Because mine is the
weak one.
The pounding in her
temples was a familiar thing now, the natural response to impotent
rage and being stupid enough to act anyway.
I'm already
dead, just like the Southlanders. I wish I could remember the name
of their god. He would be good to call on, now. I'll just have to
hope he hears me anyway.

“
My
brothers cannot help you, now,” Aiul said absently as he held
the necklace up, as if verifying it was genuine
. Kariana saw
Caelwen's attention on her waver briefly, and took her chance. She
lunged forward, a near-bestial cry on her lips.
Then I'll help
myself, you fuck!

Caelwen tried, but she had
timed it well. She easily avoided his attempt to restrain her and
charged Aiul like a bull, crashing her shoulder into his back at
full speed, fully intending to knock him flat. To her shock, the
impact felt more like she had ran at a statue or a mighty oak,
rather than a man made of flesh. Her charge ended with a sudden,
painful, bone-jarring stop that rattled her teeth in her head and
set her reeling. Kariana swayed briefly, then staggered backward,
arms pinwheeling. Aiul took no notice of her as she fell to the
floor in a heap, cracking her head soundly on the floor for good
measure.

Kariana saw the rest of it
through a red haze. Caelwen rushing forward, Aiul seizing him about
the throat and holding him up like a rag doll. Caelwen fought
against it, swinging his blade, but it was useless. Aiul plucked the
weapon from his hand and tossed it aside.
I‘d
miss you, Caelwen, you stuffy old soldier, if we had any hope of
surviving. Don't feel bad. We never had a chance. At least we tried.

But what was this? Aiul was
talking to him.
Well, as
victor, one sometimes needs to pontificate before killing, I
suppose. It’s only proper.
But that didn’t
seem to be what was going on. She could almost make out the words,
but there was an annoying humming in her ears, the perfect match for
her blurred vision and splitting headache.

Suddenly, she understood what
was being said, though not so much through sound as from impact, as
if she were being beaten with the words. She felt rats gnawing at
her bones, and the scritch-scritch sounds of their teeth forming
words in her mind: “And so the Eye of the Lion entered the
world of men once more, to wake the Sleeper. This is how the world
ends.”

The assault of words tore into
her mind, too much too withstand. As she watched Caelwen tossed
aside like a child’s toy, her vision faded from red to black.

Ahmed’s vision returned
slowly, a gradual brightening from black to bloodshot orange. He
opened his eyes, found himself staring directly into the sun, and
quickly closed them again. He was warm now, and for a moment, it
seemed all would be well. Then he tried to draw a breath.

His body seemed to move of its
own accord. He hurled himself onto his stomach, the claws of a
hundred cats scraping at his lungs and his belly. He heaved and
vomited seawater onto the sand beneath him. It seemed as though he
were filled with it.

Shouts arose around him. “Ahmed
lives!” “Liar! He is dead as stone, I saw him!”
“Dog! Come and see!”

Ahmed recognized Sandilianus’s
sharp features as the soldier knelt beside him. Sandilianus nodded
and gave him a smile. “So he is. I am glad to be wrong.”

Ahmed, fairly busy trying to
breathe, simply nodded a response.

Another shout. “Ho! Tahir
is dead!”

Ahmed, still unable to speak,
managed to struggle to his feet as Sandilianus called out in an
incredulous shout, “What? How is he dead?”

Sandilianus charged toward
where Tahir lay on the sand, surrounded by four of the crew. Ahmed
followed as quickly as he could. One of the men was trying to
explain what had happened. “He called to Ilaweh, and then he
dropped dead.”

Sandilianus gave the man a
quizzical look. “Tahir called to Ilaweh? You are certain?”

The crewman nodded, and
Sandilianus shook his head in wonder. “Then we can guess why
he is dead. He must have hit his head, and hard. It’s the only
way Tahir would be talking to Ilaweh!”

The others nodded and murmured
agreement, and Ahmed nodded too. It was easier than speaking his
true thoughts. In his heart, Ahmed felt Sandilianus had the right of
things the first time.
I was dead, and Tahir alive.
Somehow,
Tahir had taken his place.
That is madness!

Yet
it felt true.

Perhaps I hit my head, too.
He
decided that it would be best to take stock of himself
before doing much else, especially contemplating insane notions.
Save for the water left in his lungs, which was still forcing itself
from him every few moments in fits of ragged coughing, he was
reasonably whole. His shoulder ached from where he had bashed it
against the cabin door, and he had plenty of bruises and scrapes,
but these were nothing. No broken bones, no gashes or anything
requiring treatment, certainly.

With a start, he remembered
Brutus’s papers and the charge he had lain on Ahmed’s
shoulders. Ahmed reached inside his shirt and sighed his relief to
find the oilcloth bag just where he had placed it. As he pulled it
out to examine the contents, something hard and heavy fell from his
shirt.

He bent to retrieve it and
wiped sand from its surface. It was metal, covered in years of
calcified accretions, but clearly artificial. It was difficult to
see what it had once been, though it seemed it might have been a
depiction of a face. There was a hint of a nose, a mouth, perhaps an
eye. But it was strangely proportioned, if so.

The sword Brutus had given him
had also, miraculously, made the journey to shore. Ahmed had stuck
it in his belt, and Ilaweh had been kind. Ahmed took the blade and
carved at the deposits on the lump of metal, gradually clearing the
surface as best he could with such a tool. He was pleased to see
that his guess had been correct. It was a face, or at least half of
one, the right side of a tiny lion’s head, mouth open in a
roar, empty eye socket staring at him in blind fury. Likely, there
had been a gem there, once. The side in the middle was smooth, with
no sign that there had ever been a left side at all.
But why make
half a lion head?

Ahmed shrugged.
Might
as well ask why it ended up in my shirt, for all the good it will
do.
He held it up to the sun, examining it, trying to
work out what sort of metal it was. It shone like gold, but it was
far too hard. Even steel did not scratch it.

He tucked the piece into a
pocket. It would make a nice souvenir, a memoir he could show to his
children some day, and tell them of the time he had sailed the
ocean, been shipwrecked, and almost drowned. For now, he had other
matters to attend. He checked the integrity of the papers in the
oilskin pouch, then called out, “Everyone, assemble. I have
orders given to me from Brutus before he perished.”

Sandilianus shot him a curious
look. “So you are in charge now, boy?”

Ahmed held up Brutus’s
sword. “If you wish to question it, I will show you who is a
boy.”

Sandilianus chuckled and raised
an eyebrow in surprise. “You would go steel with me over it?”

Ahmed considered a moment, then
lowered the sword. “Fists.”

Sandilianus nodded. “Wisdom
is good in a leader. Swords or fists, I
would
destroy you like a child, but I would be wrong to do it. You are
Yazid’s second, and if what you say is true, Brutus’s
now, as well.”

Ahmed ground his teeth.
“If?
You a
ccuse me of lying? I nearly died with him!”

Sandilianus waved a hand
dismissively. “I accuse you of nothing, but you protest much.
That makes me wonder.” He cocked his head to one side and
smiled, balling his hands into fists again, as if considering
accepting the challenge after all. “What mission did Brutus
give you?”

By now, most of the others had
gathered around and were listening. Ahmed looked about, but saw
little faith on their faces. Sandilianus was the key, then. He alone
would determine how things went.

Ahmed raised the sword again,
overhead, on display. “Brutus gave me his papers and this
blade. The papers, he charged me to return to Prince Philip. The
blade, he gave to me as my own.”

“Why would he do that,
abandon his duty and turn it over to you?”

“He was trapped. The
water was rising, and he did not want to drown. He told me to stop
behaving like a woman and do what I had to do.”

Sandilianus slapped his knees
and laughed out loud. “You speak truth, then. Those are surely
Brutus’s words.”He raised his open hands for all to see,
and the battle was over, the tension between them evaporating into
nothing.“So that is why he gave you the sword, eh?”

“Aye.”

Sandilianus nodded respectfully
at this. “And how does it sit with you? Have you ever killed a
man before?”

Ahmed found he could not quite
meet Sandilianus’s gaze, and his throat felt swollen and
thick. “Bandits and such, yes. But never a man I knew. I did
not like it. I did what I had to do.”

Sandilianus rose to his feet,
still nodding. “Then Brutus chose well.” He turned to
the rest of the men, looking them over, daring them to defy him as
he called over his shoulder, “What are your orders, sir?”

Ahmed felt the mantle of
leadership settle upon his shoulders as if it were a physical
weight. It was heavier than he had expected, no longer theory,
second guessing and ‘if I were in charge’ swaggering.

First,
I must take stock of what I have
. He counted the faces.
Nineteen men, plus himself, an army of twenty. How many were
Brutus’s men, and how many were sailors?
It
doesn’t matter. They are all Xanthians.
“Our
goals are simple. We must survive, and we must find a way home. We
have neither supplies nor a ship. We have no money, and so we cannot
pay. We have no friends, and so we cannot borrow. How many are
armed?” Ahmed was pleased to see all but one arm raised high.

Sandilianus laughed out loud.
“Bashir, you fool! How many times have I told you, better to
lose your dick than your blade!”

Bashir grinned sheepishly.
“Better to lose my blade than drown, eh? I had to hack through
a wall to get out, and the blade stuck.”

Ahmed chuckled at this,
remembering his own narrow escape. “Then you will use a club
for now. There are plenty on this beach to be had.” Laughter
rippled through the men at this, and some of the men kicked at
wreckage from the ship to accent the point. Sandilianus nodded in
approval.

Ahmed waited for the chatter to
die down before continuing. “We go to war of necessity, not
enmity. We will harm no one unless we must, and we will take nothing
we do not need. As soon as it is dark, I, Sandilianus, and three men
of his choosing will scout. I saw lights from the sea last night.
There is a town nearby. For now, we salvage everything we can from
the wreckage. If we are to go to war, we will need shields. One for
every man is the least I expect by nightfall. Ilaweh willing, we'll
find some armor and javelins, too.”

The men were eager to be led,
once they had accepted a leader. They fell to the task of scavenging
with gusto. By the time the sun hit the horizon, they not only had
arms and armor for one and all, but had rounded up food for dinner
and a even recovered Bashir's lost sword. The most pleasant
surprise, by far, was the discovery of a spyglass. Tahir had managed
to salvage one, and they discovered it when they buried him in the
sand.

Ahmed, Sandilianus, and their
men set out shortly after dark. Ahmed was grateful indeed for
Sandilianus’s help. The man had a knack for direction. He
found the small fishing town in an hour, where Ahmed might have
taken the whole night.
This
is another lesson of leading: you are not smarter than your men.

Sandilianus pointed toward a
small, sheltered beach a few miles in the distance. “There, I
think. According to the natives a hundred leagues back, it is called
Brust, though I wouldn’t even trust that much. We paid them
good coin, and the dogs led us onto a reef.”

Ahmed raised an eyebrow at
this. “Did they tell us to go north or south to avoid it?”
he asked, though even as he spoke the question, he knew the answer.

“South,”
Sandilianus groused. “And that is what we did....” He
trailed off a moment, started to speak, then paused with his mouth
open, eyes wide with sudden understanding. “The old map…and
the Nihlosians called us Southlanders! They reckon north and south
opposite of the way we do, don’t they?”

“Aye. I think it is so.”

Sandilianus’s face grew
suddenly haggard and pained as the realization sank in. “ And
we might have saved our brothers had we realized it.”

Ahmed shook his head
vehemently. “I think not. If you must blame someone, then
blame Brutus.”

Sandilianus gave him a scowl.
“So we’ll blame the dead man? Convenient.”

“I told Brutus for months
that Ilaweh wanted us to stay, but he would not hear of it. I warned
him just last night that it was dangerous to defy Ilaweh’s
will, that it could turn ill for us if we forced him to intervene.
Now we see the truth of it.”

Sandilianus rubbed at at his
eyes a moment and heaved a great sigh. “Do you speak truth,
Ahmed, or do you say this just to make me feel less guilty?”

Ahmed laid a hand on his
shoulder and squeezed. “I swear to you in the name of Ilaweh,
it is true.”

“Then let us do his
will.”

Ahmed observed the town through
the spyglass, he and his party lying low in the grass of a nearby
hill. It was a village of a few hundred, perhaps a thousand, mostly
primitive buildings of straw and mud, with some larger places built
from rough-hewn logs, nothing terribly unusual. But the people! They
were the same small, brown men he had seen in Aviar! “This
should be easier than we think. These people are cowards by nature.”

Sandilianus looked at him with
suspicion. “How could you know such a thing from looking?”

Ahmed chuckled, and considered
letting the elder soldier think him possessed of uncanny power, but
it would be disrespectful. “I have seen them before. The
barbarians in Aviar capture them and sell them as slaves.”

“Truly? And they do not
fight?”

Ahmed shrugged, still scanning
the town. “Some do. Most don’t, though. We should be
able to intimidate them well enough, which is good. I want no
killing unless we must. Now, as to whether they have anything worth
taking…”

He panned over the town. It was
situated at a small harbor, and boats dotted the shore. Most were
small, but there was one larger vessel that might do. Ahmed passed
the spyglass to Sandilianus to get his opinion.

Sandilianus grunted in
surprise. “That is a Gruppenwalder ship!”

“The Gruppenwalder dogs
are trading in slaves?”

Sandilianus continued looking
through the spyglass. “The Gruppenwalders trade in everything,
including ships. There is nothing to say the people who own it are
from
Gruppenwald.”
He continued watching for a bit, then sighed, his face grim. “There
is no one fighting, and the men on deck are the same as the men in
the streets.”

“Perhaps they bought the
ship.”

“You are good of heart,
Ahmed, but you are young and foolish.”

Ahmed flinched, wounded to be
spoken to in such a way. “I thought we were friends.”

Sandilianus lowered the
spyglass and handed it back to Ahmed with a grin. “We are,
which is why I call you a fool, as opposed to allowing you to remain
one, eh?”

Ahmed scowled, but the logic
was good. “What am I missing?”

Sandilianus shook his head.
“Maybe nothing. We’ll know soon enough.”

Ahmed growled and waved a fist
at Sandilianus. “Damn old men, always talking in riddles! Why
will you not just tell me?”

Sandilianus offered him a sly
smile. “I will tell you
why
.
It is because it makes me seem very clever. That makes my men
confident and loyal.” He clapped a hand on Ahmed’s
shoulder and squeezed. “If I predict and I am wrong, I look a
fool. But if there is anything amiss, even though it may be other
than what I thought, then I will simply smile and let others draw
their own conclusions.”