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Prologue

Baghdad, Abbasid Caliphate, 1307

“Hey, Scot. Scot, wake up.”

Ian opened his eyes and lifted his head, ignoring the ache in his old wounds. Moonlight fell on the dirt-packed floor through tiny vertical windows up by the ceiling. It was warm, even at night. Around him, other slaves wheezed peacefully on the benches by the walls. The air smelled of unwashed bodies, dry dirt, and the orange tree that grew outside the windows. Even after eleven years here, Ian missed the fresh air of the Highlands.

Abaeze, the slave from Africa, whose bench stood right next to Ian’s, raised his head, his eyeballs glowing white in the darkness.

“Yes?” Ian whispered back. “What is it?”

They spoke Arabic, the common language here. Learning it when he’d arrived had been the difference between staying alive and dying.

Abaeze glanced around, sat up, then slithered soundlessly to Ian, quick and efficient. A slender man even taller than Ian, he was as dark as the night, his hair a black cloud.

Abaeze crouched next to Ian’s bench. “Abaeze hear a thing,” he whispered, his accent thick. Since Abaeze had only arrived recently, his Arabic was limited, but he could get his point across. “You be careful today. You watch you.”

A bad feeling settled in Ian’s stomach. “For what? Something during the fight?”

The man nodded. “Abaeze sleep and see death. You watch you.”

Fear gripped Ian’s throat in its icy hand. With that final message, Abaeze left Ian and settled back on his bench. Soon, he wheezed rhythmically.

Ian lay on his back and stared at the lime-cured white ceiling.

Death.

Would it be so bad, to let it finally take him? What hope did he have with a life like this? He’d never see the Highlands or his family again.

He always asked this question before a fight. His opponent and he needed to kill the other to live, to continue giving their masters the bloody satisfaction of power. The entertainment. The rush of a bet.

And on and on.

Every fight he’d won since he’d been here meant he’d taken a life. Ian had lost count of how many he’d killed. He’d become famous. The red-haired unbreakable beast of the caliph—the Red Death, they called him. Or simply, the Scot. Because the caliph valued him as a rare find—no other Scotsman had been captured.

Thank God.

He’d fought Germans, Spanish, Indians, Turks, English, Africans, and many, many Arabs. It didn’t matter what skin color they had, what language they spoke, if they had a family back home, mayhap children and a wife. They all fell from Ian’s hand.

Because he wanted to live.

But maybe Abaeze had seen the time for him to welcome his own death. Was he ready?

Ian asked himself that question repeatedly during the sleepless night and again in the morning. The sun shone into the room, and slaves brought food. The men were let out into the inner yard to clean and sweep. He was still thinking about it during the midday meal.

Other slaves were afraid of him. Abaeze, being relatively new, was Ian’s only friend. He’d had friends here before. They all were dead now.

The fights were always in the afternoon and towards the evening, when the sun had already started to set, to avoid the main heat. As always, Ian and the others were given armor first, then led into a windowless chamber full of weapons—scimitars, spears, and shields. There were two doors: one lead to the courtyard where the caliph held the fights, the other—back into the small wing of the palace meant for slaves.

“You watch you,” Abaeze repeated, taking a sword.

“You watch you, too,” Ian said. “Thank you for the warning, friend.”

The door to the courtyard opened, bright light blinding Ian in the darkness. They waited to see who’d be called first. But instead, many feet pounded against the dusty ground outside. Guards who stood lined along the walls shoved the first of the men standing closer to the courtyard door, yelling for everyone to get out.

Abaeze and Ian exchanged glances. “Looks like we fight many against many,” Ian said. “I will have your back.”

“And Abaeze fights for Scot.”