The Dark Lord

CHAPTER TWENTY

The Sinai, Near Pelusium

Wind kicked out of the south, throwing fine sheets of dust across the dune. Three figures paced along the crest of a long, wind-compacted ridge, desert cloaks ruffling around their legs. To their right, to the east, complete darkness lay on the land. The moon had not risen and there was nothing to break the mantle of night; no habitation, no campfire, not even the glint of a traveler's lantern. To the west, though, long twisting lines of lights burned in the night. Hundreds of torches and dozens of bonfires gleamed and flickered. Even at this late hour, there was a murmur in the air, the distant echo of hammers, mattocks, braying mules and shouting men.

"Do they sleep?" Shahr-Baraz stopped, boot toes on the lip of the dune, darkness below, only the bare light of the stars and far-off lanterns on his face. Sand spilled away, making a soft ssssshh sound. The King of Kings drew back a length of cloth covering his face. "They must sleep by turns… passing tools from hand to hand. Some will never see daylight, not with the exhausted rest they earn from such labor. Sorcerer, what do your secret eyes behold, in the camps of the enemy?"

The second figure was already watching the night, lean head turned to the west. In the darkness, a pale witch-light crept across his skin-invisible by daylight-heightening the cadaverous planes of his face and skull.

"I see a hive of bees," Dahak whispered, "swarming around a fat queen. Busy, always busy, coming and going, building, digging, setting stone and wood, bending the earth to their will…"

"What are their numbers?" Shahr-Baraz pulled back the cowl, letting cold night air play in his hair. "How many Legions? Who is their master? How deep and wide is this wall of stone?"

The sorcerer hissed, displeased, and he looked at the King of Kings in anger. "You have eyes," he snapped. "Look for yourself!"

"I have," the shahanshah said, hooking both thumbs in his belt. The broad leather strap was heavy with scabbards and sheaths. A plain-hilted sword, two daggers and a mace hung against flat thighs. The king did not go unarmed into the desert night. "My scouts cannot see beyond the Roman lines-you can. Will you answer my questions?"

"I could," Dahak said, his full attention focused on the king. The air grew colder, the faint light around the sorcerer stronger. "Yet my attention is on many things… some are far away. Isn't your army strong enough?" A thin finger jabbed out at the lights in the west. "Do you need my help to pass this barrier?"

Shahr-Baraz frowned, a glint of anger in his eyes for the first time. "Our backs are to the desert, our enemies entrenched behind a wall of stone and earth the height of a goodly building. We must ship water from Gazzah, a hundred miles away, to share a cup among three men. The legionaries mock us from atop their wall and everywhere my scouts go, the Romans are waiting." The king waved a flat, broad hand, indicating the horizon from south to north. "Their wall runs from vast bogs of cane, mud and crocodiles to the sea… an enormous work. The Roman fleet is waiting on the blue water and I will not chance risking our fleet, or my men, on a sea attack behind the wall. We cannot go around to the south, for the footing is poor for our horses, the sand deeper, then the land a poisonous morass…"

"Then you do need my help," the sorcerer interrupted, smug. "You wish me to open a way forward, as I did at Constantinople?"

"Yes," Shahr-Baraz said in a level tone. "Can you summon the worms of G'harne to consume the Romans? Break down their rampart, shatter their gates?" The king's voice became contemplative, curious. He seemed to loom over the sorcerer. "Have you a second Axumite box? Holding pearls of an unusual hue?"

The Queen, standing quietly a few yards away, froze, barely even breathing. She stilled her mind as well, thinking of things far away and long ago, pleasant and innocuous. Only in the faintest whisper, at the back of her mind, well disguised behind remembered chatter and gossip, did she shudder in fear. What did he say? That was one of the forbidden names! The words slipped away from her memory, bubbles of oil rising in dark water.

Dahak raised a hand, a muttered curse under his breath. The crawling, leprous radiance on his skin vanished, plunging them into complete darkness. Even the stars were faint and cast no light on the sand. "Be quiet!" The words were a low hiss. "Where did you hear that name?"

"From you." Even in low tones, the Boar's voice was a hoarse shout. "You were careless, I think, to tell me so much."

"I was." Dahak moved in the darkness and the Queen gained the impression he was drawing something, some figure or diagram, on the sand with his staff. "The old ones are not a toy to be brought out at a king's whim. Even I-and my power is great, O King-will not tempt them a second time."

Rumbling laughter answered and the clink and rattle of metal on metal. "A single throw of the bones, then? So be it. Are your dead men in the Roman camp?"

"No," Dahak said, grudgingly. Despite her best intent, the Queen's ears pricked up and she listened intently, eyes closed, barely breathing. "They cannot be everywhere… and the Roman magi are thick as flies, crawling about in their hive, long noses in everything. They are alert and fearful. I do not want to risk the Sixteen so openly."

"Can you send some in, even one alone? They will not mind death, or pain, if caught." Shahr-Baraz seemed ghoulishly pleased at the prospect. "I thought there were several in the delta already?"

"They are busy on other, more important, errands." The sorcerer sounded irritated. He was still concentrating on the lights in the west. "What is this? The Egyptian priests are binding a pattern into the stone and earth. They think they can keep out my dreams!"

Silence followed. The Queen could hear Shahr-Baraz breathing. Finally, the king stirred. "Do they know you are here?"

"No…" Dahak did not sound convinced. "Perhaps. They are not blind. They can feel me, as I feel them-buzzing gnats, a racket of crickets, the mindless chatter of the small… I can taste their fear."

"It is time to reveal yourself." Shahr-Baraz's voice was firm and the words a command.

The Queen heard a sharp intake of breath and two pale points of light gleamed in the darkness as the sorcerer turned towards the king. She clutched her cloak tighter, trying to keep out the chill seeping from the air. Frost began to form on the wool.

"You…" The sorcerer's voice was thick, barely intelligible. "You are not the master here!"

"We must break through the Roman lines," Shahr-Baraz said, ignoring the venom in the sorcerer's voice. "We cannot go around. We cannot remain here, slowly dying of thirst. Now, you have pressed me to strike against Rome. You were eager to go forward. If we do not attack within the next few days, I will turn around and return to Persia."

The Queen, heart beating like a drum, flattened herself onto the sand, quiet as a mouse.

"Ssss!" Dahak sputtered, then mastered himself. As the Queen watched, frost crystallized on the sand; tiny white flakes drifting from the sky. Her breath made a white haze in the air. "Where is the Boar's cunning now? You wish to charge ahead, to impale yourself on their spears? We must go around! Find a way!"

"We cannot," Shahr-Baraz said, perfectly calm. "Our fleet, though strong, does not have enough stowage for all of our men and horses. If we attack by sea, then we go ashore with a fraction of our strength… and the Romans will close upon us with all of theirs. I will not waste an army, even one composed of barbarians and mercenaries."

"The south, then. My powers will find us a path through the sand!"

The Queen quelled herself again, stilling a wild urge to cry out, or run. The sorcerer's tone verged on something like fear. What horror could strike caution into that black heart? Wild speculation churned in the Queen's mind, but thought was dangerous, and she focused, again, on inconsequential matters.

"Can your powers draw water from the sand?" Shahr-Baraz was curious again. "Each step we take from the sea and our barges means water, food, fodder must be carried for leagues across the desert… all exposed to Roman attack while we toil slowly through the wasteland." The King of Kings sighed, and the Queen felt his attention turn upon her for a moment. She remained still. It seemed, for a moment, as if he was going to speak to her. He turned back to the sorcerer. "Can you?"

Dahak did not answer. The cold grew. The Queen began to shiver uncontrollably. At last the sorcerer said, "I cannot. But I will not reveal myself to the enemy, not yet. It is too dangerous!"

"Why?" Even with such a short utterance, the Queen could hear the hint of a mocking smile in the king's voice. She began to wonder why he'd taken such a long walk, in darkness, with the two of them. She squeezed her eyes shut, expecting some brilliant flare of destruction to light the rolling dunes. "You have been very wary, sorcerer, since we captured Constantinople. Furtive, even."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean," Shahr-Baraz said in a musing tone, "you once feared to cross the narrow strait before Constantinople, demanding a bridge of saplings, layered with earth. Yet you later rushed to board a ship, the Queen's ship, to be carried across to Chalcedon-without a single precaution. I know full well you can summon powers and servants to carry you great distances in the blink of an eye-yet you hide in your wagon, surrounded by the army, moving at a snail's pace across the land. Indeed, you have abstained from your usual violence, your usual hunger." Shahr-Baraz paused and now the Queen knew he was laughing at the sorcerer. "Who are you hiding from, old snake?"

There was no answer, only a crack of frozen cloth as the sorcerer settled on his haunches, squatting on the ground like a common tailor. The Queen did not move-indeed, now she wondered if she could move, so cold had her limbs become. After a minute there was a muted, soft muttering. The Queen realized the sorcerer was arguing with himself.

Something touched her shoulder and she started. Shahr-Baraz loomed over her. "You're freezing," he said quietly, mustache white with frost rime. The Queen could see the stars around his head, burning very cold and bright, like a crown. "Here…" He lifted her gently, powerful arms making light work of her thin frame. The Queen felt faint, her head throbbing. The king folded her in his cloak, and she swallowed a gasp, feeling the warmth of his body-hot as a furnace, it seemed-against her frigid hands. Curling herself up, the Queen pressed against his chest. The cloak folded around her.

"You are rash," Dahak said, rising up from the sand. His voice was brittle in the darkness, bottled fury straining against a tight leash. "Endless torments await those who have displeased me… your shell, stripped of will and thought, will serve as well as this living body! I thought you a wiser man, Baraz, a wiser man…"

"Huh." The king lifted his beard at the sorcerer. "I have listened to Khadames and his stories of your plans and plots, your secret fortress in the east, your ever-growing strength. You are strong, but I see you are afraid of something. Something you found, something you saw, in the Roman city. I will tell you now, sorcerer, I am not afraid. Of you, or what you fear." Shahr-Baraz stopped, waited a beat of his heart, then said, "We must attack or leave. You must choose."

"Sssshhhhh!" Lightning flickered in a clear sky, the stars rippling. The Queen heard a grinding sound. "We cannot go back." Anger, fear and defeat mixed in the sibilant voice. "We must go forward."

"Then you must reveal yourself, for we cannot advance without your strength to break the Roman wall!" The king's voice rose sharply.

"I will not!" hissed the sorcerer. Around the three figures, the sand was suddenly whipped by a fierce wind, swirling around them. The air blurred, filled with flying grit. "Not yet! I am not ready!"

"Then-" Shahr-Baraz stopped. Cold, frost-streaked fingers pressed against his lips. The Queen turned her head, barely able to draw breath in the chill air. She felt weak too, as if the power rising in the air drained her life out like a leech.

"There is a way," she croaked, rich contralto ruined by the thin atmosphere. "Lord Prince, you could exert your power through another. You need not appear yourself, where men might see. They would see another face, and-being men-draw false theorems from poor evidence."

Dahak paused, eyes narrowing, and the pale radiance surging across his flesh brightened. Shahr-Baraz looked down, a slow smile growing in his face. His mustaches tickled her face and the Queen sneezed. Embarrassed, she wiped her nose.

"Can this be done?" The king sounded pleased.

"Perhaps…" the sorcerer growled, expression turning sour. "The jackal is biddable… I can see through his eyes, move his limbs." A sardonic, foul smile grew on his face. "Oh, sweet Queen, you are filled with excellent advice. Yes-I can move dear Arad like a puppet-pour my will into his shell. He will be the very figure of power! Little Zoe and Odenathus can be at his side…"

"Then," the king said, cutting off the sorcerer with a sharp tone. "We will attack in two days."

Dahak nodded, turning away. The night swallowed him up immediately, shadow on shadow.

The King of Kings climbed another dune, one of an endless succession stretching off to the south. A thin moon crept up the eastern sky, shedding a furtive, distorting light. The Queen was in his arms, carried as easily as a child, head leaning against a broad chest. The strange chill had fallen away and the desert night-cold by any other standard-seemed warm in comparison. The Boar's boots dug into the sand, which spilled away behind him in long trails. Ahead, the lights of the Persian encampments were beginning to sparkle.

"Why did you command our presence, my lord?" The Queen was still weak, but her voice was recovering. Feeling was beginning to creep back into her hands and feet.

Shahr-Baraz looked down, distant firelight glinting in his eyes. "I wanted to speak with you and with the sorcerer, in private, without witness or hungry ears at the door."

The Queen licked her lips. "We are… allies, my lord. You have but to ask."

He nodded. They reached the top of the dune and he paused, rolling his shoulders. "Our other… ally… recently expressed his extreme displeasure with you, my lady. In my hearing."

The Queen tried to muster a laugh, though it came out more a rasping croak. "The lord Khalid does not love me today."

"No," Shahr-Baraz allowed. "This matter is none of my concern, save I am puzzled by your desire to send a troop of his horsemen to garrison a town previously held by your soldiers. I have not been king for very long, my lady! I would be loath to give up such a rich prize…"

The Queen tried to laugh again, but this time nothing came out. Her thoughts crystallized like the dying air. Could he guess? But how? He cannot read minds… For a moment, she couldn't think of anything to say. She was only conscious of the man's powerful arms and the heat of his body.

"I… saw trouble, my lord. There was bad blood between the two men-between Lord Khalid and the Ben-Sarid chieftain, Uri. I heard… rumors… Khalid would use the Ben-Sarid rashly in this campaign. So Uri would be killed by the Romans and Khalid's hands would be clean."

The Boar made a gruff, grunting sound of displeasure. The Queen's heart beat again. "This seemed wasteful and petty," she continued. "So I sent Uri and his men away, with a letter for the garrison commander, directing him to join us on the march in all haste. They are Greeks out of the Decapolis and will rejoice to fight beside their brothers."

Shahr-Baraz began walking again, half-sliding, half-stepping down the further slope of the dune. "The lord Ben-Sarid reached Aelia Capitolina safely, then."

"Yes," the Queen said, closing her eyes. "Later, Lord Khalid expressed his opinion to me. His words were heartfelt, if not temperate. He is not a reticent young man."

"No…" The Boar refrained from laughing, though the Queen could feel a powerful guffaw bubbling in his chest. "No, he is not. I saw the Greeks arrive-a strong garrison to leave in some hill town!"

The Queen made a tiny, shrugging motion. "The city has a large Roman colony. They are restive, needing a firm hand to keep them in line. Uri will do that, I think."

"Good." Shahr-Baraz entered the camp, striding swiftly now across hard-packed earth littered with tiny stones. Guardsmen appeared out of the darkness, saw the King of Kings, then faded away again. It was very late and a rattle of snoring echoed among the tents. The Queen craned her head, looking about.

"I can walk, I think." She could see the tents of the Palmyrene contingent not far away. Shahr-Baraz halted, swinging her gently around to stand upright. She clutched his arm, nails digging into the heavy cloak, then stamped her feet. They were tingling fiercely. "Ow," she muttered.

"Have your slaves warm some water, then plunge your feet in," the King of Kings said, grinning. He held up his massive right hand. The last joint of his ring finger was missing. "I was trapped in ice, once, for just a little too long. Then we rode hard, killing two horses, before we could stop. I was lucky-could have lost my toes, even my leg. Good night."

The Queen watched the Boar stride off, unaffected by the long walk over the dunes, the dreadful cold, the sorcerer's anger, anything at all. She licked her lips, stomach tight. The king is no fool. He might suspect, she thought, turning remembered words over in her mind. He might guess…

Zoe shuffled off through the tents, thin shoulders hunched, thinking furiously.