“Why yes, of course,” the anthropologist replied, munching happily.
“Personally,” Cynder added, “I’m a little bothered by the fact that I don’t know what kind of animal it comes from.”
The three rode together, as usual, following Kenton, who rode in the front, with Baon alternately riding in the back, the side, or, when occasion suited him, scouting ahead. The warrior appeared relaxed, even lax, upon his mount, but his constant position shuffling proved otherwise. He was worried about the possibility of another attack, and was determined not to be surprised again. He hadn’t said anything, at least not while Khriss was present, but she knew he was displeased about Kenton’s closed-mouthedness.
The river beside them had broadened slightly as they moved, and it now stretched at least a hundred feet across. They had been riding along it for two days now, and it was growing steadily larger. It didn’t appear to be very deep, but the current was swift in places. Earlier in the day they had seen the first signs of human habitation here in Lossand. The villages were small and compact, settled between the river and occasional patches of sandy soil. The crops they grew looked more like what would be found on darkside, as opposed to the strange under-sand vegetables that came from the kerla.
However, she was quickly coming to understand why Lossand was considered the desert. The crops were stumpy and short, and there was little livestock. The Kershtian villages they had passed had been both larger and better protected, and the people had looked richer. It had been hard for Khriss to see at the time—she was used to darkside colors and flamboyancy—but now that she had something to compare, she realized that the Kershtians were very well off, despite their lack of extravagance. The Kershtian tents had been well-maintained and their insides plush. The people had been clean and well-fed, and many of them had appeared to have at least some leisure time.
It wasn’t that the Lossandin people were poor—they just weren’t as wealthy. The buildings—often stone or mud—didn’t appear as comfortable as Kershtian tents, and the people were always busy working beneath the hot sun, caring for their sickly plants.
The more she watched, the more she became certain that her darkside learning wouldn’t apply on dayside. Acron had been wrong when he’d assumed Khriss didn’t know the social sciences. Khriss had taken quite a number of anthropology classes—she liked all kinds of science, though the physical disciplines had always been her strongest area of study. Darkside logic said that a culture who lived in tents and used bone weapons couldn’t possibly be advanced as one that lived in homes and had access to iron. Yet, the exact opposite appeared to be true here on dayside.
“Well, I don’t care what it is,” Acron was mumbling as he reached for another piece of jerky. “It’s good. That’s all that matters.”
Khriss frowned, watching him chew. The jerky was different from what she had eaten on darkside. It was much softer, for one thing. It was stringy and dull brown, kind of like darkside jerky, but it didn’t come in cut strips but flat round discs, almost like loafs.
Cynder chuckled beside her. “Shall I warn our poor dayside friend that he’s about to suffer another interrogation?”
Khriss blushed. “What do you mean?” she asked, trying to play innocent.
“Oh, come now, duchess,” Cynder chided. “I had you in far too many classes to mistake that look. What are you curious about this time?”
“The jerky … or whatever it is,” Khriss said. “You’re right—we don’t know where it comes from. It must be from a sandling of some sort, but what part? Certainly not the shell. But that means there must be soft flesh underneath, and soft flesh requires water—which I thought was poisonous to sandlings. In fact, I still can’t accept that they’re all hydrophobic. What kind of creature could exist without water? Do they not have blood?”
Cynder smiled, his aged eyes twinkling with mirth. “Well, those are good questions, I suppose. And, the Divine be thanked, for once I’m not on the receiving end. Go and ask—but, on second thought, don’t tell me what you find out. I have a feeling I’d rather not know where that jerky comes from—at least, not until we get to a place where there are other options to choose from.”
Khriss ignored his jibes—mostly because they were so well-placed. She tried to hold herself back, but now that the curiosity had gotten hold of her, she found it impossible to ignore. Eventually, beneath the elderly linguist’s knowing eyes, she hammered her tonk forward to confront Kenton.
The daysider rode alone, his expression thoughtful, even regretful. The dark sense of despair that had seemed to hover behind his eyes since the attack a few days ago was still there. In his hand was a bit of sand that he absently rubbed against his palm—a nervous habit of his. She had seen him do it before when he was deep in thought.
Kenton looked up as she approached, then groaned audibly.
“Oh, stop it,” she huffed. “You’ll be rid of us soon enough.”
“The sands willing … .” Kenton mumbled. “What is it this time?”
“The jerky,” Khriss said. “I want to know where it comes from.”
“Jerky?” Kenton asked.
Khriss pulled a piece out of her saddlebags. The floppy piece of meat was flexible and soft to the touch—and, unfortunately, she could smell the pungent ashawen that coated it.
“Oh, the ZaiDon,” Kenton said. “It comes from sandlings, of course.”
“Yes,” Khriss said, “but what part? Do they have flesh underneath?”
“No, it comes from the entire thing. The entire sandling.”
Khriss frowned. “How?”
“Like this,” Kenton said, pulling out his canteen. He waited for a few moments, watching the ground. Eventually, he saw one of the ever-present tiny bug-like sandlings scuttle from one patch of sand toward another. Kenton poured, dumping a shower of water on the creature. It immediately began to shake, jerking and squirming in the deadly rain. Khriss turned, watching the little creature as they passed. It bubbled and boiled, and a few seconds later it was nothing more than a greenish-brown puddle on the ground.
Kenton replaced his canteen, taking another pinch of sand from the pouch at his side and absently rubbing it between his fingers.
“See?”
Khriss sat on her tonk, looking behind her at the receding puddle of goo. Suddenly she felt very sick. “You mean … ?”
“You take sandling pus, churn it in a tub for a few hours, then let it dry in the sun. ZaiDon is a staple food, Khriss. We eat it with every meal. Of course, some forms of ZaiDon are so tasteless that we usually spice it as it’s drying. What’s wrong?”
Khriss barely kept her stomach under control. “I … On darkside we aren’t accustomed to eating squished bugs.”
“Bugs?” he said, obviously translating the word in his mind. “But, when they actually make ZaiDon, they use large sandlings—creatures like tonks. Of course, tonks don’t taste very good—other sandlings make better ZaiDon. Either way they aren’t ‘bugs.’ They’re far too big.”
Khriss shook her head. “The word doesn’t necessarily just refer to size,” she informed. “Regardless, I … .” she trailed off, frowning. Something was wrong. It took her a moment to pick it out, and when she did she wondered why she it had seemed so odd to her. The sand in Kenton’s palm had turned black. He must have gotten some water on his hands when he opened the canteen.
“What?” Kenton asked.
“Nothing,” Khriss said.
Kenton frowned, still rubbing the sand as if he had forgotten it was there. “No, really. What?”
“The sand in your fingers,” Khriss said with a blush. “It was white just a few moments ago. You must have—”
Kenton yelped in surprise, nearly dropping the sand as if it had suddenly bitten him.
“What!” Baon demanded, hammering his tonk forward, a pistol in one hand, sword in the other.
“Oh, uh, nothing,” Kenton sand nervously, still staring down at his hands. “I … thought I saw something.??
?
Baon didn’t look convinced. He did, however, let the matter drop as he put away his pistol and pulled out the spyglass instead. “Here,” the warrior said, handing the glass to Kenton. “I saw this right before you screamed. Look downriver.”
Kenton raised the glass hesitantly to his eye—he had used the glass before, but obviously didn’t know what to make of its ability to see great distances.
“I assume that’s where we’re going?” Baon asked.
Kenton nodded, lowering the glass, intentionally handing it past Khriss’ waiting hand to Cynder, who had ridden up beside her. The linguist smiled, but refrained from taking a look, handing it to Khriss instead.
With a growl at Kenton, she raised the glass to her eyes. There, barely visible on the horizon, was what looked like a large island rising out of the middle of the river.
#
Kenton hammered his tonk forward, moving ahead of the others. The darksiders probably assumed the move came from his excitement to get home. In actuality, sighting Kezare meant little to him. Home it was, but he had actually begun to loath returning—coming back to Kezare would mean revealing his loss of power to the remaining sand masters.
But, maybe not … . Kenton clutched the bit of black sand in his fist, hesitantly allowing himself to hope once again. After the last battle he had surrendered hope, for hope had become to painful. It appeared, however, that the emotion was too resilient to destroy, even intentionally.
It was probably the water, he told himself as he moved away from Khriss and the others. You’re just going to disappoint yourself again. But, hope moved him forward anyway. Hope led him to reach down and pull a fistful of sand from his sand pouch—worn now out of habit, rather than necessity. It was hope that shone believingly in his eyes as he hesitantly commanded the sand to obey.
And it did.
He nearly leapt from his saddle—half in joy, half in shock—when the sand suddenly burst into radiance. It sat in his hand, warm and familiar, glowing with its shifting mother-of-pearl light. His ability was not gone, it had only lain dormant for a time—a supposed impossibility.
Kenton sat stunned for a long moment, staring at the sand. He had always cursed his small talent, but these last few days without had been excruciating. One ribbon may not be very much compared to other sand masters, but it was infinitely better than no ribbons at all.
In a daze of contentment, Kenton began to move the sand out of his hand, spinning it in a very small pattern before him. Then he frowned—something was wrong. No, not wrong … just different. During his years as a sand master, he had grown accustomed to the draining effects of sand mastery—it could be as taxing on a man’s body as physical labor. Perhaps it was just because he had gone so long without mastering, but it seemed like the sand was … .
“Kenton?” a feminine voice asked.
He jumped, hurriedly letting the ribbon fall stale.
Khriss’s tonk caught up to his own a few moments later. The darksider’s face was suspicious. “What are you looking at?” she demanded.
“Nothing,” Kenton said, letting the black sand slide from his fingers.
She watched the action with thin eyes, then turned up to stare at his face, searching for answers. “All right, daysider. What’s going on?”
“What do you mean?” Kenton asked innocently.
“Those Kershtians attacked us just to get to you. For some reason, they thought you were so dangerous they only sent one of their men against Baon, but they sent six against you. Now, you seem mystified by bits of sand. What are you hiding?”
Kenton almost told her. There was really no reason to keep it hidden—she would find out about the sand masters soon enough. As he looked up to speak, however, his eyes fell on her face. Her authoritative, demanding face. So much like Praxton and the mastrells. As his mouth opened, he found himself hesitating.
“What am I hiding?” he finally said, his reflexes taking over. “Well, certainly not the fact that you annoy me, dear Khrissalla of darkside. In fact, how do you know it was me they were trying to kill? I seem to remember warning someone, back in that village, that she should pay more attention to Kershtian customs, lest she offend the ‘savages.’ Retribution comes swiftly among us primitive people—I wouldn’t be surprised if those men were hired to come after us by the merchant whose home you offended by breaking tradition.”
“I—” Khriss said, shocked, her face growing red. She obviously didn’t believe him, but there was enough possibility to his words that she couldn’t be certain. She stuttered for a moment, then hammered her tonk to the side, fleeing back to her darkside companions.
By the sands, how could I be so cruel?, Kenton thought in amazement. What have I become?
His fight against the Diem had made him strong, but the constant effort had produced side-effects. Since he had become a sand master every moment of his life had been a struggle. Nearly every other Diem member had been an enemy—or, at least, someone to whom he needed to justify his continued defiance of the mastrells. Kenton had worked hard to gain what support he had. Instead of just responding to his accusers, Kenton had needed to make them seem like fools, for the entire Diem had been watching. But, somewhere during the struggle, the cynicism had become a part of him. He was a rebel—not necessarily because he needed to be, but because he had been one for so long.
#
“He seems to get endless joy from infuriating me,” Khriss fumed. Only years of dealing with courtly back-stabbing kept the tears from showing on her face. “He attacked me for no reason. What did I do to deserve this? Save him from dehydration? Perhaps the Divine intended for him to die, and now they’re punishing me for interfering. And why am I talking to you anyway? You don’t care.”
Baon raised an eyebrow. “No, I don’t care,” he agreed. “That’s probably why you’re talking to me.”
Khriss looked back toward Kenton, who was riding a good distance in front of the rest of them. They should have left him days ago—the darksiders could have followed the river on their own. They didn’t need a guide any more.
“I must have said something truthful—something that made him uncomfortable,” she decided.
“Or, maybe you just asked something he couldn’t answer,” Baon said with a shrug.
“What?”
“People get annoyed when you ask questions they don’t know the answers to. It makes them feel insufficient. And, duchess, with the number of questions you ask, the odds are definitely against the daysider.”
Khriss snorted at the comment, falling silent. The truth was, however, that she couldn’t remain annoyed for long—not when they were so close to their destination. Kezare was a city of legends on darkside, a mystical place where the sand mages ruled.
She was encouraged to see that it really was on an island, like the stories said. The river split directly in the middle, birthing a massive rock of an island that was bulging with tents and buildings. The land on the banks to either side of Kezare was obviously more fertile than what they had passed so far—it was covered with farms, though the crops were still poor compared to darkside standards.
In addition, the river got even bigger here. As they approached, Khriss could see a second, smaller river merging with the Ry’Do Ali. If her map were to be believed, its origin could be found in the mountains to the east, the only of their kind on the continent other than the single peak at the center of the kerla. Here, in the pseudo-lake surrounding Kezare, she saw ships on the water for the first time. Most of the riverboats were small, but a couple were more massive, probably cargo vessels.
Kenton allowed them to catch up as they approached the city. Smaller towns lined the banks of the river, most of them little more than a dock and a few clay structures. It was to one of these that Kenton led them. He rode straight up to the river bank, then told them to wait beside their animals as he negotiated with one of the sailors—a man with lighter Lossandin skin, as opposed to Kershtian olive.
A moment later he
returned, handing Khriss a small pouch of coins. “I’ve traded him your tonks for this,” he explained.
“What?” Khriss demanded. “I didn’t tell you to do that!”
“And?” Kenton said with a chuckle. “Were you intending to take them with you?”
“Why not?” Khriss asked.
“Across water?” Kenton asked with a raised eyebrow. “That wouldn’t be a very good idea. Tonks go wild whenever they’re put onto a ship—I don’t know how they can tell they’re near water, but they can. Even if they couldn’t, all it would take would be one leak or splash to drive the whole lot of them into a stampede. And, if you did get them across, there wouldn’t be anything for them to eat. There’s not much sand in Kezare.”
“But, how do we travel around the city?” Khriss asked.
“You walk,” Kenton said. “Or, I suppose, you can hire a carriage if you must. Either way, the tonks stay here. A ferry ride across the river was also part of the deal. From there, the man’s son will lead you to Lonzare.”
“Lonzare?” Khriss asked.
“The darksider section of Kezare. You’ll probably want to find rooms there.”
“But, what about you?”
Kenton smiled. “I thought you wanted to get rid of me.”
“I do,” Khriss informed. “I just … oh, never mind.”
“Then this is farewell, Khrissalla,” Kenton said with a nod. “I have … things I need to attend to.”
With that, he nodded his farewells to Baon, Acron, and Cynder, then left them standing on the docks, the Lossandin sailor gesturing for them to board his boat.
#
Kenton rushed along the riverbank, the darksiders forgotten for the time being. Now that he was so close, his eagerness was taking control of him—he needed to know who among his comrades had survived.
The Diem itself wasn’t in Kezare, but on the lake shore a short distance away from where he had dropped off the darksiders. He made the trip quickly, barely letting himself wonder who would be dead and who would be alive.