“Are you certain about your decision?” Noah’s voice was harsh, and she crossed her arms behind her back, her expression unreadable.
She offered them to wait out the summer solstice and remain hidden and safe from all outside danger. They would have nothing to worry about. It was the best option they could have taken in their exhausted state.
Instead of taking her up on that offer, they chose to continue traversing the desert and risk their lives based on ‘a feeling’.
“We are certain,” answered Kiur. The river carried his nervosity, stretching behind him and beckoning to be crossed. It was the middle of the night, and the silent waters glimmered from the stars and moon above the chasm.
A beautiful and peaceful night to travel.
“It’s not too late to reconsider.” Noah eyed their little antics. How their hands tightened against the few and tattered clothes they had, how their feet shook nervously, and their eyebrows furrowed. They tried to mask their fear, knowing it wasn’t the right one.
“W-we appreciate the offer- but we made a decision!” announced Xander, faking confidence, as usual.
“E-Eggsactly! We can manage to cross the entire dessert in less than a month! Ha ha,” laughed Cylia, as forced as you can imagine—not to mention her sudden urge to make terrible puns.
“If that’s what you want,” stated Noah. “You fools run into a painful death.”
She didn’t voice out her thoughts and didn’t need to. Their resolve was already standing on brittle ground, but it was a resolve nonetheless. She would respect it, knowing it was a decision they had chosen.
A necessary one.
“Have these, a last act of courtesy.” Noah handed Kiur a garnet-coloured gemstone and Xander a sapphire-coloured one. They glistered in their hands and were respectively either warm or cold to the touch. “A parting gift.”
“...Looks like a petty stone- ACK!” Xander was elbowed by Kiur, recalling how he should behave when receiving a parting gift.
“Thank you for everything!” Kiur bowed before Noah and forced Xander to follow suit.
“Hey, that doesn’t seem fair!” complained Cylia, stomping with her foot and pointing her finger at them. “Why do they get a gemstone and not me? Don’t pick favourites!”
Kiur suppressed a laugh. Noah didn’t strike her for someone to make sentimental gifts or for Cylia to become jealous of not receiving one. Although being left out must have been unfair to her.
“You are right. I don’t want to create a wrong impression here.” Noah snapped with her finger. Out of the crowd came the warrior-like men and women Cylia liked to associate herself with during their brief stay.
They handed Cylia a pair of silvern wristbands engraved with an assorted number of symbols and runes neither she, Xander or Kiur could read. One symbol stood out from the rest. It was one with three interlocking triangles and wings on either side and long lines along the middle.
“Something to remember us by on your road.” The warriors grinned and flexed their arms, showing off their own wristbands. Cylia couldn’t help herself but mimic them.
“Since when was she so chummy with them?” whispered Xander, receiving a shrug from Kiur. They hardly had the time to make acquaintances with them, but Cylia and the warriors behaved as if they knew each other for far longer.
“And this one too.” Noah took off a necklace she was hiding underneath her clothes, a silver chain pendant with the depiction of a large golden cat—a lynx. “This will help you when you reach the borders.” Noah clasped the necklace around Cylia’s neck, who touched her new accessory in awe.
She couldn’t remember the last time she received so many gifts at once—not since she was a child.
And Xander was definitely not letting her enjoy it. “That’s biased now! Why does she get jewellery, and we get some pretty stones- ACK! STOP HITTING ME!”
“You should stop complaining,” mouthed Kiur. “We are grateful for all your help.” Kiur pinched Xander’s arm and smiled at him. “Aren’t we?”
“We are!” Cylia overshadowed Xander’s response with her shout, celebrating her last moments with the warriors while Xander groused indigently, rubbing his arm. “At least we can get buried in style when we die in the desert.”
Cylia’s morbid comment killed the mood. Xander grimaced at her. “You just had to say that, didn’t you?”
“I’m not wrong, am I?” She looked over at Kiur. He furrowed his brows. “Not like we stand any chance, anyway. Remember, I only agreed to this because I trust you.”
Xander felt bad for Kiur.
He agreed with Cylia’s opinion but couldn’t help but frown at her remark. Maybe she didn’t mean to be so insensitive, but still. Kiur was doing it for their own good. That’s what Xander hoped for. He couldn’t help but put a hand on Kiur’s shoulder, showing he supported his decision—even when he couldn’t confidently meet his eyes.
“Before you go,” Daedal, the greying dwarf Kiur got to know in Kuara, was the last to approach them. “I would like to ask for a blessing. If that’s alright with you, Lord Noah.”
Noah and Daedal exchanged agitated stares. The others weren’t sure what the tension was about, but whatever it was, Noah relented. “You want me to give them my boat? Fine by me. It can carry them to where the river dries. Not that it would make much difference. The desert is over 3000 kilometres long. They can walk the rest.”
The trio sweated profusely, hearing the measurements.
“Do you really want us to march through an entire continent?” thought Xander and Cylia, but Kiur remained steadfast—well aware of the magnitude of their task.
“Thank you.” Daedal bowed curtly. With a stretch of his hand, the waters brought in a gentle breeze. The small rowing boat rocked forth to the river’s bank, begging and budding against the docks for its passengers to come aboard. “Perfect for exactly three people. Make yourselves comfortable and let the river carry you as far as it goes.”
“We will, thank you very much,” Kiur extended a hand to Daedal, who simply smiled at him, refusing to shake it.
“No need for formalities.” he outstretched his arms. “How about a hug?”
Kiur was initially surprised but took him up on the offer, hugging the dwarf, who rubbed Kiur’s back and whispered to him. “Hug your mother like that when you see her, will you?”
Kiur nodded and entered the boat alongside Cylia and Xander. It bobbed and swayed from one side to the other before it departed on its own.
“Thank you for everything! We hope to return one day!” they waved their goodbyes to the citizens of Kuara. They waved until the river snaked out of their view and away from the underground city, drifting to where the sun was rising above the chasm.
—❂—
Noah took a deep breath and exhaled a hazy blue mist, enveloping the entirety of the city. Its inhabitants shimmered in and out of existence.
“Are you happy about this outcome, dear?” Noah asked as a man emerged from the crowd with his cane. He sat down in the chair Noah conjured for him with her magic. He was the real Noah, the one who revealed Kiur’s and Xander's nature to one another.
“They had to leave. This is no place for youngsters,” answered Noah to his substitute—who, in reality, was his wife. She padded a pillow to cushion it behind his back. “What do you think of the boy, Daedal?”
“He reminds me of my youngest, who was too good for this world. “Daedal hunched his back and wiped his nose with a handkerchief. A tear rolled down his weary eyes. “Tell me, Lord Noah, when will I see my children again?”
“Soon, very soon.” Noah nodded, sharing his sympathy for Daedal and everyone else here whose form flickered in the mist with blue flames sprouting from their chests like tulips. “After the Summer Solstice during Dumuzid’s Descend to the Underworld, your wait will be over, and you will reunite in your afterlife.”
Noah let out a deep sigh. Long, long ago, they tasked him to lead and watch over Kuara, a city that was not supposed to exist alongside its residents. He was too old to carry on. Without the support of his dutiful wife, he would have crumbled millennia ago.
Kiur made the imperative decision to convince his friends to leave. Soon, this place would cease to exist and disappear. It was never meant to exist in the first place, and its visitors never meant to stay.
“The whims of the gods are awful,” thought Noah, knowing that the god that descended to their hidden sanctuary was listening in. “Shamash, is this what you wanted?”
Out of the corner of the river, where Kiur and the others had left, rays of sunshine bend, seemingly breaking apart and bending anew to create a curtain of light.
Dozens of Scorpion People poured through the curtain and into the underground city. The warriors were panicking from the sudden assault of the army of monsters and put up their weapons.
It never came to a fight, however.
The Scorpion People sheathed their swords and put down their bows for a god to enter the city. His feet never touched the ground or riled up the sands on his jaunt towards Noah.
The god wore a beige robe with a silk-woven crimson shawl in the same fashion Kiur and his people did. A disk-like symbol representing the sun adored the brooch that pinned his shawl to the left side of his shoulder.
The god had short, light brown hair; his skin was like polished bronze. On his head, he wore a twisted golden crown, forming the shape of six horns intertwining one another. With two sets of white wings and pointed brown feathers at the ends, they reached the sky.
Golden jewellery adored his neck, wrists and feet. He touched the ground, and it glazed into a colourful mosaic. His golden eyes opened and held a sheen of crimson on their borders.
It was Shamash, the God of the Sun and Justice.
“Utnapishtim- No, Noah, my old friend. It has been years. How have you been?” inquired Shamash. He bowed courtly to the ageing man, who held nothing but indifference towards the gods. His wife scowled, full of contempt alongside every other citizen upon the god’s arrival. Yet they bowed, showing their respect to the sun god.
“What do you want here?” asked Noah’s wife, barely holding back her anger. “We did what you asked us for. Leave us alone. My husband needs his rest.”
Shamash dipped his head. “I am well aware of your husband’s constitution, Na’amah,” he addressed Noah’s wife with a raised hand, glowing with the mark of the sun on its surface. “We all appreciate his work, truly. He is the only one we could trust with-”
“Don’t give me these excuses!” Na’amah lashed out and raised a fist at the god with tears welling from her eyes. “You lot forced him into this condition! Gave him immortality despite the illness that plagued our kin! Now, you ask him to perform his magic regardless of the damage it does to him? You are no god but a demon who-”
“Silence, wife!” Noah hollered, bringing the cave system into a rumble and startling Na’amah, the citizens and the Scorpion People, who grew agitated about watching their god being berated. Shamash remained unfaced, his golden eyes set on the couple’s quarrel. “Do not talk ill of the gods,” Noah continued with laboured breath. “They granted you immortality, too, so we could remain together. Our roles are not yet over. Tell me, Shamash,” he turned to the god, “did I complete your task?”
“Hmmm,” Shamash hummed, his golden eyes directed at the sky. Daybreak was coming. “Did you deliver the message and the gemstones?”
Noah nodded. “I did. I gave the gemstones out but for the message-” Noah fell into a coughing fit and fell from his chair. Blood colouring his beard crimson. Na’amah tried to help him up, but he pushed her back.
“The message.” Shamash tapped his cheek impatiently. “Did you deliver it to the boy?”
The god waited for Noah to recover, observing how the aged immortal panted heavily. Purple spit ran down his mouth; the skin under his eyes broke and grew darker. It was an illness that could kill even an immortal like Noah, who was granted eternal life by the gods themselves.
It was but a question of time when he would succumb and die.
“I did,” Noah spit out the remainder of the black blood in his mouth and stood up with the help of his cane and wife. “But I have to ask, why are the Chthonic Deities and even that selfish ex-hero concerned about a mere child? The Gods of Below do not care for what’s happening outside their domain. And those gemstones, you made us deliver… why do you try to hide these children, and from whom?”
“Hmmm,” Shamash smiled and closed his eyes; a playful hum escaped his lips. “You know, my older sister, Ereshkigal, rarely takes a liking to people. Unlike our younger sister—who was pampered a bit too much as a child—our older sister never once voiced a wish. She even took over the underworld without a single complaint, living in solitude her entire existence. And you know what was the first thing she asked of me, her younger brother?”
He directed the question to the couple, but also the residents of the underground city and the Scorpion People. They exchanged confused looks with one another and shrugged, having no answer.
With his presence dimming, Shamash tried to imitate the appearance of his older sister, copying the gloomy expression she always held as the Queen of the Underworld.
He then repeated the words she imparted to him when he stood before her.
“Make sure my child is safe and sound. Deliver her through the desert and hide her from our blood. I do not want to see her harmed. Please, do that for me, my adorable little brother,” said Shamash in a rather playful tone than his face suggested. Sunrays radiated from his form again. “Though I might have exaggerated a little, she barely talks or not at all, always the quiet and serious type, but I’d like to imagine that’s what she said.”
Shamash chuckled at a memory and tapped his head.
“One time when we were children,” he chuckled again, “our little sister and I played war with the humans, but oh heavens, Ereshkigal did not like that and swept us off the field with her bright flaming spear. She’s not as temperamental as our little sister, but I would never mess with her. There’s a reason she once hung her up on the gates of hell, haha.”
Noah frowned at Shamash’s chuckle, unsure what exactly he was playing. “Lord Shamash, from whom exactly does she want to hide the child?”
“Did I not make myself clear already?” Shamash cocked his head. “Our younger sister, of course,” laughed Shamash and beamed brightly as only the personification of the sun could. “I love her, but my twin sister can be such a handful. You know the stories, haha. Like the one time when she married those two men and ended up throwing them into the–”
“So the gods have set their eyes on her, huh?” Noah interrupted Shamash before he went on sharing another story. “What about that boy with the loose mouth? Are they aware of him?”
“Not yet,” replied Shamash, putting a hand on his cheek in thought. “The gods are still blind and should remain so. The one accompanying the golden boy has a different role to play in the future. A different pantheon.” Shamash’s eyes lost their sheen, and his face turned sour. “The stones will keep them hidden until they grow stronger. Especially the golden one.”
“You think he won’t make it?”
“Do you?” Shamash returned the question to Noah, who simply grunted in response. “That’s what I thought. The child is a ticking time bomb. A risk for themselves and everyone else. I observed them when I visited the underworld. One day, their heart will burn them asunder.” Shamash’s scowl deepened at a future event. “They will throw their life away when their pain becomes too unbearable. The cold-hearted one will keep it at bay—not just because they are polar opposites. He’s virtually the only one to keep the fires at bay and teach control.”
Noah remained quiet. He didn’t know enough about them to say anything else except to agree with the god. Seeing Kiur as he was, Noah knew that one day the boy would–
“I think you are wrong,” Daedal interjected into the conversation, finding the courage to speak up in the presence of a god. “You’re underestimating the child. I know he’ll pull through, no matter the struggles. I believe in him. He’s strong. The Gods of Below saw it while the Heavens are in the dark.”
“What makes you think so?” wondered Shamash, kneeling to be eye-to-eye with the dwarf. “Why do you put so much trust into the fact he won’t burn away? No log can keep on kindling brightly. It’s destined to turn into ash and-”
“Because he has innocence,” answered Daedal, headstrong, “just like my youngest. My wife had raised our children to be steadfast until the very end. And I know she would do it again. I know this child will make it.”
“Then I hope your words hold true,” replied Shamash, readying himself to leave with the first rays of the morning sun reaching the city. “I don’t want to think my efforts were in vain. It was a request directly from my older sister and her entourage. I’m curious to know where it goes.”
“One last thing, Lord Shamash.” Na’amah stopped Shamash and addressed him respectfully for the first time in forever. “What about the girl that accompanied them?”
Shamash raised an eyebrow in confusion. “I don’t know what you are talking about. What girl? Did someone else accompany the two?”
Taken aback, Na’amah turned to Noah for guidance, who appeared just as perplexed.
Shamash, the Sun God, saw and knew everything that was happening on the surface of the earth as long as the sun shone down on them. It was very unusual for him to react as if he didn’t know about someone.
When Shamash still didn’t reply, Na’amah and Noah concluded that he wasn’t aware of Cylia’s existence. “It’s nothing,” said Na’amah acquiescent. “I’m sorry… my lord.” She bowed for good measure. Shamash, though, already forgot what she had asked.
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“If you will excuse me now. I have to travel westward, but before I forget.” Shamash turned to the Scorpion People, who looked up to the god, loyally waiting for a command. “Umbin, come forth!”
The Scorpion People retreated. Out of the crowd came one of their kind, who was not just tall and strong-looking, but also recently maimed. Dried blood marred his face where he was missing an eye. One of his arms and giant claws were ripped apart as well, with blood still dripping from the stumps. The bandages on his head were coming loose, revealing his wild, pitch-black hair.
Drawing his broken swords, the Scorpion Man laid them down before Shamash and bowed.
“W-wh–at c–an d-do I-I,” Umbin had trouble speaking, failing to imitate the formal tongue. He stopped talking and bowed deeper in shame.
“You fought the Asag valiantly.” Shamash rustled Umbin’s wild hair affectionately and raised his head. “I will give you one last task. Lay down your life and make sure those who carry the stones of Ninsung reach the Achernar—alive.” Shamash turned the Scorpion Man’s head left and right. “Do you understand, Umbin? This will be your last task. Do whatever it takes, but ensure their lives.”
“I-I und-ers-stand, o-oh ex-exalted o-one,” Umbin’s voice broke, but he stood up with resolve. He clacked with his remaining foreclaw and a raised crimson fist.
His followers came forth and offered him a new ebony-coloured sickle sword. Umbin roared with the new sword in his right hand and skittered away to follow where the boat had left off.
“This has to be done,” said Shamash, vanishing in the light, with the Scorpion People following their god west so he would reach the heavens.
Noah caught into his fist, spitting up blood again and curled up on the ground.
Na’amah and Daedal rushed to help him back up, but Noah refused. The hand that held his cane trembled unsteadily. “Wife, tell me. When did you consort with Vanadis?”
Na’amah shamefully looked away when her husband scrutinised her. As frail as he was, his mind was as sharp as ever. Centuries of tragedies did not dull him. “Last night, when you performed your magic. I saw the lady watching over the sleeping girl, crying tears of red gold. She asked me for a favour. I had to oblige. I am sorry.”
“No, don’t apologise. After all, we are mere tools for the gods.” Noah dismissed her and walked back to the city. He stumbled when his legs gave up. He couldn’t walk alone anymore with his legs turning to ash and his vision darkening. “Shamash couldn’t see the girl. Keeping her existence a secret was for the best. Alas, we need to prepare now.”
While carried in the arms of his wife, Noah looked at the people and warriors who held flaming blue hearts inside their chests. They were waiting.
“We need to start preparations to leave. Kuara is not meant to exist,” coughed Noah, and the people looked at him in worry as he was being carried back to Kuara, the City of the Dead. “When the solstice arrives, I hope no one remains in the desert. Otherwise,” Noah stopped talking, his eyes had turned completely black, “their fate would have been far more merciful if they remained here than dying in the dunes.”
—❂—
Three weeks had gone past for at least two separate groups wandering the Navarrien Desert. Less than two months remained for an event called the Summer Solstice.
The first group to remain was Hessian, his closest allies, and four dozen ill-equipped slave warriors to take on an impossible quest to prove their worth.
They were now reduced to half the strength they held at the start of their quest.
“We can’t go on.” They lost another one.
Hessian looked back, his gaunt and wild appearance reflected in every one of his party. His dishevelled hair fell over his face. He was at his limits, too, but kept going, not sparing a single minute for their fallen brethren.
Tomoe had given them the quest to retrieve the poison gland of a Scorpion Woman—whatever they were—they had never seen one in their lives. Aside from finding one, they had other concerns.
They were hungry and thirsty, had their skin burned from the sun, and were utterly exhausted. Yet, they had to keep going if they didn’t want to die in shame.
But despite their determination at first, they never once found the Scorpion People responsible for slaughtering all the other Reiszer groups they had heard about.
They discovered one straggler who survived the hunt of the Scorpion People and told them it was an impossible battle. Hessian ended the soldier’s misery after they told him where to go.
It was not far. Hessian could smell it, but he grew wary with each step leaving behind a part of his strength.
“This is useless!” one of them cried out, trying to drag along the body of one of their comrades who succumbed to his injuries. “Why are we still going? This desert is cursed! We should just make a run for it and-”
“And what?” Nertha asked the slave warrior. She was one of the few people left to follow Hessian to the end and keep the remaining slaves in line. “We are bound to our overlords. Even if we run, we die.”
“Listen to her,” Bjorn concurred with Lovis nodding affirmative. “We’re thralls, slaves, but we were given a quest. Running is for cowards. We will finish it or die trying.”
“We will die anyway!” the slave warrior cried out, throwing away his friend’s body and grabbing the tall Bjorn by his torn clothes. “This is all useless. We should have run, we should have given up and–”
With the dull side of an axe rammed against his head, the slave warrior buckled down and screamed from Hessian’s sudden assault. “Stop complaining. I’ve only nicked you.”
Hessian rested his axe against his shoulder and turned to the others. They took a step back, including his friends, afraid of how tyrannic Hessian became during the quest.
Since they got back from the failed retrieval mission, Hessian seemed off. They didn’t notice it at first because he was always like that, but Hessian grew increasingly irritated and angry in the first week of their quest.
As if he was obsessed with something, or rather, someone.
“Hessian, please stop.” Nertha placed her hand down on Hessian’s axe arm, lowering it. “We’re all a little on edge. It’s difficult for all of us, you know?”
Turning his head at Nertha, Hessian’s eyes crossed hers but didn’t linger on her for even a fraction before he picked up the slave by the arm. “It’s never easy.” Hessian pulled the slave's face close to his and bared his teeth. Not just at the slave, but at everyone else, too. “Listen, if you want to give up, then drop dead right here and now. If not, get your grit together and keep fighting. This is yet another hell, like all the others we walked.”
Hessian’s eyes flared with a purple ting, creating an inner fire ready to burn them away.
“Have you forgotten what we suffered? How many have died? We are thralls. Proving we’re not worthless is all that matters.”
Hessian threw the slave back to the sand, riling up a dust cloud. His facial muscles pulsed when he looked at the others. He realised—none of them would make it by the end of the quest, not a single one. Dying by nothing but the elements or monsters.
Hessian relented. “15 minutes break, then we continue.”
He didn’t like it. Nothing of it. Sitting down on a rogue rock on top of a dune, Hessian overlooked his surroundings.
“Sand, sand, and nothing but sand. This place is as dead as the rest of us.” Using one of the nearby stones as a whetstone for his axe, Hessian whet it fiercely. “I hate it here, I hate it here. I hate it all!”
Grinding too hard with the stone, the already rusty edge broke another edge, and Hessian cut into his palm. “For pokker!” Frustrated by it all, Hessian threw the axe as far as he could before his shoulder popped out of the socket.
He wasn’t taking care of himself, and it showed. Not just physically, but also mentally.
A shadow bobbed in and out of existence. First, it took the shape of Kiur, mocking him with a sad expression before turning into the image of a woman. Hessian didn’t know her, but his brain was being pierced with hot needles when he saw her.
Hessian crunched with his teeth and slumped with his shoulders—his right one hung down more than it should. Hessian sighed, “This is exhausting.”
“Unlucky day today, huh?” asked Bjorn, standing behind Hessian and admiring the view of nothingness. “Tomorrow might be our day, though I wonder how anyone can survive in this hellhole.”
“They don’t,” answered Hessian with a rough grunt when he popped his shoulder back in place. “What do you want, Bjorn? Did Nertha set you up on this? I swear, this woman never gives me a rest!”
“Oh, I know that feeling,” grinned Bjorn, only to confuse Hessian. “Not much for foreplay, are we?” Bjorn carefully put a hand on Hessian’s bad shoulder, a firm and warm grip. “You’re losing focus. We all noticed, and we are worried you will grind yourself into a pit.”
“Pah.” Hessian brushed off Bjorn’s hand. “What would you know?”
“You’re still holding on to that brooch” pointed out Bjorn, indicating how Hessian was caressing the sand-covered golden brooch of a lion. “What is that boy to you? Why does he bother you so much?”
Hessian was quiet, eerily quiet. As if he was in a trance or lost. “I don’t know,” he answered soberly. “Something upsets me about him.”
Bjorn scoffed with a laugh. “Upset? You? Hessian, I have seen you being upset, and this isn’t your upset mood. You’re brooding. Tell me, what did you see in that boy?”
“...” Hessian opened his mouth, but no words came out. He didn’t know what to say. Rubbing the surface of the lion’s face, Hessian didn’t know what bothered him. He just knew he was upset, but at what? Kiur? The quest?
Hessian glanced at the shadow of Kiur standing before him. He was watching, judging, or simply looking at Hessian with a pained expression. The image of the woman flickered briefly into existence, and then the shadow was gone.
“We found something!”
It wouldn’t come to an explanation, not yet, at least.
Someone Hessian sent out to scout the perimeter had returned, reporting about their findings. A finding they hadn’t expected in the middle of nowhere. A dungeon from ancient times where gods roamed the world alongside their subjects.
“Impressive,” whistled Bjorn. “That’s an extraordinary find. Imagine when was the last time anyone entered it!” Bjorn beamed, infecting the others with positive energy and Lovis celebrating with a dance of his twin axes.
“As far as I see, this is a dead end.” Nertha was less impressed alongside her entourage of female slave warriors. Pinching her nose, she grimaced fearfully. “It reeks of death. I doubt going down there would be a good idea.”
“No, this is the place,” stated Hessian, taking another step forward before the long staircase downwards of the derelict granite structure. There was only darkness awaiting them below, and he could feel the grip of evil grasping for him.
Holding the lion brooch tightly in his hand, Hessian saw a single golden light in the darkness, beckoning him to go down there.
“You can’t be serious. Hessian, this is madness.” Nertha tried to pull Hessian back, but he leaned down and unearthed something out of the soft ground before the stone steps.
In his scarred hand, Hessian held a short sickle sword. The bronze blade gleamed from the scorching sun and reflected Hessian’s glimmering hazel eyes. “Bingo, we’ve found their nest.”
—❂—
“This is what they call the end of the river? I think we were scammed.” Xander kicked a rock into the wall of the desert valley they had been traversing for the past three weeks.
The surface consisted of mostly dried-out stone with dried earth and sand flowing in from half a meter above their heads. The path was almost eight meters in width and relatively safe to travel.
Their boat ride had ended when the river forked into two paths and a tunnel raised above the river. The boat refused to go further, and when they climbed into the tunnel, the boat turned and left them to ride back to Kuara.
A cluster of glowing sapphires imbued with mana stuck on all sides of the tunnel walls—Xander vigilantly made sure Kiur didn’t touch any of them.
When they reached the end of the tunnel, they found themselves inside a depression with no way to climb out. Cylia and Xander had to realise they didn’t know where they were if it wasn’t for Kiur guiding them by reading the stars.
“I think this was once a river,” said Kiur, inspecting the crumbling surface of the valley near a small pond of water. “It feels old—must have dried up ages ago.” Kiur pointed further ahead. “But the original pathway still exists. There will be a fork up ahead; beware of sinkholes.”
Huffing, Cylia raised an eyebrow. “How do you know there will be- ah!” Cylia’s foot got stuck in said hole and almost fell over before Kiur caught her.
“Just a hunch,” answered Kiur. Cylia quickly brushed herself away from him, embarrassed by how clumsy she was.
“This place doesn’t feel safe. What if one of the magic beasts finds us?” Cylia quickly changed the topic. She held up her hands to feel the sun’s heat touch them—she immediately withdrew them. One good thing about this path was that the sun barely hit them—for most of the day, it was safe to wander.
“We can’t rule that out, but it’s the safest way to travel,” explained Kiur. “The desert has several pathways like these since most of them are dried-up former rivers. Firm ground with lots of shade.”
It was the best thing they could have asked for. Were it not for the people in Kuara aiding them, they wouldn’t have got as far as they did.
However, Kiur’s navigation skills could only get them so far. He was never so far out west, and their equipment left a lot to be desired—like water, food, proper clothing or camping gear.
Despite everything, having a safe path with almost no danger was a tremendous advantage.
“We already used up everything we had. Could have asked for more food and water… or a big shovel,” commented Xander on the path swallowed up by a collapsed dune that piled up from above the walls. “What now, tour guide? We can’t climb out, can we?”
Cylia proved Xander’s point the moment she fell off the wall she tried to climb, landing on her butt and yowling in pain. “This wall is too unstable!”
“Great, backtracking it is. I hate my life,” Xander complained alongside Cylia.
“I could try to make something,” proposed Kiur. “Give me a moment.”
“Wait, no, don’t do this idiot-!” Xander’s attempt to stop Kiur came too late as the magic left Kiur’s fingertips, causing the dune to shake, rise, and then topple to bury them alive.
One by one, their heads plopped out of the carpet of sand. “This went well,” Kiur responded sheepishly to the accident he caused.
“You don’t say!” Xander heaved up his arm from under the sand, pointed a finger at Kiur, and yelled. “What were you thinking!? We talked about this. Don’t use your magic, or we will end up with something far worse than a toppled dune. Like, I dunno, being nuked—AGAIN!”
“No idea what you mean by nuked, but stop yelling at him!” Cylia, having no idea of the terms Kiur and Xander sometimes used, was yelling back at Xander. “Not like it’s always his fault for messing up with his magic!”
“Not his fault?” Xander heaved himself up from the ground. “This dune just toppled on us when he tried to solve it with his magic—which I can’t mention enough—he can’t control!”
Xander and Cylia barked at one another like animals. Arguing and jabbing fingers at one another. The mood had been tense for a while, but it was about to boil over.
“This was a mistake! We have been wandering for the past 19 days,” Xander cried out. “It’s only a matter of time until we get killed, either by the Reiszer or the Asag!”
“Actually, it has been 23 days. You weren’t paying attention.” Cylia sneered at Xander and inched closer, threatening to headbutt him. “You can try to walk back, but I’m not confident your sense of direction is as good as counting days.”
“Why you? I am not afraid to kick your butt, girl.”
“Try me.”
“Both of you, calm down!” Stopping them, Kiur nudged them over to the side of their pathway, where the shadows were the deepest. “The heat is getting to our heads. Let’s take a break and think of something later.”
Reluctantly, the group sat down and relaxed, finishing up any resources they still had left—which wasn’t much.
They have been carefully rationing their water and food supplies, took breaks whenever the sun was at its zenith, and resumed walking eastwards or wherever their path or Kiur led them.
The last time they had found an oasis was over a week ago. They would run out of supplies from today onwards, and they were too tired to continue. Maybe crossing even half the desert was a tall order, and Kiur led them to certain death after all.
“Do you think it was all a mistake?” asked Kiur, turning over to Xander, who was still awake. Cylia was snoring off against Kiur’s shoulder. She needed the rest more than them and desperately tried to hide her discomfort, but it didn’t go by Kiur.
He patted her dishevelled head and wondered how he could be more like her, tenacious.
“Possibly.” Xander shrugged and rested his head against his knees, barely holding it together in the environment. His eyelids were heavy. “We should have remained in the city.”
“I start to believe the same.” Kiur, too, could barely hold his eyes open. “But I don’t think staying was right. I want to believe the Asag’s words had merit since they were right so far.”
“‘The End of the River’, hm?” Xander mused and let out a deep yawn, resting his head against Kiur’s other shoulder. “What if it was some kind of idiom? What if the end of the river is the underworld?”
Kiur laughed awkwardly, and Cylia’s head slipped off Kiur’s shoulder. He caught her and carefully repositioned her head to sleep on his lap, where she continued to snore away peacefully. “Then I was a fool for believing.”
Letting out another yawn, Xander nodded off. “No, we all are fools. We decided to stick together. There’s no changing it now.”
Lotte woke up underneath the familiar tree of the school’s hill, wearing the same uniform she always did and holding her favourite book in her hand. The tree’s crown cast long shadows, protecting its occupant underneath from the blistering sun above.
She knew she was dreaming because this place was long gone.
“Hey there, sleepyhead,” Liara came into view and met Lotte’s eyes, who smiled upon seeing her. “How is it over there?”
“Tough, really tough,” responded Lotte, and remained to lie down. Liara sat herself down next to Lotte. Their eyes never parted from one another.
“Did you find friends there?” asked Liara, caressing Lotte’s cheek. “Is it at least fun?”
“I think so,” said Lotte. “It feels that way. The two give me a few nasty headaches, but they’re fine. One understands me somewhat, and the other makes me keep going no matter how hard it gets.”
“Will they replace me?” asked Liara, who stared up past the crown of leaves.
Lotte craned her head, trying her best to keep looking at Liara. She feared she would lose her if she lost sight of her. “No, never.” Lotte’s hand reached out for Liara, but she stopped and put down her hand next to hers. “I love you, you know? No one could ever replace you.”
They stayed like that. The leaves danced in the wind, and Lotte felt wistful in touching Liara’s hand. “It’s time to wake up,” Liara touched her hand and smiled back at her. “Move forward, don’t stop. You can do it. I know it.”
Kiur woke up from his dream to the dark sky. Night had come, and they had all slept through the day as exhausted as they were. He regarded Xander and Cylia, who remained asleep, pinning him in place. He was glad to have received friends he could trust in this world and who would stay by his side.
“The sky is beautiful today.” Kiur looked up to the night sky, seeing shimmers of blue and purple illuminating the night. His eyes widened in realisation, and he immediately stirred his companions awake. “Quick, everyone, wake up.”
“I don’t want to drown!”
“What- No, I didn’t eat the last palm date.”
Xander yelled in terror from his late dream, and Cylia was drooling from her last meal three days prior. Kiur stood up and called Xander over to the collapsed dune. “We need to reach the top, but the sand is too fine to climb. You know how to do it, don’t you?” asked Kiur—his eagerness was like poison for Xander’s groggy state.
Xander thought for a moment, quietly assessing the situation. He shook his head a few times and then snapped his fingers. He told Kiur to face the dune and bury his hands in the sand.
“Think as if you are moulding the earth, giving it a new shape,” explained Xander, pressing his cold hand between Kiur’s shoulder blades. “Don’t worry about losing control. Just do it like you usually do.”
With a ting of hesitation, Kiur did as Xander instructed. The warm feeling in the pit of his chest tingled with the calm sensation of the earth. It resounded and obeyed to Kiur’s command, but then his doubts and fear of failure returned.
His heart skipped a beat and turned to fire, leaping out of his chest and convulsing the sands and stone violently, threatening them to be scorched to ash.
“Not today,” spoke Xander, and willed his ice-blue magic into Kiur. “Heart of Fire. Be quenched by the water and listen to the earth.”
“The Red Earth is your domain,” The Asag’s voice called.
Kiur’s breathing relaxed, and the fire in his heart turned to embers and then reduced to the size of a candle flame. He was in control now and moulded the fine sand of the dune. One clustered after another, the sand liquified into clay but had yet to be hardened.
“What now?” asked Kiur, unable to tell what to do while Xander had his head full to keep Kiur’s fire under control. It felt like stopping a wildfire from exploding—Xander’s face was drenched.
“I got it.” Cylia sped past them like a sprinter and plunged an agate-coloured dagger—which she somehow unearthed from the valley during their travels—into the liquid clay. She swiped her dagger horizontally to create a soft ridge. “Solidify the area. We will repeat it up to the top!”
Working together, Kiur liquified the sand and solidified it with Xander’s help whenever Cylia cut a ridge with her dagger and climbed up the dune. When she reached the top, they truly knew they were done.
The two who remained below the former dune collapsed over one another, panting from exhaustion. Cylia fell over from exhaustion as well. She rolled down the dune and fell on top of them.
“I am done for. I want to sleep,” grumbled Cylia, lying on top of Kiur as they both squashed Xander underneath them. Not even he had the strength to complain anymore. “I saw lights shining the further I came up, but I couldn’t see anything before I fell. What was that?”
Without answering Cylia’s question, Kiur rolled away. His hands moved to the ridges, and he scrambled up the wall.
Xander and Cylia watched as Kiur kept climbing further up, not exhausted in the slightest as he reached the top. He called down to Xander and Cylia to come up. Soon, they were up at the top as well. Their jaws dropped when they walked down the other side of the sandy dune towards the scenery they saw.
“W-what is this?” The pair gaped, processing the view.
Stars glittered like a carpet of precious gemstones. A sky clear of clouds shone brightly in colours of blue and white in the sea of darkness. The dunes, the sand and the stones were all enveloped by the light.
Buildings of the ancient past were scattered across the desert. Old and decrepit, but still standing strong in the face of time with a few lonely trees and shrubs in between.
Sounds of flowing water reached their ears. Narrow rivers snaked their way through the ancient desert, with one of them coming from the same direction Kiur and the others had climbed up from.
The rivers all conjoined where a mighty obelisk as tall as the mountains pierced the sky.
The facade was crumbling, but the edged markings of five old, enormous letters adored the timeworn black structure. It emanated a purple glow in the glamorous skylight for every wayward wanderer who looked upon it.
“This,” Kiur pointed at the structure, feeling the tears reach his eyes. “This is the Achernar, the waymarker. We have reached the centre of the desert… and just behind it lies Navarre.”
“We’re almost there,” thought Kiur, wrapping his arms around Cylia and Xander. “We almost did it.”