They barrelled along the cheetah road in a tight-knit quartet, leaving behind an endless dust cloud kicked up by each Tamed. Sweat streamed down his head beneath the drenched silk hood. His haloed ochre gold Sinha helm bounced on his thigh. Winter seemed weeks away this far south west. The skies had been blue and clear, with a wisp of white above. But the nights were icy, whistling with a sharp wind. Master Anele made sure their campsites were safe from the cold and unwanted eyes.
Humidity was at home in the Tej Province. Much to the prince’s joy. But it allowed endless rolling plains of green all around. Defying the season with dry lushness. The commonplace, leafless thorn trees were the only hint towards winter during the day.
The quartet slowed to a bouncy stroll atop their Tamed, wiping sweat with shreds of cloth, snacking on dried meat and fruit in silence. Zaki’s mismatched eyes wandered on either side of the busy road.
The distant towns were all off the main road at first. Sounds of gleeful children and jovial music were never far away. Livestock wandered amongst vast swathes of grazing fields, and the speck sized herders glanced at the road, though he doubted they saw anything.
The shaded homesteads, with their painted homes and low ringing walls, were a temptation during midday. With the sun at its highest, he glimpsed guarded wells, swarmed by loungers stretching their legs. Servants fanned their well-dressed and bejewelled masters, while children scurried around and played close by.
A different world existed here, compared to the capital. There was still a lot of Ko'Eri to see, but the start excited him.
Levies dressed in crude leathers were the most common on the road, with Cali Cituva carved into their chests. Their eyes narrowed whenever they passed, then widened in surprise as they hurried to avoid eye contact. Everyone jumped out of their way. More often than not, Master Anele kept their pace brisk.
Morning became midday before he knew it, and Master Anele signalled for speed when the sun crawled into the west. Prince Zaki leant forward atop Dawn, allowing the resisting wind to whip off his hood.
Anele was a few lengths ahead atop her slender Tamed Cali Cituva, loose and low as well. Dawn’s joy exploded through their bond whenever she could stretch her legs. Her attention remained fixed on the Cali Cituva while she tried to catch it.
Jazmin was close behind, and the sole unarmoured rider. Her luscious linens streamed behind her while she kept the pace. Zaki avoided glancing back at her, but he often felt her eyes bore into his back.
Master Sinalo brought up the rear atop his Tamed Cituva, the only one attempting to communicate between them. Anele was far from open. Beyond the formal orders and mutters of advice, she kept to herself. There was also a hint of disgust in her eyes during the few moments she glanced at him, unsettling disgust.
Even if she was open, Zaki had little interest in talking to her.
Jazmin’s presence wounded him days later, since learning she would join him. No warrior, and the reasoning for her presence was sound to those who were naïve enough to believe it. She was a babysitter. Though it simmered, he wasn’t ready to give her the time of day.
A grand festive town was the last sight they passed after the sunset graced their journey with its amber beauty. Darkness took over with winter’s chill. The Tamed all slowed and Zaki wrapped his arms around himself. Anele pointed off the road, and they rushed through the dense foliage in the north towards a stony grove.
They set camp in silence. Sinalo and Jazmin prepared the fire, then they supped in silence around the flickering flames. Until everyone unrolled their beds and gave in to sleep. Zaki never took off his armour. The sheen was long gone, along with his excitement. It stayed on to save time. Its pliability aided sleep to snatch him away.
Sleep was a blink, and they broke camp in relative darkness. Everyone scurried around to gather their belongings, rushing to mount up. Zaki stole a glance at Jazmin, which became a habit every morning, and watched her veil her mesmerising face.
“This is not how to attract the woman.”
“What?” Zaki jumped. It was foolish, considering their bond. “That is…”
“I am glad you did not bother with a lie. Her presence insults you, yet you ogle her every morning?”
“I am not in the mood,” Zaki snapped, though Dawn’s laughter soon drowned his bond words. He squeezed her with his legs when he mounted and she punched after Anele right after her Tamed sped back for the road.
He caught up in a moment, just as the first tendrils of the Great Beast’s fiery eye touched Ko’Eri again. Zaki dismounted with the others, and watched as their Tamed darted ahead. Scouting, Dawn claimed, at least he had little doubt that Anele’s Tamed was, for Dawn shared nothing of her supposed investigations. Perhaps the beasts were getting along with each other better, and yearned to be as far away from their silent Tamers as possible.
“My, if you are so perturbed by the current situation, change it!” Dawn said.
Zaki would have entertained her with an answer until her following chuckles. He growled aloud and dug into his bag for something hard to grind his anger on.
Breaking his fast happened in silence, while they strode apart upon the cheetah road. He ground his grumbles into the bland dried stick of meat, watching Anele widen her strides and open the gap ahead. She was a speck on the eastern horizon by the time the sun took control of the sky, forcing the last of night’s darkness into the abyss.
The heat was quicker and sharp in its arrival. Zaki raised his hood before the warmth baked his head. He found moisture in a dried peach slice, far more taste than the disappointing dried meat. Washing it all down with a generous helping of cool water from his skin.
Whispered chatter aroused his attention from behind. The prince resisted the urge to turn back for the moment. The hushed voices of Jazmin and Sinalo were uninviting. Instead, he focused on the rhythm of their strides, the complimenting difference of their footfalls. Master Sinalo’s boots ground the clay stone road, crushing the loose gravel with every step. Jazmin’s sandals glided over them, pattering softly, caressing the loose gravel instead.
His eyes drifted when their chatter turned into a polite tedium. Towards the rolling plains and skeletal thorn trees, to the south at least. In the north he made out more yellowwood groves, with surrounding boulders to match their campsite from the night before. For once, there were no structures. No homes or farmsteads, no villages or even the hints of a town dotting the nearby landscape.
The birds finished their songs as the early morning ended, though there was little difference, besides the slow withering of the gentle chill. With the approach of midday, Zaki yearned for shade. Despite the extraordinary weightlessness of his armour, it failed to shield him from the heat.
He almost sighed when he glimpsed the tall speck of Master Anele after cresting the steep rise in the road. Her arms ever crossed, and pristine umber skin glistening with beads of perspiration. Zaki met her grassy green eyes long before they stood before each other and suffered her indifference. Somehow, he offended the woman, yet he hadn’t an inkling on how or why she clung so harshly to it.
Zaki turned towards Sinalo and Jazmin when he arrived, watching them saunter and chuckle at a pace that belied their mission’s demands. Jazmin laughed, caressing Sinalo’s arm until her veiled beauty fell upon him and Anele.
“The last open well awaits us, with our Tamed. Inkokeli Onako is expecting us at his homestead,” Anele was monotonous, her face passive. The pale scar running down the right side of her face dribbled with sweat. She dabbed it with a cloth.
“What happened to the secrecy of our mission?” Zaki asked when her eyes lingered on him.
“Do you intend to declare our intentions to the inkokeli when we arrive?”
“Our presence will be enough to win curiosity.”
“Well, let me reassure you then,” Anele tainted her scent with annoyance. “Inkosi Musa has already laid plans to prepare our armies. He sent word days before our departure. We are Cheetahs, Prince Zaki. It is likely the inkokeli know already, but they will not be using this information to undermine the inkosi for personal gain.”
Anele didn’t give him the chance to retort as she turned her back. He was not oblivious to her insinuation, but was angrier at denying him the chance to speak against it. Zaki watched as she traipsed away, without a stomp or any signs of aggression that her tone suggested. His gloved fingers dug into his palms.
Jazmin and Sinalo were quiet when he resumed, still behind him. It was his own boots that hammered the ground. His hands begged for respite and instead he shifted his frustrations onto his teeth, grinding them as much as his footfalls crushed the loose clay below.
The prince remained oblivious to the noise of livestock and people carried by the wind. He ignored the pale green grass, thorn trees turning into a darker shade and yellowwoods. Not even the hardening of the road below would snatch his attention from Anele’s back.
“Why so foul, boy?” Dawn asked, within his field of view. Beneath a wide yellowwood with the other Tamed.
“You should ask her.” He grumbled, though his anger waned.
Dawn chuckled at him.
Zaki tore his eyes away from Anele and admired the colours splashed on the walls of the sturdy homes. The lack of walls surrounding what appeared to be a village preceding the town south of it took him aback.
A pair of guards in rich leathers and bronze greeted them, with a quintet of assegais on their backs. The slender spear tips sheathed, and they halved the shafts. They splashed their steel bucklers with sky blue to match the sashes wrapping around their torsos.
“Welcome sister, generals,” the hazel eyed one smiled. They all stood before her.
“Vadar’Kair opens its hospitality. The inkokeli offers his home to you all.” The lean, gruff voiced man added with a grin.
“No need.” Anele’s lips contorted into something that could have been a smile, a sincere one. “We only wish to refill our water skins.”
“Follow us.”
Their Tamed lingered beneath the shade while they followed the guards through the village. Children giggled as they scurried between thatched homes and rondavels, pointing and whispering about the strangers in their midst. Zaki enjoyed the aroma of soup and baking bread. Cheese and milk mingled with corn, boiled and fried with spices.
Goats bleated; chickens pecked in their pens. Sheep grazed in grand, fluffy flocks beyond the borders of the village. Cows chewed lazily alongside them. Some lounged in the shade of grand yellowwoods. Under the watchful eyes of herders.
More guards patrolling in lesser armour filled his view once the narrow road widened into the bustling town. The gravel turned into solid clay bricks baked by the warm winter sun. Homes were grand, with vibrant colours. The thatching was fresh and hardened by clay. Gardens bloomed within the low walls, possessing colours that defied the season.
A grand manor of rock and wood, of wondrously polished clay and tiles, rose elegantly. It stood out, and not only because it was the largest building around. The guards turned towards it, through a busy marketplace where farmers and butchers mingled, delivering their fresh wares to merchant stalls. Fruit stalls glistened under the sun; perspiration dribbled like jewels off of them.
The courtyard of the inkokeli’s manor swarmed with silk clad people, lounging in the shade of wooden gazebos, snacking on fruit beside jugs of wine and beer. Nearby guards wore garish armour that seemed to be more fashionable than functional. They stood beside a tall burly man in silks hanging off of his muscled body. Pale scars riddled his midnight umber skin, and he shifted on his feet as if nursing an old injury.
“Welcome to you all. I promise not to keep you for too long. Please, hand over your water skins to my guards and we will have them refilled without delay.”
Zaki hesitated at first, searching through the inordinate amount of perfume shielding the inkokeli’s emotions. Though, after a nudge from Jazmin behind, he produced both of his empty leathers.
“Please, make yourselves comfortable,” Inkokeli Onako folded his ringed fingers together with a smile that reminded him of the sycophantic nobles in the capital. “Master Anele, please join me inside for a moment?”
Prince Zaki didn’t share in his companions’ lounging comfort. His legs drummed on the ground while he sat forward. He shovelled down two plums. Every moment felt like an age, and his eyes never left the wide entrance of the manor.
They lounged in the shade upon cushioned benches, sipping on the wine and enjoying grapes. Jazmin’s eyes wandered with quiet awe, and many other nobles watched her extravagant beauty with interest. Master Sinalo twiddled his thumbs with a peaceful smirk on his lips.
Whispers spread about more than Jazmin’s appearance. The Cheetah nobles began with the other Lion in their midst, before noticing his golden eye. Zaki sat up now and puffed his chest. It was obvious these were not Tamers if they were so sure their whispers wouldn’t carry to them. It didn’t take long for them to connect the dots, and soon their excitement surged when they realised the Lion Prince was in their presence.
It wasn’t long for them, unfortunately. Once the guards returned with water, and bags of sweet-smelling treats as well, Anele emerged with Inkokeli Onako streaming behind her. Zaki rose to his feet, preparing his question for the Cheetah Tamer, but her eyes avoided him. Neither she nor the grinning inkokeli gave anything away.
“Thank you for your hospitality, Inkokeli,” Jazmin nodded, winning the burly noble’s admiration for a moment.
“May the Beast keep your journey swift, and safe,” Inkokeli Onako bowed before crossing his capable arms at them.
Inkokeli Onako’s blessing started off well, for they sped along the cheetah road once they returned to it. Prince Zaki donned his helm on this occasion, more to save his cheeks from the blistering wind. A sudden gloom took hold in the usually blue skies above. It might have given respite against the winter sun of the Tej Province, but it only brought a chill, making him wish for a cloak over his armour.
Villages and farms increased in number. North and south of the road, becoming grander the further east they rode. Single story homes widened into homesteads and grand manors. Low walls ringed villages that served as entrances to sparkling towns behind them.
Night fell quicker than usual, aided by the afternoon gloom that stretched into the evening. It was quiet, even from Dawn, because they never ceased their pace. The gloom continued into the night, barring the stars from shining their silver beauty down onto them.
Anele lingered on the road longer than usual. Their pace had long since slowed to a stroll in the gloomy darkness. All of them clumped together while the Cheetah’s eyes searched the northern and southern horizons. For all the gloom above, the Tej was aglow with lamps and torch fire. All the farms, villages, and homesteads sparkled with life, which meant trouble for them.
She gave up her search and eventually diverged from the clay road towards a grand yellowwood that lost much of its foliage. The grass was flat and yellow around the trunk. There were hints of ash from campfires long dead.
“I will take first watch,” Anele muttered.
There was no fire for them. The surrounding light was more than enough. Once again, they laid out their beds and ate in silence. Zaki dug Melina’s shield upright into the soil to lean against it. A strange comfort to rest his back on the strengthened gold. Melina embraced him from behind, or while he lay on her thigh and she ran her fingers on his chest.
“Prince Zaki.”
Zaki jumped when Jazmin knelt beside him. He was more surprised by where his thoughts were leading him. The prince cleared his throat and turned towards the shadowed beauty of lady Isis before him. Dark stubble grew atop her usually bald head. She lowered her veil, and he tasted the berries on her breath.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.”
“I wasn’t… what is it?”
“I just wished to offer my company. You seemed so alone.” Jazmin’s voice was hushed, though not soft enough for the others to miss. Even for the patrolling Anele, who stomped around the camp. “I have a big heart, forgive me.”
Her hand disappeared beneath her robes when he snorted at her. He glanced at her eyes and her hazel gems glistened with a plea. Zaki shifted when the vanished hand scrunched.
“A gentle soul, I would say,” Zaki managed poorly.
Jazmin shoved a folded scrap of paper between his thighs with none of the excitement he should have felt. His eyes followed her dainty fingers. She pinched his thigh and flicked his attention back to her face, to her mouthing lips.
‘Chase me away.’
Zaki frowned at her, and she nodded. He cleared his throat again and searched for the words.
“I appreciate your concern, but I enjoy my solitude, and prefer it now.”
“Your loss,” she smirked. “The offer remains.”
Jazmin rose to her feet to glide back to her bedroll. Zaki’s eyes lingered on her, before it hit him again on what had occurred. He turned away and looked ahead, while a free hand slid for the paper. Chaotic but faded ink, the words were few.
Hang back.
We must talk.
The cheetah road wound southeast days after horrendous slumber beneath the yellowwood. Dryness seared with fatigue upon his eyes, worsened by their pace against the brisk breeze. Winter finally struck the southeast and it couldn’t have come at a worse time. It didn’t agree with him, nor allow him to find rest. Even as they rode through another town, larger than Vadar’Kair. The buildings in its surrounding villages were as vibrant as Inkokeli Onako’s manor, and not that much smaller in comparison.
Anele led them to an inn, possessing beds with lush mattresses that failed to bring him the rest he begged for. Zaki didn’t care to remember the name of the suspiciously empty yet exuberant location, nor the town. He ground his teeth as they trotted through the town, along the hard clay road, attracting the attention of children and nobles in elegant silks alike. Not even the jovial music and singing lifted or woke him from his dour.
It was difficult to blame the camp under the yellowwood, or the late coming winter. Prince Zaki glanced back at Jazmin jabbering away with Master Sinalo in the early morning. Anele was far ahead as usual, arms crossed before her, waiting to catch up to their scouting Tamed.
Zaki slowed, fell in with the chuckling pair, while his hand fiddled with the scrap of torn paper in his pocket.
“Ah Prince, joining us?”
“What am I joining?” Zaki flashed at Sinalo unintentionally. Only Jazmin appeared to take note.
“Or the Leopard is too polite,” Dawn chimed in.
“We were gossiping!” Jazmin’s eyes screamed for him to leave. “Matters too low for you.”
“Nonsense.”
“Lovers Prince, we were gossiping about past lovers,” Master Sinalo said.
“Being the youngest, I’m sure your experiences are lacking in that area,”
“I should check on Master Anele.” Sinalo rushed ahead, kicking up his pace while Zaki and Jazmin slowed further.
Jazmin snatched at his wrist, stopping them. Her eyes shifted around him and lingered before returning her gaze back to him.
“I understand you are who you are, but surely you possess a modicum of self-awareness?”
“I would watch your tone. I might save those two from having to show me the respect I deserve, but you,”
“Who are you performing for? There is only you and I, unless you mean to kill me here and have to deal with two Master Tamers?”
Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
“You underestimate my ability.”
Jazmin’s mouth opened and closed, and she sniffed.
“We have lingered behind as you asked, what do you wish to tell me?”
“Have you been sleeping?”
“Damn you!” Zaki whipped out the scrap of paper thrust it into her face. “Was this a game to you, then?”
Jazmin snatched the paper, squashed it in her hand, then an overwhelming wave of warmth exuded from her. Zaki took a step back when the searing heat surged from her chest into her fist. A ball of fire sparked within her grip, and tendrils of orange redness seared through her fingers like claws.
She opened her hand, and the wind swept the ashes away from her palm. Dark blotches remained until she blew them away. Jazmin crossed her arms and the heat she exuded dissipated without a hint that she had immolated.
“Is that meant to impress me?” Zaki asked, yawning.
“Great Beast, you need some sleep.”
“Don’t waste my time again.”
“We are probably keeping the masters waiting,” Jazmin’s smile frustrated him, but he watched as she sauntered away. With Dawn’s chuckles filling his mind.
“What kept you two?”
Master Anele dared a smirk at Jazmin when he caught up behind. Sinalo turned away, but Zaki caught the edge of his widening lips.
“Lion business,” Jazmin said while mounting her pale gold Tamed. The Sinha glared at Zaki while he mounted Dawn, who wasn’t too far away from anger herself.
Their fast pace resumed, with the same formation of Anele at the head, Zaki behind, with Jazmin and Sinalo bringing up the rear. The road continued into the southeast. Yet the flat rolling plains, solitary yellowwoods, and thorn trees became scarce. Grand mountains sprouted far to the south, with rocky peaks hidden behind a veil of wispy grey.
The chill worsened. Rumbles followed the slow darkening of the sky above. Soon, falling spittle splattered onto his haloed helm, which he donned when the sky drummed.
His golden ochre armour chimed against the falling drizzle, pinging on his strengthened steel. Anele and Sinalo’s plated leather added their own low tune to the music, with only Jazmin drenched by the rain.
There was no telling if it was midday or evening with the gloom. Thankfully, the drizzle remained a drizzle, but at their recently reduced pace and tight-knit formation, it was still a draining hammering from above.
Master Anele turned them north with the flick of her hand, off the road towards a rocky outcrop. Dead trees swarmed around it, and there was shade beneath an enormous slab of sharp grey stone. More than enough space for all three of them and their Tamed to hide from the rain.
Dead twigs swarmed the ground, and Sinalo rushed to gather them. Anele lingered in the rain, snapping branches for firewood. Zaki watched as Sinalo dripped on the formerly dry kindling, while Anele dumped the firewood.
“That won’t…” Zaki began, before feeling a familiar wave of heat wash over him from behind.
He spun around towards Jazmin and steam emanated from her clothes. She shook the final droplets from herself and strode passed him towards the pile of kindling before Sinalo. Her warmth lingered on her as she knelt.
“May I?”
“Please,” Sinalo stepped away.
Jazmin caressed the pile of damp kindling with her palms. A moment’s hesitation passed, then the warmth exploded like a flash of lightning. Zaki flinched and blinked to minuscule sparks smoking the kindling. Anele rushed to feed the growing flames with her damp wood after handing them to Jazmin to dry.
Everyone huddled around the crackling wood, offering their bare hands to it. Zaki glanced at Jazmin huddled in her corner, caressing her dried clothes and avoiding his eyes.
“I overheard you gained the same talent as well,” Master Sinalo muttered.
“The palace tends to over share.”
Sinalo laughed.
“I will spare you the demonstration.”
“Power is earned,” Master Anele said, before laying her grassy green gaze upon the prince. “I would love to hear how you came to earn it?”
Her tone was far from the passivity of her expression. Though it soured her hardened face all the same. Zaki bit his tongue initially. The retort wouldn’t have been appropriate. He forced a smile in reply, ignoring Dawn’s giggling through their bond.
“Palace gossip didn’t reach you?”
“I avoid such haughty heights.”
Zaki’s smile wavered for a moment, but he forced it to remain.
“Well, Prince Immolator?”
“Can you?”
“Not all of us have the talent, nor the eye of the Beast, to attract such adoration.”
“Anele,” Sinalo warned.
“What? I only speak the truth.”
“I think we are all grouchy from this journey,” Jazmin joined them from her corner. “Perhaps we should leave it at that and use this moment to rest.”
“From the moment we left the capital, I’ve suffered your silent ire without reason. No more!” Zaki didn’t know when he rose to his feet, but Anele rose with him. His mind became mush from rage and fatigue, and all he saw was Anele’s smugness.
“Ire? Are you so used to unearned adoration and praise that when you don’t receive it you imagine ire? Do you arrest every poor Lion who doesn’t prostrate themselves when you grace them with your presence?”
“Do not victimise yourself here, you have no right.”
“Enough!” Sinalo forced his arms between them.
Zaki glared into Anele’s green, not up nor down, straight at them. His arms itched and fingers twitched with a desire to act. The golden, leather wrapped hilt of his khopesh beckoned his grip. Though Melina’s shield was more than an arm’s reach away. Anele kept her iklwa and shield close, which wouldn’t disadvantage him too much.
“We are allies! There is a war happening. The capital is soon to have its fate decided. How can we lead the reinforcements when two generals are at each other’s throats?”
Anele was the first to back down, biting her lip and turning away, exuding frustration and subtle shame. Zaki fought himself from smirking at his victory, though Dawn did her best to fill their bond with her bitterness towards him.
Jazmin nudged his arm, dragging him away from the fire. She shared in Dawn’s mood. Zaki didn’t have long to wallow in the present tension, seated beside Jazmin against a rock before he finally collapsed to sleep.
The morning stroll was peaceful, considering the night before. He couldn’t tell if it was the distance between himself and Master Anele, or that he somehow rested for a few hours. His short temper should have worsened, but it was as if he lay on his mattress in the palace. Dreamless as well, and he awoke on Jazmin’s thigh. Her hands hovering over him when he blinked his eyes open.
Jazmin strode beside him, closer than normal, for the briskness grew as they edged west. She ringed her gloved hands while they walked below the gloom of the Tej Province. There was a lot of activity. On the side roads leading towards them, not just from surrounding villages and farms.
The common folk were early risers, and skilled at not noticing the Lions in their midst. The difference between the Lions and the Cheetahs was not significant. His ornate armour and haloed Sinha helm, coupled with Jazmin’s extraordinary grace, caught their attention often. As well as mutters behind their palms.
Prince Zaki enjoyed the freshness of the breeze, filling his lungs with the sparkling chill. It invigorated his limbs with forgotten strength, whittled away by their days of traveling. He felt Jazmin’s eyes on him, yet kept his distant smile, enjoying the horizon ahead. A lull on the main road brought Jazmin even closer. Her thoughts whispered into his ears.
“This hasn’t gone as you intended, has it?”
“What makes you say that?”
“There is no need to play coy. Our eyes cannot make out your fellow generals, and we both know they aren’t scouting.”
“Do you intend to add to my supposed misery?” Zaki kept his eyes forward.
“Not at all, I merely,”
“What should happen, then? How could you know?”
“I don’t,” Jazmin shrugged, still sporting her friendly warmth for the odd passer-by. “I wished to return to my usual loquacity.”
Zaki huffed, finding a rhythm to his strides. There was a rumble, but no rain.
“What did you do to me?”
“Do to you?” Jazmin guffawed. “My, you have a way with words.”
“I awoke with your hands hovering above me, and I do not remember falling asleep on your thighs.”
“These thighs gave you the rest of the softest feather stuffed mattress,” her chortling drew more eyes. “Oh, I’m only teasing. You were thrashing, muttering, and I thought it best to ease whatever hellscape your mind forced you to suffer.”
Zaki frowned at her, abandoning the gloom ahead. His mismatched eyes dropped to her gloved hands before meeting her inquisitive hazels. Perhaps Ma had other motives.
“You wouldn’t have healing hands, would you?”
“Not in the manner you might understand it. I cannot mend the flesh. I soothe the intangible.”
“And you see my dreams?” Zaki panicked for a moment. Judging by Jazmin’s hesitation, she caught it in his scent.
“I do not know the source of the storms that trouble one’s mind. The shape of the clouds, the intricate details that make up lightning and rain elude me, but my hands soothe, or aggravate if necessary.”
“So, no?”
Jazmin nodded.
Prince Zaki’s mind drowned with the memories of his failure before that Heka man. The explosion of the dead woman’s last moments echoed through him again, and he clutched at his throat, but avoided flinching at the sudden throbbing in his groin.
His chance to delve further ended, and so did the memories of his failure. For they arrived beneath a dead thorn tree beside the road, where their lounging Tamed and Masters Anele and Sinalo waited. One with their arms crossed. No one spoke when they mounted up again.
Faint yellow light pierced the shadowed grey gloom above, announcing the approach of midday. The winter cool remained, however, bolstered by the speed of their Tamed. It whistled through the gaps of his ornate armour, drying beads of sweat oozing from his flesh. Dawn was far from her quickest, for their formation changed. With Zaki and Jazmin making up the rear, Master Sinalo ahead, and Anele further up.
“When do you plan on apologising?”
“She has found her voice again.”
Dawn was a silent judge. She shared her displeasure often, without words. He didn’t need her words. Her bitterness exploded through their bond, souring his tongue.
“I will, when the time is right.”
“When is the right time to apologise?”
“Once everything has calmed.”
“You hope for everything to be forgotten first?”
“That is not what I meant.”
“I am incapable of misunderstanding you, that is what you meant.” Dawn’s ire grew with every word. “Are you apologising to rectify your wrong, or to win unearned forgiveness?”
“It is not only my wrong,” Zaki said, but she wouldn’t allow him to continue.
An unseen wall barred him in their bond. His words fizzled against it. Her anger almost vanished. It trickled through the wall towards him. He growled and forced his attention away from his Tamed, which wasn’t too difficult, for the Tej became busy.
It forced their pace to slow upon the main road, despite the masses keeping to the edges. A choice made and imposed by Anele, who trotted ahead. Parents snatched their children, shielding them against the strangers in their midst. Most were far too inquisitive, peering around shoulders, pointing and muttering their awe.
Homes filled the northern and southern horizons. Colourfully painted with an assortment of shapes decorating the low walls surrounding grand homesteads. Fields swarmed with healthy, grazing livestock, adding to their already plump appearance.
The gloom gave way as the evening approached. A setting sun turned the Tej into a fiery violet hue, adding to the vibrancy surrounding them.
Night fell in a hurry. Anele led them off the road. Though her search for a campsite amongst bright lights dragged for longer than it should. Every suitable sight encroached on farmlands, or was too close to village borders. Prince Zaki was on the brink of suggesting they find an inn within one of the nearby villages until Master Anele grunted towards a ring of rocks up ahead.
It was dark, far from the surrounding flickering lights of nearby homesteads. Only the sounds of jovial villagers gave away their presence.
Felled yellowwood trunks formed makeshift benches, with dents from years of use. A fire pit of small stones had long since lost its natural greyness. Soot stained and black beyond recognition. Master Anele sighed at the popular campsite, but dropped her belongings in a corner, regardless. Zaki made a point of staying away, much to Dawn’s renewed grumblings.
Jazmin kicked the ash-stained grass in the centre of the pit before collapsing onto her unrolled bed. They sat together in silence, stewing in the shared discomfort. Not even the stars deemed them worthy to shine their silver glow on them. Zaki sipped on his water, leaning against the lounging Dawn behind him, rising and lowering with her torso.
“We need a fire,” Anele sprang to her feet. Zaki felt the urge, and Dawn’s nudge.
“Let me help,” he blurted out, winning spurts of surprise from both Jazmin’s and Sinalo’s scents.
Anele grunted at him, and Zaki threw off his gloves as he followed her out of the shielding ring of rocks. A biting wind greeted him, thrumming all around as he trudged south behind the Cheetah. Night’s darkness cloaked a mountain range far south on the horizon, with a flat peak.
Master Anele knelt to snatch up twigs and dry branches before a small gathering of dead, yet still standing trees. Zaki rushed to help, feeling the smooth wood on his bare fingers.
“I didn’t need help with this,” she muttered.
“I came to apologise.”
“Far from the others, of course,” she scoffed.
“Does that matter?”
Anele spun around with genuine surprise on her face. Not on the pleasant side, however. Frustration brewed in those grassy greens.
“Does it shame you to admit to wrongdoing?”
“Wrongdoing, I’m apologising for any offence you might have taken.”
“Hah! Of course, forgive me great Prince, oh masterful Lion, how dare I,”
“Enough! Clearly, I made a mistake in thinking there was some maturity in you.”
“How can… do you not hear yourself? Have you no…” Anele paused, then slammed her gathered wood down, shattering it them into tiny splinters, pinging off his legs.
She stomped past him and Zaki’s fire blazed in his chest as she did.
“Where do you think you’re going?” The prince snatched her wrist faster than she could avoid him.
The world froze.
Anele’s face contorted as she turned back to face him. Her face never completed the journey. Only the right side marred by the pale scar running down her eye. She had no green in her eyes. Somehow, the white surrounding the iris turned grey to match her skin.
The biting wind ceased. Jovial villagers vanished, and all the colour drained from the world in a blink. Zaki’s chest was still ablaze, but it simmered into confusion.
“What is this?” Zaki asked.
He yanked his hand away from Anele.
A grey imposter remained, still gripping her wrist, with an enraged expression that looked unlike him. Zaki stared at himself, at his greyness, the colourless Lion Prince snatching the master Tamer in dulled armour. It froze Anele mid turn, as he was, like the entire world. Blades of grass were bent, splinters of the shattered fire wood floated and remained in the air, lifted by the wind that wasn’t blowing.
Zaki spun around, seeing nothing but drained colour from the world, even from the frozen flickering torchlight in the distance.
“What is this?” He wailed, unsure if he spoke, or thought aloud.
He glanced back at Anele, then she pulled him into her. Zaki blinked again, and he was formless, floating in nothing. An unseen force yanked him again into another world.
Zaki blinked and stood in a cramped room of lifeless grey. A girl, twelve, he guessed, peered through the splintered gap of a door, dressed in poor rags. His confusion barely grew before something shoved him towards the inquisitive girl.
The world unfroze, and colour returned to the greyness.
Rhythmic moaning filled her ears. She folded her lips and held her breath. There was a sweaty commotion on the bed.
“Yes, yes, yes,” the gruff voice chanted. A woman moaned beneath him; her panting not nearly as heavy as the man’s. Who sounded as if he ran a marathon.
Legs were in the air, flesh bounced, and sweat spilled. The noises confused her. She couldn’t tell if it was pleasure or pain. She smelled both, and shame, and another scent she didn’t understand. Though her ears and cheeks seared with embarrassment.
She was so focused on the wrestling, noises and smells that she neglected the slippers behind her. Perfume filled her nose, saving her from the growing sweaty stink beyond the door.
“Anele!”
The girl spun round to a wide-eyed woman, her soil-coloured skin glistened with perspiration, paint too vibrant for her pudgy face.
“For fuck’s sake, girl.”
Zaki blinked again at a new setting, though not entirely different from before. The world was grey and frozen, and he spied the same bed, only this time with ruffled sheets and a naked woman curled into a ball atop them. Fingernails bruised her bare back. A pair of men dressed themselves in rich silks. They bejewelled their fingers with gaudy rings, matching the precious metals around their neck. It sucked the prince into the woman before it burned the scene into his mind.
Colour returned, and the world unfroze.
She was numb, empty, sickened. The cousins panted while they dressed, sliding on their silks and smacking their lips. Their floral perfume was sour, but still couldn’t drown out her shame.
I could break them with a flick of a wrist. She yearned to, but she didn’t.
They did their best to roughen her, but she was calm, as loving as she could be. Letting them do as they pleased without a squeak of resistance. They slapped and pinched; they groaned, and they moaned, thrusting with the uncontrollable desires of rabid dogs. Then they shuddered and whimpered right as they finished. She hardly felt any of it.
But why do I cower?
Tears streamed down her cheeks as one caressed her back. His fingers enjoyed the shape of her hips and grabbed her ample bottom, before sliding between her cheeks to have one final touch of the pleasure between her legs.
“No one else’s, you hear?” He whispered into her ear before sucking his greedy finger.
“Put some fucking effort next time,” the other said. “I don’t want to feel like I’m fucking a corpse, Anele.”
“As you wish, Inkokeli,” she managed, hiding the fear from her voice her tears wished to expose.
Zaki blinked once more at a grand arena. With clay stone seats ringing around a dusty fighting pit. Swarmed by boisterous people, frozen in grey cheer. Most were roaring, hands raised, fists clenched in the air. A few seated souls covered their eyes.
Anele stood in the centre, assegai in hand and drenched in blood. A torn open face awash in grey blood. Ahead stood a pair, one cowering behind the other, yet both shared their fear. He didn’t have time to study the bodies that littered the battlegrounds, for the unseen yanked him towards Anele.
Colour returned, and the world unfroze.
Her thighs bubbled with fatigue, moments away from buckling her knees. Blood oozed from the spear tip, drenching the clay soil in more maroon darkness.
One more, just one more.
The din of the crowd did its best to distract her. Their demands for more blood almost did. So close now, so close to tasting the coldest of dishes, the sweetest revenge. Her entire body stung from the many cuts she took. Her shield arm was numb and unencumbered. No amount of flexing brought any feeling back to it.
Her facial wound gushed and tasted metallic when it dripped near her lips. Though nothing tasted better than the fearful scent of the Tamer across from her. The inkokeli’s bastard, she would savour killing his daughter in front of him.
Anele inhaled before charging low towards her. Her dead hand dragged along the dusty ground, filling her fingers with a handful of soil. The woman raised her shield, anticipating the blinding dust, but Anele hid it behind her back, using her spear instead. It dented the strengthened shield, rumbling the girl’s arm, before she stomped down on it, avoiding the counter swing of her short sword.
Her spear pinged as she parried, dancing back and forth with the hesitant girl, keeping her clay surprise behind her back. There was hardly a thought in her mind. She acted, and soon she cackled. Anele laughed as she fought without breaking the momentum. In fact, she stole it from the girl, forcing her back, keeping her on her heals.
Anele’s assegai coloured itself redder, chipping away at the gaps in the girl’s leather. She grunted with every slice, and Anele kept her booming laughter. Finally, the shield lowered after the battering it suffered, and Anele tossed the blinding clay. The inkokeli’s daughter was wide open.
She kicked with all her strength and enjoyed the crunch of bone when she shattered her knee. Anele howled with joy as she stood over the girl, savouring the inkokeli’s wide eyed, dumbfounded expression. Pungent urine trickled down his leg, perfect.
“Look and see Inkokeli, look and see!”
Anele buried her spear so deep into the girl’s skull she felt it shear through flesh and bone, brain, bone and clay all at once. The blade was non-existent, and the strengthened wooden handle protruded from the dead girl’s skull, a stem emerging from bloody soil.
The inkokeli fell and tried his best to drag himself back while she stepped closer. She abandoned her spear and found life returning to her dead arm. Her laughter soared. She flexed her fingers and enjoyed the inkokeli soiling himself.
“The Great Beast is good!”
Anele snatched at him, but the world froze once again, and the colour drained from everything.
“Enough!”
Prince Zaki gasped once he returned to reality. The biting winter wind of the Tej Province returned. The jovial noise of the villagers returned to his ears, yet drowned out by Anele’s echoing resistance in his mind.
She completed her turn towards him, and his grip loosened on her wrist, but her contorted expression was far from enraged. Instead came shame shared between them. They stood together in the colourful night time, frozen by their own choice, staring into each other’s eyes. He fixated on the now closed, pale scar running down her face while his chest warred with chaos.
Anele snatched her arm away and slapped him. Without purpose, not stronger than the wind, but his cheek cracked like lightning. He spotted fear in her grassy eyes, hesitation and regret, before the scent of shame overpowered his nose. She rushed back towards their camp. Zaki lingered in the open chill, struggling to comprehend what had just occurred. Though it wasn’t long before his mind exploded with Dawn’s rage.