Chapter Eighteen Rayan
Chapter Eighteen
Rayan
Rayan hadn’t been to see his grandfather since he had been sentenced for his crimes. His penance was the worst one possible in Mosima: cleaning the aqueducts. Sahar wasn’t expected to survive the month, let alone four months.
But if there was one thing he had learned about his family it was that they were stubborn. Almost as stubborn as Lettle.
She had awoken not long after he had left Furi in the quarantined district. It had taken Rayan some time to recover after she had spoken to him through Ajax.
‘I love you, and want you, and need you. ‘They were words he would treasure until he breathed his last breath.
She had healed more wounds than he knew he had. Though his relief was short-lived as she was plunged into danger once again.
Afa’s power was immeasurable and it terrified Rayan. But Lettle had proved herself eminently capable and was now coaxing more answers from the ancient being.
Come home to me, my heart, he thought.
As he approached the entranceway to the aqueducts, he stole one last glance at Lettle.
She was sitting in an orchard eating a pear, her lips slick with juice. As much as he wanted to watch, his task was urgent.
Two faeguards stood at the staircase that led down to the underground waterways.
‘My king,’ they bowed low.
‘I am here to see Sahar.’ He couldn’t bear to say ‘grandfather’ any more.
‘We will send someone down there to retrieve him for you.’
Rayan shook his head. ‘No, I will go, no need to put someone else in danger.’
Perhaps it was foolish, but Rayan wanted to see the aqueducts with his own eyes. He wanted to see what Sahar had to suffer.
The guard nodded and let him past.
The stairway smelled of wet earth and moss. It was slippery and he was careful to hold the handrail as he descended.
At the bottom of the stairs, another faeguard directed him towards the west of the canal system.
The tunnels were lit up with fraedia crystal; no fire was allowed down here–it was too dangerous given the small spaces the cleaners occupied.
Stone archways linked the underground channels of water on either side of a singular pathway.
The walkway gently sloped so that any water that flooded the path trickled downwards towards the gutters.
The curved ceiling got lower the further Rayan walked, making him feel trapped with no way out.
Find Sahar, find a cure, then leave, he coached himself. Simple words, but they required more complex actions.
‘Help me pull out this body,’ someone called to him up ahead. It was another soldier, who hadn’t realised who she was talking to. She looked shocked as he drew nearer, the fraedia light revealing his face.
‘Your majesty, I did not realise it was you,’ she said. Her cheeks were streaked with grime and sweat.
‘I’m happy to help.’
The soldier wanted to say no, but Rayan had already waded into the water. The body was just visible beneath the stone arch.
‘How did they die?’
‘Surge of water, it’s quick,’ she said.
‘Shall I grab the legs?’
It was grim work, but Rayan had moved many dead bodies in his life. Rigor mortis had already begun to seize the muscles, making it harder to move the limbs as he pulled.
Finally, the body eased free of the pipework. In a panic Rayan closed his eyes to avoid seeing its face: What if this is Sahar?
‘King? I can take it from here. Her family is waiting to collect her.’
Rayan opened his eyes in relief. Then he got annoyed with himself for his depth of feeling. He wanted to hate Sahar for trying to kill Lettle, and part of him did, but there was still a kernel in his heart that loved the grandfather that he’d become.
‘Send my condolences to her family,’ Rayan said, before continuing on down the tunnel.
It was easy enough to pick Sahar out from the other cleaners. How he had mistaken the other body for him, Rayan wasn’t sure. He was tall, like Rayan, and lean too. His nose stood proudly on a gaunt face–made thinner from his time down here.
He was talking to another cleaner and Rayan listened in.
‘If you twist your shoulder like this, you don’t need to extend quite as far. It’s safer this way, you see. You can then keep your head above water.’
The other cleaner nodded and said quietly, ‘Thank you.’
‘Sahar,’ Rayan called.
His grandfather was startled, as though he hadn’t heard that name in a long time.
‘Rayan?’ he exclaimed. ‘What are you doing here? It’s not safe. There might be a surge.’
Rayan smiled and shook his head. Sahar’s concern was for Rayan first–that was the reason he was in this position in the first place.
Trying to kill Lettle to stop a prophecy was a foolish endeavour, one Rayan couldn’t understand. But prophecy does strange things to intelligent people: they begin to think they have control of the Fates, just because the Fates speak to them.
Like Lettle and her lies.
‘I need your help,’ Rayan said.
Sahar looked abashed. ‘My help?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well then, let us go sit somewhere a little safer. There is no telling when the waterways will flood.’
Sahar led Rayan to two benches tucked into the side of an archway. Food and waste covered the table next to it.
‘We don’t bother cleaning, as the surge so often takes it away,’ Sahar said apologetically.
‘Aren’t you cleaners?’
Sahar cocked his head. ‘Our task is to clean the aqueducts.’
Rayan knew how exhilarating small rebellions could feel, but also how they could end up growing into bigger ones–Sahar was an example of that.
I will have to tell the guards, he thought.
‘It is good to see you,’ Sahar said quietly. ‘I have thought of you often.’
Rayan bit the inside of his cheek. He wanted to rage at his grandfather but now was not the time.
‘We have a situation,’ Rayan said. He went on to explain the rats and the wasting pox. ‘This,’ he showed Sahar a picture of the flower, ‘is the plant that cures the disease. Do you know of it, and do you have any in your supplies?’
Sahar looked at the picture and shook his head. ‘No, I’m sorry.’
Rayan’s chin slumped to his chest.
‘Is Lettle unwell?’ Sahar asked. He had read Rayan’s devastation in his face but had reached the wrong conclusion.
His false concern also sparked Rayan’s anger. ‘So she might yet die and complete the job you intended?’
Sahar flinched as if struck. ‘That is not what I meant.’
Rayan didn’t say anything for a time. His anger burned too hot to voice any words. So he waited for the flames to fade until they were barely flickering beneath the surface of his mind.
‘It’s Furi,’ Rayan said.
Sahar swore and stood from the bench. Rayan drew him back to the main reason he was here, ‘Do you know of any other cure?’
‘No, this flower does not grow in Mosima, I am sure of it.’
Rayan stood up to leave with a heavy heart. ‘Many people will die.’
Sahar ran a hand through his thinning hair. ‘You say the flower must be soaked in alcohol for two weeks to remove its toxicity?’
‘Yes.’
‘Use owen tree sap. Mix one part with ten parts water. It will leach the toxins much quicker than alcohol.’
‘How long?’
‘Two days, to be safe.’
Rayan’s relief was short-lived. ‘We have no flowers to treat, so the owen tree sap is pointless.’
‘So Furi might die?’ Sahar said incredulously.
Rayan clenched his fists, his rage once more igniting. ‘Your concern for Furi is touching, but I know your care to be surface-level only.’
‘No, do not say that. We are blood, you and I. We are family.’
‘And Lettle was what? Collateral?’ With each word Rayan’s voice rose in volume.
Sahar flinched. ‘I love her too, you know—’
‘You cannot know what love is to say that!’
Rayan, Ajax’s voice was urgent.
Is Lettle hurt?
No, she is well. But there is much knowledge to share.
Tell me.
‘I have to go,’ Rayan said, all his anger spent. He had nothing else left to say to Sahar.
‘Will you keep me updated on how Furi is?’
Rayan looked at him and shook his head sadly. ‘Goodbye, Grandfather.’ Then he walked away.
It was the last time he would see him.
‘Rayan?’ Sahar called after him. ‘Don’t go!’
Sahar screamed until he sobbed, but Rayan didn’t look back.
—
‘Mosima is a haven? Not a prison?’ Yeeran said. She was as shocked as Rayan had been when he’d heard the tale from Ajax’s memories.
‘Yes, to protect the fae from Afa.’
Yeeran was pacing at the quarantine’s edge. ‘And the human souls went into the obeah because Afa killed them all?’
‘Evidently.’ Rayan would not believe it if he hadn’t heard it himself.
Yeeran rubbed at the bags under her eyes.
‘How is Furi?’ Rayan asked.
‘Sicker. Weaker. Her arms no longer work.’ Yeeran spat the words as if she were cursing, then she went back to pacing.
‘Did Sahar know where we could find hister flowers?’
‘No. But he did say owen tree sap will speed up the process.’
Yeeran stopped her pacing and sank inward with disappointment. Then she perked up as a thought occurred to her. ‘This human magic seems limitless–perhaps Lettle and Afa will be able to create a cure?’
‘No,’ Rayan answered quickly. He had seen how the magic had broken Afa’s spirit and mind. His life’s tale was a haunting one. ‘Besides, they are far away from us.’
‘Then we have to go outside and look for the flower,’ she said resolutely.
‘We can’t, the elven army will be at the tunnel entrance. There’s no way we can leave,’ Rayan replied.
He had already considered it and run through all the complications. It was certain death now for anyone who crossed the threshold from Mosima to topside. The boundary was the only thing keeping them safe.
Yeeran made a frustrated noise. ‘Could Lettle bring down the boundary? Maybe then we could tunnel out?’
‘By the time she gets here there’d be very few people left in Mosima to save.’ Rayan looked to the queue that had formed of sick people at the quarantine’s border. He stopped counting at fifty.
It could not end like this. They had to try.
‘If we go outside the boundary, we have to ensure we do not get hurt. We’ll need an advantage,’ he said.
‘Malak,’ Yeeran said the name they were both thinking.
‘We’d be losing any leverage we could use in the future,’ Rayan said, running through the ramifications of offering up their one prisoner of war.
‘Yes, but what will leverage matter if everyone is dead?’
Rayan felt as though he had to consider Furi’s thoughts in this as though she were here. ‘Furi would say the risk is too great.’
‘But she would still do it. You know there is nothing she would not do to save her people.’
‘True.’
‘Send me out. I know how to forage, I did it enough times as a child. Plus I’m the only one other than you who has actually seen the flower before.’
It made sense. Rayan wouldn’t be able to leave because of his connection to the city.
‘You might be infected though,’ he said.
‘I will go alone, no one else need come. And once I find the flower, I will return.’
One of the healer’s voices called out from the front of the queue, ‘Single file, remain calm; we will get to you as soon as we can.’ They wore bright purple gloves made of linen.
‘Some of the healers have got sick,’ Yeeran said.
‘The gloves aren’t helping?’
‘They are, but some must have caught the pox beforehand.’
‘Jay?’
‘They’re fine. Tending to Furi still.’
‘Good.’ The wasting pox was an awful disease.
‘Have you already had it?’ Yeeran asked.
‘Yes, when I was seven, before I moved to Waning. In Shah, hister flowers grew on the border of the city, so it was easier to make the cure.’ He knew that having it prior had likely given him immunity, but he wasn’t stupid enough to test the theory and walk among the sick.
He’d been frustrated when Yeeran had crossed the quarantine border to Furi. But he’d understood it. If these were to be their last days, he would have wanted to spend them with Lettle too.
He let his gaze slip from Mosima to the sanctuary as he inhabited Ajax’s sight.
Lettle was watching Afa with tenderness. Even knowing everything he had done she had the humanity to offer sympathy.
Furi had once called Lettle ‘pricklier than a prickle bush’ and he’d never understood that perception of her. Yes, Lettle knew her mind, but there was no one who cared more deeply than she.
A scream pulled Rayan out of Ajax’s sight. A young girl who was being assessed by a healer had collapsed to the ground. It didn’t take long for her to be escorted away on a stretcher into one of the waiting sickbeds.
As much as he wanted to watch Lettle forever, he knew they had no time to waste.
‘Let’s go release our prisoner,’ he said.