‘N-no. Please continue,’ I wheeze out, drawing to my knees.
Around me, the remaining pazktab students are attacking both squadrons. With no defences to conceal our positioning, we are cattle. Still, through sheer bravery, the children flirt with the remainder of Madj’s and Fayez’s troops, who toss them around easily until the last of the students are subdued, a laughable melee. A cry rebounds through the fields and I watch Negar retaliate against Firat, clenching the student with an arm around his neck.
I cough out blood. Fayez straightens and turns, hunting for our banner as Katayoun – ahead of him – runs in the opposite direction.
‘Even your subordinates abandon you in the face of their opponent,’ Fayez says, leering before nodding to Cemil, who summons his affinity to eat the distance to Katayoun, marked from trifecta training. Before he reaches her, she stumbles and drops the flag, then flees. Cemil turns to snatch the banner she left behind, but any triumph slides off his face when it disintegrates beneath his fingers into white beetles.
‘What the Hells?’
‘The fool is you, Captain Fayez. I was your bait.’ I wipe blood from my lips and grin.
The realisation dawns upon them. Fayez assumed the flag would be protected at his rear, but instead of making the pazktab children my bait as he predicted, I chose to sacrifice myself along with them. A hard lesson learnt but realised at the right moment.
As Yahya had collected the branches at my order, to plant this final deceitful banner, Yasaman, from the southern flank, supported the deception by summoning beetles to cover the branches, making them appear as ours. Relying on our pazktab forces to charge Fayez, Aina and Arezu used the opportunity to retrieve Fayez’s banner.
None of Fayez’s soldiers had noticed, for they had no choice but tohold back my other roving students as one would swat stubborn flies. They may be flies but, in a swarm, they are an acknowledged presence.
Horror plays across Fayez’s features before, in a mad dash of desperation, his azhdahak body swoops across the territory.
‘Now!’ cries a young voice as three pazktab students tackle Fayez – the very pazktab students from the sinkhole that no one had bothered to account for, who Katayoun had freed at my order.
Cemil lunges forward but he cannot manifest his affinity so soon, with the time and geographic limitation.
‘Run!’ Katayoun’s voice rends the dusty air, as Aina passes the banner to Arezu, who scrambles up the salty ridges of Territory Five, to join Yasaman and Sharra at the top.
I limp to Katayoun, vision bleary. We watch Arezu climb with her bloodied hands, holding the fourth banner as if it’s an emanation of hope. Yasaman pulls her to the top, clutching three other banners. Scrawny and underestimated by their enemies, the two children slam the banners into the cliffside before Za’skar City.
The warriors gawk in horror at the four banners in my squadron’s grasp.
The Keeper dissolves the Veil and declares Squadron Six the victor.
I stagger into Katayoun and collapse.
24
The Heavens seem pleased despite the day’s violence. A pale mid morning through a shock of white sun, a blink of pleasant warmth above the burnished sand, stretching her limbs beneath the sky’s belly; the bickering shouts of warriors a comforting tune. My sticky curls cling to my neck, my thin kerchief plastered through with blood. I sniff sharply: the potent taste of triumph bitter to my senses. My tactics were unconventional, and for that, is there pride in my win?
I cannot dwell on it. The emperor would remind me that true success has not been earned until I have a rank to partake in military assignments and collect intelligence on our enemies.
Katayoun and I brace each other’s weight, limping forward. ‘Where is Cemil?’
‘There.’ She nods her head. Cemil is on his knees, staring at his hands. ‘He fell for our ruse.’ She meets my eyes, a warning brimming in them. ‘He is confused, and confused men with wounded pride go to great lengths to avenge themselves.’ Before I can mull over her words, a cheer emanates from our squadron.
‘Do you hear that?’ Katayoun actually smiles.
‘Those are children, drunk on victory,’ I say as the pazktab students shriek at Yasaman and Arezu carrying Yahya across the sand dunes. I gaze at them in fascination. Za’skar displays its sharp contradictions. On one hand, a lot of these warriors are violent and merciless. But between its sheaves are the displays of camaraderie, the tempered kind, thrumming low and slowly.
‘A part of me is still in disbelief,’ Katayoun admits. ‘I doubted you.’
‘At the very least, Yabghu will be relieved of lecturing you. Will you try to earn more ranks?’
‘No.’ Her cheeks redden, and she gestures at the injured warriors surrounding us. ‘Never again. And I believe you owe me your stipend.’
I fight the urge to smile. Soon, Aina bounds across the fields and Katayoun leaves me to greet her cousin. The sensation disappears as I look up at the craggy mountains, where officers and bureaucrats are amongst the dense crowd of onlookers; most frowning from bets lost. Amidst them, one grabs my attention. Even at a great distance, I know his gaze meets my own, before he turns and descends the cliffs back to central Za’skar.
Perhaps the Sepahbad permits the Marka because of what it yields. Perhaps horrid violence unites people when pain is shared and victory is the consequence. Perhaps the point of conflict is surviving it together.
‘You realise,’ No-Name begins from over my shoulder, and I turn. A breeze relieves the heat of my wounds, but her monastic robes stay vast and still. ‘Your vengeance will end the lives of those students.’
