Emil

  With Rakan’s death and Nabil submitting to Karni’s rule, the battle between the Gharian tribes came to a tumultuous end.

  The sands of the Saar bled red as the twilight descended. The Shiraza set up tents on the outskirts of the mining encampment. With the Azurite mine theirs and the tribes of Gharia unified under Karni’s leadership, it was time to consolidate power. Those able-bodied amongst the Zal’Khari and Dhazara were sent out as messengers to spread news of their unification. Karni also wanted the warriors of each tribe to rally at the encampment.

  The scene was being set up for Gharia’s rebellion.

  Is she planning to make her move right away?

  The speed at which everything was progressing was remarkable. Did Karni have all of this planned out in advance? Did she foresee a clash between the Zal’Khari and the Dhazara forces at the mining encampment? The timing of Shiraza’s arrival was impeccable. As was this brewing rebellion. From Emil’s perspective, Ardair was ill-prepared to fend off a unified Gharia. The destruction of Isarelle and the fall of Thanatos occupied the Ardairan’s collective conscious. While everyone was focused on Vigil, Karni had created the perfect storm for her people to rebel against their annexation.

  She had a secure source of Azurite to equip her Exalted, access to Archanum, and most importantly, an arsenal of Borealis at her disposal.

  Meanwhile, House Ulster would likely be alone in their defense against this Gharian insurgence.

  Emil’s stomach churned at the terrible premonition. He was currently under house arrest within a large tent shared amongst Anna, Liesel, and Kai. They all had been stripped of their Azurite and weapons. The only things they were allowed to keep were the torn and bloodied clothes on their bodies.

  The Shiraza visited them once with a single modest meal that barely kept him satiated. A single canteen of water was given to the group, forcing them to share and ration it amongst themselves. Kai and Liesel fared the worst. The injuries they sustained in combat kept them incapacitated as they were only provided with the most basic of first aid. Emil suspected that the Shiraza were deliberately being cruel. It appeared that Karni intended to keep them weak and desperate to make them easy to control.

  Never thought I would get to experience one of Steiger’s interrogation techniques like this, he mused morbidly before closing his eyes and silencing his mind. The best thing to do now was to sleep and conserve his strength. Allow his body and mind to heal after this grueling encounter. Karni wanted them alive for the moment—he could only hope that this fact doesn’t change in the immediate future.

  “At least we’re all alive right, everyone?” Anna said weakly in a dry and sarcastic tone.

  Emil shot her a curious look. Kai and Liesel had their eyes narrowed, their exhausted expressions a mixture of confusion and displeasure.

  “Sorry, just trying to lighten up the mood a bit.” Anna shrugged. “Honestly, this could have been a lot worse. But look, we now found our target! And if you think about it, nothing’s really changed! We’re still hostages, just under a different warlord!”

  Kai and Liesel rolled their eyes and turned away, not wanting to expend any of their energy reacting to this nonsense. Emil sympathized. They were tired and in a lot of pain.

  “It was a valiant attempt,” he said, trying to throw Anna a bone.

  “Whatever. Not like you could have done any better,” she said, sulking as she collapsed onto a cot of straws placed onto the sand. After a pause, she asked in a soft voice, “Emil, what are we going to do?”

  It was a valid question. An extremely valid question.

  “I don’t know,” he replied, “This is out of our league. There’s not much that we can do with our hands tied.”

  “You’re not being very reassuring. Surely, you must had training to know how to deal with this type of situation.”

  He grinned at the reference to his Steiger training as if the shadowy organization under the royal family’s commands was an omnipotent force with all the answers to every situation.

  Well, technically speaking, a Steiger agent taken hostage is supposed to commit suicide to prevent information leaks. But I doubt that’s the answer she’s looking for.

  “No. We’re hostages without any leverage. This is the worst-case scenario. Well, the silver lining is that Karni seems to want us alive. And the Shiraza have treated us relatively humanely so far.”

  Anna let out a long sigh. Her voice was quiet as she mumbled to herself. “I really wished I never came here.”

  It was undeniable that the rest of them shared the same sentiment. This mission to investigate the Saar for Karni’s whereabouts had completely flipped on their heads. All they were meant to do was to find information and leads. Instead, Van was dead and they got caught by the enemy who were planning for a rebellion.

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  Emil’s thoughts drifted to Nasir. The Zal’Khari Exalted had escaped his grasp. He didn’t catch him amongst the Zal’Khari warriors within the encampment. Was he hiding somewhere? Or were the Shiraza deliberately keeping them separated? Emil was certain that the man would come for him the moment he was allowed a chance.

  His thoughts were interrupted by a scratch on their tent.

  “Excuse me, I’m coming in.”

  Without waiting for a response, a Gharian with a mature, rugged face entered the tent. He was above average height with a sturdy build that exuded the vibe of someone reliable. A long neatly trimmed goatee extended from his chin. It was the man named Hisham, apparently Karni’s right-hand man.

  “Princess Kiniyani wants to speak with the four of you.”

  ***

  As it was expected, Karni had the largest and most extravagant tent within the Shiraza camp. The interior was spacious, aided by the impression of the dome-shaped ceiling, large enough to fit at least fifty or so full-fledged Shiraza warriors. Torches were affixed to the poles lined along the perimeter, casting a strong and incandescent light over the dozen soldiers standing guard. Hisham led them into the center of the tent.

  Karni herself was seated on a stone dais that served as a makeshift throne. She sat with her legs crossed and head tilted to the side, leaning against one of her hands steadied by her elbow. Emil thought the arrogant and lackadaisical posture was unlike her—his image of the Gharian princess was one of a dominant and nonsensical leader.

  This frivolous appearance felt performative like she was deliberately putting on an act.

  But for what? To make them relaxed? To lure them into a false sense of security? If so, it seemed meaningless. She was a core member of Vigil, someone who Emil vowed to never take lightly. Even now, he felt like he was walking into a den of snakes.

  Karni said nothing for a while. She merely stared at them with her piercing gaze, feigning an air of disinterest.

  Not daring to take his eyes off Karni, Emil glanced at his friends from his periphery. He didn’t miss the discomfort on their faces. Anna struggled to maintain a neutral gaze, her jaws locked in a half-grimace. Kai and Liesel were covered in sweat. They squirmed as they were forced to endure through their injuries. It probably hurt for them to even stand, much less hold their bodies still in an unpleasant kneel.

  Finally, after a torturous eternity, Karni finally ended the silence.

  “Convince me why I should let you live.”

  Emil’s heart dropped. It was a simple declaration, but the implication was heavy. Did she no longer plan to hold them as her hostages? Or was this simply an act to try to elicit more compromises out of them? Why would she negotiate with the hostages anyways? It wasn’t like they were in any place to make promises.

  “The Shiraza has no place for uselessness. And as far as I’m concerned, you are all liabilities who I have to keep alive. That’s resources I can use to feed my men. So, do plead your case. My ears are open.”

  Shit.

  His friends looked at each other in horror, realizing that the guarantee on their lives was suddenly at stake. None of them were ready for this sort of negotiation.

  Karni tapped the armrest of her throne impatiently. “Time is of essence, my darlings,” she said, dripped in sadism, “You better start making a compelling point.”

  Emil caught a thin thread of mana flicker in the air. The sands surrounding their feet suddenly stirred. It didn’t take a genius to guess what was lurking beneath the grounds, and the faint hint of a high-pitch squeal all but confirmed their nightmares.

  “I-I’m the scion of the House Belle!” Liesel stammered. It was distressing to hear her panic. The cold and composed image of the infallible Ice Maiden of Belle was shattered.

  “And? What of it?” Karni asked dismissively as though the Belle’s name meant nothing to her.

  “W-We have plenty of wealth! Riches! Resources! Land! Anything that you name, I’m sure my father could supply!”

  The Sand Priestess snorted with derision. She said nothing to acknowledge Liesel’s plead and turned her piercing gaze to Anna instead.

  “U-Um! My parents ran the Seibert Merchant Company! We can supply the Shiraza with trade and discounted goods!”

  Karni tilted her head, seemingly amused, but unimpressed. Kai was next.

  “I…I will join your rebellion.”

  The air in the room suddenly went still. The energy shifted. Emil felt the gaze of every warrior in the room zeroed in on Kai.

  Karni burst out in laughter. The stifling tension never dissipated. Her cantankerous guffaw was loud and obnoxious, completely out of character. She tossed her head back and slammed the armrest repeatedly like she couldn’t control herself from Kai’s outrageous statement. The rats in the sand seemed galvanized by her reaction as they squealed in frenzy. For a moment, Emil feared that the rats would lunge out of the sand at Kai.

  “Your parents,” Karni suddenly said, wiping her eyes of the laughing tears. Her tone was instantly cold as steel. The abrupt shift was terrifying. “Did they leave the Saar?”

  “…M-My mother did.”

  “Huh. How curious. What makes you think I’ll let an outsider fight Gharia’s battle? Do you expect me to entrust you with an Azurite stone? Or even a weapon? Just because you share our sun-baked skin? You look Gharian, but you lack the qualifications. You have not lived in the sands. You are disconnected from our culture. A leaf that falls off a tree is no longer a part of the tree.”

  “I was taught! My mother educated me in the ways—”

  “But you have not lived it,” Karni cut him off with a note of bloodlust, “To know and to experience are very different.”

  Kai gulped nervously. His teeth clattered in terror as he failed to give a response.

  Karni let out a harrowing sigh. “The daughter of a noble who can only give empty promises. An apparent merchant from a company who I’ve never heard of before. And an outsider who dares believe he could so easily reclaim his heritage as a child of the sands.”

  She turned to Emil. Her eyes gleamed with a serpent edge. “Well then, how about you? What can you offer me that will tip these scales?”

  There was a clear expectation in her tone, and Emil understood.

  This was about me all along, wasn’t it?

  She knew. She knew about his secret identity. His abnormal nature. She had to. Melody discovered his Gifts during the Clash of Dawn banquet. He had also exchanged blows with Kleine during Aoife’s rescue. And then there was all of his activities in Isarelle before and after Thanato’s collapse, undoubtedly observed by Karni through her rats. Knowing all of that, it wasn’t hard to connect him to Steiger.

  She wants information on what the royal family knows about Gharia.

  Once again, the people he was close to were being used against him.

  Once again, he was being forced to make an impossible choice.

  Mia and Raz—just what consequences awaited them if he caved to Karni’s demands? He didn’t want to find out. When faced with the chance that everything that he’s worked for, everything that he’s sacrificed, every drop of blood that he’s bled would become worthless, he wanted to close his eyes and avert his gaze from that abyss.

  The rats beneath his friend’s feet stirred. Kai paled. Liesel whimpered. Anna looked at him with desperation.

  “…I’ll cooperate,” he hissed, cursing his new set of shackles.