**********
9. Burn the Mask
**********
(Mid-Winter, 1179)
The
governess asked them, Abana and Maliq, if they were ready to depart.
Both nodded yes.
After months in the making, preparations were complete. Abana of
Hafiz opened the folds of his hooded sable cloak and unsheathed the kidney
spike by an inch, just enough to display the freshly forged blade within –
polished and poisoned. Lady Yahya nodded approvingly. Bitterblack poison was
almost odourless, only seasoned herbalists had the nose for it. Whomsoever
survived the wound would not survive its kiss. And then a stolid Maliq stepped
forward and drew his scimitar. Much like Abana's dagger it was fashioned from
watered steel and designed for swift death. It was called Lion's Claw
and it was a gift of Yahya's own commission.
They were ready.
It was no
easy road getting there. When Maliq woke from that first night of passion,
Abana was forced to tell him the truth – that he had declared himself for Lady
Yahya's campaign against Rahab of Mahmun and was determined to be the
executioner – one way or another.
Maliq, who had already sacrificed two years of his life to that
campaign, was not pleased with the news. The Kushwari boy did not blame him for
that at all. The rural life of Iblyd was hard but peaceful and it suited him
well. All he wanted was to put the past to rest and settle down to a
comfortable life. Abana wanted those things too (as he explained) but he also
knew that he would never be content with that life until he ended
Rahab's.
But not just Rahab's.
There were others out there who hurt and betrayed Abana – were they
owed any less of a debt? The dancer made it plain. The path to happiness could
not precede the cause of vengeance. "I want you," Abana had said to
Maliq that night, "but I cannot build a life with you until Rahab and his
ilk have been made to pay... I cannot rest until they do."
He was disappointed. He was saddened. He was most certainly angry.
But he understood. And eventually he kissed Abana beneath the moonlight to
assure him of the fact. "If your heart is set on vengeance then you must
take it," said the Jamaran. "But you must take me with you."
They made love again after that.
From that point on Abana devoted himself to his training. His
mistress was an herbalist by nature and knew much of the arts of healing and
poisoning, as well as the histories and courtly affairs of Tehraq. Abana
absorbed everything she had to teach. By day he was the notary, drawing
up important missives and carefully maintaining the Sanguine Vigil's records.
By night he was the assassin, practicing the arts of poison and
seduction and perfecting his dance until Hamami herself would have been
jealous.
As he honed himself sharp as a knife for the grim tasks to come,
Abana found support as well as solace in Maliq's arms. They grew closer to each
other as the months passed by until Abana requested permission for Maliq to
move into his quarters at the Sanguine Vigil, a request that Lady Yahya
granted. Whether to eat or talk or sleep or dance, Abana and Maliq spent every
spare moment with each other until love slowly overwhelmed them. It was not
planned. Neither of them predicted it. Abana just caught himself staring at his
lover one night and it struck him like an arrow... that he loved this man.
He needed him. He would go to the ends of the earth for him.
Two opponents warred for dominance within Abana's soul – his budding
love for Maliq and his bitter hatred of his abusers.
One was light and one was dark.
One was the future and one was the past.
And then one night, a hundred moons ago, Maliq admitted to Abana a
similar pain – that for years his sole obsession was to see strip Tehraq to its
very foundations, free Jamara from its grasp, and to toast that freedom by
delivering Qattullah's severed head to the gravesite of Hamra lo'a Daiira.
`Seductive yet unobtainable' was how he described it. `The
worst kind of dream.'
Abana asked him how he overcame it.
"I met you," he had said.
Abana disliked himself because he knew himself too well. He was not
as strong as Maliq. His hatred would not be quelled by love. Only blood would
sate his rage... but paradoxically, he knew that only by sating his rage could he
put it behind him and have the life he deserved with the man he loved.
Thus, when he and Maliq went before Lady Yahya that day, once all
the preparations had been made, he felt no sense of sadness or nascent
trepidation... just a burning desire to bring it all to a close.
The governess of Jawwaz sat upon the cushioned stool of her audience
chambers with an unsealed roll of parchment in her lap. "I have just received
word that the annexation of Kushwar is complete. The army garrisons at Qasr
Ghazna to await Qattullah's orders. As soon as the king returns to Tehraq for
his victory banquet, he will declare his expedition to Yahvat Yahva. You must
kill Rahab before that happens."
"How long before Qattullah returns to Tehraq?"
"Twenty days," said Yahya to Abana. "You
have a head start but do not become complacent. Once you leave Iblyd you must
make your way to Qazyr to convene with the merchant Dhabr. He is delivering
prize animals to Tehraq as gifts for the king – use his caravan as cover to
sneak yourselves inside the city, where you must journey to the Old Plague Ward
and convene with Magistrate Tayyab, a representative of the governors. He will
get you into the Elephant Palace."
"What is his plan?" Asked Abana.
"These are plots of treason we are
hatching, Abana. The less we put to parchment the better. You will know when
you get there."
The dancer nodded.
"Remember – you are to kill
Rahab, not fight him. He is a dangerous man with or without Kafnak. Dose him
with the bitterblack as he sleeps. The poison will claim its victim within three
days which should be enough time for you to escape. If you are caught, you will
be tortured and killed. The governors and I will deny any involvement with you.
Do you understand?"
Abana nodded yes.
Then Lady Yahya looked to the Jamaran
man by his side. "You are rather quiet, Maliq. Have you nothing to say?"
The swordsman shut his eyes. "No. We
complete this task and return to you at the earliest opportunity. I swear it."
Maliq stood up and bowed to the governess. His riveted helm and armour rattled
beneath his sable cloak as he left the chamber in silence.
Yahya demurred. "He is angry with me."
"With me also," said Abana. "But he
understands."
Judging by her expression the governess
did not agree. Regardless, she extended her hands to the Kushwari boy and asked
her to take them.
He did.
"Abana. You are about to embark upon a mission that might re-shape
the course of history. I know you have your own reasons for doing this... but
never lose sight of that."
"I shall not," Abana kissed Lady Yahya's
hands goodbye. "And we shall not fail you. We shall return."
*
Abana
found Maliq outside the gates of the Sanguine Vigil adjusting his horse's
saddle and attaching Lion's Claw to its harness. Steedmaster Yuza gave
them a pair of dun-coloured mares; well-trained, sturdy, and inured to desert
conditions. Their saddlebags bulged with provisions and waterskins.
"Maliq."
His hands stilled. "I do not like hiding
things from her, Abana. She is a Tehraqi to her core, but I owe her my
freedom."
"As do I," It almost hurt to think that
Maliq did not think he felt the same. Abana bade the taller man face him. As
soon as he did, he threw himself into Maliq's armoured embrace. "Are you still
with me? I cannot do this without you, Maliq..."
The swordsman man lifted the dancer's
chin and held his gaze until he saw (and understood) the conviction in his
eyes. "Beloved, hear me plain. Whether heaven or hell... wherever you go, we
go."
**********
(Late Winter, 1179)
`Beloved,
hear me plain,' he'd once said. `Whether heaven or hell...
wherever you go, we go.'
Khamali Maliq Moromaya had the heart of
a poet beating inside his chest. Maliq. As the blood soiling his back
began to cool and the stench of his own dried urine toxified his senses (Maliq)
Abana of Hafiz left his mind to wander of those lost days in Iblyd, running
from his parchment and quill at the Sanguine Vigil to that tiny little
homestead at the edge of the mangrove forest (Maliq, I'm sorry...) where
all the happiness in the world awaited him.
(...You were right, all along...)
Why was not it enough?
Those warring tribes of his heart, light
and dark, had he merely... given in to one? The wrong one? Why was it now,
in the frank pit of reality, that his mind gave him pause to re-consider? Was
it the pain, the physical pain? No. He suffered worse as a slave... far worse.
Then what was the source of the regret? Why now?
(...I never intended to live...)
A black sea filled his soul. An
emptiness. And then a spark, a spark that blossomed into a raging fire, sprung
up from those waters heedless of all improbabilities. The great inferno swelled
the sea until its lashing tongues spread to all corners of its reach, warring
with the depths below but never conquering them... but why? Why? Why was it not
better to just... ebb away with the tide and be forgotten?
(...I did not deserve you...)
"...I... I... was a fool..."
(...You should have left me to rot
here...)
"...Oh Maliq..."
(...I pray you build your happiness
someday...)
*
He smelt
the smoke first. Even in his state it slowly kindled his consciousness from the
miasma of blood. Next came the heat. It was worse than the oppressive bludgeon
they called the Tehraqi sun – it was a heat that prickled the skin like a naked
flame against a cold traveller's fingertips. It was the sort of heat that
burned until it consumed all in its way.
There was a fire out there.
`This is it,' thought Abana. `This
is how I go...'
The cell door was built of a sturdy
ironwood that had not rotted throughout the centuries. Only a key or fire could
get through it, so it did not surprise him when he heard the door unlock. Had
Rahab made good on his threat and sent his men and horses and hounds to rape
him to death? No. Not with a fire raging. Perhaps he was back with that soiled
whip of his get a few last sadistic lashes in before the fires came to burn the
flesh from his bones.
No.
Not that.
In the end it was him... that man that the
true gods made for him to love and cherish... the man he almost lost.
"M-Maliq...?"
The Jamaran man, clad in pilfered
guardsman's armour, warned him not to speak to keep his strength up. He put
Abana's arms around him and told the dancer to hold on tight as he unlocked the
manacles around his ankles. He clung on desperately as his feet gave way, and
slowly the fogging rush of blood passed. Once he was right side up, he slumped
into Maliq's arms, too weak to stand on his own feet.
"Are you alright?" Maliq yelled. "Abana,
speak to me! Are you alright?"
`...I knew you would come...' "...Yes,
my love... I am alright... I will survive..." `You should not have... you should
have left me... but I knew that you would...'
Maliq took a moment to inspect the wounds along Abana's back. The welts
had congealed so they did not weep freely, but they risked infection the longer
they went untreated. `Why do you love me like this?' The Kushwari boy
was like a lifeless doll in the Jamaran's grasp as he took off his tattered
doublet and undershirt, tore the shirt into strips with which to bind up and
dress Abana's wounds, then slipped the doublet back onto his torso to lift him
up to his feet. `How can you not see how worthless I am?'
Maliq took Abana's left arm and draped it over his two shoulders.
"Lean all your weight on me. Just put your feet forward and I will do the
rest."
Merely thinking was a struggle at that point, but somehow Abana
heard the command and somehow, he managed to put a foot forward. He put down a
second then a third and slowly he hobbled his way out of the gaol in Maliq's
arms.
The Elephant Palace gaol was converted from vacant cellars beneath
the blacksmith's forge. It boasted twenty cells (all empty now) along a
u-shaped corridor 100 paces long on each stretch. Dead guardsmen littered its
flagstones.
At the end of that corridor was a tall flight of stone steps that
Maliq helped Abana climb. They led up to the palace grounds where the smoke
rolled across the black marble floors and the thrashing of the flames roared in
their ears. Embers wafted on the air. Distant load-bearing pillars crumbled
within the raging flames and brought their ceilings down with them, crashing
into thick black clouds of dust and ash. Abana heard screams over the chaos as
well. Guardsmen, led by Ghassan perhaps, were yelling for his men to "hold
their nerve" and fetch buckets of water from the wells to douse the flames.
Some screams were those of the dying. Others were of escaped slaves and eunuchs
breaking free from their confinement and absconding.
Abana's thoughts went to the Silk Court
as Maliq hurried him down the corridor and away from the worst of the chaos. `Hamami...
Pasha... Li... Zanza... Roswyn... wherever you are... take your chance... escape...!'
The rolling smoke was so thick it singed
his bare shins as he strode through it. Maliq warned him to keep his head up
and not inhale as they turned a corner to avoid a hallway shrouded in fallen
timber. The long path ahead ended in a crush of rubble, broken cabinets, and
statues, but beyond that was an exposed crevasse... one of the Elephant Palace's
many clandestine pathways. From there it was the only way out.
Maliq went first, carefully climbing the mound then (once he found a
solid footing) reached out his arm to his lover. Abana, still cripplingly weak,
took Maliq's hand and held on as the older man dragged him up to the top of the
pile with a single arm. From there they slid over to the other side and fled
into the hidden corridor.
"We must keep going," said Maliq. "One of Yahya's men, Baelik – he
awaits us outside the palace. Come."
It was narrow and pitch black. The
further they ventured down its sloped path the thinner the smoke. The roars and
tremors of the palace collapsing upon itself grew distant. Abana found it
easier to breathe. They pressed on until the pathway returned them to the dank
bowels of the Abyyabid mausoleum buried beneath the palace grounds. All its
sconces were lit. Death masks and burial urns sat untouched upon stone shelves.
Dust covered the floor like snow.
Then, as Maliq and Abana verged out into
a huge dome-shaped chamber with its walls sculpted into ignoble frescos, they
found a tall and solitary figure standing in the centre with a broad-bladed
scimitar. He was gaunt and he was weak, struggling for his every breath, but he
still had white hot magical energy burning around his free hand.
He was Rahab of Mahmun.
"As a babe I was abandoned in the
desert..." he whispered to himself. "Cast out by parents I did not know for a deformity
I did not choose... but then the desert monk found me. He taught me of the gods...
of alchemy and magic... but he was too afraid to seek the deeper truths... too
scared to seek the source. And so, I surpassed him. And I rose from a
lowly scrivener to the Grand Vizier of Tehraq... all to return to Yahvat Yahva,
the seat of the Abyyabids... to revive our ancient past and reclaim the lost
knowledge... the power of the gods..."
Rahab raised his sword up and shuffled
around on his bony feet to greet his guests. "Why are your minds so small? Why
are your souls so primitive? So uninquisitive? How can you not wonder... of the
realities of reality? If you are content... to roll ignorantly the filth
of this tiny little planet then so be it. My future... is in THE STARS ABOVE US! AND
I WILL DESTROY ANYONE AND ANYTHING THAT STANDS IN MY WAY! EVEN
THE GODS THEMSELVES!"
"Stand down!" Maliq grabbed Jahanshah's
hilt as a warning. "Howsoever you still live, your `god' and your men have
abandoned you! Your palace is crumbling around your ears! It is over!"
"Not while I still BREATHE!"
Abana smiled darkly. "You will not be
breathing for long. Bitterblack poison is crawling through your veins ...you will
be dead before dawn. You will NEVER see Yahvat Yahva. You will die in this pit...
just like Qabus... just as you deserve!"
Rahab sneered. "SILENCE, you ignorant-"
and then the sorcerer suddenly stopped. He threw a hand around his mouth to
stop a sudden glut bubbling through his throat and surging up to his lips.
Blood and bile leaked through the gaps between his fingers.
"Damn you..." Rahab shook with rage as his raised up his sword. "DAMN
YOU!"
Maliq pushed the weakened Abana aside,
warning him to stand back as the mad sorcerer brought his burning hand to his
backsword's blade and set it alight. His spell was swift, but it was not done...
for as he swung his sword behind his back, he muttered an incantation in the
ancient tongue as he thrust his flaming palm into the ground. The dust rippled
from the impact like waves in the water as six sparkling streaks of white fire
shot free from his hand and snaked off in six directions towards six slab
caskets lodged into the walls. The caskets all flashed with the diffusion of
magical energies and fell still. Then, as the destruction of the Elephant
Palace roared on above their heads, those six caskets broke open into clouds of
sepulchral dust, and the half-preserved ancient corpses interred within slowly
rattled into un-life.
"By the blood of the Sun God..." Maliq raised his sword and kept Abana
close behind him as six lumbering, skeletal cadavers crawled out of their
caskets and ambled towards the pair like ravenous red-eyed dogs.
Rahab of Mahmun, sword and fist aflame, steered them to their
quarry. "KILL THEM BOTH!"
**********
(Mid-Winter, 1179)
Abana of Hafiz
and Khamali Maliq Moromaya came upon the Ziggurat of Mnenomon on their third
day of flight from the oasis town of Iblyd and a day after crossing the impact
crater boundary between the dominions of Jawwaz and Tehraq.
As they found the ziggurat it was merely
partway through its construction, encircled by ironwood scaffolds over 200
cubits high. By Abana's guess they had nearly a thousand slaves constructing
it: broad-shouldered men of largely Jamaran origin dressed in nothing but sweat
and loincloths. A rotating series of carts and sledges (driven by oxen and
mules) delivered massive sun-baked stones to base of the edifice where the
slaves used ramps, pulleys, and rope riggings to ferry them up to the summit.
It was a churning hive of activity enforced by a joint contingent of
Wahdi spearmen (on loan to the temple from the Royal Court) and paid
Tehraqi slave tamers. Any slave who did not pull fast enough or chisel hard
enough was beaten or whipped. Architects and stone masons gave directions to
the slave tamers, many of whom were versed in the Jamaran tongue, who then
passed those directions onto the slaves.
The Ziggurat of Mnenomon built up slowly
at the base of a small and rocky valley just a few hundred paces off the main
caravan lanes. Abana and Maliq entered the site by blending into the traffic of
bawling cattle dragging heavy mud brick cargoes inbound, shielding their faces
from the clouds of red dust and sand kicked up into the air like mist. There
was a large encampment just a hundred paces east of the main site – hundreds of
tents surrounded by trenches, waste pits, latrines, tanning racks, cookfires,
workbenches and makeshift kilns bulwarked by a ringed wall of wooden stakes
driven into the earth. Each thatched roof entrance (one for every compass
point) was guarded by a small dispatch of six or seven Wahdis. Abana and
Maliq pulled away from the cattle traffic ambling noisily towards the ziggurat
and approached the eastern gate.
"Greetings!" Said Abana. "Glory to
Mnenomon and his highness the King! I am Shahar Yajna, a novitiate of the
Temple of Mnenomon in Jawwaz. Who is in charge here?"
Wahdi captains symbolized their
station by bearing three peacock plumes from their helms rather than one.
"I am." The captain arose from his stool. He was grey-bearded and
battle-scarred. "State your business."
"At the behest of Governess Yahya, I bring offerings of sage and
frankincense to bless the creation of this great structure! And, for your
master, I bring the finest date wine fresh from the oasis town of Iblyd! Would
you be so kind as to deliver this wine whilst we bring the offerings to your
head priest?"
The Wahdi captain frowned. "We have work to do, novitiate.
Deliver your own gifts. Take the wine to the red tent but leave
your slave here."
Maliq frowned but held his tongue.
Abana thanks the captain for his time and coaxed his horse past the
guards into their camp, cantering by its busy cooks, blacksmiths
and cupbearers. The headman's tent was nestled at the centre of the encampment,
guarded by two more Wahdi spearmen. Abana dismounted and asked one of
them to summon the camp commander, which they did (grudgingly) and out he
emerged.
Hakkan the Slaver.
Abana grit his teeth with spite. Fifty
moons ago he uncovered a missive sent to Lady Yahya from the Temple of
Mnenomon. It requested a `small' donation of 600 silverlings to aid the
construction of the ziggurat and in passing it mentioned that the grand
overseer had commissioned a famed slave trader named Hakkan to supervise the
slave staff.
And it was him. Abana recognized
that bald head from half a parasang away, though these past two and some years
had not been kind to him. Much of his muscle was lost and replaced with fat
(distorting the shape of his tattoos) and his right arm was missing from the
elbow down. In its place was a boiled leather prosthesis with a bloodstained
bullwhip attached to the `wrist'. He was no longer the man he was... but he was
still fearsome. Hakkan still had it in him to break any slave's spirit.
"Master Slave Tamer!" Greeted Abana,
cheerfully. "A thousand blessings unto you for your aid in building this divine
monument!"
Hakkan dug a finger into his ear and
flicked out the wax. "Another preening pilgrim...? Spare me your damned sermons.
What is it you want?"
"The Temple of Mnenomon in Jawwaz offers
you a gift, good sir." Abana fetched the date wine and a small ceramic cup from
his saddlebags. The cup was coated with bitterblack. He poured a sample of the
wine into the cup and handed it to Hakkan. "Please, good sir! Avail yourself!
You have earned it."
Hakkan snatched the cup out of his
Abana's hand and sniffed it suspiciously... then handed it to one of the Wahdis.
Fortunately, he was less sceptical than the slaver and swallowed it whole.
"It is good!"
Hakkan snatched the cup back, then tossed it to Abana and ordered
him to pour another drink (which he was happy to do) and the bald pate took
himself a swig.
"Not bad," he said. "I'll take the rest."
There were three more bottles of date wine inside his saddlebags.
Abana asked the Wahdis to take them into Hakkan's tent, gave the opened bottle
to Hakkan himself, then offered profuse blessings and thanks as he took his
horse's reins and excused himself to `confer with the high priest'. He turned
to leave.
"...Wait," said Hakkan.
Abana froze.
"...Turn around..."
Abana turned around and found Hakkan towering over him, blotting out
the sun with his thick shoulders. He was not the man he was... but he was still
fearsome. And he cracked his bullwhip.
"You look familiar..." he said. "...Why do I feel I've seen you before
somewhere...? What is your name...?"
"Me? I am Shahar Yajna, sir... a novitiate
of the Temple of Mnenomon in Jawwaz. Perhaps you attended a feast day at our
shrine?"
"Jawwaz, you say?" Hakkan's eyes
thinned. "I've never even been to-"
He was cut off by a resounding crash so
loud and destructive it sent a flurry of dust throughout the camp. All eyes
turned to the Ziggurat of Mnenomon as one of the ropes connected to a pulley
snapped and its gigantic stone fell crashed into the base of the structure. The
shockwave knocked the slaves screaming from their feet and shot up a plume of
dust and rubble that rocked the scaffolds from their walls. Slaves and slave
tamers alike ran for their lives as one by one they toppled over and crushed to
death anyone unlucky enough to be caught in their shadows. A nearby Wahdi
dropped his spear and sounded the alarm bell as dust clouds swallowed up the
camp.
"Damn!" Yelled Hakkan. "Secure the
livestock!"
With a man like him there was no telling
if he meant the oxen or the slaves. As Hakkan's slave tamers and the Wahdis
scrambled to contain the chaos, a hooded Abana returned to his horse discreetly
slipped away.
**********
(Late Winter, 1179)
Abana of Hafiz knew fear.
Fear of the future. Fear of lust. Fear
of violence. Fear of wrath. But this was a fear he could not comprehend. He
only felt it – choking and intrusive like a stone in his chafed throat,
foreboding like the distant crackle of thunderheads on an open plain. This was
a primal fear from a forgotten time predating the creation of the wheel and the
conquest of fire. Abana felt it from the pit of his stomach to the marrow of
his spine as he watched those creatures crawl out of their own caskets to kill
him and the man he loved. For all the horrors this miserable life had shown and
rendered unto him... none compared to absolute horror of this necromancy.
Ghouls.
Beneath the ancient finery time had
ravaged into tattered rags, their marbled skins yet clung to their bones like
the sloughing flesh of a leper. They moved in shuffles and jerks and twitches
like puppets dancing on strings, eyes flaming blood in the dark before they
came screaming for him.
But Maliq's battle roar shattered
through their screeching din. The first of Rahab's ghouls pounced off the
ground and threw itself at the swordsman just as Jahanshah slipped free of its
sheath and sailed through its spinal bones. The ghoul split into two halves and
shattered against the floor into a puddle of itself, its fractured arms, legs and skull wriggling and twitching in the dust until
they fell still again. By that time two more ghouls were upon the Jamaran, one
scuttling across the floor to gnash at his feet with its teeth as the second
ran at Maliq from his left. Growling, Maliq stomped his sandaled foot through
the crawling ghoul's skull and stomped it into an ashen pulp, but even headless,
the magics empowering that ghoul remained strong enough for it to snatch its
arms around Maliq's leg and hold him fast. The other ghoul hurled itself at him
before he could raise his sword and the three fell backwards into the dirt,
wrestling for supremacy.
"Maliq!"
His kidney spike was gone. The closest
object to hand was a fallen candelabra. Instinct alone made Abana grab and bash
open the skull of the creature writhing on top of his lover's sword. The blow
cracked its cranium like an egg and splattered its effluvium over his face;
sodden grey matter pickled with marrow. Maliq shoved the corpse off his
breastplate. Its red eyes went dark again.
"Abana! Stay behind me!"
Maliq shouted this as two more ghouls
shambled towards them from left and right. This time he did not wait for them
to attack – he threw himself at them. Abana stared in awe as the former
Bloodshield cut through the creatures of the underworld with his grandfather's
glittering blade. The severed remnants of a dishonoured nobility; rib bones and
skull fragments and broken thoraxes; floated through the rank air like threshed
wheat.
Bony fingers slapped around Abana's
mouth.
It was Rahab – not his ghouls.
Only one Ghoul remained to battle Maliq
as the sorcerer dragged his former slave off into a secluded corridor of the
mausoleum. Abana tried to scream but his throat was too weak, he tried to
wriggle free but even half-dead Rahab was so much larger and stronger than he
was. The sorcerer shoved him against a wall so hard it knocked the breath from
his lungs – then opened his palm and summoned more of his magical flame.
Abana's body flushed with pale light as Rahab's magic lifted him into the air
and held him fast.
"I will drain every drop of energy from
your body," spat Rahab. "Your life essence will keep me alive until I find an
antidote for your damned poison..."
"RAHAB!"
Two sudden and powerful slashes cut open
the governor's cassock and sliced deep into the muscles of his back. The old
man screamed. Blood hit the walls and the floor in streaks. The white light in
his hand disappeared, as did the white light surrounding Abana's body. The
Kushwari boy felt himself fall out of the air and crash into a burial urn that
exploded into fragments and ash. He hacked and wheezed, unable to move at all,
as the man he loved most in the world faced the one he hated
most.
Rahab climbed back onto his feet. Blood
streamed down his back from open wounds. "How... dare you...! How DARE you defy me!
I am your MASTER!"
"We are our own masters now!" Yelled Maliq. "It ends here, Rahab!
Once and for all!"
The sorcerer raised up his sword as that
burning white fire enveloped its broad blade. "...Perhaps for you and your little
whore, you loathsome Jafari mongrel... but this is not my end... now DIE!"
Even with his back carved open and
glutting with blood. Even with the bitterblack poison creeping through his
organs. Even with the corpuscular degeneration that caused Kafnak to break
faith with their pact – Rahab of Mahmun still had enough strength in his
haggard body to leap forward with that burning sword and rain blow after blow
at Maliq's defences. He fought with a rage of a man denied. He shrieked with
fury with every slash and thrust as the Jamaran fended off his blows. Sparks
danced off their clashing blades and lit up the blackened corridor as Rahab
forced Maliq backwards into the mausoleum.
Maliq. When Abana opened his
burning eyes all he saw was black ash. Maliq. They streamed with tears
when he scrubbed them clean, but he could see... and he saw his love being pushed
back by his hated former master. Maliq. Abana rolled off his back onto
his belly. The broken shards of painted pottery gouged his skin, but he was
barely aware of it even as he bled from them. Maliq. Abana fought his
way onto his feet even as his whip wounds scorched with agony beneath the binds
Maliq tied. It did not matter. His body did not matter – he just needed to get
up. Abana dug his nails into the wall and hauled himself upright. Sweat dripped
down his nose and brow as he then padded along and followed the claps of
clashing metal echoing in the distance.
All around them the walls of the
mausoleum were shaking. Numerous cracks broke into the domed ceiling and spat
streams of sand. Smoke from the burning fires above seeped into the mausoleum
and its chambers. The Elephant Palace would be a mound of rubble before
sunrise. Yet Rahab fought on and on like a man possessed, battering away at
Jahanshah. With each strike Maliq's stance lost more of its form, his arms and
legs shaking at each impact, his reserves of strength whittling away...
...and then Rahab stopped.
The governor fell to his knees.
Breathless. His shoulders heaved. His bony breast punched in and out with his
every racing breath. And then his mouth gaped open as his guts vomited up a
sickly gout of blood, bile and undigested fish.
"...P-Poison..." muttered Rahab.
Maliq caught his breath as Rahab slowly
lost his. Abana fought through the mist of blood loss to keep his eyes open.
That was how he was still able to see it when Maliq weakly lifted his sword and
thrust forward. One last charge whilst the sorcerer was down.
Jahanshah flew through the dust and
smoke. Half-cataracted eyes rolled up in their sockets. They caught it, the
sight of it, that flash of steel warping through the air, and Rahab thrust out
his longer arm in response. Maliq's whole body jerked back as Rahab plunged his
flaming sword into the warrior's chest.
Abana's heart sank.
"NOOOOOO!"
The paladin's blade Jahanshah fell out a
limp hand. A pair of kind eyes, the colour of almonds, rolled into the back of
a skull. Noble blood flowed down a thick blade embedded in a fragile iron
breastplate... and Abana of Hafiz watched helplessly as his lover, Khamali Maliq
Moromaya, slumped dead upon the mausoleum floor.
**********