Gloom of his making, darkness by his hand, Mazin hunched over Bavamso and Beyond at his desk. His oil lantern spat occasionally, pleading for more fuel. From resting elbow to bracing palm, his left arm numbed. Mazin flexed his jaw every time it threatened to join his arm in the realm of unfeeling. He yawned, then the buzz of the palace broke his concentration.
Master Roole’s hammering trickled in through the gaps of his closed shutters. Marching boots clunked outside his doors, shuffling slippers rushed up and down the passage, bearing an array of scents. From food to wine and beer, fresh linens and fruit scented liquids.
Mazin shook his head and focused on the ink swarmed pages. The words warred with each other on the paper battlefield. Chaos ensued as the lines blurred. No amount of blinking or eye rubbing stilled the ink warriors. He groaned, burying his face in his hands when the crumbling foundations of his concentration turned to rubble.
The darkness pulled him when he closed his eyes. Sleep, and the nagging call of the void. Mazin shook himself and jumped to his feet. He forced his heavy eyes open and dragged himself away from Bavamso and Beyond. Prince Mazin floated towards a window and flicked the shutters open. A humid gust whispered away the remnants of his perfume. Another yawn struck him while he enjoyed the rust-coloured sunset. Hints of violet splashed amongst the fading fire.
Sandy gold stone, red and gold baubles dominated in the lion district. Children kicked up dust from the clay stone streets as they chased each other, drawing the idle ire of the adults they bumped into. Bazaar stalls with striped and colourful awnings prepared for closure. Their hoarse voices croaked a final time before they hid their wares away. Mazin fiddled with his ironvine ring while his mismatched eyes fixated on a building beyond the bazaar.
It didn’t stand out amongst the other homes. Wood protruded from the stonework. The faintest hint of colour decorated its edges. He knew them to be hieroglyphs, but not even his Tamer eyes saw more than scratches from his room. Nothing changed while he watched it. Even after returning from filling another glass of sour wine. He watched until the district lights flickered on, rising from the noble ring close to the palace and flowing along each district until it splashed upon the towering walls of Bil’Faridh.
Mazin drained his wine in one go, shuddered at the sour bitterness and his burning chest. The courage was necessary, he grunted and thumped his chest before turning away and snatching his khopesh. A black silk hood, mask and coin pouch filled to the brim, then he rushed out of his room.
He tightened the strap of black silk tight over his ruby eye. His hood billowed under the humid breeze at the top of the hundred steps. Mazin massaged the ruby pommel of his khopesh before rushing down the steps. Left hand keeping the hood in place.
A flash of coolness suddenly wiped away the humidity that dominated the day. It wasn’t much, but anything was better. Ma once described the deserts of the Gaur Province as dry brown snow, like that which fell in the north. She was prone to hyperbole when it came to describing weather, but it put a picture in his mind. He’d never seen the province of his ancestry; he had never been beyond Bil’Faridh’s towering walls.
Two onyx scaled armoured palace guards watched his approach to the gates. Their eyes bore through his mask, no number of wandering eyes on his part lessened his unease. Mazin stood at equal height before them, yet their aura made it feel like he strained his neck up at them. The dark Sinha carved into their chests were ringed with strengthening script, and had rubies for eyes. He finally mustered the courage to meet their eyes, but his skin crawled.
“Perhaps we can come to an agreement?” Mazin tested.
Their eyes glimmered in the darkness, and their helms failed to hide their amusement.
“Duty demands, Prince Mazin.”
“But we do not bar your way,” the other chimed in. “It is simply wartime policy.”
“She doesn’t have to know.”
The gate whistled open by their hands, gold, silver and bronze intertwined with thick iron. Mazin stepped forward but hesitated.
“Is that a yes then?”
“When the pharaoh asks after you, we will be duty bound to tell her.”
“Better than nothing, I suppose,” Mazin sighed.
“May the Great Beast’s eye never shut on you, Prince.”
He grumbled as he entered the noble ring. The subtle clink of the gate closing behind was followed by their snorts. Mazin touched the ruby pommel of his khopesh while he darted from shadow to shadow. Avoiding the jovial attention of the nobles mingling up on their balconies. Draped in rich silks and swarmed by flourishing hanging gardens. The rare Tamer amongst them sniffed at his trail, eyes lingering in the shadows he hid.
Mazin passed hieroglyph decorated obelisks before the grand entrances of sand stone homes. Small statues of Sinha stood guard with snarling jewelled teeth and gems for eyes. The darkness deepened when he passed homes of black tiled roofs and sturdy thin walls. Homesteads with ghost trees displaying their white silk streamers over the walls. All abandoned, an eerie silence lingered amongst an already mournful setting.
The prince stormed into the lion district, leaving behind the wealthy homes. There was little need to cling to the darkness now. Night was in full effect, and the stench of beer drowned out the slight hints of piss. Mazin rushed past noisy taverns bursting with merrymakers sloshing their goblets. District guards littered the street. He turned away when one caught the ruby pommel of his khopesh. Hands rushed towards their own weapons, mutters about his strangeness reached him. Worst of all, they reeked of fear before scurrying away.
Mazin darted left at the quiet bazaar. Red and gold baubles hung from silk limbs stretching out in all directions from the central, towering obelisk. Which wrapped around the streetlights ringing the bazaar. Much too bright, yet here amorous habits kept curious eyes busy, too drunk to catch the black hooded stranger.
Accompanied by lust moans in dark alleyways, slurred chatter from revellers smelling more of fermented barley than sweat. They grunted in his direction for a moment, but he was gone before they could trust their eyes. He traversed deeper into the darkening street, angling right. Clay crunched beneath his boots. His nose drowned in the combining stink of beer, sweat and torchlight.
Blood.
Mazin halted and turned towards the source of the metallic odour from a nearby alleyway. Commotion brewed within the darkness, a glint of steel amongst flesh, wetted and followed by a yelp. He rushed into it, barging past a watcher who failed to warn the others. Mazin’s shoulder winded and knocked him off his feet. The prince snatched the blade wielding wrist before it could wet itself again.
“Who the…” they began, before Mazin tightened his grip.
The cowering victim below bled from gashes on his arm and chest. His sheer linens were slashed, bruises ruined his gold glittered light umber skin.
“Let go, you shit!”
His lips were a mess of cuts and red paint, mixed with congealing dark maroon blood. More bruises lumped his chiselled features. Kohl smudged by tears, and his nostril was torn from a ripped off ring.
“Are you a fucking Tamer?”
Mazin squeezed, and the stabber’s breathy attempts to free himself turned into wailing. He collapsed to his knees and sobbed for mercy, dropping the knife. His bones crumbled like dry twigs until his wrist became a flesh sack. The prince glared down at him, he knew his ruby eye was masked, but the stabber’s own eyes widened at the silk shred covering it.
“Plea… please.” The man said.
Mazin stepped away, repulsed by his sudden pity turning his tongue pity. His heart lurched when he glanced at the crushed wrist, he was too harsh. The man he winded with his shoulder recovered and crawled away. There was no anger left in him, and his blood cooled.
“I’m,” Mazin stopped himself. Then the stabber snatched his knife with his remaining hand and stumbled away.
“Who are you?” The other he rescued asked.
Mazin rushed to his knees and tore scraps off his pants and wrapped his wounds. He mouthed a million apologies with every grimace the man made.
“Apply pressure to your chest,” he handed him the remaining scraps. “You should find a physician as soon as possible.”
“You are a Tamer, aren’t you?”
Mazin nodded.
The man’s eyes narrowed at the silk covering his ruby eye, then widened.
“Beast, you’re the one! She’s always going on about you when she drowns in her cups. You’re the prince?”
Mazin wiped his bloody gloves on his pants and avoided his gaze. He allowed the man to snatch at his arm after an overpowering scent of concern exploded from him.
Stolen novel; please report.
“If they came for me, they’re going for,” he groaned. “I heard a girl from the cheetah district was found dead. Farah knew her, she must be next!”
Mazin rushed to his feet and reached for his khopesh, but thought against drawing it.
“You need to get out of here, will you be fine?” He asked the wounded man.
He nodded and Mazin sprinted away, deeper into the alleyway’s darkness.
“I’m Jamar, Prince,” Jamar wheezed just as he turned the corner.
Threats of violence filled his ears after a quick sprint. Mazin rushed through the piss reeking alleyways, with a growing familiarity rising as he did. He skipped over a mumbling drunkard curled into a boozy ball, then cowered in the darkness of the last corner, out of the range of the torches ahead.
“Farah, Farah, Farah, come out!”
The smallest amongst four others hammered her fist on a wooden door.
“Enough of this game. How far did you think this would get you, stealing from me? Jamar’s dead because of you now.”
“Fuck you!” A voice shouted back.
“Blood on your hands, girl, a life you’ve thrown away for foolish greed. It doesn’t matter anyway, Luvuyo and yourself are of greater value to me. Tell me where she is, and I’ll consider your future punishments lessened.”
“Fuck you, I know she’s been killed already!”
“Come now girl, don’t be like this.”
“Fuck you, Oma!”
Oma sighed. He watched the dainty woman from the shadows, her strong perfume was out of place, smelling of someone who thought themselves higher than what they were. One of the brutes beside Oma hefted a stone hammer after she gave them a nod. Mazin emerged from the shadows without being noticed, drowned out by the first strike splintering the door. A squeal followed behind it. He cleared his throat after the second blow shattered through.
“Run along boy, this isn’t your business,” Oma squinted at him. Overdressed in emerald silks and far too many bronze jewels. A Lion who was a little older than expected. Her makeup failed to hide the creases on her face.
“That’s a pretty blade on his back,” one of Oma’s brutes whispered into her ear. The others produced clubs, while Mazin noticed dagger shaped bulges hidden along their thighs and calves.
“Final warning boy, leave before we do worse than this door upon you.”
Mazin drew his khopesh, and the brutes charged at him. It took an age for them to arrive. He inhaled deep and lowered his blade. The first swung her club agonisingly slow, he barely moved to snatch her bulging forearm, yet crushed it with little effort. She was forced to be his shield before the pain struck her, and the back of her head cracked. Mazin tossed her limp body into another. A third swiped at him, an easy side step was all he required, before firing a swift, controlled punch into their kidney left them in a groaning heap on the ground.
Oma hid behind her hammer wielding thug, whose pudgy face contorted with fear. There was a hint of alcohol in the air, stifled, not from the pair he faced.
“Who are you?” Oma asked.
“Farah’s friend,” he grimaced as he said it, though it must have looked like a snarl to them. “I think it’s time you left her alone. I don’t want to harm you two.”
“You don’t know the trouble you’ve brought upon yourself, and whoever your fool of a master is.” Oma’s eyes narrowed at his khopesh. “What would a Tamer want with a thieving whore anyway?”
“Mistress, please,” her guarding brute trembled.
“This isn’t the end stranger. You’ve muddied your hands in the wrong garden.”
Mazin watched Oma scamper away with her remaining brute, abandoning the crumpled heaps he dealt with. Their torches still burned on the ground. They groaned and shifted, unable to rise on their own. Beer and aged blood spurred him towards the shattered door. It was gloomy within, littered with splinters and dust.
He shoved the battered door off its hinges and stepped into an empty home. Farah yelped, clutching a bottle swirling with beer, bleeding and breathing heavily. His boots crunched on the floor as he took in the emptiness. It had been some time since someone lived here. The only light was a torch at Farah’s ankles to his right. She stood against the wall with wide eyes, holding the corked bottle like a club.
Farah yelled as she swung, knocking herself off balance as he caught the bottle, dropped his khopesh and caught her from falling as well.
“Who the fuck are you?” Farah belched. Her recently oiled, shoulder length curls glittered with ruby dust. Beneath a sheer shawl of awful grey. She had been weeping, kohl ruined her cheeks and her brown lips quivered as he let her go.
“Well?”
His eye hovered on her wrapped right arm. Dried blood soiled her bandages. Corruption oozed from it, stinking of rot. She swayed, then caught herself, eyeing the bottle in his hand. Her cloth was poor and as bland as her shawl.
“Did you kill the bitch?”
“No,” Mazin sighed, then lowered his hood. “Farah it’s me.”
“You who?” She belched and stepped closer, her eyes struggling in the darkness. “I’d like to think I would remember sleeping with a pretty, one eyed…”
Farah snatched away her hand and stumbled backwards. Her eyes widened and she forced her wounded arm behind her back.
“Mazin?”
Oma’s battered guards finally scurried away outside, moaning and sobbing as they did.
“We need to go before more of them come.”
Mazin offered a hand, she hesitated at first before snatching it. He sheathed his khopesh and caught a hint of disgust from on her face.
Farah’s home was a stroll away from the abandoned home, and every step closer to it, worsened his guilt. He shouldered the barricaded door off its hinges, and forced it back into place once inside. She coughed at the disturbed dust they kicked up, while Mazin searched for an oil lantern in the darkness.
“Why the fuck are we here? I haven’t been here in years.”
She did most of the leading, and her scent gave away the lie. Drunkenness would not keep her scent from him. Mazin returned with a lit lantern and placed it on a dusty table. Farah’s eyes took a moment to adjust, then she dragged a chair and collapsed into it.
“I didn’t know where else to go,” Farah answered herself. “Too low for the palace, am I?”
“I thought…”
“What do you want? Why did you find me?”
“I… I don’t know.” Mazin fumbled with the coin purse on his waist. It was Zaki’s spoken remembrance perhaps. Now that everything calmed, he realised he didn’t think this through at all.
Farah’s laugh was sardonic, “Three years Mazin, three years since you sent me a scrap filled with scribbles, now this? Are you watching me?”
“No, never,” Mazin grimaced when she brought her wounded arm closer to the lantern. “We should find a physician.”
“It’s fine. It does this at times, the corruption passes.”
“That’s not,”
“I said it’s fine! There’s no physician who can help me.”
A Tamer might, Mazin thought to himself.
She poked, then flinched. Poked, then flinched until boredom struck her. Her shoulders dropped and she sank into the chair, staring up at the ceiling. He watched her, hesitating with the coin purse, unable to find the right words.
“Jamar!” Farah sat up.
“He’s fine, he should be.”
Her sour expression softened, then she slumped back down.
“What happened?”
“She’s been pocketing more than she was allowed to, so I thought to take back what was ours. Luckily, I’m good at it, I make her a lot, I don’t think she was going to kill me, despite her killing Luvuyo.”
“No… I meant, I thought you were going to,”
“The Beast made me a great fuck, or haven’t you heard?” Farah glared at him. “That’s it! You finally want to have a taste, don’t you? I bet none of those nobles want anything to do with your fucking eye.”
“Farah,”
“You always find a way to remind me whenever your guilt catches up to you. At least you had the decency to show your face, but one night of playing hero doesn’t fix anything.”
“That’s not fair.”
“Fair? Fuck you! Look at where we are, my parents were respected! People sought after their clay, Asim was ready to sell his own body to the clan and become a district guard. Until you and your brother wandered down from your riches to play poor.”
“That’s not… it was a mistake.”
“A mistake? You beat Asim to a pulp, then run back to your little white and gold shithouse. I’m sure they all praised you for your skills, while physicians bled us dry. A mistake! At least you learned to tie your mask tight.”
Farah stood, smudging her already ruined kohl with fresh tears. Her wounded arm tightened into a fist, reeking awfully. Grief, fear and a subtle hint of deceit dominated her scent. She quivered, holding back her rage.
“Don’t look at me like that. Don’t look at me as if you’re… capable of remorse. Fuck you, fuck,” her cheeks bulged. Mazin smelled it while she spoke, her bile rising up her upset stomach. Farah turned away and sprayed it on the floor.
The yellow-brown puddle churned his own stomach, and she swayed after dry heaving. He caught her before she collapsed, turning to ice in his hands. Farah was limp and her pulse faint, her colour faded and Mazin’s heart raced.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered down at her, fighting to remain calm.