“We still have some days until we reach Aham-Nishi,” Menes said as he buried the ashes of their fire from the night before. “I think it would be wisest for me to scout the road ahead and then return.”

“Are you certain?” Ilati rubbed her eyes. She was still tired, but Eigou’s lessons had done much to exhaust her into dreaming and thinking of nothing. The blisters on her hands had all but disappeared thanks to the sorcerer’s medicine. So far, Eigou’s efforts to open her perception, that inner eye, had failed. It was hard not to be discouraged, but he insisted that she would need time.

Eigou set a skin of water down beside them. They had made progress away from the River Esharra, but the land between two rivers was full of marsh and creek-threaded landscape. They were never far from water in Kullah, a boon to farmers and hunters alike. Thick green grass crowded around them on all sides, tall as a man’s midsection. It had helped to hide them the night before by concealing both their bodies and their fire. “I think the suggestion is a good one,” the sorcerer said. “Ilati and I will wait here. Do not engage any bandits, Menes. Better we go around than risk injury.”

Menes nodded as he pulled on his leopard skin and then belted on his bronze sword. “I will be careful. Keep your heads down. We are not far from the road and any could come upon our camp if given a hint to search.”

“I assure you that we will be well behaved,” Eigou said, a glint in his golden eye.

The warrior grumbled something under his breath as he turned away. Menes vanished into a copse of small date palms, trying to find a more hidden path.

“Now that he is away, I have a lesson for you.”

Ilati frowned. “Why does he always absent himself when you have a lesson?”

Eigou sighed at that question. “Menes has suffered much at the hands of magic, though the practitioners of his homeland rather than people like you or I. He seldom sees much of a distinction, however.”

“What happened?”

“That is not my secret to tell, Ilati. Let us focus on your own power and trust our leopard to hunt out any sign of trouble.” Eigou steepled his fingers and then tapped them against his lips. “I have a different idea for accessing the world of spirits.”

Curiosity caught Ilati’s tongue. “How?”

His expression kept the same composure that she had seen before going into the desert, unreadable to even her trained eyes. “What do you know of true names, Ilati?”

The priestess ran her fingers through her hair, breath coming out in a sharp sound of something approaching fear. “I know that they are powerful and can be used in spells. Any priestess knows that invoking the name of a god is central to treating with its heavenly might.”

Eigou inclined his head slightly. “This is so. Gods, however, are wise enough to protect their true names. They give those that supplicants can use and keep their nature hidden close to their hearts. For the moment, it is most useful for us to turn our eye to the nature that surrounds us. All things, in the world of the physical and the world of forms, have names that are the summation of everything that they are.” He plucked a blade of grass and twisted it between his fingers. “What is this, Ilati?”

“Grass.”

“And what does such a name tell you about the nature of the thing?”

Ilati considered the question carefully. “It tells me that it is a plant of a particular type with a particular sort of use.”

“A category imposed by men, no different than a birth name given by parents. Both are less than useful, as neither have any true knowledge of the subject.” He flicked the blade of grass at her and then turned his attention to another growing blade of grass, surrounding it with the circle of his thumb and forefinger. He leaned close to it lovingly and parted his lips to speak.

Ilati froze at the sound that issued forth. Eigou made a noise that rippled outwards in the air like a stone cast into a still pool and for a moment, the grass glowed like a comet at the center of her mind, shimmering with life and light.

—her roots digging into soft earth, leaves stretching up to greet the heat of the sun. Within dozens of little segments, endless tiny changes cycling in little pulses, fueling the rise of her body. Fragile, ephemeral, but hardy and growing all the same. She understood every fiber of her being, every unwritten law that guided her to being not a mere piece of grass, but a reflection of a whole vibrant spirit. She was not a blade of grass, but the idea bound to her form, an intersection of divine will and physical space—

The sensations vanished in a second, leaving Ilati stunned into speechlessness. Her eyes fixed on the blade of grass, even as the glow faded away. “What was that?”

Eigou scratched at his beard and smiled. “A taste of the understanding that comes with true names. I am pleased you took to it as well. I suspect all your training as a priestess makes you more sensitive to such incantations.”

Ilati managed to catch her breath and pull her wits together. “But true names are control, not just understanding.”

“Even knowing a name, it takes understanding to use it. You could not, say, manipulate a whole field without knowing the grass well. Invoking a harvest god is much easier, for they might do such a task for you.” Eigou shrugged a little. “Better that you come to appreciate and understand this, as K’adau will intervene only when she wishes and I know little of predicting her whims.”

“How do you learn the names?”

Eigou tapped below his empty eye-socket. “That is where perception comes in. Many names can be unearthed by careful study, though in the case of spirits, one might have to ask or force them to reveal their true nature.”

Ilati sighed. “That is a more difficult task than you think.”

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

“Nonsense. Simply look.”

“Cheap advice from one with an eye that is already a spirit.” Ilati looked back down at the blade of grass. It seemed as simple a thing as it had been before Eigou spoke its name.

“This is not something that happens immediately, Ilati,” Eigou said. “This will take patience, dedication, and time to develop.”

She knew he was right, but it didn’t help the knot in her stomach. Nysra had already mastered whatever magic it was that he had at his command. Every day she floundered was a day he could further ravage the world without interruption. “What kind of magic does Nysra use?”

“Truthfully?” Eigou asked.

“Yes. Entertaining lies are not helpful.”

Eigou rubbed the back of his neck. “I am not certain if it is a pact with dark gods or name magic. Perhaps it is both.”

Ilati bit her lower lip as she considered that, running a finger along the deepest of the scars, that stretched down her cheek and pulled at the corner of her mouth. “What do you know about Nysra?”

The sorcerer settled in to sit more comfortably, leaving the blade of grass he had been focused on alone. “That is a mired question. There are many stories about the King of Nadar.”

“But what is the truth?”

Eigou shook his head slightly, smiling. “Who can say? I can tell you the story most popular in Nadar.”

“I will hear it.”

“In the days of Ilishu, Nadar was a captive kingdom, subjugated just as all the other four corners of the world were by the greatest king of Kullah. At the birth of his own son, Ilishu put to death the old royal line that had done their best to spite them and imagined that was the end of it. One of the princesses, heavy with child, fled with hunters on her tracks. She lived just long enough to give birth to a baby boy, but one she could not protect. So she made him a basket of reeds and set him adrift on the Zarkassa River, praying to their gods that he be saved.”

Ilati curled her arms around her knees, pulling them to her chest as she listened. Eigou wasn’t a great tale-teller, but she appreciated the story still.

“They say a humble shepherd found the baby and raised him up to a man. He learned how to fight by protecting his flock from dangerous beasts in the foothills of the mountain. One day, though, the shepherd told him of his mysterious origins and the young man set off to follow the river to its source and perhaps an answer. Eventually he learned the truth from a servant woman who had come with the princess and visited his mother’s grave. Her spirit whispered to him in the night that he was the true king, and so he assembled an army through guile and persuasion that beat back Amar-Sin and retook his kingdom.”

“And his magical powers?”

“They say that he was granted such things as a reward for securing Nadar’s independence from the gods of Kullah.” Eigou shrugged a little. “There is another story, though: that Nysra was a cup-bearer of no standing who murdered King Emesu for bowing to Ilishu. He usurped the throne before driving out the invaders with an army he bribed and threatened into cooperation. All this story of the river and the humble origins then serve as a way to seem a true, legitimate king of royal blood chosen by the gods.”

Ilati considered that carefully. “And which is true?”

Eigou smiled faintly. “Which would you trust more, his friends or his foes? There are many who have their reasons to believe one story or the other. Perhaps the truth is somewhere between the two.”

“Someday, I want to know the truth.” Ilati rubbed at her scar again, still livid and fresh. “I want to ask him why he destroyed Shadi.”

“That may never have a satisfying answer,” Eigou said gently. “The hearts of men hold many dark secrets and some make sense only to those who hold them.”

Ilati nodded. After years of holding people and their secrets, she could understand that much. “Then Nysra has many stories about him?”

“As many as there are days in the year. To find the truth is to sift through them all and separate the few grains of wheat from the mountains of chaff. Not easily done, you might say.” Eigou waved a hand dismissively. “All of this is smoke. We should focus on the task ahead, which is training you.”

Ilati was silent for a long moment, considering Eigou’s stories carefully. Then her thoughts turned back to her family. A hard knot formed in her throat, almost choking her again. “I can feel his anger in me,” she finally admitted.

Eigou reached out and gave her shoulder a tight squeeze with one hand. “I thought you might. Anger often follows pain. As much as I would wish to discourage it, I must say: such anger may be necessary. We take on a task that is monumental in scope. The army of Nadar is the best in the world. To defeat it will take an alliance of many kings. There is no other way, no magic spell that could destroy him. Only the gods turning loose the Great Flood once more would stop him, and that would spell destruction for all.”

Ilati shuddered at the thought. She had survived near misses, floods that had damaged Shadi but not destroyed it. She knew full well how close they had come to disaster at heavenly hands, even protected by the grace of Zu. She could not imagine a flood that consumed the world itself.

“Come, we will focus on the grass. Once you feel a field of it, you will know how small you truly are,” Eigou said. He glanced back at Ankhu, where the mule was steadily chomping away. “Perhaps not so close to our dependable animal companion, however. The chewing distracts me.”

“How long will Menes be gone?”

“No more than a day, gods willing. He only scouts the parts of the path where we are likely to be ambushed, few and far between in this open land.” Eigou gave her shoulder another squeeze. “Have no fear. He is more than the equal of a few bandits.”

Ilati tried to feel reassured, but it was hard to think of being safe after everything she had experienced. She sighed and tried to pick a different anxiety. “Am I being foolish, Eigou?”

The old man chuckled. “Probably, but let us hear the whole thought so that I may judge. I am a soothsayer, not a reader of minds.”

She felt faintly foolish. “About asking the Sut Resi for help. Neither you nor Menes have absolutely come down against it, but at least he seems uneasy.”

Eigou stroked his beard thoughtfully. “I think it has promise, as ideas go. Even the Nadaren find the problem of horse-warriors vexing, and they have the least to fear from the Sut Resi. Their capital is warded from the southern steppes and fertile plains by mountains. Not that the Sut Resi have never crossed, but it is more treacherous for them to move through such terrain. Now Nysra will have to deal with them in their element if he wishes to keep his vast empire, and he will be lucky if he does not rip out his beard in fury trying.”

“My father fought them, and he was not even half the general Ilishu was.”

Eigou plucked a strand of grass, chewing on its end. “A war that cost Kullah its western holdings, shrinking the border almost again to the shores of the River Ninti. Besides, Amar-Sin was not fool enough to try to invade Sut Resi territory. I think your idea is a good one. Better not to have arrows stinging at your heels while trying to battle Nysra, no?”

Ilati nodded, relieved.

Eigou hummed thoughtfully for a moment before adding, “I think Nysra only begins to cut the teeth of his ambition on the world.”

The priestess shuddered at the thought, even certain down into her bones that it was true.

The stories stayed in Ilati’s thoughts for the rest of the day and well into the night as she tried to put a face to that hated name.