of no more than a thousand men. When spread out in a line against the plains, they had seemed ten times that number. Or perhaps the One-Eyed Preacher had used his sorcery to demoralize the defenders of Ashfall.
He counted the brushfires along their encampment. They lit the faces of small groups, though most of the men had covered the lower half of their faces with their neck scarves, in the custom of their people. He noted the looseness of their robes as a weakness—not what he would have chosen to wear as armor into battle. His own men wore leather armor that closely conformed to their bodies, their weapons at their waists, shields slung over their backs. The Nineteen may have been well-fortified, but Khashayar perceived disadvantages the Zhayedan could exploit.
As they crept ahead with utmost stealth, he considered sending a message by hawk to convey his discoveries to Arsalan, the commander of the Black Khan’s army. But too many of the tribal herders who made up the Rising Nineteen had cast their glances at the sky, waiting for such a signal to give away the enemy’s position. As he scanned the perimeter for a possible ambush, he noticed when two soldiers in each group raised their torches, the signal he had been waiting for.
He held up his hand to silence all movement. The Companions came to a halt, the First Oralist at his side, the Claim a near-silent murmur from her mouth. They were no more than fifty feet from the rearguard of the Nineteen. Two of the soldiers glanced in their direction.
The breeze that brushed the grasslands whipped against their faces, forcing them to turn away.
Khashayar’s smile was grim. He knew his duty was to escort the Companions to Timeback, but his mind was racing with other possibilities. With the First Oralist’s use of the Claim, perhaps they could strike against the rearguard and strike hard—hard enough to gain Ashfall another night’s reprieve.
Before the First Oralist could answer the question in his eyes—or before he could act on his own—a chant began in the Nineteen’s camp. The soldiers beat against the ground with their torches in an accompanying rhythm. The chant was meant to terrorize the citizens of Ashfall, but Khashayar was mystified by the meaning of the words they spoke. They offered it in the High Tongue. As an elite commander, he was literate enough to understand.
“Over this are Nineteen.”
Over what? What did their name signify? He lowered his arm in a signal and began to move again, letting the words sweep over the night. The First Oralist’s continuous murmur of the Claim dimmed any fear he might have felt at the chant.
Over this are Nineteen.
He glanced back at his men to ensure that their course was steady. They moved with precision, a line of warriors determined to protect the Companions and the boy, weapons in hand, eyes focused on the soldiers who should have seen their movements in the open but whose heads remained turned away.
Though the temptation to strike was great, Khashayar bided his time. He would get the Companions to safety, and then he would persuade the First Oralist of the merits of his plan.
They stole across the grass, their movements sleek and their footing sure. None looked away from the Nineteen, waiting for the silence to break, prepared at any moment for discovery.
But under the steady flow of the First Oralist’s words, they made their way to the hillock and dipped down the other side. Now they were positioned on a twenty-foot dune that loomed above the Nineteen. Khashayar made a rapid calculation and was convinced: if the First Oralist used the Claim to shield them, he and his men could eliminate the rearguard.
She would caution him, he knew. Ten against two hundred. But he’d seen the power of the Claim.
Still, he had to consider the step that would come after a surprise attack. News of the First Oralist’s routing of the One-Eyed Preacher at the Messenger Gate had spread rapidly through the ranks of the Zhayedan. She was a weapon they could wield. If she remained on their side. Angering her for a limited victory could mean losing her assistance entirely.
Too, the First Oralist had made calculations of her own. She wanted the horses the soldiers closest to them had grouped at the rear of their camp—horses whose finely shaped heads were the mark of the region’s thoroughbreds. The horses could take them some distance farther west, though they lacked the stamina for the journey through the heart of the Rub Al Khali desert. At some point, the Companions would need to trade the thoroughbreds for camels.
But surely he could use that to his advantage. He would give the First Oralist her horses, if she agreed to his strike. If she helped him destroy the Nineteen’s entire vanguard. He glanced over at her, expecting to find her attention focused on the horses. Instead, her gaze had followed his, and now she watched him closely, as if she could read his thoughts. Could she? He frowned at the thought.
“First Oralist—”
She spoke to him kindly, her cloak thrown back, the breeze taking the long strands of her hair, so that it whipped at his skin, soft as Marakand silk. “I don’t have the power you seek.”
“You defeated the One-Eyed Preacher at the walls.”
“A momentary respite.”
Something in the air shifted. The chanting slowed. Deepened. Soldiers in the camp began to move. Spyglasses scanned the dunes.
Arian and Khashayar ducked down. The murmur of the Claim began again, this time augmented by Sinnia, while the boy, Wafa, crouched at their sides, his blue eyes wide with fear.
Arian shifted closer to the horses. His courtesy set aside, Khashayar’s hand shot out to clamp down on her wrist.
She turned back to him, pinned him with eyes that seemed to see everything, things he didn’t want her to know.
But it was the boy who wrenched Khashayar’s grip from her wrist. A hard smile touched Khashayar’s lips. The Hazara boy freed by the Companions had a blind devotion to them now. Nothing could rout him from their sides, or from their self-appointed Audacy.
He watched as the First Oralist took the boy’s hand and pressed a kiss to his curls.
The Talisman’s prejudice spilled over into his thoughts. How could the First Oralist of Hira kiss a child of the Hazara, a people too weak to defend themselves, instead of aligning herself with much worthier allies?
She answered his unspoken question. “We are all equals. We all belong to the One.” Then, moving out of his reach, she skirted closer, lower down the ridge to where the horses were pastured. “If I could help you, I would, Khashayar. You’ll have to learn to trust me.” She nodded at the city in the distance, a glimmer of lights beyond the army’s encampment. The sounds of battle were fainter far from the walls, yet still audible. The clash of steel, the destruction sowed by catapults that creaked under the weight of their projectiles, the clean whistle of arrows slicing through bursts of noise. Brilliant dots of fire flickered along the walls.
“I would understand if you and your men chose to return to make your stand at Ashfall. Just as Sinnia and I must fulfill our purpose.”
She held his gaze, her own astonishingly clear.
Go with her, the Black Khan had said. Do not leave her side. Whoever stands against you, whoever you must destroy, your foremost duty is to bring the Sana Codex to Ashfall. No matter what the First Oralist may tell you. No matter where she tries to take it. Do otherwise, and you will be party to the destruction of this empire.
Khashayar’s fingers curled into his palm. He moved to give the First Oralist cover, signaling to his men. Crawling crabwise across the hill in their descent, he felt the verses of the Claim attain an urgency. A harshness to stand against words that had no meaning for him, despite their pounding pulse.
Over this are Nineteen.
His armor was brushed by spiky tufts of grass that pricked at the skin of his throat. The breeze summoned by the Claim blew the smoke from the Nineteen’s fires away from their small party back into the camp, where soldiers could be heard coughing. He gripped his sword, sliding sideways.