‘The scout. You sent a missive to central Arsduq,’ I say, piecing it together.
We trek down a cliff-side trail until we overlook the confluence of rivers converging below.
The Sepahbad wipes blood dripping down his mask. ‘Yes. The governess of Arsduq is one of two prefects in fray with Emperor Akashun. Even at odds with me – her enemy – she is prudent enough to gauge that weakening Akashun works in her interest. The missive was a mad gamble. But victory will come by pinning the Zahr strongholds against Akashun.’
And it worked.
The Sepahbad glances forward. ‘Direct the nur downwards to intercept the Azadnians, but hold at the middle before spreading it to the flanks. When our main force withdraws, the Azadnians will rush forward, and our overhead archers are at the ready.’
His arms outstretch, as water swirls from the river, like a slice of the great sea in his hands. It climbs as a watery azhdahak, creasing the light of the pale sun. Two thin ribbons of nur billow toward the centre, and the water collides.
‘Direct it to the peripheries,’ he orders as he draws forth barriers of water to shield us while I manipulate the last of my nur through Third-Stratum. It’s a jumbled symbiosis, for we are not familiar with each other’s affinities. I glean that the Sepahbad cannot control bodies ofwater that equate to more than the total amount of Heavenly Energy inside him. By subduing a portion ofa river... his must be bountiful.
Finally, after I work out the nur’s correct density, steam surges upwards, clouding the valley.
‘Fire!’ a captain roars from the ridges above our cliff, and the screams begin. Arrows sink in stunning precision; evidence of Za’skar’s cruel efficiency. Bodies drop to the ground in a low thunder.
‘Fire!’ she barks again.
It’s long, it’s drawn-out, it’s sickening. Azadnians crawl like ants from the river toward the tunnels only to be greeted by more archers.
My body begins trembling at their pitched screams. The Sepahbad glances at me but expresses no reaction. A man who has seen so much mortality in his existence that he has become dulled to death. Bored even, from his skimming glance.
The valley descends into an eerie silence. Above us, the captain orders a retreat to our encampment.
The Sepahbad scans the surroundings before nodding. ‘Rejoin your squadron.’
But a cold fog arises from the cliffs. The mist clings to my skin, so wet I feel caught in the dour of a lake.
‘This is not our steam,’ the Sepahbad realises.
A quiver runs across my spine, like fingers scratching lightly. The air tastes foul, not from blood, but rot.
‘Can you disperse the fog?’ I ask before the cliffs rumble below us. My eyes squint, but the fog makes it difficult to discern anything. Suddenly, a stink of hot breath fans against my back. I’ve hardly time to think, let alone turn, before an arm wraps around my torso, yanking me out of the way just as something crashes where I stood.
I stumble into the bedrock, the Sepahbad shoving me behind him. ‘Are you well?’ he asks, eyes darting down my form.
‘What was that?’
‘We need to retreat.’ He backs me further along the trail while extracting us from the mist. He erects a vertical shield of dense water and clears the fog with a snap. Ahead of us, a spiked, teal-scaled tail slams into the cliff side as a mountain-sized body trawls up the rocky ledges, a forked tongue the size of tall poplars darting where I stood mere seconds ago.
The blood drains from my face. The demonic falak has not been spotted since Prophet Nuh’s flood.
What contract did the Azadnian emperor create with the Unseen to force a falak from the Veil into the human world? The serpent before us is mangled, with glimmering red wings, three wide pink mouths, and milky eyes on several bobbing human heads embedded in its scales.
‘The bonds from those human souls forced it through the Veil into the human world under Akashun’s control.’ The Sepahbad shares in my thoughts before extending his barrier to deflect its ramming tail.
He freezes the water into a thick ice-hewn pick before shooting it right into the third eye of the falak. The creature recoils with a roar and drops off the cliff but its tail wraps around a cluster of pines, saving it from plummeting further. It roars again, undeniably human-sounding. All the more horrifying.
The Sepahbad skewers it with another ice pick and another. As he does, the valley throbs once again. I watch in shock. Three shadows hurtle from the Heavens, growing in size. Long-tailed creatures half the size of the first falak, swallowing the grasslands. In a mangle of sharp scales, the serpents bellow forward to the retreating auxiliary archers.
The Sepahbad whirls—
Everything happens in less than a blink.
The auxiliary are suddenly no more. A thousand warriors. Disintegrated in a spray of crimson.
Shreds of skin and wet bones clog the valley. It took one fell swoop of those spiked tails, lashing outward.
