Secrets of Moth (The Moth Saga, Book 3) (9 page)

Cam pointed at himself and
Linee. "We're from the kingdom of Arden."

The fisherman raised his
eyebrows. "Arden?" He began to talk again in his tongue,
sounding amazed; the kingdom of Arden lay many miles in the north. As
far as Cam knew, he was the first Ardishman to have ever visited this
desert.

As they sailed upriver, the
rivulets began to gather into a single stream—the mighty Kae. Fish
leaped in the water, a family of crocodiles stared from the rushes,
and when Linee gasped and pointed, Cam saw two hippopotamuses
battling in the distance. Storks and cranes cawed and flew overhead,
dipping to catch fish.

Many vessels sailed around them.
Some were humble fishing boats carrying baskets of flapping tilapia
and perch. Others were galleys of many oars, bearing treasures from
distant lands: parti-colored parrots in cages, exotic plants in pots,
and jugs of wine. Cam cringed to see one ship ferrying men and women
clad in rags, metal collars around their necks—slaves.

Soon the city of Kahtef appeared
upon the horizon, and Cam watched it approach. Sandstone walls grew
from an oasis of palm, fig, and sycamore trees. Scorpion banners beat
atop turrets, and upon the city battlements stood guards in
breastplates, round helms hiding their heads, spears and bows in
their hands. Behind the walls, Cam could make out the tips of tall,
narrow buildings capped with platinum. A gatehouse rose around the
river ahead; the water flowed between two towers and under a stone
arch, entering the city like a road through gates. It seemed to Cam a
city as exotic as anything he'd seen in the night.

The fisherman pointed at
himself. "Izmat. Izmat." He pointed at Cam and Linee and
raised his eyebrows.

Cam tore his eyes away from the
city. He pointed at himself. "I am Cam." He pointed at
Linee next. "This is Linee, my companion."

Izmat grinned, showing crooked
teeth. "Ah! Cam and Linee! From Arden!"

Cam cleared his throat. "Yes.
You speak a little Ardish?"

The fisherman's grin widened.
"Little."

With that, still a mile away
from the city, Izmat began to direct his boat toward the riverbank.
Rushes bent and slapped against the reed hull.

"What are you doing?"
Cam crossed his arms. "I thought you're taking us to the city."
He pointed to the distant walls and towers. "Kahtef! To Kahtef."

The
fisherman smiled, bobbed his head, and held up a finger as if to say:
Just one moment.

The
boat drove closer to the marshy bank. Rushes now rose several feet
high, hiding the world. Cam could no longer see other boats or the
distant city.

"Maybe he has to go to the
bathroom," Linee said.

Cam felt a chill, and his hand
strayed toward the hilt of his sword. "Maybe he wants to rob
us."

When the boat drove into the
sandy riverbank, Izmat sprang out and landed between the rushes,
leaving Cam and Linee on the boat.

"Cam and Linee from the
kingdom of Arden." Suddenly his accent was less pronounced. His
smile vanished, he reached between his robes, and he pulled out
something that looked like a long flute or hollow reed. "My
master, Ferius the Lord of Light, told me you would be arriving up
the delta."

An amulet came free from Izmat's
robes. It was shaped as a round sunburst, sigil of Sailith. As he
raised the pipe to his lips, Cam understood what it was: not a flute
but a blowgun. Cam leaped sideways. Izmat blew into the tube. A dart
shot out.

Cam glimpsed steel and red
feathers. As he jumped off the boat, the dart slashed through his
cloak. Linee screamed and ducked. Cam landed in the shallow water,
cursed, and drew his sword. As he ran toward his enemy, the fisherman
loaded a new dart and brought the blowgun to his lips again.

"Cam, duck!" Linee
screamed behind him.

He obeyed and kept running,
hunched over.

Another shard of metal flashed.

Cam
winced, for an instant sure that Izmat had blown his dart.
I
will die here in the rushes, far from home, and our quest will fail.

He grimaced, expecting to feel
poison seep through his neck. Instead, the fisherman gasped and
froze. Cam gasped too. It was not a blowgun dart that had flashed. An
Elorian throwing star pierced Izmat's neck. The fisherman gave a last
gasp, blood spurted, and his blowgun fell into the mud. An instant
later, Izmat followed.

Cam froze and spun around, sword
raised.

Linee stood in the boat, holding
a second throwing star. She stared at the fallen man, then back at
Cam.

"Suntai gave me a few
throwing stars once, and . . . I've been practicing in secret. I
didn't think . . . that I'd ever . . . Oh Idar. Camlin, are you all
right?"

His mouth hung open. He blinked
a few times, then ran back to the boat, jumped inside, and hugged
her. "Soggy sheep bottoms, you're full of surprises, aren't
you?"

"I killed someone."
Her voice was barely a whisper.

He nodded. "And probably
saved our lives. This land is more dangerous than we thought, and
Ferius knows we're here. I'll fetch the man's cloak. At least one of
us can hide under the hood."

He returned to the body.
Grimacing, he removed the man's cloak, rinsed it in the water, then
brought the garment back to the boat. As the white cotton dried, Cam
rummaged in his pack for his small mirror and razor, then spent a few
moments shaving his head.

"You look silly,"
Linee said, hugging herself. "I don't like it."

"Get used to it, because
I'm going to grow a beard too. Ferius knows what we look like."
He nipped his scalp and winced. "Damn!"

"Well, he'd know you
anywhere, Camlin," Linee said. "You're too short. Maybe you
should grow to normal height to blend in."

He grumbled. "Maybe you
should grow a brain."

When his work was done, he
stripped off his old clothes from Arden—a woolen cloak and a tunic.
He removed the half-sun amulet from around his neck—the symbol of
Idarism, the faith of North Timandra—and hid it in his pocket. He
remained in only his breeches. Shirtless and hairless, he looked at
Linee.

"Do I look Eseerian?"

She gaped. "Oh, Camlin!
You're skinnier than I am." She placed a hand on his chest. "You
need more muscles. I can feel your ribs. Forget searching for a clock
hand; try searching for a solid meal."

He muttered and turned away. "Be
quiet. Now grab that hood and cloak. They're dry now. Hide yourself.
I haven't seen anyone else here with blond hair and green eyes."

Cam grabbed the oar and pushed
the boat away from the bank, leaving the dead man among the rushes.
They sailed on—a bald young man, clad only in breeches, and a young
woman hidden in cloak and hood. They rowed on toward the city,
looking—Cam hoped—like nothing more than two Eseerians returning
home.

Kahtef grew closer ahead, its
walls looming, its archers gazing down from the battlements. A
hundred boats sailed back and forth around them, and the sun beat
down, glimmering in the water and nearly blinding Cam. They rowed
toward the stone archway that crested the river, welcoming them into
the city.

"We've been in Eseer for
only a few hours," Cam said as he rowed, "and already one
of Ferius's minions tried to kill us. We'll have to be more careful."

Sitting at the prow, Linee gazed
at him from inside her hood. "Let's find that zigzagging rodent
as fast as possible and get back to the others."

"A ziggurat, Linee. Not a
rodent."

With one more thrust of his oar,
their reed boat sailed between the guard towers . . . and into a city
of light, stone, and steel.

 
 
CHAPTER EIGHT:
THE HENGE

Through mist and shadow, Koyee
watched the island grow near.

"And
one time, I ate
twenty-nine-and-a-half
entire bat wings!" Nitomi was prattling behind her. "And
then I was sick, and then I ate another
fifteen
wings, only they said that doesn't count because I threw up the first
ones, but I still think I won the contest, and— Oh! Land!"

The little dojai assassin,
barely larger than a child, scuttled forward on the boat. She stood
by Koyee at the prow and gasped.

"The island of Montai,"
Koyee said softly, holding her lantern. "The land of silver and
silk, of dreams and darkness . . . of an ancient gear and a hope for
the night."

From here in the dark waters,
the island seemed like a humble, black bulge rising from mist, barren
and smooth and rolling across the horizon. Koyee saw no lights, no
other boats, no walls or towers. It seemed a lifeless land.

"A land of monsters,"
Nitomi whispered and clutched one of her many daggers. For once, she
did not prattle on but stared, silent, her lips tightened.

Koyee frowned and looked down at
the shorter woman. "What do you mean?"

Nitomi
gulped so loudly her head, neck, and shoulders bobbed. "You
haven't heard the tales of the monsters of Montai? Did you grow up
under a rock where nobody tells any tales because the rock is
squishing them? All children in Ilar know of this place—the cursed
island of, well, curses. None of our ships ever sail to Montai. I
think we're the first ones to ever come here in thousands of years.
Sometimes
their
ships arrive in Ilar, though, carrying silver and silk and stories .
. . terrible stories, Koyee. Stories of a demon that deforms their
children, and of giant worms the size of whales who wrap you in
cocoons and eat you, and . . . and . . . " She covered her eyes.
"I was trained in the Dojai School in the mountains, and they
taught us to never be afraid, but . . . they didn't know I'd go
here
,
and now I'm scared, Koyee. Monsters are real and I'm so scared."

Koyee placed a hand on the young
assassin's shoulder. "I've been all over the lands of night,
Nitomi. I climbed the crystal towers of Pahmey and shivered in its
alleys. I rode upon a dragon in Yintao. I fought hosts of sunlight
and creatures from across Timandra. I faced the curse of mages whose
scars still cover my arm. But I've never seen a monster that cannot
be defeated." She smiled. "You are quick and silent and
carry many daggers. I carry a sword, and dear Qato here is larger
than a nightwolf. Whatever evil awaits here, we will defeat it."

At the sound of his name, the
towering Qato lumbered across the boat. He stood by them, his
shoulders soaring over their heads, and stared at the distant island
too. The wind whipped his white hair, but he remained shirtless as if
immune to the cold.

"Qato brave." He
pursed his lips and nodded. "Qato strong."

Nitomi
tilted her head back and looked up at him. "Qato
row
!
Get back to the oars, you big pillock. The boat's tilting."

The
giant assassin grunted but obeyed. The
Water
Spider
moved through the mist, and the island grew ahead, looming above them
and hiding the eastern stars. The wind grew colder, and Koyee wrapped
her cloak around her and shivered. Beneath the silk, she wore her new
Ilari armor. The dark steel plates were heavier than her old Qaelish
scales but fit snugly, allowing her to move just as freely. Her
companions wore no armor, for they had trained in Ilar's Dojai School
for speed, silence, and slinking through shadows. Their silks were
black, and even their blades were painted a dull charcoal.

When Koyee looked back eastward,
she glimpsed a light soon gone. She narrowed her eyes and pointed.
"There! I saw something."

As they oared closer, she
scanned the island but still saw only darkness. Boulders rose from
the mist like sentinels of stone, the water crashing against them.
Koyee stepped back to the stern, grabbed the rudder, and they
navigated between the jutting obstacles. The waves rose and fell and
the sea grumbled, and though she kept scanning the shores ahead, the
light did not return.

"I didn't see anything,"
Nitomi said. "What did you see, Koyee? Did you see a monster? Oh
by the stars . . . was it big? Did it have lots of teeth, or—"

"I saw a light." Koyee
leaned forward, squinting. "I must have seen a light. Maybe . .
. maybe it was just a leaping lanternfish. It certainly wasn't a
monster, though. It—"

A moan rolled across the land.

Koyee froze and a chill ran
through her bones. The moan rose louder than thunder, a keen like a
drowning god, like a dying nation, the sound her heart had made when
Shenlai had fallen upon the plains of Qaelin. It went on for long
moments, rippling the water and filling the air, a sound that seemed
to come from everywhere and nowhere. When it finally died, the sea
seemed silent, and even the waves against the boulders hushed.

"The monsters," Nitomi
whispered and hugged herself.

Koyee shook her head. She
remembered a time almost two years ago—by the stars, it felt like
another lifetime!—when she had chased a thief into the graveyard in
Pahmey. Ghosts had moaned and flowed around her, and it wasn't until
Koyee had faced them that she found wind chimes and hanging strands
of silk.

"In strange shadows, the
only monster is fear." Koyee nodded. "We heard trumpets,
that's all. Trumpets to scare us away. Look! The light shines again.
We sail toward it."

As they sailed closer, the glow
rose in the mist like a veiled moon. They navigated around another
boulder—Koyee had to lean off the hull and push them away from
it—and made a beeline to the light. A mile from the coast, Koyee
could make out lanterns, huts, and a small port.

"A town." Hope rose
within her. "This is no wasteland. This is no wilderness of
monsters. People live here."

Nitomi
chewed her lip. "If you can call the Montai 'people.' I've seen
drawings of them, and they're horrible, all tall and silent. Well,
everyone is tall compared to me, and I'm not sure why I think they're
silent, because drawings are always silent, but . . . they just sort
of stared at me from the paintings, and I could
hear
their silence through the parchment, if that's possible. Do you think
it's possible to hear silence, Koyee?" She tapped her cheek. "I
don't know, because normally it's never silent around me, not even
when I'm sleeping, since people say I talk in my sleep, and—"
She slapped her hands across her mouth and mumbled between her
fingers. "I've gone and done it again, talking too much. Hush,
Nitomi, hush!"