The Daylight War

12

333 AR Summer

28 Dawns Before Waning

Abban gasped for breath, sweating onto the fine silk sheets of the master bed in the Palace of Mirrors. The very bed where Ahmann first took Mistress Leesha, a bed yanked out from under Damaji Ichach at Abban’s suggestion. It pleased him to steal his own pleasure there, marking the silk while the leader of the Khanjin tribe laid his head in some lesser place.

Shamavah was already on her feet, pulling on her black robes. ‘Up with you, fat one. You’ve had your draining, and time is short.’

‘Water,’ Abban groaned as he sat up. Shamavah went to the silver pitcher cooling on the table. Beads of water ran down the metal as she poured a cup, much as beads of sweat ran down his skin.

‘One of these days your heart will give way, and control of your fortune pass to me,’ she taunted, quenching her own thirst before refilling the cup and bringing it to him.

Had any of his other wives dishonoured him so, Abban would have taken the cane to her himself, but for Shamavah he only smiled. His Jiwah Ka had never been the most beautiful of his wives, and her fertile years had long since waned, but she was the only one he bedded for love.

‘You already control my fortune,’ Abban said, taking the cup and draining it as she began helping him into his clothes.

‘Perhaps that is why you send me away,’ Shamavah said.

Abban reached out, taking her face in his free hand. He knew she was only teasing, but still it was too much to bear. ‘I will curse every minute we are apart.’ He winked. ‘And not just because I will need to work twice as hard without you.’

Shamavah kissed his hand. ‘Thrice.’

Abban nodded. ‘But it is for that very reason that I trust no one else to begin our dealings with the Hollow tribe. We must secure our operations and win the greenlanders over, even if it means red in the ledger at first.’

‘Nie take me first,’ Shamavah said. ‘It did not take long to buy the Hollowers’ trust, and they sold it cheaply. They do not have the stamina to hide their weakness for long.’

It was true enough. When they first set out from Deliverer’s Hollow, the Northerners all quieted whenever Abban drew near, mistrustful of any with a dusky tone to their skin. But Abban always came bearing gifts. Nothing so bold as gold or jewels — that would offend these people. But a silk pillow casually offered to one rubbing a sore backside from long days on a cart bench? A flattering word when it was needed? Exotic spices to flavour their cookpot? A few bits of common knowledge about his people?

These things the Northerners accepted freely, congratulating themselves over learning to say ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ in his language as if it were some great deed.

And so they began talking to him, still guarded, but with increasing comfort, letting him lead a conversation about the weather into talk of harvest festivals and holidays, marriage customs and morality. The Northerners loved the sound of their own voices.

It wasn’t the information Ahmann wanted, of course. The Deliverer wanted troop sizes and positions, points of military or symbolic significance, and maps. He wanted maps most of all. The Rizonan Messengers’ Guild had burned theirs the day the Krasians attacked, and the idiot Sharum had not bothered to stop them. The maps in Duke Edon’s library were extensive for his own lands, but for those outside his borders they were a decade old. To the north, Deliverer’s Hollow was growing exponentially. Small villages were swelling with refugees, and new settlements were forming, many far away from the Messenger roads Ahmann needed to move the full strength of his forces.

‘The landscape is changing,’ Ahmann had said. ‘We cannot achieve victory without understanding that change.’

It was sound military thinking, but gullible though they were, the Hollowers were not such utter fools as to reveal such information. Yet while Ahmann might turn up his chin at gossip and bickering, Abban knew it for the power it was.

Great things can be found in small talk, his father Chabin used to say.

Shamavah had done much the same when the greenlanders came to the Palace of Mirrors. All Abban’s wives and daughters spoke Thesan, but on her orders they had pretended only a handful of words, turning simple interactions into such complicated pantomime that the Hollowers had quickly stopped bothering to speak to them despite their near-constant presence. They silently brought food, cleared away refuse, changed linens, and carried water, all but invisible.

After weeks on end, the greenlanders no longer bothered to hide their petty squabbling. Even when they thought they were alone, more often than not they stood near one of the palace’s many air vents, and Shamavah had women ‘cleaning’ the central shafts continually. Abban read their reports, detailing everything from privy habits to sexual encounters. Some he read with more pleasure than others.

Now the leanings of the Northerners’ hearts were open scrolls. Know a person’s desires, his father had told him, and you can charge whatever you wish to fulfil them.

Like the steps of a ladder, he had built their trust, keeping their secrets and offering sound advice. Occasionally he even seemed to suggest a course not to his master’s advantage, a tactic any child in the bazaar knew to mistrust. But the trick always seemed to work on greenlanders, the best of whom were poor hagglers.

Most delicious was when he could offer up a secret about Inevera, buying their trust even as he helped thwart the manipulations of the Damajah.

She was beginning to suspect his hand now, but it mattered little. He had made his opening moves too subtly for her to oppose him openly, using unwitting agents — including Ahmann himself. The Shar’Dama Ka might publicly heap abuse on Abban, but he tolerated none of it from others, brutally putting down even his sons and closest advisors when they tried to bully the khaffit.

But it was not enough. Sooner or later, Inevera or one of the others would have him poisoned, or killed in his bed, unless he vastly increased his protections.

‘I fear for you while I am gone,’ Shamavah said, as if reading his thoughts. ‘You and the rest of our family, now that we must leave the Palace of Mirrors.’

‘Look to your own concerns in the coming months,’ Abban said. ‘I can see to my own protection, and that of our women, while you are gone.’

‘And our sons?’ Shamavah asked.

Abban let out a deep sigh as he straightened his turban in the mirror and reached for his camel crutch. ‘That will be more difficult,’ he admitted. ‘But one problem at a time. For now, you have a caravan to catch.’

When he had seen his wife and the greenlanders off, Abban limped back to Ahmann’s palace. Duke Edon’s manse was the most impressive and defensible structure in Everam’s Bounty, though it was dwarfed by the palaces of the Desert Spear. Abban himself had larger holdings in Krasia, though his were disguised as crumbling warehouses in poor districts. It was unwise for a khaffit to advertise his wealth to the local dama and Sharum.

The Damaji and most powerful dama had claimed all the grandest structures in Everam’s Bounty when the city was captured, and the Sharum had snatched up the best of what remained. Abban had been left with a humble abode in the poorest and most remote section of town, the building not even large enough to properly house all his wives, daughters, and servants. His pavilion in the new bazaar was grander.

In the short term, Abban had solved the problem by moving everyone into the Palace of Mirrors while he quietly bought all the land in his poor neighbourhood. Slaves worked day and night, secretly tunnelling the perimeter. He would fill the tunnels with poured stone to found his outer wall, the materials already stockpiled. By the time anyone knew what was happening, the wall would be up, and safe from prying eyes, though even those would see only a squat block of a building with nothing to note the splendour within.

But a wall was nothing without warriors to guard it. Abban was no warrior, but he knew their value. He had many muscular chin slaves, but they were no match for true Sharum. If he wasn’t prepared, the Damaji would take his new palace from him the moment the final brick was laid.

The halls of the Shar’Dama Ka’s palace were full of dama and dama’ting, with Sharum marching to and fro, guarding every archway and door. Black-clad dal’ting scurried about carrying trays and laundered linen. Abban kept his eyes down, exaggerating his limp as his crutch thumped a steady beat on the thick carpet.

Always appear weaker than you are, Chabin had taught, and Abban had taken the lessons well. Shattered decades ago, his leg pained him still, but not half so much as he let on, even to Ahmann. A simple cane would have sufficed, but the crutch made him seem that much more helpless. As intended, almost everyone avoided him with their eyes, that they not show their disgust.

Hasik stood outside the throne room, and glowered as Abban approached. Ahmann’s entire inner circle despised the khaffit, but Hasik had a capacity for hatred and sadism that surpassed any man Abban had ever met. Tall and muscular enough to wrestle the Northern giants in Deliverer’s Hollow, he had been given special training in sharusahk since becoming bodyguard to the Deliverer. Pain meant nothing to Hasik, and even kai’Sharum feared to face him. For Hasik did not simply defeat his enemies. He left them crippled and humiliated.

They knew each other from sharaj, when Abban and Ahmann had been friends, and Hasik Ahmann’s greatest rival. Now Hasik served Ahmann fanatically, but his hatred of Abban had only grown, especially since Abban took every chance he could to flaunt the fact that Hasik was only a bodyguard, while he had the Deliverer’s ear.

Unable to strike at Abban directly, Hasik vented his frustrations on Abban’s women, coming often to his pavilion and home on some errand for the Deliverer, always making time to break some item of great value or rape whichever of Abban’s wives or daughters was nearest to hand.

In the Palace of Mirrors, his women had been safe from Hasik, and denied this pleasure the brutal warrior’s loathing had multiplied. His nostrils flared like a bull as the khaffit approached, and Abban wondered if he would be able to control himself.

‘Don’t just stand there, open the door,’ Abban snapped. ‘Or shall I tell the Deliverer you delayed my answering his summons?’

Hasik gaped and looked like he was going to choke on his own tongue. Abban watched in amusement as he sputtered, but he did at last open the portal.

Ahmann had made enough examples of those who would hinder Abban that even Hasik dare not do so. His eyes promised vengeance as Abban passed, but the khaffit only smiled in return.

There was a knot of Damaji and various hangers-on around Ahmann as Abban limped into the throne room, but Ahmann dismissed them with a wave. ‘Leave us.’

The men all shot glares at Abban, but none dared disobey. Ahmann led the way into a smaller side chamber. There was a great oval table of dark polished wood surrounded by twenty chairs, a throne at its head. Behind the throne was a great map covering an entire wall, and the table was laden with fresh food and drink.

‘She has left?’ Ahmann asked when they were alone.

Abban nodded. ‘Mistress Leesha has agreed to allow me to set up a trading post for the Hollow tribe. It will help facilitate their integration, and give us valuable contacts in the North.’

Ahmann nodded. ‘Well done.’

‘I will need men to guard the shipments, and the stores at the post,’ Abban said. ‘Before, I had servants for such heavy duty. Khaffit, perhaps, but fit men.’

‘Such men are all kha’Sharum now,’ Ahmann said.

Abban bowed. ‘You see my difficulty. No dal’Sharum will take orders from khaffit in any event, but if you would allow me to select a few kha’Sharum to serve me in this regard, it would be most satisfactory.’

Ahmann’s eyes narrowed. He was guileless, but no fool. ‘How many?’

Abban shrugged. ‘I could make do with a hundred. A pittance.’

‘No warrior, even a kha’Sharum, is a pittance, Abban,’ Ahmann said.

Abban bowed. ‘I will pay their family stipends from my own coffers, of course.’

Ahmann considered a moment longer, then shrugged. ‘Pick your hundred.’

Abban bowed as deeply as his crutch allowed. ‘I will need a drillmaster to continue their training.’

Ahmann shook his head. ‘That, my friend, I cannot spare.’

Abban smiled. ‘I was thinking perhaps Master Qeran.’ Qeran had been one of Abban and Ahmann’s own drillmasters when they were in sharaj. He was harsh, bigoted, and hated khaffit with a passion. He had also had his leg bitten so badly by a field demon that the dama’ting had been forced to amputate it. The drillmaster had healed, but his pride had not.

Ahmann looked at him in surprise. ‘Qeran? Who struck me for not dropping you to your death?’

Abban bowed. ‘The same. If the Deliverer himself decided to spare me, and has come to see my uses, perhaps the drillmaster will, too. He has been having a difficult time of late it seems. He still teaches in sharaj, but the nie’Sharum do not respect him as they once did.’

Ahmann grunted. ‘Nie’Sharum are ever fools until blooded, but there will be blood for all soon enough. If you wish Qeran to work for you, you may ask him, but I will not command it.’

Abban bowed again. ‘Will your promises to the mistress of the Hollow tribe alter your plans?’

Ahmann shook his head. ‘My promises affect nothing. It is still my duty to unite the people of the Northland for Sharak Ka. We will march on Lakton in the spring.’

Abban pursed his lips at that, but nodded.

‘You think it a mistake,’ Ahmann said. ‘You would have me wait.’

Abban bowed. ‘Not at all. I am told you have already begun recalling your forces.’

Ahmann nodded. ‘We have angered Alagai Ka by killing the demon princeling. The next Waning will bring the opening salvos of Sharak Ka. I can feel it in my heart. We must be ready.’

‘Of course,’ Abban agreed. ‘The chin are pacified and will offer little resistance even as you remove most of your warriors from their lands. Their women properly scarved, their sons taken for Hannu Pash, and their men enslaved. It will be years, though, before the boys are old enough to test as dal’Sharum, and their fathers, the chi’Sharum, are not progressing well in their training, I hear.’

Ahmann raised a brow at him. ‘You hear much from the Sharum pavilions, khaffit.’

Abban only smiled. ‘My leg may be crippled, my friend, but my ears are sharp.’

‘The boys taken for Hannu Pash have been separated from their families, and are young enough to forget the old ways,’ Ahmann said. ‘Many of them will be fine dal’Sharum, and a few of them valuable dama we can use to proselytize in the green lands. Their fathers, however, remember too much and learn too little. Most will never open their hearts to the honour we offer them by training them to fight in Sharak Ka.’

‘First you ask them to fight Sharak Sun against their greenland brothers,’ Abban noted. ‘That is a difficult thing for any man.’

‘The Daylight War has been foretold,’ Ahmann said. ‘It cannot be denied if we are to win against the alagai and rid the world of their taint forever.’

‘Prophecies are vague things, Ahmann, oft misunderstood until it is too late. All the stories in the Evejah tell us so.’ Abban held up his ledger, a heavy book with huge pages, all filled with neat, tiny lines of indecipherable code. ‘Profit margins speak clearer truth.’

‘So we will make of them a blunt instrument,’ Ahmann said. ‘Fodder for the slings and arrows of the enemy. They will be the shield of my army, even as the true Sharum are its spear.’

‘Your spears will have fine mounts, at least,’ Abban said. ‘We pride ourselves on our breeding in Krasia, but the herds of wild horses roaming the grasslands of Everam’s Bounty put them to shame. Mustang, the chin call them. Enormous, powerful beasts.’

Ahmann grunted. ‘They would have to be, to survive the night.’

‘The dal’Sharum have proven exceptional at hunting and breaking them,’ Abban said. ‘Your armies will be quick, and little will stand in the way of their charge.’

Ahmann nodded in satisfaction. ‘Spring cannot come soon enough. Every day we wait, our enemies have time to gather their forces.’

‘I agree,’ Abban said. ‘Which is why you should not wait. Attack Lakton on first snow.’

Ahmann looked at him in surprise, but Abban kept his face blank. It pleased him to so shock his friend.

‘Since when does Abban the coward ever suggest attack?’ Ahmann asked.

Abban held up his ledger. ‘When it is profitable.’

Ahmann looked at him a long time, then went and poured himself a goblet of nectar, sitting on his throne. He gestured at Abban to sit. ‘Very well. Tell me your prophecy of profit. How am I to know when the first snow will come? Are you now dama’ting, to see the future?’

Abban smiled and took a goblet of his own, sitting at the table and opening his ledger. ‘First snow is not an event, but a specific date in the Thesan calendar. Thirty days after autumn equinox. In Lakton, it is significant because it is when the harvest tithe from the hamlets is due to the Laktonian duke.’

‘And you want us to steal it,’ Ahmann surmised.

‘Spears are useless when carried by men with empty stomachs, Ahmann,’ Abban said. ‘Your army almost starved this past winter, especially after that fool dama set fire to the grain silos. We cannot afford another such blunder.’

‘Agreed,’ Ahmann said, ‘but now we control the largest swathe of farmland in the North. What need have we for more?’

‘We do,’ Abban agreed, ‘but so, too, has your army grown. There are now chi’Sharum in the thousands, and you have a growing nation to hold and feed. More than that, you must deprive Lakton of their winter stores. The city is built on a body of water so great, they say that from its centre one cannot see the shore in any direction.’

‘It seems impossible,’ Ahmann gestured to the great map on the wall, ‘but the greenlanders would appear to agree.’

‘No scorpion bolts or arrows will reach the city from the shore,’ Abban said. ‘If they can take their ships to the city full of provision, it may be a year or more before you can dislodge them.’

Ahmann steepled his fingers. ‘What do you propose?’

Abban rose heavily, leaning on his camel crutch as he limped over to the great map on the wall. Ahmann turned to regard the khaffit with interest.

‘Like Everam’s Bounty, Lakton has an eponymous city proper.’ He pointed with the tip of his crutch to the great lake and the city close to its western shore. ‘And dozens of hamlets throughout the duchy.’ He moved the head of his crutch in a circular motion around a much larger swathe of land. ‘These hamlets have land as fertile as Everam’s Bounty, with harvests nearly as prodigious, and they are all but unguarded.’

‘Then why not simply annex the hamlets and have done?’ Ahmann said.

Abban shook his head, waving his crutch over the area again. ‘The land is too vast to simply take. You do not have enough men, and would then need to harvest them yourself, if the inhabitants did not burn the fields the moment they saw your army on the horizon. Many would slip through your fingers, reaching the city in time for the dockmasters to pull stores and weigh anchor, locking the city tight.

‘Better to wait for first snow, and attack here.’ He pointed to a large village on the lake’s western shore. ‘Docktown. It is here the chin will bring their tithe, to be tallied by the dockmasters, loaded onto ships, and sent to the city on the lake. The dockmasters’ entire fleet will be docked or at anchor, waiting to fill their holds.

‘Docktown is weakly fortified, and will not be expecting an attack without warning so late in the season. But your army will be quick atop their mustang. An elite group could capture the entire harvest, the majority of Lakton’s docks, and half its fleet. Send your blunt instrument in behind to crush the hamlets once the surprise is done. Focus first on those along the lakeshore, denying safe harbour, and the Laktonians will be trapped on their island all winter without proper provision. Come spring, they may surrender without a fight, and if not, you will have ships of your own to fill with Sharum to take the city.’

Ahmann stared at the map a long time, frowning. ‘I will think on this.’

You will consult Inevera’s dice, you mean, Abban thought, but he was wise enough to keep silent about it. It would be well enough to consult the hora before such a risky undertaking.

With Ahmann’s writ in hand, Abban limped into the training grounds, headed for the Kaji’sharaj.

He was spotted immediately by Jurim, who had trained with him when they were both boys. Jurim had laughed when Abban fell from the Maze wall — shattering his leg — and had himself been cast down by Drillmaster Qeran as punishment. But while Abban remained forever crippled, Jurim had recovered fully. And he had not forgotten.

The warrior was taking his ease with others by the Kaji pavilion, enjoying cups of couzi and playing Sharak. It was a game Abban had been surprised to learn the greenlanders played as well, though they called it Succour and had different rules. One Sharum clattered the dice in a cup and threw, roaring with victory to the scowls of the others.

‘What are you doing here among men, khaffit?’ Jurim cried. The other warriors looked up at that. Abban’s heart sank at the sight of two of them, Fahki and Shusten.

His own sons.

Jurim rose to his feet, showing no sign that his back had been whipped raw barely a week past. He had always been a quick healer, even before he began absorbing demon magic at night.

The warrior approached, looming. Abban was by no means short, but Jurim was taller still and blade-thin, while fat Abban was stooped by weight and forced to lean on his crutch.

Jurim did not dare touch Abban — even with Ahmann nowhere in sight — but like Hasik, he missed no opportunity to hurt and humiliate his former classmate. While Hasik took his hatred out on Abban’s women, Jurim and Shanjat cut as deeply through his sons. The older men were Spears of the Deliverer after all, the most famed — and deadly — of the Shar’Dama Ka’s warriors, seasoned by battle and kept young and strong by the magic they absorbed on a nightly basis. Fahki and Shusten worshipped them.

The young men followed Jurim, but there was no greeting for Abban, not so much as the slightest acknowledgement in their eyes. Indeed, they looked at the ground, each other, off into the distance — anywhere save at their father. In a culture where the name of a man’s father was more important than one’s own, there could be no greater insult.

‘Your sons have made fine warriors,’ Jurim congratulated. ‘They were soft at first — as expected for blood of khaffit,’ Fahki spat in the dust at that, ‘but I have taken them under my shield, and found the steel in them.’ He smirked. ‘They must get it from their mother.’

All three warriors laughed at that, and Abban gripped the ivory haft of his crutch so tightly his hand ached. Its hidden blade was poisoned, and he could put it into Jurim’s foot before he ever saw the blow coming. But while it might earn him a moment’s respect in the eyes of his sons, it would be short-lived. Poison was a coward’s weapon after all, and it was death for a khaffit to strike a Sharum for any reason. Had he been anyone but the favourite advisor of the Deliverer, even speaking disrespectfully could earn him a spear in the chest.

Fahki and Shusten glared at him with barely hidden disgust. If he struck, they would turn him in to the nearest dama without hesitation, and his sentence would be carried out before Ahmann ever heard of it.

Abban kept his face blank and forced himself to bow, holding up the scroll with the Deliverer’s seal. Jurim, like many warriors, could not read, but he knew the crown and spear well. ‘I am here on the business of Shar’Dama Ka.’

Jurim scowled. ‘And what business is so important that you must sully the ground of warriors?’

Abban straightened. ‘That is not for you to know. Take me to Drillmaster Qeran, and be quick about it.’

Shusten snarled. ‘Do not take that tone with your betters, khaffit!’

Abban snapped a cold glare at him. ‘You may have inherited your mother’s steel, boy, but obviously not her brains if you would hinder the will of Shar’Dama Ka. Go find something useful to do or the next time I speak with him, I will mention to the Deliverer how his Sharum waste their days playing Sharak and drinking couzi when they should be training.’

The boys blanched at that, glancing at each other before hurrying off. Abban felt a cold satisfaction, but it did nothing to stem the blood from the knife twisting in his heart. That other men sneered at him for his crippled leg and coward’s heart, Abban had learned to live with. But a man that did not have the respect of his own sons was no man at all.

Soon, he promised himself. Soon.

Many of the Sharum flouted the restrictions of the Evejah, drinking couzi to give them courage in the night, and to forget the nights in the day. Few, though, were fool enough to get so drunk they could not stand at attention should a dama pass them by.

Qeran was that drunk and more. The drillmaster sat on a stained pillow with his back supported by the tent’s central pole, his black robes wet and stinking of vomit. Next to him lay his fine warded spear, a special crossbar added to allow him to use the weapon as a crutch. His left leg ended just below the knee, the leg of his pantaloons pinned back. Strapped to the stump was a simple wooden peg.

He glared at Abban as the khaffit entered, small eyes hard with hatred. ‘Come to gloat, khaffit? I’m nearly as useless as you now, but at least my place in Heaven is secure.’

Abban let the tent flap fall closed, leaving the two men alone. Then he spat at Qeran’s feet.

‘I am not useless, Drillmaster. I serve our master every day, and never once have I whined like a woman over my fate, much less drunk myself into a piss pool. Everam blessed you with a strong body, but I see without it, your heart is weak.’

Qeran’s face twisted with rage and he grabbed for his spear, meaning to leap to his feet and thrust it through Abban’s heart. But he was new to his wooden leg, and unsteady from the couzi. He stumbled, and it was all the time Abban needed to strike the peg hard with his crutch, knocking it clean off the drillmaster’s leg. As Qeran fell, he struck again, knocking away the spear.

The drillmaster hit the ground hard, and there was a click as Abban’s hidden blade snapped open, pointing right between his eyes.

‘You have killed many demons in your day, Drillmaster,’ Abban said, ‘but will even your place in Heaven remain secure if you are killed in your own filth by the crippled khaffit you cast from sharaj in shame?’

Qeran remained still a long time, his hard eyes nearly crossed as they watched the blade hovering at the bridge of his nose. ‘What do you want?’ he said at last.

Abban smiled, stepping back and retracting his blade so he could lean on his crutch as he bowed. From within his brightly coloured vest he produced the scroll marked with the Deliverer’s seal. ‘Why, to make you great again.’

Abban and Qeran drew many stares as they limped through the training ground toward the Kaji khaffit’sharaj. The drillmaster had been stripped by one of the jiwah’Sharum, doused in clean water, and dressed in fresh blacks. Abban knew without doubt that his head was pounding from the couzi as he squinted in the bright light of day, but the drillmaster had recovered something of himself and showed nothing of his discomfort. His back was straight as he walked, head high. As was the custom, Abban walked a step behind him, though he could easily have outpaced the slow gait Qeran required to walk with dignity.

They came to a section of grounds where tan-robed kha’Sharum trained — thousands in the Kaji tribe alone. Most practised the simple spear and shield forms Abban remembered from what seemed a lifetime ago, turning in unison, shields overlapping as they thrust their spears as one. A smaller group practised more advanced techniques.

Qeran spat. ‘Most of these men should still be in bidos, or better yet carrying water and polishing shields.’

A handful of young Sharum walked the ranks. They wore black, but the veils hanging loose around their necks were tan, marking them as khaffit drillmasters.

‘Pups,’ Qeran sneered, ‘sharpening their teeth on khaffit in hope of earning the red.’

One of the young drillmasters caught sight of them and approached, eyeing them with wary disdain until his eyes lighted on Qeran’s red veil. His eyes flicked up and lit with recognition as he met the drillmaster’s face. Qeran had been among the Spears of the Deliverer, and his reputation was well known. He and Drillmaster Kaval had trained the Shar’Dama Ka himself.

The young drillmaster bowed, ignoring Abban completely. ‘I am Hamash asu Gimas am’Tesan am’Kaji.’

Qeran returned his bow with a slight nod. ‘I trained your father. Gimas was a fierce warrior. He died well in the Maze.’

Hamash bowed again, more deeply this time. ‘What brings you to the khaffit’sharaj, honoured Drillmaster?’

Abban limped forward, holding out his writ. Drillmasters, like kai’Sharum, were given special training that included letters and warding, but from the way Hamash’s brow furrowed as he stared at the writ, he had obviously fallen short in his lessons.

Abban let the failing pass. It was to his advantage. ‘The Deliverer requires ten of your best kha’Sharum. I am to select them.’

‘You, a khaffit, mean to select warriors?’ Hamash said, eyes flicking to Qeran.

Abban smiled. ‘Who better? They are khaffit warriors, after all.’

‘Warriors, still,’ the young drillmaster growled.

‘Drillmaster Qeran will ensure they are fit to fight,’ Abban said. ‘I am to ensure they have brains in their heads.’

‘Only ten?’ Qeran asked quietly, too low for Hamash to hear. ‘You told me the Shar’Dama Ka commanded a hundred.’

‘The Deliverer has no tribe, Drillmaster,’ Abban said. ‘We will select ten from each.’

‘That is more than a hundred,’ Qeran said. There were twelve tribes of Krasia.

Smart for a Sharum, Abban mused. ‘I remember your training methods well, Drillmaster. There will be those who will not survive its rigours, and others who will not be fit for battle when you are finished.’ He tapped his own leg pointedly with his crutch. ‘We will start with one hundred and twenty, that you may kill or cast out those who fail you.’

Qeran grunted, and Hamash, who had been watching the exchange, met his eyes. His lip curled slightly in disgust. ‘Even a crippled drillmaster should not allow a khaffit to speak so boldly to him.’

Qeran’s calm eyes revealed nothing of his intentions as his spear haft snapped upward, taking Hamash between the legs. The young drillmaster bent forward, and Qeran spun the weapon, cracking it hard against the side of his head, knocking him to the ground.

Hamash was quick to roll aside, but Qeran anticipated the move, slamming the metal butt of his spear down just as he rolled into the blow. Hamash’s cheek tore open as several of his teeth shattered. He coughed blood and shards, trying vainly to regain his feet, but the beating did not stop there. Qeran had firm footing, and struck again and again. Most of the blows were painful but not meant for lasting damage, but when the young drillmaster continued to resist, there was a sharp crack as Qeran’s spear butt broke his right arm at the elbow. He roared with pain.

‘Embrace the pain and be silent, fool!’ Qeran hissed. ‘Your men are watching!’ Indeed, drillmasters and kha’Sharum alike had stopped their training, watching with mouths hanging open.

Qeran turned to look at the other drillmasters. ‘Strip the men to their bidos and form squads for inspection!’ he roared, and they scrambled as if the command had come from the Deliverer himself. In moments their spears and shields were neatly stacked, robes folded, and the men stood at attention in nothing but their tan loincloths.

Qeran jabbed the butt of his spear into Hamash, still writhing on the ground. ‘On your feet and heel me. I will already have your tan veil. Fall behind or disrespect me again and I’ll have your blacks as well.’

Abban resisted the urge to smile as Hamash struggled to his feet, his face pale and bloody. He had chosen his drillmaster well.

Looking pale and dazed, blood running down his face, Hamash stumbled after as they limped over to the first squad. Another tan-veiled drillmaster stood at attention before them. His bow to Qeran was so low, his beard nearly touched the ground.

They walked the line, Qeran calling each man forth, treating them no differently than slaves on the auction block.

‘Flabby,’ Qeran noted of the first, pinching at his arm, ‘but a few months of gruel and carrying stones as he runs around the city walls would cure him of that. Perform the first sharukin.’ The man began to sweat, but he complied, moving slowly through the series of movements.

Qeran spat in the dust. ‘Pathetic, even for a khaffit.’

‘What was your profession before you answered the Deliverer’s call to sharak?’ Abban asked the man, taking out his ledger and pen.

‘I was a lamp maker,’ the man said.

Abban grunted. ‘Were you master or apprentice?’

‘Master,’ the man said. ‘My father owned our business, but left me to train my sons.’

‘What difference does this make?’ Qeran demanded, but Abban ignored him, asking several more questions before moving to the next in line. He was so thin his bones showed through his skin as he stood in his bido. His eyes squinted as they came to stand before him.

Abban held up three fingers. ‘How many?’

The man squinted harder. ‘Two.’ There was doubt in his voice.

Abban took several steps back, and the squinting stopped. ‘Three,’ the man said more decisively.

Qeran gave the spindly man a shove and he fell onto his back in the dirt.

‘On your feet, dog!’ one of the tan-veiled drillmasters shouted, whacking at him with a spear butt, and the man quickly got back in line.

‘This one does not even belong here, much less among the Deliverer’s elite,’ Qeran said.

Again Abban ignored him, still facing the man. ‘Can you read? Do sums on a bead lattice?’

The man nodded. ‘I can, when I have my lenses.’

They continued on thusly, Qeran pinching and prodding the men as Abban interrogated them. Some few were ordered to stand apart from the others, a group of potentials for Abban and Qeran to choose from.

They approached one who stood a head and more higher than all the others, his chest broad and his arms thick with muscle. Abban smiled.

‘You will not want that one,’ one of the drillmasters advised. ‘He is strong as a herd of camels, but he cannot hear the signal horns — or anything else for that matter.’

‘You were not asked,’ Abban said. ‘I remember this one. He was one of the first to answer the Deliverer’s call. What is his name?’

The drillmaster shrugged. ‘No one knows. We simply call him Earless.’

Abban made a few sharp gestures, and the giant left the line to stand with the other potentials.

There were over a thousand Kaji kha’Sharum in the capital. When the dama sang the curfew from the minarets, they had barely seen half of them. They culled from the potentials as they went, but still there were more than fifty men following them. Abban and Qeran took these into the pavilion, testing and interrogating them further until the group was narrowed to twenty, then ten, until at last they agreed upon four, including the deaf and mute giant.

Qeran argued against the giant. ‘A warrior who cannot hear the horns is a liability.’

‘In alagai’sharak, perhaps,’ Abban agreed, ‘but as the dama’ting have their tongueless eunuchs, I can make good use of a man who will never overhear anything he shouldn’t.’

They returned the next day after court, spending every moment until sundown inspecting, testing, questioning, and arguing until satisfied. Six times, Qeran threatened to quit if Abban overruled him on a particular man.

‘Go, then,’ Abban said over the seventh, a pit dog from Sandstone. He was a powerful brute, but his eyes were glassy with stupidity, and he could barely count his fingers. ‘I will not have idiot soldiers.’ The brute glared at Abban, but Earless towered behind him, arms crossed, and he thought better of speaking.

Qeran glared at him, but Abban glared right back. At last, the drillmaster shrugged. ‘Would that you had such steel when you were a boy, I could have made a man of you.’

Abban smiled and gave a slight bow. ‘It was always there, Drillmaster. Just not for battle.’

‘You have a good eye,’ Qeran offered grudgingly in the end, as he looked over his ten new recruits. ‘I can make warriors of these men.’

‘Good,’ Abban said. ‘Tomorrow we will go to the Majah khaffit’sharaj and begin again.’

It was another day to vet the Majah, a third for the Mehnding. It went more quickly after that, the tribes shrinking in size as they went down the line of pavilions in the training ground. The smallest was the Sharach with only three dozen full dal’Sharum and barely a hundred kha’Sharum.

‘We passed over hundreds of better men in the Kaji,’ Qeran noted after they had selected the best the Sharach had to offer. Like many of the older warriors, trained before Ahmann united the tribes, Qeran was fiercely loyal to his own and would prefer the majority of his recruits share his blood.

Abban nodded. ‘But the Sharach are masters of the alagai-catcher.’ Indeed, they had watched the Sharach warriors drilling with the weapons, long hollow spears with a hoop of woven steel jutting from the butt end to loop around the neck of a demon or man. A lever near the crosspiece could quickly widen or constrict the hoop. There were sharusahk forms to leverage the weapon, keeping control of the victim.

‘I can teach the weapon well enough,’ Qeran said.

‘Well enough is not good enough, Drillmaster,’ Abban said.

The drillmaster showed his teeth. ‘I taught the Deliverer himself to fight. That is not good enough?’

Abban was unimpressed. ‘You taught him much, but the dama taught him more, and it was blending the two that gave him true mastery. Ahmann studies the sharukin of all tribes now, and you will, too. You will teach these men, but you will also learn all they know. The Nanji spear and chain. The Krevakh ladder techniques. Everything. And if you are not up to the task, I will find one who is.’

‘I can learn the tricks of lesser tribes,’ Qeran growled.

‘Of course,’ Abban agreed. ‘And improve many of them, no doubt. I chose the greatest living drillmaster for a reason. You will make the least of these men more than a match for any kai’Sharum.’

Qeran seemed mollified by that. Sharum were such simple creatures. A bit of lash with a compliment at the end, and they were yours.

‘I cannot teach them the secrets of the dama that kai’Sharum learn,’ Qeran admitted.

Abban smiled. ‘Let me worry about that, Drillmaster.’

A wooden palisade had gone up around Abban’s compound by the time he and Qeran marched in the 120 kha’Sharum. The stakes were planted deeply and lashed tight to give no sign of what went on behind them, but they were carefully worn to look haphazard and weak. The wards along its length were strong, but painted with no artistry — nothing to draw attention to what might be going on behind.

It was, of course, an elaborate disguise. Once inside, Qeran gaped. Hundreds of chin slaves laboured to haul and mortar fine cut stone into the true wall — already waist-high — just inside the palisade. Others cleared rubble from the remains of the shoddy greenland homes that had previously populated the area. Great pavilions had been raised, some venting great plumes of smoke. The sounds of ringing metal, smashing stone, and shouting workers filled the compound.

‘You’re building a fortress,’ Qeran said.

‘A fortress from which we will arm and armour the forces of Sharak Ka,’ Abban said. ‘A fortress that must be protected, especially now, when it is weakest.’

For perhaps the first time since Abban had come upon him in a drunken stupor, Qeran smiled, his trained eyes dancing along the palisade and the foundation of the inner wall. ‘Leave that to me. Your kha’Sharum will be patrolling in shifts by nightfall.’

‘That will do for now, but it will not be enough,’ Abban said. ‘My agents have purchased many slaves from the auction block, and their labours have made them hard, but they are not warriors. You must train them as well.’

‘I have never been comfortable with Shar’Dama Ka’s decision to arm the chin,’ Qeran said. ‘The Evejah tells us to disarm our enemies, not train them.’

‘Your comfort is irrelevant, Drillmaster,’ Abban said. ‘The Shar’Dama Ka has spoken. These are not enemies, they are slaves, and I do not mistreat them. They sleep in warmth with full bellies, many of them beside their own families, safe from predation.’

‘You are a fool to trust them,’ Qeran said.

Abban laughed in spite of himself, forced to stop walking and clutch his crutch for balance. He wiped a tear from his eye as he looked at Qeran, who scowled, unsure if he were the butt of the joke. ‘Trust?’ He chuckled again. ‘Drillmaster, I do not trust anyone.’

Qeran grunted at that, and they continued their tour. Abban led him to the armourer’s pavilion, where metal rang and the forges burned hot. Even with fanned vents along the walls, the air inside was stifling, thick with smoke, heat, and the steam of quenching troughs. Artisan stalls ran the length of the pavilion — forges of metal or glass, blacksmiths, grinders, woodworkers, fletchers, weavers, and warders.

Each stall was run by several women in the thick black robes of dal’ting, seemingly oblivious to the damp heat. Qeran, too, showed no sign of discomfort, though he had taken on the rhythmic breathing of a Sharum embracing pain.

Abban took a deep breath of the hot, foul air and let out a contented breath, as if tasting the finest tobacco from his hookah. It was the atmosphere of profit.

In the centre of the pavilion were neat, growing stacks of finished products: spears, shields, ladders, hooks and lines, alagai-catchers, as well as the smaller — though no less deadly — weapons Watchers concealed about their persons. Scorpion stingers by the gross, and the giant cart-driven bows to launch them.

The drillmaster selected a spear at random from a pile, setting his peg leg firmly and putting it through a series of spins and thrusts. ‘It’s so light.’

Abban nodded. ‘The greenlanders have a tree called the goldwood, and true to its name, it is worth its weight in precious metal. Goldwood is lighter and stronger than the rattan used for Sharum spears in Krasia, and needs less lacquer to harden the wards carved along its length.’

Qeran tested the tip against the meat of his palm, smiling broadly as the point slid in easily with only the barest pressure. ‘What metal is this, to hold such an edge?’

‘No metal,’ Abban said. ‘Glass.’

‘Glass?’ Qeran asked. ‘Impossible. It would shatter on the first blow.’

Abban pointed to a cold anvil in one of the forge stalls, and Qeran did not hesitate, limping over and bringing the spear down on it hard enough to break even a steel blade. But there was only a ringing in the air, and a notch in the anvil.

‘A trick we learned from the Hollow tribe,’ Abban said. ‘Warded glass — lighter and stronger than steel, and hard enough to hold the sharpest edge. We silver the glass to obscure its nature.’

He took Qeran to another stall, handing him a ceramic plate. ‘These plates are what dal’Sharum currently wear in the pockets of their robes.’

‘I am familiar,’ Qeran said drily.

‘Then you know they break on impact, proof against one blow at most, and often making a powerful hit all the worse with shrapnel,’ Abban said.

Qeran shrugged.

Abban gave him a second plate, this one of clear, warded glass that glittered in the light of the forge. ‘Thinner, lighter, and strong enough to break a rock demon’s claw.’

‘The Deliverer’s army will be unstoppable,’ Qeran breathed.

Abban chuckled. ‘No ordinary dal’Sharum could afford such armament, Drillmaster, but nothing is too good for the Spears of the Deliverer.’ He winked. ‘Or my Hundred. Your recruits will be better equipped than all but the Shar’Dama Ka’s elite.’

Abban saw the glitter of greed that shone in the drillmaster’s eyes at that, and smiled. One more gift, and he will be mine.

‘Come,’ he said. ‘No drillmaster in my employ will hobble on a cheap peg.’

Abban watched in satisfaction as Qeran paced before the khaffit and chin he had selected for training. The drillmaster’s peg had been thrown on the fire, replaced by a curved sheet of warded spring steel. It was simple, elegant, and gave him the potential to regain almost all the combat ability he had lost. He still used his spear for balance, but was becoming more sure-footed by the moment.

The men had been stripped down to bidos, their robes and other clothing burned. The khaffit wore tan, the chin a cloth the colour of green olives.

‘I do not care what titles the paltry excuses for drillmasters in sharaj gave you,’ Qeran shouted. ‘You are all nie’Sharum to me, and will be until you have proven yourselves. If you do well, you will be rewarded. A warrior’s robes and veil. Fine weapons and armour. Better food. Women. If you shame me,’ he stopped, looking just over the heads of the crowd, seeming to stare in all their eyes at once, ‘I will kill you.’

The men stood stock-still, backs arched and chests thrown forward, more than a few sweating and pale, even in the cool morning air. Qeran turned to Abban and nodded.

‘Now,’ Abban murmured to his nephew Jamere, but the young dama was already striding forward. He was tall but not thin, having never partaken in the dietary restrictions of the Evejah. Neither was he fat, moving with the fluid grace that marked Evejan clerics. Jamere had lived in Sharik Hora most of his life, and had copied or pilfered the secret sharusahk manuals of almost every tribe, mastering forbidden techniques. Skills he was all too happy to sell his uncle.

‘Kneel before Dama Jamere!’ Kaval barked, and the men fell immediately to their knees, none hesitating to put their palms in the dust.

Jamere held up his hands. In one, he held the writ Ahmann had signed, and in the other, the Evejah. ‘Loyal nie’Sharum! Ahmann asu Hoshkamin am’Jardir am’Kaji, Shar’Dama Ka and Everam’s voice on Ala, has given you to his servant Abban. It was Abban who brought the Deliverer’s eyes to you, giving men cast from Everam’s light a chance at redemption, a chance to prove your loyalty.’

He swept his gaze over the assembled men. ‘Are you loyal?’

‘Yes, Dama!’ they shouted as one.

‘Everam is watching!’ Jamere cried, sweeping his hands up to the sun. ‘Those who serve with loyalty and faith will see their rewards both on Ala and in Heaven. Those who break their oaths or fail in their duty will suffer greatly in their final hours before He casts their spirits down into Nie’s abyss.’

Abban suppressed a snicker. The fanatical light in his nephew’s eyes was nothing but a practised act, like that of a Northern Jongleur. The man was utterly faithless, and had been since before he was called by the clerics.

But the fear in the eyes of the men showed that his veil was perfect. Even Qeran seemed cowed as Jamere held out a copy of the Evejah.

‘Your spear hand,’ Jamere commanded, and the drillmaster laid his right hand on the worn leather.

‘Do you swear to serve Abban asu Chabin am’Haman am’Kaji?’ Jamere asked. ‘To protect him and obey him and no other save the Deliverer himself, from now until your death?’

Qeran hesitated. His eyes flicked to Abban, his brows bunching together in outrage. When the three men had met earlier to rehearse the oath-taking, no one had mentioned the drillmaster would be included. It was one thing for Abban to demand oaths from khaffit and chin, but another to expect one from a dal’Sharum drillmaster of Qeran’s stature.

Abban smiled in return. Make your choice, Drillmaster, he thought. Everam is watching, and you cannot take it back. Serve me, or go back to walking on a cheap peg and sleeping in your own vomit.

Qeran knew it, too. Abban had given him a path to glory, but glory had its price. The drillmaster looked to the waiting nie’Sharum, knowing that every second of hesitation would be a doubt he would have to beat from the men.

‘I swear to serve Abban,’ he growled at last, meeting Abban’s eyes, ‘until my death, or the Deliverer relieve me of the oath.’

Abban reached into his vest, producing a flask of couzi. He lifted it in salute to the warrior and drank.