The Guardian

Chapter 67

By the standards of the Fifth Strata, Aucor was a huge and forbidding continent. Traveling across it on horseback, leading my pair of ill-tempered pack mules, gave me a deeper appreciation for Old Qammuz. They had ruled this place for centuries and had built a network of roads and aqueducts that were still used. It was a stunning logistical achievement. I had ruled but a fraction of that territory and it had taxed me to my limits.

I pondered these things because it was better than thinking of what I had done to Dioscoro and Diotai. Memories of them still intruded along my journey despite my best efforts. I could not understand how nearly identical circumstances had produced a monster like Dioscoro and an exemplar like Deimara. One was a source of eternal pride, the other shame.

It was not a peaceful journey and in some ways I was grateful for the distraction. Aucor was a land in chaos, and an apparently unarmed and solitary man was more attractive prey than a band of adventurers. Most attackers I frightened off with a display of power. The rest I slew.

I followed the old maps. They were never as accurate as I wanted them to be and what seemed plain during peaceful study was in fact more of a challenge once out on the road. I suppose I didn't want it to be too easy. I needed time to come to terms with what I had done, and a quest that proved too easy would not suffice.

This is when I remind myself not everyone reading this will be an expert in the subject of Old Qammuz. A greater span of history separates us now than it did then, and Qammuz itself has become a relic of an earlier age as am I. It has been a preoccupation of mine for reasons I have detailed, and the only reason I am not the foremost expert is that I could never eclipse my wazira Zhahllaia. Our household language is still Abbih, and in a stroke of irony, thanks to that fact it has outlasted a good number of tongues that were once common on Thür.

Old Qammuz was the second great human civilization to rise in the Fifth Strata, spreading across Aucor to an extent that would not be equaled until the Heacharid Empire. They fought great wars against the barbarians of the north -- my ancestors -- and the warlords of Kharsoom who back then still looked outward. The Qammuzi built the metropolis that would become Castellandria and many other cities besides. They founded colonies in the distant lands of Jhobai, Uazica, and Hazica. Their culture influenced every part of the world in ways that will never truly be appreciated.

Pharnaz was their center of learning. A great university had been founded there, educating the ruling class of the empire for several centuries until the hubris of Shah Nirhit V saw it swallowed by the swirling sands of the Farayid Desert.

The city had been built on the site of an oasis, but that, like the city itself, was hidden beneath the dunes of sunset sands. I wandered the desert for a time, thankfully able to subsist with the aid of my Sweetwater Goblet and the satchel of food Syventyth had given me. It was a bleak existence, but I was in no danger of starvation.

The Farayid Desert was a land of stark beauty. I bedded down to the bloody glow of every sunset and rose to the fiery glory of the sunrise. I was struck dumb one night as a quiver of great sand serpents swam by, their haunting songs echoing through the dunes. I drank from the crystal waters of an oasis while every manner of desert creature surrounded me. Even after centuries of life, the world could still ignite my soul.

The first sign of Pharnaz was the sandstone head of a beautiful woman poking from the dunes. A symbol representing the sun was emblazoned on her forehead, and a broken crown of feathers rested above her brow. Thanks to Zhahllaia, I understood this to be how Qammuzi rendered djinn, and why some believed djinns to possess a third eye in the middle of the forehead. Many Qammuzi cities featured such statues at their gates, a warning to all about the mighty slaves of the empire.

I followed the contours of the sand into the depression beyond. More sandstones structures poked out, no doubt recently and temporarily uncovered. I summoned a wind and brushed away more sand, revealing a doorway inside one building. I led my horse and mules out of the punishing sun and into a cool and dark chamber. In the center of the room was a tiled area that perhaps had once been a fireplace. I summoned rainclouds and filled it for the thirsty beasts.

A corridor led off into the darkness. I breathed out the tiny stormcloud that gave my light and crept into the funereal silence of the dead city. I quickly found that I was on the topmost floor of a sprawling structure that had been buried long ago. I found bedchambers and communal rooms. Mosaics of incredible beauty decorated the walls. My thoughts turned to my lovely wazira. Would Zhahllaia want to see this land she loved so much, or would it hurt to see Qammuz in ruins?

Pharnaz was a mystery to me. I had only a few written descriptions, Zhahllaia's recollections from visiting but twice in her long life, and a spot on the map. I wanted the library, seeking the mysteries of what my love had convinced me was the pinnacle of human achievement. From what I understood, the library was near the center of the city, but it would require exploration to find where that was.

Most of the city was unreachable beneath the dunes, but what little I could find near the surface was breathtaking. Zhahllaia had made of me a Qammuphile, which was her intent all along. I do not know what language you read this in now, but it was set down in Abbih. My sweet wazira feigned annoyance when she saw to what ends I twisted the civilized tongue, but I have caught her perusing this manuscript more than once.

All around me were the remnants of the civilization Zhahllaia had held up as the great jewel of Thür. My curiosity was great and if I wished to find the library, I would need to unearth this treasure. I wandered outside into the late afternoon sun, trudging up the shifting dunes, to the place where the statue's head poked from the sand. This thing would have loomed over buildings and I climbed atop its head with barely a step. I knelt once, touching the crown of her head in thanks. Qammuz had never known me, but it gave me my first love. I could not help but show it respect.

I touched the currents of wind in the desert. The heat of the sun pushed it east and I wondered if the people of Zuunkhorun would be caressed by the same breeze, if perhaps they would I that moment think of the Good Tyrant. I dismissed my fancies, taking the wind in my aerilean grip, guiding it, twisting, looping it back in on itself. I let it get its fingers into the sand, drawing it into a whirlwind. The spiral hurled the sand from the city, a great tornado revealing the treasure to the sun.

I pulled strands from the tornado, conducting winds like music, pushing them down avenues and up, out of the widening canyon. Steadily, I unearthed the sleeping city, revealing Qammuzi beauty street by street, statue by statue. I could still read some of the signs carved into the sandstone, the information coming to me from the very fingers of the wind. As my storm unveiled the city, awe cloaked me. I beheld streets, plazas, statues, that had been buried for millennia.

I threw my spell across the desert, allowing the winds to dissipate as they raced over the dunes. I now stood many feet in the air atop a great statue, the city's great plaza before me. When Pharnaz had been at its height, this sight would have greeted visitors as they passed through the gates. Qammuzis liked to awe their visitors, for any outsiders who came to the city would by definition be barbarians. Only the Kharsoomians had seen such grandeur, and their lands had already fallen to decadence.

The plaza would be built over the oasis. The Farayid Desert had not been so dry nor so stark in those days, but water was still a paramount concern. They would have added wells here, accessible by all. This was a traditional gathering place where Qammuzis of all stations would mingle, from the aristocrats to the lowest laborers. Here none would forget any other part of the culture that made them what they were. Statues depicting the Qammuzi virtues of Learning, Community, Frugality, and Courage still stood, though the verdant garden that would have surrounded them was gone.

The far side of the plaza was a temple dedicated to Qarnai, the great Bull God whose hooves made thunder. He was also considered to be a patron of learning, as his thunderbolts were compared to bolts of insight and inspiration. I never felt much kinship to aurochs, though were I a faithful man of Qammuz, I might have sacrificed to Qarnai on his feast days.

I remembered Zhahllaia's descriptions of Pharnaz. The library would not be far from the temple. I followed the contours of the city and spotted it not a single street away. I prepared a spell to carry me from my perch when movement stopped me.

A woman emerged from the temple. As the sunlight hit her skin, it gleamed bronze. A web of golden chains stretched over her nude form, her wrists and ankles encased in ornate bracers. I knew in that moment she could only be a djinn.

Her figure was unlike Zhahllaia's. My wazira was petite, in stature and silhouette. This djinn was a storm of curves. Her hair was like Zhahllaia's, a dark brown that was nearly black, hanging past her shoulders and cut straight over her wide, liquid eyes. Her breasts were heavy, her nipples dark. The chains stretched tight over her wide hips. Her beauty stirred me and suddenly I wanted another treasure from this lost city.

Her power was a typhoon. The sensation of breath across my skin, so familiar as Zhahllaia's touch, reached me where I stood. The sand swirled beneath her barefoot tread. The air about her shimmered. Unlike Zhahllaia, this creature still wielded the untold power of the djinn.

She stopped in the middle of the plaza, looking about. "Who disturbs the sleeping city of Pharnaz?" the djinn demanded in Abbih, her voice echoing through the city. I tasted bronze on her words.

I had successfully negotiated with one of her people when I was a mere apprentice. I, who had ruled a great kingdom, could repeat the feat here, or so I thought.

"I am Belromanazar of Thunderhead," I boomed in the same tongue, "friend to Qammuz and husband to Zhahllaia the Enlightened."

Her attention fell upon me and my skin was alive. It was the strange sensation of a storm prickling over my flesh, at any moment lightning would spider over my body. She squared her body and though she was nude and clad as a slave, I bore no illusions about the extent of her power.

"I am Zhireen, called the Merciless, protector of Pharnaz." Her accent was more precise than Zhahllaia's, and I wondered if our long association had softened my love's Abbih. "Though you speak the civilized tongue passably enough, you are a barbarian. You have come to despoil this bastion of civilization but you will find only your death."

The threat in her word reached my understanding too late for me to do anything but hold my hands up in a placating gesture and futilely call out "Wait!"

Her magic was like nothing I had ever experienced. It came suddenly, without apparent preparation or incantation. I was struck for a moment with the awe that Zhahllaia had once possessed these abilities but had long ago been taken from her. That every djinn could do these things left no mystery how their masters had built the greatest civilization on earth. Foolish that I was filled with love for my Zhahllaia in that moment, but it is the truth.

I had not time to ruminate. I sensed Zhireen around me like spiced bronze, clean and pure as a desert oasis. The air ran like wax around me. The statue below, which now I understood to be a stylized representation of Zhireen herself, grabbed me in one stone hand. The scraping of the sandstone was loud in my ears as the fist clenched, ready to grind me to pulp.

Thunder boomed and Ur-Anu was in my hand. I swung the Blackspear desperately, the skystone blade slicing cleanly through the statue's arm. I hit the sand, rolling away. The stone arm landed nearby with a heavy thud.

I fought to my feet, my breath already agony in my lungs. I stood just outside the gateway to the city. The walls were crumbling, but much of them still stood. The archway was miraculously intact. Two statues, both echoes of Zhireen, stood over me, visions of colossal loveliness. One cradled the stump of her right arm. The other leaned over to grab me.

I brandished Ur-Anu, and the statue seemed to understand the danger. Zhireen advanced without fear, her hips swaying. In her arrogance, she displayed no doubt who would be the victor in our contest, and I did not have reason to doubt her.

I reached for the storm I had brewed to unearth the city. I thought perhaps I could bring it back, harness its power in this duel I had suddenly found myself in the middle of. Lightning might stagger her, cloud might blind her, wind might distract her. Even as I thought it, I knew it was foolish. A djinn was power incarnate, her form ephemeral. Still, I had no better options.

"Shah Mehrad III, may his name be covered in flowers, voiced his fondest wish, that Pharnaz would remain unspoiled," Zhireen intoned. "I waited beneath the sands for you, barbarian. I will make sport of your death."

"Shah Mehrad is long in his grave!" I protested, my will frantically trying to grasp the tail of the retreating storm.

"What is life and death to a djinn?" she asked. "His wish is as eternal as the beauty of Qammuz."

She was magnificent. Echoes of Zhahllaia were in her face, the wide eyes, the full lips. They could have been sisters. Their bodies were so different. Where Zhahllaia's chains were loose against her little body, these hugged tightly to full hips that I could not help but imagine the feel of. Even as I was close to death, I could think of nothing else but taking this delectable creature.

"I am husband to a djinn!" I cried.

"You lie!" she hissed, anger blazing in her eyes for the first time. "No human would love my kind any more than you would love a sword!"

I did not have time to protest that her argument was wrong both on specific fact of my own life and in more general terms that nearly every warrior held a near romantic love for his weapon. She swept one of her hands and the sand reared up around me in a predatory wave, lashing me with cruel burns.

The wind writhed from my grasp like an angry serpent, wrenched away as the sandstone bricks at my feet turned to liquid. I fell into a lake that had been solid ground only a second before. I opened my eyes and beheld creatures swimming through the air like nothing I had ever seen upon Thür. My mind tried to make them understandable, but I could not even perceive how they fit together as living things. Before I could follow the contours of those thoughts, I tumbled free, landing heavily on a stone floor.

I staggered to my feet, more slowly this time. I wasn't certain how many more times I would be able to rise if the punishment continued. I was inside, cool stone surrounding me. I looked about in the dim light and realized I stood in the Temple of Qarnai.

The altar was behind me, an opening to the sun where the fragrant smoke of sacrifice would have drifted to the heavens. Statues of the Great Bull of Heaven reached to the ceiling. In every one, he was depicted as the massive auroch with a mighty rack of four horns. His eyes were human, his hooves shod in tarnished gold.

I have never been a religious sort, but I felt some sort of power in this place. I had always felt that the gods had their domain and me mine, and we would do what we could not to trouble one another. I would not insult people of faith, all the more so considering one of my wives is devout. I had met more than one divine entity, depending upon how one measures such things. I felt a similar sensation in this place as I had in the presence of Ksenaëe, Ocoxochi, and Bashamerax, though this was the first time the being was not in my presence. I did not sense love, nor even interest. I felt attention, a mild curiosity about the first human to set foot inside this temple in more than a thousand years.

Zhireen approached the doorway in the bloody light of the dying day. She walked with a casual, seductive grace that was all the more alluring for the danger I was in. She stepped into the doorway. Her silhouette was poetry, the hourglass of her enticing even as it meant my murder. I should not lie. This is no place for deception. All reading this know what I think when a woman has a blade to my throat, I want her all the more. I was too addled to fight.

And that was when I saw my salvation. It was so obvious. I couldn't believe I had not realized it until the moment of dying. Perhaps it was thanks to a bolt of inspiration from Qarnai, or perhaps a moment for a wily old goat to gather his wits.

"I will slay you in this holy place, barbarian," sneered Zhireen. "A fitting sacrifice for the patron of my city."

I felt myself hardening. Such things would be useful for what I had planned. Desire is its own form of power, and harnessed properly can feed the aerilean streams within. "My mercy will be cruel, but my victory gentle," I assured her.

"May Qarnai trample your soul into something more pleasing to him."

I shivered, her presence enough to give me the delicious feeling of breath over my flesh. I could not concentrate but I did not need to. I was well accustomed to using this power when my passions were inflamed. Clouds snaked out from me, running over the stone floors, the tendrils reaching like serpents.

"The spells of a barbarian wizard are no match for the boundless magic of the djinn," Zhireen said.

"I know," I said, outwardly serene, but I continued to gather the aerilean energies about me.

She faltered, her brow furrowing. "You surrender to your death?"

"Not exactly," I said. "I told you that I am husband to a djinn."

"A lie."

"A truth, and the deepest kind," I said, losing control of my emotions. Question anything about me, but never my love for my wives. "Learning to please Zhahllaia was an important lesson. My love for her incomparable beauty and grace compelled me to make her feel the bliss that she deserved to feel. I learned at the feet of a dragonblood sorceress and I have spent centuries perfecting my abilities. I have brought her to the heights of ecstasy for hours."

"What are you saying?" Zhireen asked, for the first time unsure of herself.

"I am saying that I can do things to you that you have never experienced."

She looked down, for the first time noticing the tendrils of my storm writhing to her shapely legs like curious serpents. Her lovely features darkened into a frown as her gold-flecked eyes met mine. A cruel flame danced within the beautiful depths. "It is rain you bring?" she taunted, though she was unsure. "Let us see how you bear the desert."

She reached to me, her fingers curling into a claw. The air about me went dry, stealing the very breath from my lungs and water from my pores. I felt as I did on the worst days in the Red Wastes, long between even their foul oases, when the sun baked me like an oven. My head pounded in time with my heartbeat. My mouth tasted of sand. The world went hazy about me as I fought to stay on my feet.

Her full lips spread into a wicked grin, but then, a soft Oh, and she faltered. She twitched, her beautiful face slackening in surprise. She stood up on the balls of her feet, then looked down once again. My clouds swirled about her, climbing her thick hips, caressing her buttocks, hiding her orchid behind gray.

"What are you doing?" she gasped.

"I am taking you," I croaked.

"I will slay you," she said. I felt her hips moving.

"Perhaps you will," I said. "But I will fuck you unconscious."

She shivered, the first echo in what I experienced just from her presence. Her power loomed about me in a persistent whisper. A caress of her nude body as she whispered into my ears. I imagined her hard nipples tracing circles over my back as she described what she would do to me. I imagined her mouth, with her plump lips, wrapped about my staff, milking me. I imagined her swallowing greedily, my seed filling her belly.

My desire fueled my own explorations. I was within my clouds. The lightning was my tongue, the thunder my soft moans. I touched her, felt her, learned every inch of her contours. It was not the carnal caress of one human for another, but an altogether more ineffable touch, maddening for the way I could not merely take her. My love was the rake of lightning over a dry prairie, the rumble of pregnant clouds overhead. One spark could mean conflagration.

The clouds boomed, unshed lighting flashing from their inquisitive depths. They were everywhere now, coating the walls and floors, tendrils reaching for Zhireen like a hungry beast. Every roll of thunder was the clash of Qarnai's great hooves against the stones of Mount Bansahr. Perhaps he approved of this. His lusts were famous, and what could be a greater worship than taking one of the wonders of the empire?

Lightning silhouetted her sex, the blue-white claws spreading her. Cloud probed at her rosebud. Rain licked her skin. Wind teased her nipples. My magical skills covered her, showing her a pleasure she had never known. She shuddered now, her breath gasps as her voluptuous body undulated. Her magic was forgotten and cool air flooded into me. What was dry was now soaked and I stood in relief and desire.

"Barbarian...!" she gasped.

"Belromanazar," I corrected. My voice was stronger now that the air was no longer baking the life from me. "Say my name."

"I call you barbarian," she said. Her eyes blazed, but her brow was sweetly furrowed with desire, her hips writhing against the constant attentions.

"You will call me by my name, or you will call me master," I said, my clouds pushing inside of her. She did not call me master, but her cry was reward enough.

The storm brushed over her. My control had improved since that distant night in the inn. It was a different sort of touch, and one that took time to master. I did not feel her in my hands but in my mind, the trill working over the nape of my neck, in the depths of my belly, along my spine. As the sensation built, it wormed its way to the center of me, where my staff jutted proudly beneath my robes. It would be buried in nothing that day, but I knew with the benefit of experience, I could find bliss without ever touching her or myself.

Her nipples hardened beneath my touch. I did not feel them as I would the nipples of Sarakiel or Tanyth. These were not solid. I felt them in my mind, a delicious tingle that worked through my aerilean senses. They were lovely nipples, thick tips with a wide areola, the glittery bronze undertone shining every time lightning reached from the clouds. I built a sucking vortex of storm, the wind making a funnel to pull, the lightning nibbling at her, the rain washing her. My storm had grown as hungry for her as I, and I believe had I released it from the guidance of my will, it would continue to take her.

My storm had advantages over my physical attentions. I had only one mouth, only two hands, only one staff. With my magic I could have as many as I wanted. I often bolstered my affections with this power, even when I had a partner I could properly take. Here, I could show every part of her body attention, shift between them, build her and keep her perpetually off balance.

Zhireen the Merciless had never known the touch of another, and thus I needed to show care. Finish her too quickly and she would recover her senses and perhaps even mount an attack. To truly defeat her, I needed to build her lusts to an indescribable height and finish her with a punishing climax that would rob her of her senses.

It was not pure practicality that spurred me. I was in the grips of savage lust myself. Her haughtiness had inflamed me, and I believe her resemblance to Zhahllaia spurred me. I wanted to be the barbarian Zhireen described, the one Zhahllaia had believed me to be on the distant shore below Thunderhead. I had been a boy then, but now I was a conqueror, a warlord. I had taken a kingdom for my own and put a continent to the sword. I was the barbaric leader of a cruel horde, and my prize was a djinn.

She was a quivering mess, already overwhelmed by what I could do for her. For one who had only ever touched herself, the wonderful uncertain joy of being touched by another was an incomparable gift. She did not know where I would go next, what skill I would bring to her desperate body and that sparked a conflagration inside her.

The petals of her orchid were plump and I would have loved to spread her fat thighs and delve between them. I would put her knees over my shoulders and lick her sweet folds. I would drown my senses in her. I could only imagine the taste of a djinn then but it was enough to drive my storm to find the sensitive parts of her, to bring her to shuddering bliss.

The wind teased her open, lashing at her. She cried out as lightning raked across her. She writhed helplessly, her magics forgotten. Whatever duel we had was not even a memory. Her wide eyes were closed now. Her breath caught, her shivers becoming shudders, her eyes fluttering. I caught the pleasure, expertly prolonging it, heightening it, playing her like a bronze instrument.

She opened her eyes, meeting mine. She panted, every breath shivery. Her chest heaved, the metallic undertones of her flesh sparkling by the light of the very storm that fucked her.

"Touch yourself," I ordered.

"You cannot command me, barbarian," she hissed, her mouth becoming a sweet O as another wave of bliss shivered through her ephemeral form.

"I wish you to touch yourself," I said.

"You did not summon me forth. You hold no power over me." The words were defiant, but they carried no weight behind them. She had already become a slave to my attentions. Even now, her hands twitched, longing to assist in sweet explorations.

"You did this for the shahs, did you not?" I asked.

"I am a creature of beauty," she gasped as I continued to take her. "There is nothing more beautiful that watching me at my bliss."

"Do it now."

"You are no shah."

"I am your conqueror," I said and she shuddered as the words took her to another plane of bliss. "I am the barbarian come to Qammuz to despoil. I have found a djinn and I will make a whore of her."

To punctuate my words, I sent a roll of thunder through the cloud. She shuddered, another cry falling from her lips. Now she could no longer ignore my order. One hand dipped between her legs between folds that gleamed with nectar. The other went to one of her nipples, teasing and pulling even as lightning raked it. The pleasure inside me was a weight, straining to find her, but she could not be touched. I could only need.

I cursed my simple traveler's garb, longing for elven robes that even now would be responding to my need. My staff pressed uncomfortably against the cloth, as though it could tear free and I could throw her upon the floor of the temple and ravage her as a conquering barbarian should. Yet not having her made it all the better, for I could only want. I could never bridge the gap between us. I knew this delicious frustration well, for it lay between my wazira and I. There was more passion in a lingering look between her and I than there was in some of my most decadent adventures.

Her ministrations were expert. I imagined she, like Zhahllaia, passed her time in self-pleasure. She knew secrets of her body that I, even with my centuries of experience, could not divine. I followed her attentions, taking her further than her touch would manage. She was the rocks of the shore, but I was the tide, poking about her only to drown her unawares.

What comportment she once had was entirely gone. She moaned and quaked, her hips shuddering with every new exploration. My storm lifted her from the ground, and I do not believe she noticed. She could only float before me, held by magical will, as the pleasure crashed over her again and again.

The clouds tore at her, splaying her body obscenely. If she ever had the will to resist, such concerns were gone. She shook with abandon, her cries shaking the very stones of the temple. I felt some sense of approval, either Qarnai looking upon me with favor, or else something inside, pleased with the carnal havoc I had wreaked.

Her passion was a tempest, whipped into a howling frenzy. I gave her everything, my storm about her, inside her, enveloping her. Every last part of her brought to shattering heights she could never conceived. Then, a sudden explosion, I felt it as an aerilean quake. It hurled me to the floor. The sensation robbed me of breath, but caressed me with a breeze both cool and loving. The pleasure boiled out of me and I felt myself unspooling within my very robes.

Silence reigned.

I rose on unsteady feet. Whatever magic I could call upon was used. Before me, Zhireen the Merciless floated upon her ineffable winds, her body slack, her eyes sightless, her mouth lolling open. She would recover in time, but for now I had broken her. She would not soon forget Belromanazar.

I nodded respectfully to her, then turned and genuflected to the altar. I am not a religious man, but nor am I an utter fool. I quit the temple then. My steps were quick to the library, for I knew not how long she would be insensate and I had not another bout of love in me.

I took what books I could, vowing to return someday for the rest. I retrieved my horse and the two mules and rode from the desert, laden with the treasure of wisdom and the sweet memories of a djinn.