The Bones of the Old Ones (Dabir and Asim) (21 page)

I leaned forward. “Tell me where you take us.”

“To my allies,” Lydia said. I could see her profile against the sky as she half turned to me. “Will you try to kill me now?”

I had never killed in cold blood, and did not mean to do so then, as deserving as she might be. “No.”

“Dabir I may need. You…” She twisted in her seat so she might fix me with a scornful look. “You had best say as little as possible.”

Dark linear shadows resolved into the outlines of a small stone fort set atop a slight rise. There are many such on either side of the border, and most of them are abandoned and fallen into ruin, for the border itself has changed many times over many years, leaving the bones of men and their structures to litter the countryside.

Three of its four walls were completely intact, and stood three spear lengths high. The fourth, and nearest, sagged inward where it was not already crumbled away. Towers rose in two corners. Within the structure were the remains of three fair-sized outbuildings, one of which was covered by a new thatch roof. I knew a chill unrelated to the cold as lanterns showed me the now familiar pattern of a circle within a circle painted on the courtyard flagstones beside the north wall, half filled with characters. This one was far larger than that Jibril had drawn. It might easily have encompassed our Mosul stable. Soldiers were even now brushing snow from it.

A cloaked and helmeted warrior was posted on the height of one tower, and called down to the men posted in the fortress center as we descended past him to settle at its base.

The wind brought with it scents of cooked meat, and the smell of horses and sheep. Of more immediate import were the armed soldiers already stepping forward and forming into a line. I had counted several dozen on our descent. Fully ten of them were alert and ready to receive us, and their casually confident stances made it obvious these were no raw recruits or infantry levies. Each had cast back thick robes to clear the way to a sword, revealing chest mail known as jazerant, a kind of armored shirt made of small interlocked plates. Their coifed helms were decorated with horsehair plumes, dusted with snow and frost. And each wore a beard, black and thick as a patriarch’s. A few were even lined with a little gray.

One, a little broader across than the others, stepped forward to salute Lydia, then quickly bent to assist her as she stood. She stretched her arms and back, for she, like us, was stiff from the long trip. It was impossible to ignore that she was a striking woman—though she was not so curvaceous as Najya—for the clothes hugged her wide hips and rounded breasts as she flexed. She was either oblivious or unconcerned, and was soon chattering at the Greek officer as the rest of the veterans regarded us dourly. I saw that if Lydia gave the order to kill us, it would be over quickly.

“I do not think we should move,” Dabir said softly to me, “without invitation.”

“Sound advice,” I said from the side of my mouth.

Lydia was pointing at the thatched roof, and the officer was looking over at it, nodding as he made another comment. He was not as old as some of the men under his command, but his face was leathery, and one of his eyebrows puckered because of a scar.

I leaned back toward Dabir. “What are they saying?”

“She has conveyed that the scouting foray was more successful than she could possibly have dreamed, and tells him to keep the courtyard center clear. She said she will have to work quickly, and that the men should stand ready, in case the Sebitti follow.”

“She must have a lot of faith in these fellows.”

“As a matter of fact, I do,” Lydia said as she turned to look down on me. She pulled a curling lock of hair from full lips. Behind her, the officer was ordering all but two of the soldiers off with him in short, barking phrases. “But I have other defenses, for even brave men like these will be insufficient against the Sebitti. I will have two of them dig a grave for your friend. But you two must come with me. Bring the bones.”

“The body must be cared for,” Dabir objected.

Lydia scowled. “The Sebitti and the spirits are looking for us now. Unless you want to end up just as dead as your friend, we must make plans to stop them. Now come!”

She turned with a whirl of dark hair and cloak and walked through the blowing snow for the tower base. Dabir and I climbed to our feet, slowly, like old men, cramped from the ride. Dabir glanced down at Jibril, then said something in Greek to the two waiting near the body. They exchanged a few words with him, then nodded assent. After that, we lifted the bone weapons and followed Lydia through the open tower door. Our guards came after. I couldn’t decide whether to feel lucky or affronted they assigned us only two.

“What did you say to the Greeks?” I asked.

“To dig the grave, but to set Jibril’s body aside until I had time for a proper ceremony. They said that there was an unused storeroom.”

Soon we were before an ancient soot-stained fireplace filled with blazing logs. Lydia swept an arm toward the crackling hearth. “The fire is yours. Food is coming.”

Gratefully, I stepped forward to feel the touch of warmth upon my cheeks.

“Your fortune has risen in the empire,” Dabir said to Lydia. “Does that mean your opinion of the empress has changed?”

When last we’d met, Lydia had voiced clear contempt for the empress regent Irene, who she’d said was controlled by bearded fools.

The Greek lowered herself into the single wooden chair beside the fire. It was old and battered, but the small woman sat it with the dignity of a monarch on a golden throne. “The less we mention our last meeting,” she said, “the better for all of us.”

Dabir and I took the floor across from her. The Greeks apparently had no cushions. This meant we looked up at Lydia, even though she was two heads shorter than either of us.

Lydia raised a well-manicured finger toward Dabir. By that she apparently meant him to wait. “I know that you have many questions. But now is not the time. The Sebitti will be on our heels, and the ritual I must perform will take all the time we have.”

“What sort of ritual?” Dabir asked.

“Did I not say to hold your questions?” Her slim arched eyebrows rose. “You are either my allies, or my prisoners. It is your choice. But”—she indicated me with a casual flick of the wrist—“if you choose to be prisoners, I have little use for your guard dog. I suffer him only as a gesture of goodwill. So”—she eyed Dabir—“what is your choice?”

“We are allies,” Dabir said, “so long as we fight against the Sebitti.”

“Of course. If you aid me, I shall let you both go free, alive. I will see you equipped with the appropriate supplies for return to your people. But I will keep the bones.”

“For use against the caliphate?” he asked.

“You have other things to worry about, currently. But no, not for the immediate future, at least.”

Even I could see the way her mind bent. She meant to place herself or some puppet upon the throne of Constantinople. These men with her were either members of her family guard, or the adherents of some powerful noble she worked for.

“So, we are allies.” Lydia smiled thinly. “How nice. You will teach me to use the power in the bones, and I shall use them to control one of the great snow spirits to fight the Sebitti. I will presently begin its summoning.”

Dabir made no attempt to hide his astonishment. “You’re going to summon another one?”

“Who are you planning to put it in this time?” I growled.

She rolled her eyes at me. “I’m not binding the spirit to anyone, idiot. I mean to call one of the great spirits—like the ones I saw you fighting. Or more powerful still.”

“What makes you think you can control one?” Dabir asked.

“Leave that to me,” she said sharply. She tapped a fingernail against the underside of her lip, and her gaze fastened upon the club. “How is it done? Is there a certain phrase to access its magics?”

I looked over to Dabir, and he did not answer. How could he?

Lydia pursed her mouth, and her eyes narrowed.

Dabir wrestled with a reply as the woman’s expression darkened. Finally my friend sighed with a slight inclination of his head. “Lydia, we have not yet unlocked the secrets in these devices.” His hand drifted to the book in his satchel. “My friend Jibril and I made some progress, however—”

Her upper lip twitched as Dabir spoke; those delicate nostrils flared. When most women discolor because of sorrow or anger, they transform into ugly caricatures of themselves. By contrast, Lydia’s beauty flared as her pale cheeks reddened. “You mean that you were just swinging the bones at those things?”

She saw the answer from our expressions, and she almost exploded with anger. A string of Greek words, some obviously profane, accompanied exasperated gesticulation before she pointed at Dabir. “The Sebitti thought you were some kind of mastermind!”

“Dabir is the brightest man I know,” I shot back.

“Who else do you know?” she snapped.

“In our defense,” Dabir said tightly, “we’ve had to learn on the run. We’ve had little time for research, and few sources to help us.”

She composed herself and leaned forward. Her voice was low and tense. “Listen to me, wise man. The Sebitti didn’t know I’d betrayed them until I plucked up the two of you. You can be sure they will shortly find their way to us, and it will not go well.”

“I understand,” Dabir told her.

“I’m not sure you do. With the right power, I can control the spirits as well as them. Better even. But I have a summoning circle to finish before I can even try.”

Dabir eyed her speculatively. “You have been planning this for a long while.”

“I have been prepared,” Lydia countered, “to defend myself. That will be far easier to do with the bones than with ordinary blood magic. Now. You will put your lauded brain to working out how to tap those magics before we’re surrounded by a band of power-mad wizards or we’re hip-deep in an army of frost spirits.” She rose, spat a few words in Greek to our guards, then strode from the tower, slamming the door behind her.

The guards then turned to us with grim expressions. I thought that they might demand our weapons, but they did not. Their bearing, however, indicated no illusion that our alliance was anything beyond a polite imprisonment.

“What did she tell
them
?” I asked.

“To make sure I worked.” Dabir looked at me with a worried expression, then reached down for Jibril’s notebook, which must have satisfied the Greeks because they exchanged a brief word, and settled into a wary watch.

A short time later, the door banged open, and a blast of air heralded the arrival of a soldier who carried a steaming pot of mutton broth and another with a tray of cheeses and breads and empty bowls. Also there were several jugs of what proved to be icy water. I had become greatly hungry and set to without waiting for invitation. Dabir but picked at the tough bread, his expression growing more and more clouded as he flipped through Jibril’s book. I knew how he felt.

“We cannot dwell on what we have lost,” I told him. “Eat. Gather your strength.”

“That’s not it,” he said. “I mean, it is, but … Jibril’s book is in code. It’s a substitution cypher.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means,” he said wearily, “that I’m looking at gibberish until I can crack the code.”

“Shouldn’t you be examining the bones anyway?”

“I have looked at the spear a hundred times.”

This was quite true.

“The club is little different,” he went on. “I had hoped Jibril’s notes might inspire me, but…” He lifted a hand, helplessly, and the book slid from his knees. He managed to snatch it before it fell, then sat it at his side and resumed gnawing on his hunk of bread.

“You should dip it in the broth,” I suggested, “to soften it.”

His look was withering.

At that moment one of our guards rose and demanded a question of Dabir, who answered in fluent Greek, then bent to retrieve the book.

“I thought you said it was gibberish,” I asked.

“Why don’t you look at the bones for a while?” he replied, irritated.

I did not think that would do anyone much good, so I kept eating. Dabir turned away to pace the room a time or two before sitting again to open the first page. He sighed, staring at a faint image there, then froze in place. I watched him, and I swear that he did not move for a full five heartbeats. Finally I heard him whisper, “By the Holy Ka’aba.” His finger traced slowly across the page, and I saw him smile.

I leaned closer. “What is it?”

“Angel.” Dabir looked up. “His last words, as Jibril passed off the book, were ‘Look for angels.’ Do you remember?”

“And?”

He spoke excitedly. “A substitution cypher has the same number of letters in a word, just different letters. So if I assume this word”—he pointed at the paper, on which I could only make out some dark squiggles from where I sat—“is angel, I can deduce other words that employ some of the same letters, and from there find the meanings of the rest. Do you see?”

I thought that I did. “How do you know that word is ‘angel’?”

Dabir lifted the book up to me, and on the front page was a little faded sketch of a pretty young woman with high cheekbones and a slight overbite. Underneath the image was a smattering of unfamiliar symbols. “This is a young Afya,” he told me. “His angel.”

He then rifled swiftly through his own supply pack, produced his notebook, pen, and ink, and dropped to the filthy floor to draw up a chain of letters and what they stood for in Jibril’s text. In a few moments more, Dabir took to studying the final pages of Jibril’s book, sometimes referencing his sheet of letters. He must have understood what he was reading, for he looked absorbed, though troubled. The guards could not see what, exactly, he did, but seemed satisfied that he was busy.

Once I ate my fill, I thought of wandering to the door to learn how far Lydia was with her circle, but knew I would not be able to explain my action to the guards. I tried, and failed, not to think about Najya, and the future now lost to us. It was too painful to contemplate.

I knew that if I was to sit I would simply brood longer about smiles I could never see, so I decided to look at the bones. The club, at least, I had barely observed. Yet I found nothing that I had not already seen: dozens of stick figures facing beasts or striking poses. The only thing that even slightly resembled a letter was the emblem Dabir had identified as Erragal’s sigil.