It was the middle of the day by the time we reached the mountains of Iliaz.
I felt weighed down with grief over Hala, like I ought to be too heavy to fly through the desert skies like this. Too heavy for Maz to carry me, even with those immense wings that cast such a long shadow across the sand below. But somehow we were soaring through the air, leaving Izman far behind, racing towards the mountain fortress of Iliaz ahead of us. Jin’s compass would lead us to Ahmed, but we had a pit stop to make first. Our destination was only a few short hours due west of Izman, as the magical shape-shifting Roc flew.
I was keenly aware that we were missing a soul every time I glanced over at Izz, flying parallel with his brother, carrying Sam, Tamid and Leyla, while Maz carried just me and Jin.
It shouldn’t have been this way. We’d had a plan. I’d waited at the Hidden House while Sam and Hala accompanied the others into the tunnels Leyla had located for us. Sam got them through the bricked-up exits of the tunnels and out beyond the barrier. And then Hala used her Demdji gift to walk them through the Gallan siege around the city unseen. Then, once the others were out of sight beyond the city, Hala and Sam came back to the Hidden House, to wait until it was time to pull off our grand trick in the prayer house.
And then … iron dust, blood, bullets … and we were left without our golden-skinned Demdji.
I’d felt Hala’s absence as soon as Sam and I emerged through the bricks and the sand, out of the tunnel, into broad daylight, facing our enemies with no cover from a Demdji illusion.
‘So, what do we do now?’ Sam had asked in a low voice that carried far too much for my liking, as we’d crouched just outside the walls of Izman, facing the Gallan military tents ahead of us. And suddenly I felt like a child again.
I’d grown up in a desert full of monsters, but I’d never feared Nightmares or Skinwalkers as much as I did the Gallan.
For a moment I wasn’t a rebel any more. I was a little girl hiding under the house when the Gallan came to Dustwalk. I was watching through the windows when they dragged a man out of his house for spitting at their boots and shot him. I was seeing a woman swing because a Gallan soldier had caught her alone in the dark and everyone had closed their ears to her screams. I was helpless in Fahali, watching a bullet go through a Demdji’s head before I even knew what a Demdji was.
I was helpless back then. I wasn’t helpless now.
I was a Demdji now. I had all the more reason to fear them for that. But I also had more weapons than I used to.
I was a Demdji. I wasn’t a little girl. I repeated that over and over, even as I dredged up enough power from inside myself to raise a small sandstorm around us, leaning on Sam for support as I did. It was enough to give us cover to get through the Gallan siege, to where the others were waiting for us.
Now Maz spread his wings, just barely brushing my knees as I clung to him against the wind. Jin’s arm went around me as Maz prepared to drop down, steadying me against his solidness.
Last time I was in these mountains I was shot through the stomach, and Jin carried me to safety – barely. This place didn’t exactly hold wonderful memories for me. But even I had to admit that Iliaz was a sight to behold. Half our country might be desert, but the rainclouds that gathered over the sea always broke across the mountains, making the soil here rich. The slopes were laced with vines and fields and orchards. And at the highest point, governing over the only pass through the mountains, was the great fortress.
Jin’s compass pointed south, toward Eremot if Leyla was to be believed. But even I wasn’t reckless enough to think we could pull off a rescue with only eight of us – seven now, I reminded myself. A Blue-Eyed Bandit and an imposter Blue-Eyed Bandit, a foreign prince, a reluctant one-time friend, shape-shifting twins, and an enemy princess. Not exactly an army.
We needed help.
The twins landed us just out of view of the fortress. Approaching by flying shape-shifter seemed like a good way to get ourselves shot. I figured we ought to at least wait until we’d been out of Izman a whole day before anybody else died. On principle.
I staggered off Maz’s back as we set down. My cramped legs almost gave out below me as I hit the ground. Jin slid down behind me, stretching out sore shoulders in a way that made his shirt pull up just enough to show the edge of the tattoo on his hip bone, drawing my eyes there.
And then Izz landed nearby, bringing Tamid, Leyla, Sam and all our problems crashing back down to earth. Maz was returning to his human shape, letting the bags we’d slung over him slide away as his body drew into itself, feathers shifting to skin, wings into arms, until instead of a Roc, he was a skinny boy with blue hair.
Jin tossed him a pair of trousers from the bag. ‘Right.’ Maz caught them in the air, tugging them on. ‘There are ladies present.’
‘Since when are you a lady?’ Sam asked me, unceremoniously scooping Leyla up under her bound arms, like she was an unruly child, and easing her to the ground. We didn’t exactly want the traitor princess with us, but we didn’t have a whole lot of choice.
Sam dropped down behind her easily, leaving Tamid sitting awkwardly astride the huge bird. His bad leg was keeping him where he was, between Izz’s enormous wings.
He looked shaken and angry, staring intently at Izz’s feathered shoulder blades. I offered my hand to help him off, but he refused to meet my gaze as he slung his fake leg over one side and carefully slid down. He landed badly, crumpling to the ground in a heap. I rushed to help him up, but he waved me away. I stood back, watching him pull himself to his feet with agonising difficulty.
He was angry at me about Hala. That he’d lost another person, someone he’d formed an unlikely bond with in all the late nights when she couldn’t sleep for grief and he was pouring over the books she’d brought him, looking for an answer that wasn’t there.
‘Can you walk?’ I asked. Izz had slipped back into his human shape and found some clothes of his own. We were ready to start moving.
‘I can walk,’ he replied bitterly, pushing past me. And we made our way up to the fortress to have some words with Lord Bilal, Emir of Iliaz.
We hadn’t been walking long when we came across the first body.
It was partly covered by dirt, like someone had heaped soil on it. And then someone – or something – else had started trying to dig it out. Whatever had been digging had managed to drag an arm and part of the torso out of the ground. There were teeth marks on the skin, like maybe a ghoul had made a start on its meal before sunrise drove it away.
The arm was wearing a deep green uniform trimmed with gold. Those were Albish colours. And the hair that poked out of the grave was the same bright gold as Sam’s. What was an Albish soldier doing covered in dirt outside Iliaz?
Iliaz was the most significant passage from east to west in Miraji. The bastion against invasion of Izman. The fighting here was frequent, and so the soldiers were the best trained in the country, and the most likely to die, as well. It was where Rahim had been sent as a boy, with the expectation that he wouldn’t last long. An easy way for his father to get rid of him. But he’d thrived instead, becoming the soldiers’ commanding officer, first under Bilal’s father and then under Bilal. Iliaz defended the country against invaders. So how come now there was an invader so close to the fortress, and on the wrong side of the pass, no less?
A little way further on, there was another pile of dirt similarly disturbed. And another one after that. A whole line of them.
‘What is this?’ I asked.
‘They tried to bury them.’ Jin sounded grim. We were close to the fortress now, and the stone walls loomed above us, casting this side of the mountain in shadow as the afternoon moved on.
‘Why would anyone do that?’ We passed another mound of earth, this one undisturbed. It was marked with a stick, standing straight in the ground, snapped off one of the vines that climbed up the mountain.
‘In the north, we don’t burn our dead like you do here.’ Sam spoke up from where he had dropped to the back of the group. He looked uneasy. ‘We bury them. Return them to the earth they came from. In Albis, you’re supposed to put them in soft earth and plant a tree to mark the spot.’
That didn’t make any kind of sense. Bodies had to be burned. Leaving a corpse lying around was like inviting ghouls to come and feast on it.
‘They don’t have the same problems with ghouls in the north as you do here in the desert,’ Jin said absently. ‘There are only five graves. That’s not enough for this to have been a battle.’
Before I could ask what he meant, we rounded a turn in the path leading up to the fortress. Half a dozen Albish soldiers’ heads shot up from where they were gathered around a freshly dug hole. Their uniform jackets were slung over nearby stones, shirts rolled up to their elbows, brows sweating under the Mirajin sun. We’d interrupted them in the middle of burying another body.
My gun was in my hand in a blink – Jin’s, too. But the soldiers were scrambling for their own weapons, diving for discarded gun belts. We were outnumbered if they got there.
We’d have to shoot first.
My finger was on the trigger when the ground moved below my feet. It wasn’t like the mountain itself shifting – more like the skin of it was trying to shake us off, like we were an itchy nuisance. Dirt slid away under our feet, pitching Sam off balance and sending him crashing to the ground. I fought to steady myself, but it was no good. The wind picked up from nowhere, slamming me backwards, sending me sprawling, opening the skin at my elbow and knocking the gun from my hand.
And then, as fast as it had started, everything stopped. The mountain stilled. The wind died.
‘What just happened?’ I asked, cradling my bleeding elbow.
Sam groaned, clutching his side as he rolled over. He’d scratched up his face. That would dent his vanity for sure. ‘The ones in the dark green uniforms,’ he said. ‘They’re like me. Well, I guess more like you,’ he amended quickly, looking sour. I glanced over at the men. Two among them were in different uniforms than the others, the green of the fabric patterned with bright gold leaves, like vines twisting up and around their bodies. And they were unarmed, unlike all the others who were now pointing guns at us. One of the men in the gold vine uniform had the most brilliant pair of unnaturally green eyes I’d ever seen. The other had a faint tint of grey to his pale skin, like it might be made of stone.
Sam might have immortal blood in him from some ancestor or other, but he had two mortal parents. These men were true Demdji. Or whatever it was the Albish called their Demdji. Jin had told me once that their immortal creatures weren’t made of fire and wind and sand but of water and clouds and soft earth. Their gifts were different, but there was no mistaking them. And they weren’t hidden away – they were standing proudly, wearing their country’s symbol emblazoned on their chests, using their powers to fight.
The twins and Leyla had been knocked down, too. They stayed there looking dazed as Jin, Sam, Tamid and I traded looks from our new positions on the ground. Sam didn’t need to translate what they were shouting across the short distance. I knew what to do when a gun was pointed at my head. I’d been on the other side of it often enough.
We raised our hands in surrender.