27. Chapter 27
Chapter twenty-seven
Erix
In my brief time leading the clans as the Viper, all the lords had met and discussed sitting around the low table in Lord Alasdar’s stifling tent.
I supposed it was my tent at that point, but I could never see it that way.
Those arguments had been full of disguised barbs and always ended with more disagreement than consensus.
While apprehension still hung thick in the air, this meeting of lords still felt different.
With the encampment not yet re-erected, we were all seated cross-legged on the ground around a fire, the open sky lit with early morning light a stark contrast to the flickering lamps inside a closed-off tent. I wore no mask or gloves.
And most importantly, Keera sat at my side.
I looked around at the assembled group, and where the day before there had been the agreement of cooperation, something deeper ran now.
Dhara and Elion sat among the other lords they had split with, and Aderyn was welcome in their midst as well.
We had all survived the tidal wave together, and the one who had most fiercely opposed us as high lords was gone, replaced by the warlord who appeared much more easily reasoned with.
Of course, there was still the problem of General Warrick. While all the representatives of the desert seemed to at least tolerate each other’s presence, everybody glanced sidelong as he settled himself among us.
Before, he had told us he knew things we did not, and I had thought it a mere tactic spoken by a politician—but he had warned us of the wave based on knowledge we did not share with him.
He could have left us to be swept away. Now, I wanted to know what other knowledge he might have, and what he meant when he referred to the youngest goddess.
“Explain what you meant when you spoke of the goddesses,” Keera started, her mind clearly taking her down the same path.
Warrick lowered his brows. “The story of the creation of the world… the three daughters of the sky?”
I tilted my head at him, waiting for him to elaborate.
He huffed and scrubbed his hand over his face.
“While Doran and Viltov see the world differently, we both share the tale of how the world came to be. I had thought you did too, as it accounts for the nature of your land. It is told in the oldest tomes in the libraries of both our countries, handed down for thousands of years.”
“Nothing in the desert stands for thousands of years,” Dhara pointed out.
“The palace in Kelvadan holds the oldest collection of tomes and is only two hundred years old. Although the books and scrolls contained there may be older and were carried among the clans before,” Aderyn chimed in.
“Our stories are told like this,” Izumi gestured to the way we all sat around the fire. “And we tell our own origin of the desert. How the monsters were tamed by the first person—people—to cross from the mountains to the sea and win her heart.”
“It would seem some of the oldest stories might have been lost in the days before the desert was conquered, then.” Warrick sighed. “For while I do not know the stories of how the clans came to the desert, our story tells of how it came to be such a wild wasteland in the first place.”
I pressed my lips together, wanting to chide him that the desert was not a wasteland, but not wishing to keep him from telling his tale either. “Share this story with us,” I demanded.
Warrick took a deep breath, as if stealing himself. “I’m much more accustomed to reading my stories from a book than reciting them around a fire, but I will do my best.
“The legends say that in the beginning there was only the Great Mother who rules the heavens. She was beautiful and endless and full of majesty, but she grew lonely. And so, she plucked out pieces of her mysterious expanse and shaped them into three daughters, whom she breathed life into.
“The Great Mother was no longer alone, and she had children to share in creation with her.
As they grew though, they too wanted a domain to shape and care for as their mother had crafted the stars in the heavens.
So, the Great Mother gifted them our world.
Each daughter claimed their portion and shaped it according to the nature the Mother had given them when she unraveled her own mystery to give them life.
“The eldest daughter was solid and steadfast. And so, she shaped the land to be as solid as she was, with a strong rocky foundation.
As the oldest, though, she shared a close bond with the Great Mother and found herself missing her terribly.
In her homesickness, she reached up toward the sky to be closer to her, forming the mountains of Doran.
“The middle daughter was quiet and mysterious and found herself misunderstood, as many middle children are. So, she carved the earth into the mysterious deep of the ocean, where none might fully explore her endless depths.
“And the last daughter was passionate and hotheaded, full of fire and changing whims. So, she shaped a land to match her temperament—changeable and challenging. She became the desert.
“While the goddesses exist in a plane that surpasses our understanding, they still shape the world we live in according to their whims, although each in their own ways.
Those in Doran who are touched by the Eldest Goddess train extensively in runes and incantations to use her power, as she respects discipline and devotion.
She will grant those who serve her visions of the future.
Sometimes she will send messages through her favored animal: The white wolf.
“There are tales of those in Viltov who used to call on great powers and control the ocean—even stories of those who could call an army of the dead to walk among them. But those powers have not been seen in many years. I do not know what the middle goddess desires.
“But the youngest goddess…” Warrick gestured around. “Much is unknown to both Doran and Viltov about the clans of the desert, but it is clear that the Youngest Goddess has granted some among you powers that are not understood by others.”
I breathed in sharply, wondering at this new information.
While parts of it were foreign to me, many pieces still rang true.
Everybody who rode the desert knew that it was alive, everybody referring to our home as “she” almost without consciously deciding to.
But some had viewed the magic of the desert as a force of nature, where I always felt that it was more than that.
It was not nearly so impersonal as nature—she wanted things and granted me different abilities when it suited her.
For years, I wondered if I had simply attributed so much agency to the desert as an explanation for the voices that plagued me. But perhaps I had not been so wrong.
“It is clear that we have angered this goddess,” Izumi agreed.
“And perhaps the middle daughter too if the behavior of the sea last night was any indication,” Warrick pointed out. “But how you might go about fixing it, I cannot say.”
I reached subconsciously for the two halves of the broken Heart tucked into my sash. At first, I just put my hand over the broken pieces, hesitating. The tether tied to the base of my skull quivered, and I glanced sideways to see Keera gazing at where my hand lay.
Izumi already knew the truth, as did Aderyn, Elion, and Dhara.
But the other lords and Warrick did not know about the Heart.
A small piece of my mind still told me to hide it—to keep the temptation of power from others’ hands like Lord Alasdar, or to keep the information close until the most advantageous moment like my mother might have.
Keera nodded at me slightly, and I felt her resolve solidify alongside mine.
No, we would not rule as our predecessors had.
We had both tried to fit ourselves into their molds and failed when our skills did not match those that kind of leadership required.
If we were to be the new High Lords of the Ballan Desert, we would have to rule as ourselves. Honest, flawed but strong—and together.
I pulled the Heart out for all to see. “Do your legends tell you of the Heart of the Desert, Warrick?”
His eyes widened, and he shook his head. “Last year in the courtyard at Kelvadan was the first time I had heard of it. But I knew if Prince Calix sought it, it could only bring harm to Doran.”
“This is the Desert’s Heart, and it has been broken.
We must heal it if she is to be whole again,” I declared.
Carefully, I told them what I had learned about Kelvar and the key to the desert’s restoration lying in Kelvadan, although I remained somewhat vague about how I knew this.
I tried to suggest that I was privy to the story of Kelvar simply by being his descendent.
“Not only must we reclaim the Great City to drive the invaders from our home,” Keera added in, once I had finished. “We need to reach the top of the palace if the Heart is to be healed.”
Warrick’s eyes stayed glued to the broken gem in my hand as she spoke, and a shiver of apprehension climbed up my spine.
I teetered on the edge of trusting him. He had shared so much information that he didn’t have to and saved us when he could have let the wave wash us away.
Maybe I did not have to trust him to not have his own purposes to let him fight at my side—after all, clan lords shifted allegiances and served their own people above all but still banded together when it suited them.
He sat back and unfolded his arms. “Some stories of creation say that each of the goddesses was born holding the answer of one of life’s greatest mysteries.
The Goddess of Doran—the eldest—was gifted the future.
Although some say time. The Middle Goddess was gifted the mastery of death, and what lies beyond.
And the third in all her passion, was gifted the unknowable power of love.
I never put much stock into such an interpretation, but perhaps that is why her Heart is the key to her power. ”
I glanced at Keera to find her already looking back at me.
It was similar to what we had seen in the temple, where the drawings clearly depicted two people, joined together in the leadership of the desert.
Perhaps Warrick had already seen the carvings and twisted his story to align with ours for his own gain.
“And why should I believe you wouldn’t want this power for yourself?” I asked him.
Warrick huffed and looked around him. “Once, I might have thought to claim it. But the longer I spend in your lands among your people, the more I am convinced I would gain no advantage from such a power. It is fickle and unpredictable—”
“Just like love,” Elion interjected slyly.
Warrick glared at him as he continued, “…and it leaves no room for proper strategy. I prefer the favor of a goddess who values steadfast tradition. Besides, I’m not sure the Youngest Goddess’s power extends beyond the edge of the desert and”—he sighed heavily, as if embarrassed by the next admission—“I hate this heat and all the sand. I miss the snow and the rocky mountains that don’t give way underfoot. ”
“And yet you would still journey all this way to aid the Clans in recapturing Kelvadan?” Keera pressed.
“As I told Izumi in messages when we conversed by eagle, I want to see Viltov fall. I want to see Calix bleed, and you will need my help.” He reiterated his point.
“With only one city in the desert, you do not lay siege the same way we do in Viltov and Doran. You do not know of the catapults and trebuchets Calix will have built—giant engines of war that throw flaming rocks. You will need my knowledge of his tactics.”
“If your tactics were truly superior, you wouldn’t covet our horses for your cavalry,” Dhara argued. “With our horses, we can face these devices. It would seem that you are the ones that would need help to traverse the desert, as you have no mounts.”
A twinkle lit Warrick’s eye, and I was reminded that he was indeed a devious opponent. “Izumi had already mentioned that, and so I came up with a rather artful solution. Come and see.”