Giliad

The dirt road that led out of Cape Town was at least ten paces wide. It narrowed after four hundred paces to a single digit. The red dirt that came from the Red Bay was an expensive commodity in the Fifth Region. It possessed unique properties. Wherever it lay, the invasive plants didn’t grow. Animals kept away from it as well, making the roads laid out with the red dirt safer to travel. This was such common knowledge that even Giliad knew it.

However, each Moonsoon Drowner season eroded the dirt roads, increasing the costs of maintenance. The downpour like this one didn’t help either. It was strange how Giliad’s thoughts focused on the road ahead of him. The jungle on both sides blurred and all he could do was to keep going forward stubbornly. Yes, he always has been a stubborn one. Isn’t that right, Tayyi? Tayyi? What am I talking about?

Giliad stopped, oblivious to the heavy rain and his two companions. Something wasn’t right. Something is… He fell to one knee. This got the attention of Zuma and Harvey Logan. They whirled around but didn’t move, petrified.

“Gil? What’s the matter?”

“I … don’t know,” Giliad’s answer was weak. He couldn’t walk in such a state. “We must get off this road.”

They were lucky. The downpour veiled the world around them and the passing guards hadn’t noticed them before they quitted the road and escaped into the trees.

“What’s going on?” One of Giliad’s companions asked. “Giliad, what happened?”

They found a sizeable hiding spot beneath the massive leaves of the plant Giliad couldn’t name. The Royalblood lay down, feeling as energy was draining out of his body. He opened his mouth to say something but forgot what. And then, he had no strength to speak, his eyelids gained impossible weight and he just wanted to sleep.

“Keep moving, boy,” a familiar voice said. “We should avoid crowded tracts.”

Giliad’s head snapped in the direction of the voice. A man – wrapped in white clothes from toes to the tip of his head – towered over him. Only his red eyes were visible.

Why am I dreaming this?

It was a forgotten memory, abandoned right after the events they concerned. They were traveling from Ashan to the Old Har. Giliad had been twelve back then, understood nothing about the world.

“Why?” Giliad asked, his voice was quiet and timid.

Tayyi’s eyes drifted to the caravan that came to stop here. This was a good place, sheltered from the scolding hot wind during a day and freezing ones arriving with the night. The rocky ridge tore through the golden sands acting as a natural wall. In the middle of this stood an old but working well. It was the well that drew caravans and travelers here. The endless desert has always lacked one resource.

Water.

Giliad hadn’t known it then, though he understood it now how the absence of water shaped the Fourth Region. Water was a tool.

Tayyi gestured him to settled down between rocks. He wanted to stay at least two hundred paces from the caravan. It wasn’t wise to mingle with strangers. Tayyi has warned him countless times. Young Giliad has always been drawn to other children of his own age.

“People are after you, boy. Dangerous people. You must be smarter than this. I wonder why … why are they after you?”

Giliad nodded, glancing at the caravan. At least a dozen children were playing there. He ached to join them. The sun was still high enough to warrant at least two hours of light. Maybe if Tayyi took one swig too many of his booze? It was incomprehensible to him why the old man loved the horrible liquid.

“I … don’t know, and,” young Giliad replied. Tayyi has always been asking him this, always expecting a different answer. “I don’t want to know.”

“You’re a stubborn brat!” Tayyi snapped as he lowered himself next to young Giliad, the strangely shaped metal bottle appeared in his hand. “How many times have I told you that knowledge is the key? This sand-forsaken world doesn’t care about you. You must take your life in your hands. To do that, you need to fill your empty head with information. Do you understand?”

Young Giliad remained silent. Did he understand? He could not say. Though he was better at picking up the important stuff, he still missed much. As they sat in silence, savoring the warmth of the day, the sun unwillingly, and slowly traveled down. Tayyi’s head lulled as he leaned against the scorched rock. Did the old man doze off? He must have!

Young Giliad slowly rose to his feet. The caravan children had so much fun! And there was at least an hour of light.

“Hey!” they called to him when he approached them. “We stole fresh water. Do you want some?”

What kind of question was that? No one refused water in the Fourth Region! Young Giliad accepted the water handed to him conspiratorily. The bunch of children hid between rocky teeth.

“It’s fresh, from the well,” they told him. Their faces ranged from dark brown to light copper. The rest of their bodies were wrapped in white cloths. The only defense against the merciless sun. Three of the caravan children seemed older than him, the rest looked below ten.

“What’s your name?” The largest one asked as Giliad took a mouthful of cool water. What a taste it had!

“My name is … Giliad.” Tayyi forced him to change his name. People who were after him didn’t name him in the wanted poster but one should never be too careful, at least according to Tayyi. The old man has been running from something his entire life. Young Giliad had no idea what exactly chased Tayyi if anything. Nonetheless, the kid followed the advice and kept his fake name.

“My name is Abbas,” the oldest kid said. He had compassionate dark red eyes and a friendly voice. He pointed to his left. “These are my friends. This is Alka—”

A sudden shouting came from the caravan, but Giliad barely heard it. The children frightened by the commotion fled except for Abbas whose eyes darted between young Giliad and the caravan.

“Hey, what’s going on?” He asked as young Giliad dropped to the ground. “Do you need more water?”

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Young Giliad’s body refused to follow his order and move. His lips barely opened, whispering an answer. Abbas looked terrified himself, but he promised young Giliad to return to him as soon as he knew what had happened inside the caravan.

Young Giliad’s vision started to narrow. What is happening to me? He’d thought and current Giliad couldn’t help but notice how similar it felt.

He didn’t know whose hands grabbed him, but they weren’t gentle. Brutal strength dragged him on the ground toward the caravan. Is that you, Tayyi? Why are you dragging me there? Tayyi? It was not the old man. The man who held him by the leg was larger than Tayyi and wore strange clothes. Sand-hued coat with a loose bottom part that flapped as he walked. Three golden strips ran from the hard him of his collar to the bottom end of the coat. He also wore loose trousers and a blouse of the same color as the coat and high leather boots. He’s military! Unlike the rest of his companions, his face was not covered. He had long brown hair, a blonde mustache, and a beard. He glanced only once at Giliad but the bright blue eyes held no compassion or mercy. So much coldness they held that Giliad panicked and if not for the fact that his body was immobilized by some mysterious spell, he would trash and writhe.

There were more of soldiers inside the caravan. Who they were? Young Giliad hadn’t seen them earlier. Why there was so much screaming? They threw young Giliad to the ground so hard that sand got into his mouth and he felt blood trickling over his forehead. The way he dropped allowed him to see everything and he’s hated what he saw. More than thirty men wearing sand-hued coats without strips towered over the caravan people who were kneeling before them, even children! Only one other man lay unmoving in the center. Was he like Giliad, too weak to stir? Amongst the military, only three had no face covered. The other two stood too far away for Giliad to discern any details except for the golden strips on their coats.

And then, Tayyi dropped to his knees next to young Giliad.

“This is bad,” he hissed quietly. “So bad.”

“Silence!” One of the masked ambushers yelled as women cried and men demanded to be released.

“Is everything checked?” The unmasked, blue-eyed man asked. He held a crude but sharp-looking knife with a blue tint.

“Yes, my Lord!” The soldier dropped to one knee, keeping his eyes on the ground.

What is this? Who are these people?

“Good,” the Lord said. “My name is Arval Orkan of the Third Strip and I am here to charge you with treason, and eradicate members of a rotten bloodline. These two,” he pointed at the unmoving man and young Giliad, “are the bastard Royalbloods.” What? What does that mean? How naïve and uneducated that young Giliad had been. And yet so similar, current Giliad thought. A terrible fear gripped the caravan people. The moment the man with the knife started speaking they understood their fate. Young Giliad was too numb to shudder.

“It must be a mistake, my Lord!” The elder of the caravan people said. “We would never betray the great empire of Aael. This man has joined us a few days ago. We have nothing to do with him.”

“Is that so?” Lord Arval Orkan asked. He stepped toward the man on the ground then squatted by him. He put the edge of the crude knife to the man’s throat. A tight gasp came from the elder. “Oh, so, there’s more to him?” The way the soldier was talking reminded young Giliad of the coldest place had ever been taken to.

The elder grabbed the cloths wrapped around his face and tore them off with strain, revealing an aged, parched face. “I beg you, my Lord. It’s my fault and mine alone. I asked him to join me on the trip to the Old Har to mourn the deceased Emperor. Please, take my life in his stead. He’s all I have left after his mother was killed. I will happily die so he can live.”

“Who was his mother?” Lord Arval Orkan asked, he hid the knife and in its place pulled a glowing blue gemstone. What is this now? What are they going to do to him? The Lord tore the wrapping from the laying man’s chest with ease and hoovered the gemstone above the naked skin of the man’s chest. Dissatisfaction and regret mixed on the soldier’s face. Whatever he hoped to find wasn’t there.

“She came from the north, tall, taller than me, and beautiful. She had the sort of hair that every other woman was jealous of. And she smiled a lot. The moments we spent together were the ones I cherish the most. Please, my Lord. Akhali is a child made of love … please. I’m the only one guilty here.” Was he pointedly ignoring young Giliad?

“Love or not, elder. The law is explicit. Sheltering a traitor of the Royalblood is punishable by death. It extends to every member of the household or in certain cases to the entire village or town.” The blade flashed faster than young Giliad could blink. The elder cried, extending his hands toward his killed son. Tears filled his eyes. What are they doing? Why they are doing this? Why?!

As the Lord buried it to the hilt, he didn’t pull it right away. He turned to his companions and said something that haunted Giliad for years to come. “Kill everyone.”

Some of the caravan people stared sightlessly, shocked or numb, as the soldiers drew their swords. Others struggled to get to their feet and run. Many screamed, cried, and begged for mercy. And children …

“Please! Not children, have mercy!” The elder yelled.

“Believe me, elder, this is a preferable way. I cannot let Aka Manahi have them. I can offer quick and painless death.”

The swords kept falling. Young Giliad felt sick. So much needless death. So much cruelty. Abbas stared at him, opening his mouth in a silent scream for help. And then, one slash and the kid who had offered him the water was no longer amongst the living. His red compassionate eyes burned out a spot in young Giliad’s heart.

The elder was the last. His eyes were closed, dried out. He accepted his death with quietude.

Suddenly, the overpowering fear grabbed Giliad. The same thing was going to happen to him and Tayyi. They were going to be killed. No trials, no second chances. Giliad wished to move but something kept his body immobilized.

“I don’t understand,” Tayyi murmured as he watched the killing “How do you know that he was a Royalblood?”

“The well is contaminated with the moonflower extract. Even a drop, paralyzes and subsequently kills a Royalblood,” a masked soldier standing behind Tayyi whispered. “I can tell you that because you’ll die soon.”

So, all I have to do is to move? And we will survive? But it was like wishing to move the mountain with words alone. The Lord was already on the move. Another twenty steps and they were going to be murdered. In the name of what? I can’t let it happen. Move! Move! Move! And then he remembered vaguely the fear of being buried alive and how his body shifted something inside. It allowed him to survive. He remembered how his sight adjusted to the darkness and how it fought the malnutrition and dehydration. But why am I dreaming this now? He’d asked himself back then and the same but thousand times stronger question returned to him now.

Young’s Giliad body twitched, then he shuddered and finally climbed to his feet. Every single man in the sand-hued coat stared at him with disbelief. Even the other two unmasked men seemed unsure of what to make of it. Young Giliad acted on some deeply ingrained instinct that he’d no idea existed.

Lord Arval Orkan stopped before him. How large this man was! He must have had three feet over Tayyi and the old man didn’t belong to short ones.

“What’s wrong with him?”

Young Giliad looked up, containing emotions that were about to burst. Abbas’s eyes…

“I feel fine, my Lord.”

“Are you sure he drunk the water from the well?” the Lord asked his people.

“Yes.”

Feeling returned to all young Giliad’s limbs. He didn’t lie, he felt fine. And yet, the silence that descended amongst them was so terrifying. Young Giliad was missing something again. Something only adults could understand. But I moved. I moved!

Lord Arval Orkan passed young Giliad and lifted Tayyi with one hand.

“Drink this,” he handed the metal bottle to the old man who accepted it with a shuddering hand. Is Tayyi a Royalblood?!

Tayyi was not as he emptied the bottle and handed it back to one of the masked soldiers.

“Shouldn’t we check him again, Arval?” one of the unmasked men approached. He was a head shorter than the Lord. His face was paler, hair shorter but darker. His face had sharp features with prominent cheekbones which indicated that the man was foreign to the Fourth Region.

“No need. Without the antidote, the moonflower kills.”

“What if this is some alchemical trick?” the other man insisted.

“Look at him, that brat is scared out of his mind. We have no time for them. We move now!” The masked soldier who spilled the secret to Tayyi and young Giliad stepped up but Lord Orkan already turned his back on them. They were … alive. They … survived.

The memory faded away and all Giliad could hear was the rain and shouts somewhere in the background.

“Find them! Find them! Find them!” Yamil, you bastard. Your bolt got me, after all. If I won’t move, we’ll die, or at least, I will. I have no plans on dying here.

Giliad moved, startling Harvey Logan and Zuma.

“Gurhala take me, what is going on?”

“Stay here,” Giliad said. “I have a score to settle.”