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But something is not right.
“What’s bothering you, Elias?” a voice says from behind me.
Laia. I’ve avoided her since the first raid. That night, I wished to comfort her. For like me, she was tormented by the killing. I wished to listen to her and hold her and pass the hours with her in my arms.
But as Mauth said,wishes only cause pain.
I mumble an excuse and make to ride off, but Laia angles her horse in front of mine.
“Stop, Elias,” she says. “I’m not here to seduce you. Just because I’m in love with you does not mean I lack in pride—”
“You—” Her words wrap around me like a breeze on a hot day.Mauth, damn you, this is when I need your magic to wipe away what I feel. But with every day that passes, the magic grows more unresponsive. Today is no different.
“You shouldn’t say that,” I manage.
“Why?” she asks blithely, but her knuckles are stiff against the reins. Her hair is caught in a braid and she no longer tries to hide the layers of emotion in her dark eyes. “It’s true. In any case, I’m not here to talk about us. Something eats at you. Is it the raids?”
Even with our losses, our raids have been successful. We have no shortage of volunteers, for our band of refugee fighters has grown from a little more than three thousand riders and half a hundred wagons to nearly double that. Survivors fleeing Sadh and Aish have joined us, as well as Tribespeople escaping smaller villages scattered across the vast desert.
“It’s the Commandant,” I tell Laia. “I feel like I’m missing something. Keris doesn’t make the same mistake twice. And we’ve hit her four times now.”
“She’s tightened her defenses.”
Know your enemy. In Blackcliff, it was the first rule the Commandant taught us about war.
“If our strikes were hurting her,” I say, “she would have done more than tighten her defenses.”
“We’ve decimated her supplies and livestock, Elias,” Laia says. “Slowed them down by days. Our attacksarehurting her. She’ll arrive in Taib with a far weaker army than she expected.”
But why should she care about Taib?It hits me then, and I feel like a fool for not seeing it before. Keris is herding us. Distracting us.
“She split her forces.” I say. “She doesn’t give two figs about Taib, Laia. She wants Nur.”
Capturing the crown jewel of the Tribal desert will net the Nightbringer three times as many souls as Taib. I slow my horse and dismount, throwingmy canteen and some provisions into a pack. “I have to go. I have to see if it’s true. I’ll return.”
“Send out scouts,” Laia says. “Or at least tell the fighters you’re going. Even if you don’t... care about them—”
“Mohsin An-Saif. Sule An-Nasur. Omair An-Saif. Isha Ara-Nur. Kasib An-Rahim.” I tighten my scim straps and swing my pack on. “Those are the five fighters who died last night. They leave behind four mothers, three fathers, eight siblings, and two children.”
Horses move around us, and some of the fighters stare at me surreptitiously. While a few call out greetings to Laia, most look away from me.
“I do not speak to them because I’m not their savior, Laia,” I say. “I can’t tell them everything will be all right. Or that I can make them safe. Instead, I tell them they can flee their enemies or fight, knowing that they will fight. Knowing that as a result, many will die. And I’m doing all of it so the ghosts find peace in the Waiting Place. I do it to save the dead, not the living.”
“Fine,” she says. “But no one wants to fight for nothing, Elias. You need to give them a reason. Let them know and understand you. Let them care for you. Otherwise you might return and find you have no army left.”
“The fate of their dead is their reason,” I say. “And it will have to be enough.” I hand her the reins of my mount. “I shouldn’t be gone more than a few hours.”
“Elias—”
“Soul Catcher,” I tell her, before windwalking out into the desert, scouring for any sign of Keris’s army. I consider what Laia said as I travel.No one wants to fight for nothing. My grandfather, Quin Veturius, is a legendary leader of men. His soldiers follow him because they trust his battle acumen. They trust that he cares about them and their families and their lives.
Keris leads through fear. Through threats that are reinforced by a fierce and uncanny understanding of human weakness.
Tribe Saif followed Uncle Akbi because they loved him. The same reason Tribe Nur follows Afya. The Tribal fighters do not entirely trust me. Nor do they fear me. They certainly do not love me. Because I am their Banu al-Mauth, they respect me. I have no right to ask for more.
Windwalking lends me speed, but it does not make it easy to find Keris’s army. I check every canyon, every depression in which they might be lurking, zigzagging over the Tribal lands. But I find nothing.
That night, I take shelter in a ravine. As I build up a fire, I step back into the memories Cain gave me of Blackcliff, of training, ofher.
