The Desert Spear

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.”

CHAPTER 11
ANOCH SUN
    p.
332 AR

    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.
    “What is this?” he asked.
    “Messenger markings, Deliverer,” Abban said. “They are all over the oasis, naming every man who has succored here on his way to the Desert Spear.”
    Jardir shrugged. “What of it?”
    Abban pointed to a large portion of the stone carved in flowing calligraphy. Jardir could not read the letters, but even he could appreciate their beauty.
    “This,” Abban said, “reads ‘Arlen Bales of Tibbet’s Brook.’ ”
    “The Par’chin,” Jardir said. Abban nodded.
    “What else does it say?” Jardir asked.
    “It says, ‘Student of Messenger Cob of Miln, Messenger to dukes, known as Par’chin in Krasia, and true friend of Ahmann Jardir, Sharum Ka of the Desert Spear.’ ”
    Abban paused, letting the words sink in, and Jardir grimaced. “Read on,” he growled.
    “I have been to the five living forts,” Abban read, pointing to the names of the cities marked with an upward-pointing spear, “and nearly every known hamlet in Thesa.” Abban pointed to another, longer list, this one showing dozens of names.
    “These names, marked with the downward spear, are ruins he has visited,” Abban noted, pointing to another long list. “The Par’chin was busy in the time he spent away from the Desert Spear. There are even Krasian ruins listed here.”
    “Oh?” Jardir asked.
    “The Par’chin was always hunting the bazaar for maps and histories,” Abban said.
    Jardir looked back at the list. “Is Baha kad’Everam on the list?” When Abban did not immediately reply, he turned to the
khaffit.
“Do not make me ask twice. If I ask one of our
chin
prisoners to translate the wall and learn you lied…”
    “It’s there,” Abban said.
    Jardir nodded. “So Abban finally claimed the rest of his Dravazi pottery,” he said more than asked. Abban did not reply, but he did