Then again, Jin’s country didn’t deserve to get invaded the way Miraji had been.

Jin pulled up his collar. “The Gallan have been kept at bay for a thousand years now by their neighbors. When it used to be magic against swords, it was a fair fight. But the Gallan are armed with guns now, and magic is bleeding out of everywhere, no matter what you believe in.”

“So what do you believe?” I asked.

“I believe money and guns get you a lot further in a war than magic these days.”

“If that was true you’d be living rich in some city with a soft bed and five wives. Not blowing up factories in the dead end of nowhere, Xichian boy.”

“Five wives?” He snorted into his flask. “I’m not sure I could keep up with that many.” I didn’t say anything. I’d figured out with Jin that if I gave him long enough usually he’d give me the truth. “I always figured the land creates its First Beings the way it creates its mortals. In the green forests and fields of the West, their magic grows from deep soil. In the frozen North it crawls and claws out of the ice. And here it burns from the sand. The world makes things for each place. Fish for the sea, Rocs for the mountain skies, and girls with sun in their skin and perfect aim for a desert that doesn’t let weakness live.” I’d never had anyone describe me like that before. His gaze flicked away too fast for me to fall into it. “Of course, my brother would tell you that the First Beings are all just manifestations on earth of one Creator God. That’s what the new philosophers are saying.”

“You’ve got a brother?” As soon as I said it I saw on his face that it was a slip. He hadn’t meant to tell me that. But he couldn’t take it back. “Where is he?”

Jin stood, brushing sand off his hands. “I think I’ll take you up on that offer to cover my watch after all.”

thirteen

The desert was changeless. For six weeks there was only sand and blue skies. The blisters on my feet turned bloody just in time for fresh ones. The restlessness I’d shoved into the bottom of my gut my whole life wasn’t staying down so easy. I was on my way to Izman and I’d never felt more awake in my life.

At night, while the rest of the camp slept, I’d shed my sheema and breathe and sit some of Jin’s watch with him until I was worn out enough to sleep before mine. He taught me words from other languages he’d learned sailing. After the first month I could threaten a man and insult his mother in Xichian, Albish, and Gallan. He showed me how he’d broken Dahmad’s wrist in the wrestling pit, a move he’d learned from a Jarpoorian sailor in an Albish port. I asked him about his broken nose once. He told me a Mirajin girl had hit him, and his brother had set it for him. He did that sometimes, mention his brother, like he was forgetting to guard himself with me. But he talked freely about most everything else. He told me about the places he’d been, the foreign shores he’d sailed to and stories of all the things he’d done, until I was itching to see the Golden Palaces of Amonpour and feel the rock of a ship below my feet. The stories of Izman had belonged to my mother. But the world was a lot bigger than my mother ever told me. And it occurred to me once or twice that I could go anywhere in it.

I knew we were getting close to the end of the desert the first time I saw something other than sand dunes on the horizons.

“It’s called the Dev’s Valley,” Jin told me as the camp settled down. We were on the outskirts of it. “It’s a mess of mountains and canyons all the way down the western Mirajin border. They say it was carved into the land during the war against the Destroyer of Worlds. Before mankind.”

“That’s one hell of a battle.” We were probably a two-day walk away. Two days wasn’t so long. I looked up into the night. The sand rolled out in an endless ripple, turned blue by the starlight, so it was almost hard to tell where it met the sky except for the wild burst of stars overhead. “We’ve been walking for near two months now. The stars have moved.”

“A captain on one of the ships I worked on used to be able to travel by the stars.”

“But you need a broken compass.” As always when I mentioned the compass, I got nothing from him except for the slightest twitch of his lip.

“You want me to take your watch?” I asked. It was a pattern we’d fallen into since the first night.

“You’re unnatural.” Jin ran his hands over his face. “This desert is enough to drain any man.”

“Well, I’m not a man,” I said. “And I was just trying to be nice, so—”

“No, wait.” Jin’s fingers laced with mine too quick to react, pulling me down to sit next to him. It sent a stupid wild jolt through me before he let me go just as fast. “I’m sorry, I’m just sick to death of the sand everywhere.”

“I’m plenty used to it, I suppose.” I stared out across the dunes. They looked like they went on forever, but the horizon felt closer with the mountains. “It gets deep into your soul after a while.”

“It’s in your skin, too.” He reached out a hand, and before I could think, his palm was flat against my cheek, warm and a little bit rough. His thumb traced the length of my cheekbone. A cascade of sand went in its wake, falling away from skin where it was stuck and leaving a strange burning shiver behind.

“Amani.” He didn’t take his hand away from my face. “You’re going to have to be careful when we get to Dassama. The city has been an encampment for Gallan soldiers for years now. It’s got almost as many of them as it does Mirajin people in its walls.”