Dark Sun: Prism Pentad 2 - The Crimson Legion (15 page)

“I'm going to take my warriors and leave, then my legion will pass through your canyon,”
Rikus said.

He slipped the ring off Wrog's disembodied digit and put it on his own. To his surprise,
the large band immediately shrank to the proper size for his finger.

“What do we do now?” asked the female mul. “Do we stop him or follow him?”

At first, Rikus did not understand the question. Slowly, it dawned on him that by killing
Wrog, he had taken more than the lask's ring. In many slave tribes, warlords achieved
their positions through personal combat. In the case of the Kes'trekels, it did not seem
unlikely that the magical ring was the emblem of that authority.

If I'm you're new leader, then you come with my legion to attack the Urikites," Rikus said.

The chamber fell deathly silent, and the mul could tell that he had made a mistake.

At last, the old dwarf shook his head. “You killed Wrog in Personal combat, so we'll let
your legion pass through our canyon. But you must return the ring and swear to keep the
location of our nest secret.”

Rikus insisted, “I won Wrog's position throughÑ” “You won nothing. It takes more than a
gladiator's tricks to lead a slave tribe,” the dwarf spat, running his eyes over the
carnage in the room. “You're a fine warrior, but I see no proof that you're anything else.
Do you accept our truce or not?”

Assassins

“What did I do wrong?” Rikus demanded. He bit his lip and kicked a stone with the instep
of his sandaled foot. “Why couldn't I make the slave tribe join us?”

Several yards behind him, Neeva said, “This isn't their fight.”

“But it should be,” Rikus insisted, not turning around. “They could stop hiding from
slave-takers and live in Tyr.”

“Not everyone wants to live in the city,” Neeva replied. There was a soft clack as she
tossed a rock away from the bed she was preparing. “Not everyone wants to fight Urikites
or gain revenge upon Family Lubar.”

“You're right, they're cowards,” Rikus said, drawing his own conclusion from Neeva's
statement. “If they want to cower in their cliff-nest, who am I to lead them to freedom?”

“Exactly.”

Fools," the mul said, shaking his head and staring out over the terrain ahead.

Rikus and Neeva were preparing to spend the night apart from the rest of the legion, atop
an outcropping of sienna limestone. A cool evening breeze swept out of the foothills and
sank into a tranquil cove of golden sand stretched out before the two gladiators. Hanging
low in the sky, the ruby sun lit the dune crests with a fiery bloom and plunged the
troughs into amethyst shadows. Many miles away, a delta of rusty orange stones spilled out
of a twisting badland canyon briefly encroaching on the sandy bay before being swallowed
by the silent dunes.

At the tip of this delta stood a dark clump of zaal trees their barren trunks and fanlike
crowns marking the location of the oasis Rikus had been trying so desperately to reach.
The long fronds of the zaal trees waved gently in the breeze, beckoning the Tyrian legion
to fill their waterskins and soak their sore feet.

Unfortunately, Rikus no longer had reason to hurry to the oasis. As the legion had left
the Kes'trekel canyon earlier that day, K'kriq had returned from the oasis with
disappointing news. The Urikite halflings had abandoned the pool, and there was no sign
that Maetan was continuing toward it. The Tyrians' prey had vanished into the sandy wastes
without a trace.

At the mul's back, Neeva said, “Don't expect to sleep like we would at Agis's mansion.”

Rikus glanced over his shoulder. His fighting partner had tried desperately to clear the
stones from a small section of barren ground, but it was a hopeless task. No matter how
many stones she moved, there were a dozen more lying on the ground.

“Don't worry about me,” Rikus said, looking back to the oasis. “I won't sleep.”

Neeva stepped to his side and took his arm, something she seldom did when there were
others around to see. “If you're worried about spending the night outside camp, maybe we
shouldn't.”

Rikus squeezed her hand. “No, it'll be good to have time alone. Besides, there aren't any
Urikites around here.” He withdrew his arm from her grasp and pointed at the distant clump
of zaal trees. “How did Maetan know to avoid that oasis?”

“Caelum says there are no other nearby oases,” Neeva answered, stroking the tense muscles
of the mul's back. “Even if we weren't following him, Maetan would have had to guess we'd
go to that one.”

“Right. But how'd he know we'd catch him there?” the mul demanded. “Someone told him.”

Neeva stepped around to face Rikus. She had used part of her water to wash her body, which
was now covered only by the green halter and breechcloth she had been wearing when they
killed Kalak. The setting sun lit one side of her shapely form with a rosy blush, plunging
the other side into alluring shadows. “Even if we had reason to believe someone had
betrayed us, how could they have contacted Maetan?”

“The Way,” Rikus answered. “Maetan's as strong as Agis, maybe even stronger. And don't
forget Hamanu. If Maetan can't contact his spies himself, he might have something like
this.” Rikus pulled Tithian's olivine crystal, which he had recovered from Wrog's mangled
body, from his belt pouch.

“Anything's possible,” Neeva reluctantly admitted. “But who would do such a thing?”

Rikus faced the canyon from which they had just come. In the evening light, it looked like
nothing more than a great shadow slicing down the side of the foothills. “The slave tribe.”

“The Kes'trekels?” Neeva gasped. “What gives you that idea?”

“They've been trying to keep us from catching Maetan all along,” Rikus
s
aid' “First they captured our scouts, then they tried to take us prisoner. Even after I
killed Wrog, they fought with us. I should have seen it at the timeÑMaetan bribed them.”

“Just because they didn't join Tyr's army doesn't make them Maetan's spies.” Neeva gripped
the mul's arm with a warm hand and tried to guide him toward the makeshift bed.

“It fits,” Rikus insisted, staying were he was. “Maetan showed no sign of knowing our plan
until after we passed the Kes'trekel nest. And why else would they have insisted on
fighting?”

“Because they wanted to keep their nest's location secret and they didn't trust us,” Neeva
said, sighing in frustration. She let go of the mul's arm and went
to
their makeshift bed, picking up one of the capes lying nearby for use as a blanket. “After
what Tithian did, do you blame them?”

“How do we know the king really betrayed us?” the mul asked. “Wrog could have made the
whole thing up.”

“Maybe he did,” Neeva sighed, no longer trying to hide her frustration. As she spread the
cape over the space she had tried to clear of stones, she said, “You still have the gem.
Ask Tithian if he lied to Wrog.”

The absurdity of Neeva's suggestion jolted Rikus, and he realized he was behaving like a
man obsessed. “It was the Kes'trekels,” he grumbled.

Rikus pulled the Scourge of Rkard from his belt so he could sit. As his hand touched the
hilt, the dusk came alive with previously undetected sounds. From overhead came the
muffled beat of a flying lizard's leathery wings, and somewhere close by a snake's belly
scales were softly hissing against the rough edge of a stone. Farther away, an unseen
rodent scratched at the ground in a frantic effort either to hide from a predator or catch
its dinner. Rikus did not pay the sounds much attention, for evening was when many
creatures came out to hunt.

“Put that sword down and come here,” Neeva ordered, stepping over to Rikus.

She kissed him long and hard, at the same time unbuckling his Belt of Rank. As the heavy
girdle slipped from his waist, he felt the first stirrings of the savage lust only Neeva
could kindle in him.

She casually tossed the belt aside, and it landed in the rocks with a loud clatter.
Rikus's desire quickly faded.

“Be careful!” he objected, grabbing the belt.

“It's that worthless strip of leather or me,” Neeva said, working her thumbs beneath the
thin straps holding her breechcloth on her curvaceous hips.

“This is more than a 'worthless strip of leather',” Rikus said, picking up the heavy
girdle and laying it neatly at the foot of their rocky bed. “It's my destiny.”

Neeva popped her thumbs free of her breechcloth straps. “Destiny?” she exclaimed. “Rikus,
I think you're taking that senile old dwarf too seriously.”

“No, I mean it,” the mul said, respectfully placing the sword next to the belt. “People
make their own destinies. Mine is to lead the legions of freedom.”

“Maybe you should think that over, Rikus,” Neeva said. “So far, you've only got one
legion, and you've nearly lost it more than once.”

The mul furrowed his hairless brow. “When?”

“Kled, for one,” Neeva pointed out. “If Caelum hadn't saved you from Maetan, by now your
mind would be ash and the rest of us would be quarry slaves in Urik's obsidian pits.”

“But Caelum
did
help me. We killed more than five-hundred UrikitesÑ”

“And lost the
Book of the Kemalok Kings,”
Neeva interrupted. “As for Wrog and the slave tribeÑit's a fortunate thing
the fight in the aerie didn't erupt into a full battle. One sun cleric was not going to
blast that fortress off the cliff?”

He didn't have to,“ Rikus countered, more hurt by Neeva's criticism than he cared to
admit. ”Why are you doing this, Neeva? I thoughtÑ"

“I'm telling you the truth because I love you and because I love Tyr,” Neeva said. She sat
down in the middle of the cape and wrapped it around her shoulders, her romantic mood
vanishing with the setting sun. “The way you're talking scares me. It's not like you to
think this way.”

“Of course not,” the mul answered, sitting at her side The sharp rocks, which had been
lying exposed to the blazing sun all day, seared his naked skin wherever they touched him.
“Before we killed Kalak, my purpose in life was to become a free man,” Rikus said,
shifting his position so that his breechcloth
insulated him from the hot
stones. “Now I'm free. I have a new purpose. We all doÑyou, me, and Sadira, even Agis.”

Neeva frowned. “Leave me out of this.”

“No,” Rikus insisted, laying one of his powerful hands on her knee. “Agis and Sadira
safeguard Tyr from threats inside, like Tithian. It's for you and me to defend against
outside threats like Maetan and the Urikites.”

Allowing the cape to fall open at the neck, Neeva faced the mul and studied him for
several moments. Finally, a hopeful light in her emerald eyes, she asked, “Rikus, what are
you trying to say?”

The mul had seen similar expressions in his fighting partner's face before. He was no more
comfortable with it now than he had been then. “I'm not sure,” he answered, fearing that
once again Neeva was reading more into his words that he meant to be there.

Neeva rose to her knees and faced Rikus, looking directly into his eyes. “Let me make this
easy for you,” she said, her voice optimistic. “Are you saying you've made a choice
between me and Sadira?”

Rikus looked away, wondering how a conversation about his destiny had turned into an
interrogation on his least favorite subject. Since they had killed Kalak, his fighting
partner had been pressuring him to end his love affair with Sadira. Neeva insisted that
now that they were free, they had to start thinking about the future and commit their
hearts to each other. To
Rikus however, commitment sounded too much like captivity. Though he loved Neeva, he was
not willing to yield any of his hard-won freedomÑespecially if it meant giving up Sadira.

When Rikus didn't answer, the eagerness drained from Neeva's face. Nevertheless, she did
not look away. Just answer yes or no."

"There's no choice to makeÑ

“Yes or no, Rikus.”

"No, I haven't made a choice, the mul said.

Neeva stood, gathering the cloak around her broad shoulders. “I'm going back to camp,” she
announced. “Why don't you stay here and ponder your destiny?”

The gladiator grabbed her heavy battle-axe, then started across the mile of rocky terrain
separating them from the rest of the legion. In the burgundy light and deepening shadows
of dusk, it was difficult to see and Neeva began to stumble over loose stones before she
had taken three steps. Despite the likelihood of spraining an ankle, she continued onward,
cursing Rikus as though he had personally placed every stone between her and camp.

Rikus grabbed his Belt of Rank and buckled it on. “Wait, Neeva. If you break a leg, it'll
slow down the entire army.”

Her only answer was a curse.

The mul picked up his sword and started to follow, but abruptly halted. Instead of the
hiss of snake scales and the beat of lizard wings that he had heard earlier, the
field was ominously silentÑsave for a hushed chorus of contrived chirps and whistles. The
noises were so soft that, had he not held the Scourge of Rkard in his hand, Rikus would
never have heard them.

Neeva, stop!" he hissed, clattering over a jumble of rocks as he rushed to catch up.

“Why?” she demanded.

“There's something out there!” the mul answered.

Neeva stopped immediately, hefting her axe into a guarding position. “This had better not
be a ploy, Rikus.”

“It's not,” the mul assured her, stepping to her side.

He searched the ground ahead, looking for the slightest indication of movement. All he saw
was an endless field of motionless rocks, flecked here and there with equally motionless
boulders. Unfortunately, he could not use his dwarven vision to pick out whatever was
making the sound, either. The sun, all but sunken behind the Ringing Mountains, was
bathing the field with just enough fiery light to wash out all traces of ambient heat.

Rikus took Neeva's arm. “They're between us and camp,” he whispered.

“What are they?” she asked, dropping the cape from her shoulders.