Chapter 23 #2
Her fingers tuck into the necklace of bones around her throat, but I catch the tremors. ‘I have seen battles before; I have seen good warriors die. And we are not even good.’
‘The Marka does not allow for murder.’
She rolls her eyes. ‘I mean wounds! Those other warriors hate us. Their violence will prove it.’
Before I can think further, my fingers slip out the melted Zahr khanjar, flipping the handle to show Arezu.
‘See this? My dada gifted me this blade after I passed a test.’ A part of me despairs in mentioning him, sharing such a private memory, but she is staring at me so intently, I swallow the cowardice.
‘Before he’d gifted it, I’d failed many tests. I choked. The blade felt unworthy.’
‘You failed?’
‘Between us . . . many times. But that is our secret. Every warrior has a weakness that manifests in our lowest moments. But the true test is if it manifests in your battles. For me, my weakness is memories. At times, I stop thinking. I am caught in the past. For you, your fear from what you’ve seen in your childhood will burden you. ’
She frowns but does not dispute it. ‘Then I am weak.’
I shake my head. ‘Weak? No, Arezu. This anger you carry, it’s a strength. It’s why I sought you for this squadron. While you are here pretending not to be miserable, I understand. I understand why you trained in solitude before you allowed me to be your master.’
Her green eyes flit up, wary. Curiosity stretches between us, the sparks of friction snuffing for once.
‘You desire power. You crave the rush like me, and you are angry. I do not know why, and in truth, I do not care.’ I hope Arezu cannot hear my own fleeting resolve.
These are the words my father would tell me, a conviction for me to cling to.
‘You may only master your power if your conviction bears the weight of its burden. So, tell me, the moment you improved your affinity, was it not the best feeling? The thrill of knowing no one could hurt you, no one could stop you just for a moment?’
Her lips twitch, as she regains her bearings. ‘It felt good.’
‘Remember it.’ I gesture at her hand. ‘You have your strength.’ I lift my blade. ‘And I have mine, always,’ I promise.
I return to my squadron. If only these students were not wallowing in their own hysteria. But they would not have survived for so long in Za’skar if they had not faced terrors inside the city’s gates. I need only to remind them of this.
‘Squadron Six,’ I bark, dragging Yahya alongside me. ‘Lines.’
The seventeen students stand in stern order, with Katayoun at my side, Aina and Sharra behind us.
‘Our opponents laugh because they smell our terror,’ I begin.
‘But they are ignorant of one fact: that you have faced greater enemies. If you can accomplish the pain of stance training, if you can handle me, or the abuses of ruthless pazktab masters, nothing is worse. Today you are warriors.’ My tongue burns from the magnitude of the lie while Katayoun fights to keep a neutral expression.
The students straighten. ‘Answer your captain: how will you fight during an enemy’s ambush? ’
‘Stab the khanjar in the enemy’s toes,’ the young squadron shouts in unison.
‘How deep?’
‘You bury the blade to the hilt to pin them,’ they drone louder.
‘Excellent,’ I murmur. ‘At the par?’s signal, the Marka begins. Focus on your tasks.’
I do not know my soldiers well, but I try for an encouraging look. From the horror in their gazes, my attempt is more awkward than comforting.
A sudden light illuminates the desert planes before a great par? soars above the salt flats. It’s the Keeper of the Great Library.
He lifts a clawed hand, huffs of silver power rippling into a Veil.
My ears pop and my mouth dries. Through the murky haze of the Veil, I can make out the shadowed forms of thousands of soldiers, scholars, officers and bureaucrats observing from atop the mountainous cliffs enclosing the desert.
The back of my neck crawls. I trained for this my entire life: to defeat opponents who outmatch me, for is that not Azadniabad under Sajamistan?
If I fail this, I do not deserve to be martial-vizier of my clan.
The Keeper bows his head. ‘May the pain of this battle bestow upon you the bond of the Heavens. Begin!’
We sprint in different directions, each Zero-Slash leading a division of the pazktab students.
Yasaman and Yahya flank me on the left of the saline oases.
At the first tree, I snag a branch from the ground.
We fasten the stick at the centre of our territory, supported by a boulder.
The banner of our territory is a calf-skin flag located along ridges of red and white sediment.
After grabbing the real banner, we circle to the south, dirt kicking up in a whirlwind at our feet.
‘Breathe to ground your Heavenly bonds into the incense,’ I encourage Yasaman, as all three of us crouch behind a cluster of cypress trees.
Sweat trickles down her temple. ‘I think I did it.’
Ahead of us, Squadrons Two and Four, led by Aygul and Osman, charge into our open territory, only to come face to face with each other. The battle is quick, decisive, as I predicted.
Squadron Two engages in a clear, bow-shaped line, dividing their numbers into two flanks.
The flexibility of the formation is like that of a pulled bow.
The captain orders her soldiers right, deceiving Squadron Four, whose captain assumes that they will be overwhelmed on that flank.
But Squadron Two counterstrikes the left-hand position.
Squadron Four sacrifices the entire left flank when Osman tries a full-weighted frontal charge despite the gaps in his wings.
In short time, Squadron Four is forced into a concession. The par? flash into the arena, carrying injured soldiers outside the Veil. With that, Aygul of Squadron Two emerges victorious.
I exhale in relief. ‘Are the fire ants in position?’
‘Yes,’ Yasaman answers.
Fire ants commanded by her affinity crawl below the soldiers’ feet. No one notices the cursed critters, let alone the infinitesimal shard of steel from a welded blade that each ant carries in its pinchers, courtesy of Sohrab’s Clay affinity, which manipulates the alloy into sliver-sized amounts.
My wrist lifts; I inhale the dabbed scent of my attar. Through a flicker of my finger bonds, a thin string of nūr threads from my hand to a metal shard, flashing light. Soldiers in the vicinity will mistake it for mere sunlight.
Ten beats later, Sohrab, from the opposite end of the territory, enlarges the metal shards gripped by the ants into thin, sharp needles.
A cry sounds, but Squadron Two is too late. The metal skewers into their heels, up through their feet. All but twelve from Squadron Two howl from the grave injuries.
‘Breathe and rest your bonds, subdue the Heavenly Energy. Then summon the third creature, the white beetles, to the stick in the centre of the territory, for the next stage.’ I turn Yahya on my lap, so his face is positioned below mine.
‘This will be difficult, but I trust you. You must go collect more bramble. After the Marka, I will use my stipend to buy you lamb-stuffed non.’
His forehead leans in. ‘Yes, master.’ Then he scurries into the cypress trees.
Again, we wait. Captain Majd of Squadron Three darts into our clearing, her thirty soldiers capitalising on a situation ripe for victory.
She pierces through the remaining forces of Squadron Two as I predicted.
I had sent a missive that offered a low-stakes alliance, inviting her to invade our territory before Captain Fayez, in exchange for roving through any surviving squadron.
Captain Madj snatches Squadron Two’s banner and spots our decoy flag, posting guards in front of it, assuming it’s real. Squadron Four must have left their flag in their territory and split their forces to defend it.
Even from our positioning, Madj’s voice carries a grin. ‘Bait-and-trap tactics by an inexperienced squadron of children. What else should we expect? The Marka is a simulation of conquering, not defence.’
Not baits and traps. We’re a moving barrage.
Stationary defenders committed to their territory are cattle to any roving troops who strike in quick successive blows.
But my troops will cause trouble by nibbling stubbornly at the enemy – like gh?ls gnawing on a corpse – before constantly retreating.
We will not practise defence until the last possible moment.
Our current position offers us natural obstacles that we can use: while they are defending themselves from our bites, we are manipulating them into geographical traps. By forcing them to swallow our bait, we divide them and survive the course of the Marka.
The problem is that Captain Fayez has not yet arrived. I expected him to engage our territory straight away, eager to make fools of us, especially when he saw Madj was there.
‘My gamble for Fayez failed,’ I note. And when Madj realises she holds a decoy banner, our alliance will alter in his favour.
‘Master, what should we do?’ Yasaman asks, his tone uneven.
We manipulated the first squadrons to eliminate the others for us.
Now I hope to manipulate a third team into stealing our fake banner.
It’s crafted from Yasaman’s white-walking beetles, a species the Divine used to plague Stone City, a destroyed apostate civilisation.
The wings of the beetles mimic any pale colour of their surroundings.
Its success hinges on Yasaman’s ability to command the beetles to take on the appearance of the banner while the real one is with me.
To conform to Marka rules, no territory banner is allowed to be covered, so our real one is tied to my back like a glaring signal against the vegetation. We have minutes until Madj realises her flag is a ruse and spots the real one.