Peter Brett - The Desert Spear

The Nanji approached, but Jardir could see hesitation in them now. His very presence unnerved them. Their spears shook in their hands, and they glanced to one another uncertainly as if to decide which should lead the attack.

"Strike or kneel!" Jardir roared. He brought up the Spear of Kaji, and the bright metal caught the sunlight and seemed to flare with power.

One of the Nanji warriors dropped his spear and fell to his knees. "Traitor!" the one next to him cried, turning to stab at him, but the third was quicker, darting in and putting his spear through the aggressor's chest.

There was a creak behind Jardir. A whisper of sandal on canvas. Knowing Nanji tactics, he turned around, looking up at the true assassin, crouched hidden atop the pavilion behind him. This Watcher should have struck while Jardir was distracted by the others, ensuring a kill.

Their eyes met, but Jardir said nothing, waiting. After a moment, the man threw down his spear and somersaulted down after it, kneeling at Jardir's feet.

Jardir went to the fallen man, pulling the spear free of his back and holding it up for all to see. "This is not khaffit blood!" he cried. "This is the blood of a warrior, the first kha'Sharum, and I will lacquer his skull and add it to my throne to remember him always." He looked out at the khaffit. "Will any step forth to take his place?"

There was a dissonant moan, and the seven-foot deaf giant pushed to the front of the crowd, kneeling at Jardir's feet. Others quickly followed, and there was a frantic press to kneel before Jardir. As Jardir touched each in turn, Abban seized an opportunity to speak.

"Fear not, those of you who cannot carry a spear from age or infirmity!" he cried. "Fear not, you women, you children! The Deliverer needs more than just Sharum! He needs weavers to make nets and smiths for spearheads. Canvas for the kha'Sharum pavilion, and food for its warriors. Come to my pavilion on the morrow, if you wish to put aid to Krasia's glory and bring honor to your families!"

Jardir frowned, knowing Abban acted as much to profit from cheap labor as to aid in the war, but he did not contradict him. The labor would be needed if they were to march in a year.

The crowd began to chant his name as Jardir continued to touch men with the Spear of Kaji and name them kha'Sharum. Soon it thundered from the bazaar, echoing throughout the city.

"Jardir! Jardir! Jardir!"

"Masterfully done," Abban said in his ear when he had touched the last khaffit. "You've bought ten thousand warriors and twice as many slaves for naught but a taste of self-respect."

"Is that all you see with your merchant's heart?" Jardir asked, looking at him. "A business transaction?"

Abban at least had the decency to look ashamed, though Jardir doubted it was sincere. The next day, two thousand men presented themselves at the training grounds, as the tribes were still erecting khaffit'sharaj. A week later, the number had tripled. A week after that, a steady stream flowed in from the outer villages as men who had been khaffit for ten generations came to break their caste, bringing their families with them to share in the war effort. In less than a month, Jardir tripled the size of his army, and the city swelled with people as it hadn't in decades.

"Next summer," Jardir said again as Abban finished his morning tallies.

"The greenlanders will still outnumber us greatly," Abban said.

Jardir nodded. "Perhaps, but the best of the Northern weaklings will not be able to stand up to even a kha'Sharum by then."

"How many will you leave here, to secure the Desert Spear?" Ashan asked.

"None," Jardir said, drawing looks of surprise from all in the room, even Inevera.

"You will take every warrior?" Aleverak asked. "Who will defend the city?"

"Not just every warrior, Damaji," Jardir said. "Every one. We must leave the Sunlit Land behind. All of us. Even the old. Even the crippled and sick. Every man, woman, and child, city dwellers and villagers alike. We will empty the Desert Spear and lock its gates behind us, letting its impregnable walls stand in defiance of the alagai until we choose to reclaim it."

Aleverak's eyes lit up with a fanatical gleam.

"This is a dangerous plan, Deliverer," Ashan warned. "Our army will move at a crawl when it must be swift."

"At first perhaps," Jardir said. "But we will need to hold the green lands we conquer, without leaving troops behind. Everam set the khaffit in the Land of Sun the same as us. In the green lands, a khaffit who follows the Evejah will still rank above the chin. Let them settle in our wake, holding the land for Everam as the Sharum march on."

Jardir saw Inevera fingering her alagai hora pouch absently. She would excuse herself to throw the dice as soon as the audience was over, but Jardir had no doubt they would confirm his course. The rightness of it sang within him, and even Abban nodded his approval.

"When will you tell the other Damaji?" Ashan asked.

"Not until we're ready to leave," Jardir said, "giving Enkaji and the others no time to oppose the decision. I want the great gate at everyone's back before they have their bearings."

"And from there?" Abban asked. "Fort Rizon?"

Jardir shook his head. "First, Anoch Sun. Then the green lands."

"You have found the lost city?" Abban asked.

Jardir gestured to a table covered in maps. "It was never truly lost. There were detailed maps in Sharik Hora all along. We simply stopped going there after the Return."

"Unbelievable," Abban said.

Jardir looked at him. "What I don't understand is how the Par'chin found it. Searching the desert would take a lifetime. He must have had help. Who would he have gone to in search of that?"

Abban shrugged. "There are a hundred merchants in the bazaar claiming to sell maps to Anoch Sun."

"Forgeries," Jardir said.

"Not all, apparently," Abban said.

Jardir knew the khaffit could dance between truth and lie as easily as a man might breathe in and out. "Inevera," he said at last, holding up the Spear of Kaji. "No thing happens, but that Everam wills it."

THE OASIS OF DAWN was a place of great beauty, a series of warded sandstone monoliths protecting a wide grassy area, several clusters of fruit trees, and a broad pool of fresh, clean water, fed by the same underground river that supplied the Desert Spear. There was a stair cut into the ala beneath one monolith, leading to a torchlit underground chamber where a man could cast nets into the river and easily catch a feast.

It was a small oasis, meant as a way station for merchant caravans but more often used by lone Messengers. It was, of course, never meant to supply the greatest army the world had seen in centuries.

Jardir's host fell upon it like locusts, surrounding the monoliths with thousands of tents and pavilions. Before most of the Krasians had even arrived, the trees were stripped of fruit and cut for firewood, the grasses mown clean by grazing livestock and trampled flat. Thousands of men wading into the pool to wash their feet and fill their skins left only a fetid, muddy puddle in their wake. They cast nets in the underground fishing chamber, but what would have been a rich catch to a caravan was not even a morsel to the Krasian horde.

"Deliverer," Abban said, approaching Jardir as he surveyed the camp. "There is something I think you should see."

Jardir nodded, and Abban led him to a large block of sandstone covered in carvings. Some were the barest etchings, faded over many years, and others sharp and fresh. Some were crude scratches, and others great designs worked in artful script. They were all in the Northern style of writing, an ugly form with which Jardir was only passingly familiar.