The night breeze still held the heat of the day. As was common. Still, this one was different. For it had a scent. A sweet, smoky one.
“We are close,” Ashallah whispered only to herself.
She looked over her shoulder. Behind her were the silhouettes of two midnight warriors, hunched on the crest of a dune. One trudged on the sand as she headed south while the other remained still, no doubt scanning the terrain.
They do not smell it, Ashallah knew. Only I do.
A grin curled on her lips. Yes. Me alone.
Ashallah rose from her knee to run down the dune and back to the other two scouts. She merely passed them, not bothering with words as they knew to follow. Soon the three of them were back amongst the forwardmost company. A few hand commands from Ashallah dispelled the messengers in all directions to gather the others.
Little time passed before the bulk of her midnight warriors was behind her. All her captains, including Vega, encircled her. In their eagerness, they leaned close as Ashallah, whose words were but slight whispers that barely stirred the air, issued her commands. Her captains responded with silent nods and dispersed as quickly as they had gathered.
Ashallah broke into a light run. Trailing her were a company of her midnight warriors – rough women used to a hardscrabble existence in the desert. Most were nomads, from tribes such the Renaika, Vedo-In, and Kitare. Others were simply offspring of beggars, having grown up outside the walls of Yasem, where their families often sold their flesh to anyone with a few coins to spare for pleasure. A few were even the Displaced – those women who had brought shame on their families, forever shunned by relatives and strangers alike.
Ashallah’s flat in Yasem would have been considered a mansion by all of those who followed her. For most of them, that was reason enough to hate her. Ashallah, in truth, did not care. It did not matter if her company of soldiers despised or adored her. So long as they respected her.
Like gazelles, Ashallah and her company traversed the dunes before them. Their feet silently patted the sand for but an instant, leaving faint prints in their wake. Over three sandhills they climbed. As they neared the top of the fourth crest, their pace finally slowed. Ashallah, bathed in sweat, breathed deeply, all the while remaining quiet as she scanned the landscape.
The Canyonlands stretched before her as if Jaha himself had built a vast series of walls to section off this portion of the desert. Various shades of gray were layered one on top of the other, but Ashallah knew their tones were false, a product of the night. During the day, the sandstone cliffs shone with hues of violet, red, tan and burnt orange. Each color reflected brilliantly in the desert sun, but in darkness, they were subdued. That was just the way Ashallah liked it, for she preferred the state of all things as they were in the dark.
A grin curled on Ashallah’s lips. This is too easy, she thought. She had anticipated searching the Canyonlands for days on end. However, her scouts, the swiftest of her elite, had returned from their run within an hour of her company entering the stone citadel of Jaha. Their scouting had been successful, and with it, their news was good: they had found the Tirkhan.
The scouts led Ashallah and her company to the southwest edge of the Canyonlands. As they neared their destination, Ashallah considered their position. She knew from having studied maps in years past that this was home to the Daasus, the City of Copper. Built over eight hundred years earlier, Daasus had started as a boomtown of a thousand vagrants looking to make a quick fortune. Few of the copper mines ran dry, so the original families who came to prospect grew rich not quickly but over time. With wealth came increased opportunity, as blacksmiths, carpenters, concubines, merchants and every artisan in between flocked to Daasus with dreams of a better life, to suck from the teats of those who came before.
That was how Daasus flourished at its height. Centuries after its founding, the copper mines still produced, albeit not at the quotas it used to. Daasus’i settled into their routine. A few more of its entrepreneurial residents turned their ambitions outwards, focusing less on the miners’ families and more on the caravans that traversed the narrow corridors of the Canyons. By offering a temporary reprieve to those who needed it, Daasus made a name for itself as part mining town, part outpost.
To many, Ashallah realized, that combination would sound idyllic. Especially to bandits and raiders. The Daasus’i, knowing the temptation of their settlement before the eyes of others, did not regard the threat of raiding lightly. They were careful when it came to their wealth. Even amongst known visitors, they remained on guard. Daasus had a reputation for having highly trained sentries and mercenaries, with guards sworn in to the service of the city for terms of five years or more. Many retired in Daasus and took wives or concubines, adding to the city’s reserves of guards. For all their precautions against the bandits and tribes of the Canyonlands and beyond, though, Daasus had one weakness in their defenses: no women. The Daasus’i were a stubbornly conservative people, and as such, the only soldiers they drafted were men. That was fine for defending against common thieves, Ashallah had to admit. Still, she knew they were nothing like her midnight warriors.
The evidence of that soon became clear. A breeze wafted from the direction of the city. With it was an unmistakable stench. One of ash. Of rotting flesh. Of sweat. Of blood spilled. Of death.
The others in Ashallah’s company caught a whiff of it too. They drew their daggers and kilij swords. Ashallah’s blade remain sheathed though. Rather than arm herself, she motioned her scouts to gather around her. When they were close enough, she pointed to her eyes, and then outlined the whole of her hand with her finger. They nodded in understanding.
With her company in waiting, Ashallah sprinted ahead of her scouts toward the City of Copper. The ground they ran over lacked the soft grains of the desert. Dirt, packed and smooth to the touch, glided under their feet. With better footing, Ashallah ran faster and further, expanding the distance between her and her quickest underling. As the walls of Daasus came into view, she slowed to take cover under the overhang of a sandstone cliff. Her scouts came after the fact, panting.
Ashallah peeked around the sandstone. Not more than a hundred feet away, a sentry tower stood, carved from the cliff face. Its windows and arrow slits were unlit. Below the tower was one of the city’s gates. It appeared intact and secure.
I must get closer, Ashallah knew. I must.
Ashallah crept forward, her body always close to the cliffs. Her scouts made their moves to follow, but Ashallah motioned them back. She continued forward, her steps light yet purposeful until she was directly across from the tower. With the hinges toward her and the gate locked from the other side, Ashallah did not have a chance to peek in. Still, she suspected that if guards were inside, they would have seen her, or she would have heard a commotion from within. She assumed the same was true of the sentry tower before her.
Therefore, she made her move.
Ashallah raced to the tower and threw her slender body against the stone giant. With her back against its wall, her hands felt its face. Smooth it was in most parts, but grooves there were. Not many. Just enough.
She turned around and climbed. Her fingers dug into the cracks as she pulled herself up, finding the first arrow slit. She reached for it and waited. No sound from within. No sword removed from leather to cut her hand. No commands for reinforcements. No battle cries. Nothing.
Ashallah gave her scouts the signal. A single shake of her hand, her fingers pointing to the wall next to her. She did not bother to look over her shoulder to see if they would follow. For she knew they were watching her every move. She knew they would follow.
She continued upward, to the next arrow slit, and then the one above it. Her scouts gathered at the base of the tower, to lift each other up one by one. By then, Ashallah had pulled herself up and over the crenel to discover the top unmanned. She had expected at the very least a corpse to greet her. But there was none.
Only then did Ashallah unsheathe her blade. She approached the other side of the tower to take cover behind a merlon. From there, she scanned the city below. The streets were empty, the windows and doors of the homes below unlit. Some of the buildings laid charred, with a hint of soot or a mark of ash apparent even in the dark of night. Otherwise, Daasus showed every sign of abandonment.
Ashallah waited for the first of her scouts to ascend the tower. As they caught their breaths, she retreated to them.
“We can speak now,” Ashallah declared.
“What of our enemies?” one of her scouts asked.
“You tell me? You and your sisters here said you spotted the Tirkhan.”
“We did. We saw them. Patrolling this very tower.”
“Then where are they? Or their spoils? Their slain and butchered? This city looks as though it has been picked clean.”
“Yes, my commander, I agree.”
Ashallah scowled at her scout, who in response lowered her gaze. Her cohorts did likewise. Ashallah turned back to the city beyond the tower. Mud and stone buildings, along with the starlit sky that loomed above, were all that met her stare.
“Where are they?” she whispered, pensively.
The violet of dawn was upon them by the time they discovered the answer. Beyond the walls of Daasus, to the northeast, they found the Tirkhan. Encamped on a small rise of the sandy flats, where the Canyonlands parted in the wake of an ancient riverbed gone dry, was a modest force. Between four to five dozen tents stood, with three pavilions in the center. Sentries stood watch on raised platforms encircling the camp, and around the rope corral of cavalry camels. Other than that, the armed force of the encampment seemed light.
“I don’t like the look of this,” pronounced one of the scouts.
Ashallah fought the urge to nod. She dared not show a hint of doubt in front of her warriors, no matter how it plagued her. The whole of this is wrong, she told herself. Why would the Tirkhan clear the city, leaving it nearly spotless, only to set up camp outside its walls? Why not settle within?
Instead, the camp laid before them. Bare. Ripe for the taking.
“What is your command?” asked another scout.
Ashallah knew that question was on the mind of every one of her soldiers. She looked over her shoulder at the lot of them. In the predawn, the whites of their eyes stood out, as if glowing. As seasoned as many of them were, their stares fell upon Ashallah as those of children looking up to their mother.
They seek guidance, Ashallah thought. They crave leadership. In this, our hour of battle or flight. They need this.
“Bull and horn formation,” Ashallah announced. “I’ll lead the left flank. Stay low until I give the battle cry.” Ashallah turned to another scout. “Those companies behind us. Tell half of them to stand their ground. When the other half attacks, they are to watch the rear and fall into defensive formation. Understood?”
With a nod, the scout turned and raced back to the companies behind them. Ashallah glanced in that direction to find hints of them visible. Silhouettes and shadows hugged the walls and crevices. Many more remained completely out of sight. Just as they should have been.
Ashallah moved to her left. In quick succession, her warriors fell into line. The bulk of her warriors formed columns in the middle as the flanks thinned out from the center. Ashallah eyed those nearest to her. Slender they were, and toned. Some sported animal skins on their sheaths and leggings, adding to the image of a cheetah or lioness about to run down her prey. The look in their eyes – one of hunger for the hunt, anticipation of a kill – only confirmed Ashallah’s observation of them.
Ashallah herself felt the urge to charge the camp headfirst. Not yet, she told herself. Soon enough. First, we must stalk our prey.
Crouched, Ashallah moved forward. The left flank followed. The right mirrored their motions as the center remained back. Not until the flanks were halfway to the camp did the center start their quiet march.
Ashallah’s pace quickened. The sentries on the platforms still had not spotted them. For the night is ours. The truth echoed through her mind. Yes, the darkness, the black is our friend, the light our foe. Hide us, mother of the night. Hide us.
Ashallah did not doubt that the sentries’ vision had adjusted to the night. However, their eyesight, keen though it may have been, lacked the training of her midnight warriors. Even the least of her women could spot bodies lurking in the darkness toward an encampment. The sentries kept on with their watch, oblivious, their mood unfazed by the approaching horde.
Then one of the guards finally caught a glimpse. Ashallah saw him on the platform, beside a burning torch, as he raised his hand to point. She quickened her pace as the sentry ushered his brother-in-arms to scan the darkened landscape. Her strides further lengthened as the other sentry stepped backed and reached for his horn. Her thighs burned as she broke from formation to scale the rise, while the second sentry blew into his warhorn.
AaaaaaOOOOOAaaaaaa!
The horn blast reverberated through the camp. The sentry who blew the horn turned his back to the oncoming force. As did his fellow guard, for a moment. That was all Ashallah needed.
Her feet found the horizontal and diagonal posts of the platform with ease. The sentry who had pointed to the approaching horde heard her forceful steps on the pole supports. He reached for his kilij. But he had turned his attention too late. His hand was still on his sword hilt when Ashallah’s dagger point slashed his throat. He grabbed his wound, a vain attempt to stop the new spring of blood, as he fell to his knees. His fellow sentry, with horn still in hand, stared aghast. His eyes were still wide and white when Ashallah plunged her dagger into the pit of his left arm. They remained open and frozen in place as she withdrew her blade and allowed her kill to collapse to the platform.
The head of her company’s bull formation had reached the camp by then, along with her flanks. Ashallah’s women made quick work of the sentries before descending on the rest of the camp. Male soldier after soldier emerged from their tents, frightened and confused. That fear and ignorance were soon displaced by absence – of thought, of consciousness, of life – as blades and blunt force met them. Men fell by the dozens. Midnight warriors snaked through the tent rows with calmness, seemingly at home under the cloak of darkness. As the women cut down their male prey, Ashallah climbed down from the sentry platform to march toward the three pavilions in the center.
Only two guards remained outside the pavilions, as the rest had joined the fight or fled. Ashallah headed straight for them, her pace undeterred. The guards dropped their ornamental halberds to draw their kilij swords. In kind, Ashallah sheathed her dagger and drew her two most prized knives – her pair of khukuri blades. Even in the low light of the predawn, they were a remarkable sight. Their blades curved inward, with the knife thickening in width just past the curve before gradually tapering to a sharp point. The handles were of ancient desert teak, a wood so rare that it often was traded pound-for-pound for rubies or emeralds. Ashallah had pulled the blades from the corpse of a general she had felled. Now, like so many times before, she was going to use them to make quick work of the two men before her.
The guard to her left was the first to move. He dashed forward, his kilij raised above his head. Ashallah would have smiled had she the time, for she saw her opening. She hopped toward the guard, leaned in and slashed at his gut, right between the bottom of his breastplate and the top of his belt. The cut was not deep, only an inch into the guard’s flesh, though it jarred the man. He stood for a moment, suspended by the sudden pain.
That pause allowed Ashallah the opportunity to take on the second guard. The other appeared more seasoned – as he held his blade close to his body, in a defensive stance, yet ready to thrust. In response, Ashallah struck out at his kilij with her blades, wanting to swipe it aside. The guard blocked her advances in kind. His steel met hers not once or twice but six times. Ashallah found his defense both admirable and frustrating, for she often killed her opponents within three strokes.
Then, from her left, came the other guard. His kilij came crashing down toward Ashallah. She deflected it and soon found herself engaging the two simultaneously.
Her response to both was a flurry of parries and slashes. Her steel rang against that of the two. Over and again, blades clanged. Although curved blades usually made for poor swordplay, Ashallah made good use of hers throughout the engagement. For their part, the guards made decent foes. That is until the one to her left blundered once more.
The guard overstepped when he parried, leaning forward a tad too much. With his balance off, Ashallah saw her chance. She swiped aside his kilij, took two long strides and slashed at his neck with her other blade. The cut – quick and precise – resulted in a river of scarlet. In that instant, Ashallah knew he was done.
Her victory was short-lived, as the other guard swung his kilij at her head. Ashallah sensed that he was hoping to catch her off guard, for his swing was forceful. With such momentum came error, for the man exposed nearly the whole of his right side. Ashallah rushed forward to plant the tip of her khukuri in the pit of his right arm. There her knife found an artery, the current to his life, for when she removed the blade red gushed forth. The man fell to his back, writhing in agony. Ashallah left the guard to it as she stepped over him to enter the center pavilion.
Inside, she found the three pavilions were but one, as hallways of framed canvas linked them together. Hot coals in braziers offered dim light, but Ashallah dared not to let her guard down. She stalked through each one of the pavilions as though she were traversing a den of vipers. Each of her steps was deliberate and sure-footed. Her khukuri blades were poised and ready to strike, even after she cleared each tent. Only when three of her midnight warriors arrived did Ashallah finally lower her blades.
“It’s a ruse,” Ashallah declared as she left. “Why else set up all these tents and leave these weak men to guard them.” She nudged one of the guards she had slain with the tip of her foot.
Thwayya approached, her leather breastplate splattered with blood. “The north end of the camp is clear.”
“You seem to have done well,” Ashallah commented.
“They say I am lucky in that way.”
“How many?”
“Only a few sentries were posted.”
Ashallah responded with a wry look. The whole of the situation did not sit well with her. Her warriors could see it on her face, in the way she brushed past them and toward one of the sentry platforms. There, Ashallah ascended to scan the darkness surrounding the camp.
This is all wrong, she thought. What army would pitch camp in a dry riverbed? The rainy season had not yet passed, and here a small storm could pour enough rain to wipe the camp from its rise. No, this is not right. None of it is.
Ashallah pondered what all of it meant as she stared up at the starless, black sky.
The sky, she thought. The sky . . . Oh, Jaha, no . . .
Ashallah looked over her shoulder to spot Thwayya and Badra back in the center of the camp. “Thwayya! Thwayya!”
“Ashallah, what? What is it?” Thwayya asked as she came running up to her.
“Sound the horn. Send our best runners to our companies. Pass the order along the line of them: retreat to the Daasus. No, to the Canyonlands and beyond. Retreat!”
“But, we hold the camp . . .”
“Do it!”
“Commander,” Badra began. “It’s too late.”
Both Thwayya and Badra paused. Ashallah quieted along with them so that she was able to hear what Badra had picked up moments earlier - screams.
War horns, their recognizable cries for some reason muffled, sounded the call to action. Commands shouted from officers drifted to Ashallah’s ears from the dry banks of the riverbed, not as hurried exchanges but as snippets, whispered. The only clear, loud noise that came through to Ashallah and the others were the cries of agony from their fellow women-in-arms.
Ashallah scanned the faces of her midnight warriors within the camp. Even her most seasoned warriors appeared panic-stricken. Fear and more fear pooled in the looks of their eyes, eyes which only moments before would have been considered those of the brave. Many began to step away from the riverbed, from the direction of Daasus, almost as if to desert not only their positions within the camp but their responsibilities as soldiers.
Knowing that her command was slipping away from her, Ashallah considered the only choice left.
“Yala Hasem!”
The ancient battle cry caught the attention of every woman in the camp. For two hundred years, it had been the rallying command for every midnight warrior battle where odds seemed insurmountable. It harked back to the days when Dyli had first expanded to the Ivory Shores, during which small outposts monitored the fringes of the empire. During one nighttime engagement with local insurgents, the midnight warriors found themselves cut off from reinforcements. Outnumbered ten-to-one by an army of male soldiers, the midnight warriors of the outpost outside of the village of Yala Hasem mounted a brazen early morning counterattack, one that resulted in their miraculous victory. In the years that followed the triumph, the veterans of the battle even went so far as to name their homes and hamlets after the village they fought to protect. Yala Hasem had even been the original name of Ashallah’s hometown until the later patriarchs of the growing city voted to shorten the moniker to one considered more masculine.
Ashallah’s throat nearly ruptured as she bellowed her command. Without so much as a pause, she jumped from the sentry platform onto the soft sand below. She rushed down the rise into the dry riverbed. Toward the muffled horn blasts and jarring screams she went, her pace increasing as if driven by the horrors of war that awaited her.
The pants and grunts behind her stirred her onward though. She glanced over her shoulder for but a moment to find her sisters-in-arms in tow. Their faces, dimly lit in the early morning, managed to express the brazen courage each one of them possessed, partly inspired by tradition but also motivated by a lust for battle.
Ashallah turned back to the dry riverbed that stretched ahead, a grin having crept on her lips. By Jaha, I love this, she told herself. I love it.
That adoration turned to caution as Ashallah caught sight of the edge of the engagement. Through what Ashallah could only describe as a haze - a curtain between her and her fellow warriors - she spotted her midnight warriors engaged with the enemy she had been searching for all along.
“Hold your breath!” Ashallah yelled as she turned back to her warriors. “Hold your breath! And close your eyes!”
Ashallah faced the haze before her. She sprinted toward it, took a deep breath and shut her eyes.
As if suddenly in a bog, Ashallah’s pace slowed, her legs weighed down by the ether. Her skin tingled, especially around her eyes, much as it had in dust storms of the past. The combination of agitation and resistance tempted Ashallah to open her eyes, to take a peak. Nevertheless, she fought on, her entire body exerting herself forward.
Then as quickly as the veil of haze had attacked her senses, it was gone. Her trudging morphed into running once again. Relieved, she opened her eyes. It could not have been a moment too soon, for before her face was the edge of a blade. Whether from a kilij, axe or spear Ashallah could not tell. She barely had a moment to bend her knees and dip beneath the cutting surface. The steel missed yet came so close and quick that it kissed her with a stroke of air.
Falling to her knees, Ashallah looked up to her assailant. With skin the color of polished ebony, her newfound enemy stood out against the background of the predawn sky. A member of one of the southern Tirkhan tribes, Ashallah determined, a few shades darker than their northern cousins but no less dangerous.
The blade that had just missed her head still moved in an upswing arc when Ashallah’s blades responded. The one in her left hand braced against the Tirkhan steel, while the one in her right found the meaty flesh of her enemy’s calf. A scream with the force of a small gale pounded Ashallah’s ears until she sliced both her khukuri blades across the warrior’s throat.
Silence fell upon Ashallah for but a moment, as did the fresh corpse she had just created. She stepped aside to allow it to collapse. Before it had a chance to thump to the ground, Ashallah surveyed the battlefield.
Columns of Tirkhan tribeswomen - ranging from the ebony women of the south to the blue-eyed, pale females of the north - were finishing what was left of the rearmost companies. Dozens of Ashallah’s midnight sisters laid strewn, their bodies turned to canvases blotted by blood and sand. Some of the less disciplined Tirkhan had even hacked off appendages rather than going for the kill, allowing their victims to wallow and bleed out in agony. The latter sight stirred Ashallah to her core. Had she been green and inexperienced, she may have vomited.
Those days had long since passed. At that precise moment, she was not sickened. She was angry.
The Tirkhan took notice of their new guest with a response of derision and contempt. Ashallah suspected her own look matched theirs. As her enemies sauntered forward to meet their new foe, Ashallah wiped her khukuri blades on the corpse she had laid.
“Aaaahhh . . . it burns . . .”
Ashallah glanced over her shoulder to find Badra’s sour face emerging from the haze. The rest of her squat figure followed in kind. Badra parted her eyes briefly before closing them again as she raised her hands.
“Do not rub them!” Ashallah commanded, even as she watched Badra defy her. “And fall into line. All of you!”
Badra at least had the good sense to do that much, as did the other midnight warriors that emerged. Some even showed discipline by choosing not to wipe their eyes.
Good, Ashallah considered as she crossed her khukuri before her chest. We may be able to finish this one.
The Tirkhan before her formed their lines. They stood ready not more than fifty feet from Ashallah’s gathering force, their captains walking the length of their ranks. Ashallah studied them, matching their intensity while hiding her confusion. Why are they not attacking? she asked herself. Their columns could have struck down our warriors minutes ago.
Ashallah turned to the veil of haze that continued to loom behind them. She knew the answer lied at the source of that storm, for she had seen its power displayed before. Within lied the specter that created it, the being capable of deciding their fates.
Then it appeared. From nothing. A jinni.
Like a fire started and extinguished at once, from a sudden blaze enveloped in wisps of smoke stood a figure. Straight and lean, a whole head taller than Ashallah. Skin the color of ash. Script written on his arms, chest, and neck, the lettering glowing, as though lit from burning embers encased within flesh. The eyes were equally hypnotic, with irises like sapphires staring upon Ashallah and her warriors.
Those with lesser experience gripped the hilts of their blades or took a step or two back, in anticipation of a retreat. Ashallah knew the circumstances warranted a withdrawal. She also recalled her orders. Lastly, she reminded herself of the consequences of returning to Yasem without a victory.
Ashallah extended her foot. Warily, she took a step. She paused to study the jinni. He remained statuesque. Only his eyes burned with life, a life so powerful it could conquer – or impose – death.
She stepped forward again. Again. Still, the jinni stood. Knowing she could not move away, Ashallah continued her advance, realizing that with every stride a few more of her women followed her lead.
Halfway between the enemy line and her own, a captain finally approached the jinni. The jinni, for his part, continued looking ahead as the Tirkhan woman searched his torso and appendages. Ashallah’s gaze remained firm on the captain. She is reading, Ashallah told herself. She is looking for something. A particular word. A phrase. The key to a command?
The captain leaned in toward the jinni. Her lips parted. A few words, inaudible to Ashallah and the rest, escaped her mouth. Then she hurried back to her battle line, a wry look across her face, reflecting a tinge of anxiety and anticipation.
The script on the jinni’s body began to glow like embers stoked by a breeze. As the lettering radiated soft light, the jinni looked down to his hands, which he opened and closed over and again.
Then came the first scream.
From behind Ashallah, it rang. Horrific it was. Desperate. Hopeless. Ashallah swung around to find the veil of haze they had passed through growing darker. The thin mist, which only minutes before had been a gray fog, now stood as a wall of black smoke. Somehow, it had no flames at its base nor did it rise to thin near the heavens. The veil, some twenty feet tall, moved upon the line of her midnight warriors. Slowly in some areas, surprisingly fast in others, its pace random. Her warriors edged back, most in time to avoid the tongues of smoke from touching their bodies. Others were less fortunate. The smoke and haze lashed out at them, striking an arm or torso, to ignite their skin instantaneously. The wounded wailed and cried as the fire ate at their flesh and bones. The pleas for Jaha’s mercy continued until the flames consumed their throats and mouths, before smoldering upon what remained of their faces.
The jinni continued to curl of his fingers. He clenched his fists. He marched forward, his steps as deliberate as a general’s, his eyes as bold and determined as an executioner.
Behind him, the Tirkhan women chanted. Their words started as whispers, then grew in volume as the jinni stepped forward. As their voices grew louder, the jinni’s pace quickened, his hands curling and opening with greater speed. By the time the jinni broke into a light run, Ashallah was able to hear the Tirkhan’s chants. Even though her understanding of the foreign dialect was rusty, she picked out the bulk of their commands.
“Master the smoke . . . Stoke the embers . . . Grow the fire . . . Consume! Consume!”
The commands fed the jinni’s resolve. The script on his body burned red. The tongues of smoke he controlled now whipped at Ashallah’s women like a squall, picking and tossing her warriors with ease. Ashallah, knowing that retreat through the curtain of black haze was impossible, held her khukuri knives before her.
This is it, she realized. My glorious death. In the heat of battle. I will die. I will join my fallen sisters; I will stand before one of the Five Doors of Hell.
Ashallah peered over her shoulder to spot her sisters-in-arms. Some stood firm, their feet square and with eyes defiant in the face of death. Many more were scared, their bodies quaking, resolved to retreat if it were not for the curtain of death behind them.
They need more discipline, Ashallah realized. They need to remember their code.
“All of you,” Ashallah commanded. “Recite your vows! Recite your vows! Now!”
Some began to murmur; others merely mouthed the words. In response to their shameful display, Ashallah started the chorus. “We are sisters, born in a land of men.”
Ashallah peered over her shoulder. A few of her fellow warriors began to join her.
“In the light of day, we are merely women. We wear our veils. We bow our heads.”
More voices from her ranks accompanied her.
“But when darkness falls, we have no reservations. We strap on our blades. We shed our veils.”
Behind her, the chorus grew.
“We become the night. Hidden. Fearsome. We take on the cause of our land, defending it when the power of men fails.
“I am a child of a sunless sky. A soldier of darkness. I train. I fight. I emerge from battle victorious. I am the eclipse to the sun of my enemies. The shadow cast upon them. I am midnight.”
The last line, meant to inspire courage in women during battle, seemed to have stoked the vicious veil behind them. It advanced on her rear lines, consuming many. Those who survived only did so by trampling over their fellow sisters, who screamed as the fog came over them.
Ashallah hung her head. Pity, she thought. They were going to die anyway. Why could they not do so with some honor? In the heat of battle, with blade in hand, by a woman’s touch. Not by some creature’s magic from Hell.
The jinni was nearly upon him. Ashallah, the closest to the man-beast, could see the white of his eyes, the stark blue of his irises. She readied her blades as she stood in a defensive posture, knowing that neither would do much to protect her. Still, she reasoned, I must do my part. I must die a warrior.
With only yards between her and her foe, Ashallah screamed, “Yala Hasem!”
Suddenly, the jinni stopped.
Ashallah, bewildered, lowered her khukuri blades a bit. She looked behind her. Her warriors, also dumbfounded, stared back at Ashallah and each other. Meanwhile, the wall of black smoke receded, having lost the height of its ferocity.
The jinni twisted his torso to glance behind him. The Tirkhan, who moments before had been emboldened and confident, stood in shock. The captain who had approached the jinni shouted at him and pointed at the line of Ashallah’s warriors. The jinni, though, did not move but only glared at her. The Tirkhan captain then broke rank and marched toward the jinni, withdrawing her kilij to point the tip at the beast.
The jinni eyed the script on his forearms. Ashallah saw it clearly from where she stood. With each word of the captain’s command, the beautifully etched lettering glowed one by one. However, the last few breaths did not resonate. The script on the jinni’s forearms – carved in a different hand, one that was crude and with haste – remained unlit from within, dark.
The captain yelled her command once more, her voice laced with rage.
The jinni looked over his shoulder. He narrowed his eyes. He bared his teeth, gleaming white razors, not unlike those of a desert tiger or grassland leopard.
Then he charged.
Ashallah could not believe her eyes. His gait was smooth and swift, like a flash flood through a valley. His strides were strong and powerful, with each length of his leg covering not feet but yards. The script on his body burned, threatening to consume him, as he pounced upon his enemy.
The Tirkhan captain backed away from the beast. Her efforts in vain, the jinni crashed down on top of her, his hands around her neck before her back hit the ground. Her flesh was aflame, her screams lost in the roar of a fire, as her sisters-in-arms watched.
Within moments, all that was left of the Tirkhan captain was ash in the jinni’s hands. He rose to his feet, his stare transfixed on his fingers, before he raised his head to stare at the rest of the Tirkhan. The women before him gripped their weapons and deepened their stances as they focused on the jinni.
From behind, a curtain of black smoke rose. Instantly, heat and light consumed the Tirkhan in the rear, turning their bodies into torches.
Needing no further provocation, Ashallah raised her khukuri toward the pre-dawn sky. She yelled. From her lungs erupted a guttural, primitive cry.
Like a whitecap, she led her wave of warriors toward the Tirkhan. In response, knowing that retreat was impossible, the Tirkhan raced to meet them. The approach of the enemy – the anticipation of the kill – sent Ashallah’s heart fluttering. So many, so many, she considered. Who will be first?
A fair-skinned Tirkhan, wielding a two-handed kilij sword, roared before her as if in answer to her question. Ashallah raised her khukuri blades to meet the kilij, which threatened to come down upon her in one overhead stroke. The broad, massive sword jarred the bones from her hands to her shoulders, but Ashallah’s grip on her knives remained firm enough to deflect the kilij. The fair-skinned swung at Ashallah again, the sword cutting horizontally. Ashallah ducked. Steel, emanating the cool of night, swiftly passed over the back of her neck. Ashallah thought of continuing the dance until her adversary tired. However, too many waited to meet their fate at her hands. So with her fair-skinned enemy having lost momentum – and with her right leg exposed and unprotected – Ashallah dove at her with both khukuris extended. The tips found the sun-dried leather on her leg, then the tightened muscle underneath, as if cutting through a camel steak. The fair-skinned one screamed a cry so piercing it could have broken down all the Five Doors of Hell. Ashallah suffered the horrific sound, fighting the urge to cover her ears, to slice at her neck. One stroke and the yell quieted. The fair-skinned, with mouth still agape, reached for the scarlet line that bled anew on her neck. She fell to her knees, her eyelids tired, as Ashallah passed her to deliver a similar fate to many more.
The rest that Ashallah fought ranged in experience from the novice to the skilled, with the latter being few in her encounters. With each, Ashallah dedicated the appropriate amount of effort and time. As fighters, the neophytes were barely passable. They were less like warriors and more like amateur maidens at play with sticks. Ashallah had only enough patience to give them a stroke or two before delivering death. The slightly more seasoned, those with at least something of a combat background, proved interesting. They showed maturity in battle while still exhibiting a beginner’s passion for the blade. Such foes deserved at least five strokes, Ashallah had decided, but little more. The veterans, however, remained Ashallah’s favorite. They were the ones who honestly believed they stood a chance against her khukuri blades. All were cautious in their own right, although some cast that pretense aside for brash optimism and recklessness due to their advanced skill levels. Such combatants met Ashallah’s firm blade strokes with those of their own, and in doing so revealed their many years of honing their talents. Some were impressive, Ashallah had to admit, such the ebony Tirkhan with the teakwood spear or the bronze-toned warrior with the throwing axes. Those encounters left Ashallah with sweat on her brow and little else. No cuts. No wounds. Just a body before her feet after each engagement, a victory like the countless others.
For all her mounting success on the field of battle, Ashallah’s focus remained distracted, as she kept peripheral watch on the jinni. The man-beast, after incinerating the Tirkhan captain, rose to march to the rear of the Tirkhan lines. The warriors, nor the weapons they brandished, did nothing to stir fear in him. For their part, most of the Tirkhan parted to allow him to pass. Some, whether out of fear or foolishness, took a stab or strike at the jinni. Their blades broke on his skin, as they would have on a boulder or piece of ore, while the jinni only had to raise a finger in their direction to send a wisp of smoke and flame to engulf the assailant. This went on until the jinni reached the wall of ashen smoke and dust that stood behind the Tirkhan lines. There, he stood tall, as the vertical cloud crept forward. With his hands extended, the ashen wall enveloped him. It was then that the tongues of smoke and flame increased their assault on the rear of the Tirkhan lines as if empowered by their master. As Ashallah fought on, she heard the screams of agony, the cries to Jaha from the Tirkhan increase.
Only when her midnight warriors had cut down the last of the Tirkhan was Ashallah able to turn her full attention to the jinni and his vertical wall of smoke and flame. By then, the tongues had receded to the cloudy mass, which began to shrink towards the jinni. The smoke disappeared into the script that covered his body, stoking the glow of the letters so that they burned white. The jinni - with his eyes closed, his head tilted upward, and his arms raised to the sky - appeared rejuvenated.
When the last wisps of the ashen cloud had entered him, the jinni opened his eyes to look upon the battlefield. Ashallah, the closest soldier to him, glanced around to see what he saw: the pre-dawn desert landscape scarred by drying blood and rotting flesh, along with warriors tired and wounded from fighting. The script on his body burned brightly as the jinni silently surveyed the scene.
Ashallah studied the jinni as he looked upon it all. Had she mistaken the man-beast for a person, she would have sworn that she saw a very human emotion in his eyes: pity.
The jinni, whether disgusted with the sight or drawn away by some otherworldly force, turned to the rise behind him. He broke out into a sprint no man or woman could ever hope to match. Nevertheless, Ashallah found herself trying. She chased after him, her legs pumping wildly. The jinni extended the gap between her and him, but Ashallah still had him in her sights to see the script on his body burn white. The light from the etched writing on his skin glowed so vividly that Ashallah finally slowed to shield her eyes. By then, the jinni had quickened his pace even further, to reach the crest of the rise. The lettering on his body exploded in a flash of white surrounded by wisps of black, as the jinni shot into the sky like a meteor reentering the heavens.
Ashallah ascended the hill, continuing in the footprints of the jinni. Then, beneath her, she felt the prints crack. She looked down at the soles of her sandals to find shards of thin glass, remnants of the heat from the jinni’s wake. She turned to the sky again, to find the sliver of the rising sun on the horizon and the silhouette of the man-beast racing towards it.
“Rilah,” Ashallah whispered to herself. “It heads to Rilah.”174Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡukvAhSTY4J
