The Desert Spear

respect.
    “My coffers would open wide to someone who could care for such small things,” he said.
    Abban smiled, bowing as low as his crutch would allow. “It would be my pleasure to serve the Shar’Dama Ka.”
    Jardir nodded. “I want to march in three summers.” He put his arm around Abban, drawing him close like a friend and putting his lips within inches of Abban’s ear.
    “And if you ever try to cheat me like some mark in the bazaar,” he added in a low voice, “I will tan your skin and use it as a dung sack. That is a promise you should remember.”
    Abban paled and nodded quickly. “I will never forget it.”

CHAPTER 10
KHA’SHARUM
    p.
331 AR

    JARDIR HISSED , EMBRACING THE CUT .
    “Am I hurting you?” Inevera asked.
    “I’ve taken far worse in the Maze,” Jardir scoffed. “But if you should slip at a tendon…”
    Inevera snorted. “I know the course of a man’s flesh far better than you, husband. This is no different than carving
alagai hora.
”
    Jardir looked at the silver tray that held the thin strips of flesh she had sliced from the palm of his hand. He let the sting pass through him as Inevera packed herbs into the wounds. “I fail to see the need for this.”
    “According to the Canon we took from one of the Northern Messengers in the dungeon, the greenlanders believe the Deliverer will have marked flesh that corelings cannot abide,” Inevera said. She let go of his hand, allowing him to raise it before his eyes, marveling at the precision of the ward she had cut into the skin.
    “Will they work?” he asked, flexing his hand experimentally.
    Inevera nodded. “When I am through, your touch will bring more harm to the
alagai
than a thrust from the Spear of Kaji itself.”
    Jardir felt a thrill run through him. The thought of wrestling a demon on its own terms and killing it with his bare hands was intoxicating.
    Inevera had just finished binding the hand when Damaji Ashan entered the throne room, followed by his son Asukaji and Jardir’s second son, Asome. Both young to be wearing the white robes of
dama,
but they were Blood of the Deliverer, and none dared question it.
    “Deliverer,” Ashan greeted him, bowing. “The
khaffit,
” he spat the word as if it had a foul taste, “is here with the tallies.” Jardir nodded, and Abban limped into the room on his ivory camel crutch while Inevera draped herself at Jardir’s feet. Damaji Aleverak followed Abban in, the empty right sleeve of his robe pinned back. Jardir’s son Maji, in his
nie’dama
bido, shadowed his steps. They joined Ashan, Asukaji, and Asome to the right of the Skull Throne.
    Abban bowed and pulled a small vial from his belt. He threw it to Jardir. “Dama Qavan of the Mehnding asked me to give you that,” he said.
    Jardir caught the vial and looked at it curiously. “He asked you to give this?”
    “The contents, anyway,” Abban said. “Mixed in your food or drink.”
    Inevera snatched the vial from Jardir and pulled the stopper, sniffing the contents. She put a drop on the tip of her finger, tasting it.
    “Tunnel asp venom,” she said, spitting. “Enough to kill ten men.”
    Jardir tilted his head at Abban “What did he pay you?”
    Abban smiled, lifting a jingling sack of coins. “A
Damaji’s
ransom.”
    Jardir nodded. Damaji Enkaji of the Mehnding had proven a vocal supporter of him in public, but this was not the first assassination attempt to come from one of his minions.
    “I’ll have Dama Qavan arrested and put to the question,” Ashan said.
    “It’s a waste of time,” Abban said. “He won’t betray his
Damaji
to your torturers. He is better left alone.”
    “No one asked your opinion,
khaffit
!” Damaji Aleverak growled, making Abban jump. “We can’t let the man live to further plot against the Shar’Dama Ka.”
    “Perhaps the
khaffit
has a point, husband,” Inevera interrupted, drawing the outraged glare Aleverak always gave when the woman dared speak her mind before the Skull Throne. “Abban can tell Qavan you ate the poison without so much as a cramp, and seed the tale in the bazaar to spread it everywhere. Project such invincibility, and even the bravest assassin may reconsider his course.”
    “The Damajah is wise,” Abban said with a bow. They were two of a kind, he and Inevera, always twisting others to their wishes. Jardir saw the
khaffit’s
eyes flick to her, just for an instant, drinking of his wife’s wantonly displayed beauty. He swallowed a flare of