He had no one to whom he could explain any of his actions. His parents had had each other. He remembered how they used to stroll through the gardens, heads close together, deep in conversation. As a child, he’d trailed after them, playing in the flowerbeds and watching the birds with their jewel-like feathers. He wondered what his parents would have said about his actions here. Would they have been proud? Or would they too have believed he risked too much?

“Rise,” the emperor said. “I have my confirmation. I am satisfied. But it seems the sky serpents pose a greater threat than we anticipated.”

The magician threw himself prone on the carpets. “Forgive me, Your Imperial Majesty. I did warn you, but—”

Every time the man groveled, the emperor had to resist the urge to kick him. He was certain that the man did not do it out of any real respect or remorse. It was merely a way to preserve his skin. The emperor wondered if the magician had ever respected anyone. “Get up.”

The magician scrambled to his feet.

“You warned me, and I took a calculated risk,” the emperor said. “It was my decision, and the responsibility and the burden are mine. Absolve yourself of guilt. So long as you share your knowledge, you do not need to concern yourself with how that knowledge is applied.” He paused. “I do hope you have shared all relevant knowledge?”

“Yes, of course!”

The emperor let the silence stretch. He’d learned that technique from his father—it often induced people to fill the silence with words they hadn’t meant to say. But this time, it didn’t. Unfortunate, he thought. He had hoped the desert man would cough up further helpful secrets. Perhaps there were none. “Very well. Once we have sufficient supplies, we will enter the desert. You will speak to any clans we encounter, explain our purpose, and solicit their cooperation.”

“They will not listen,” the magician objected. “I know my people.”

“It must be tried,” the emperor said. “If there is a chance that we can have the lake without bloodshed, then we must attempt it.”

“With all due respect, your Imperial Majesty, the desert people are not yours,” the magician said. “You don’t need to concern yourself with their fate.”

The emperor smiled. “And that, my good man, is why you are not emperor.”

“They will fight us.”

His smile faded in the face of that truth. “If they do, they will not win.”

Chapter Seventeen

“Sandstorm coming,” Korbyn said.

Liyana scanned the horizon and saw—oh yes, there it was, a smudge of tan that blotted out a patch of blue sky. All of them dismounted. Liyana and Raan pitched the tent while Korbyn unsaddled the horses. He tossed the supply packs into the tent. Without guidance Pia crawled inside and pushed the packs so they’d brace the walls. Fennik hammered stakes into the ground around the tent and secured the horses’ reins to them. He wrapped cloth around the horses’ heads to protect their eyes from the sand. It couldn’t protect the horses from the sand wolves, but it would at least prevent the horses from panicking and drawing the wolves. All was completed with practiced ease well before the sandstorm arrived.

As Fennik and Raan joined Pia inside the tent, Korbyn plopped down cross-legged in the sand. Pausing at the tent flap, Liyana asked, “Aren’t you coming in?”

“You need another magic lesson.” He patted the sand next to him.

Liyana checked the sandstorm. The wall of sand advanced across the desert, blackening the sky above it. The wind had already picked up, tossing grains of sand and debris into the air. Behind them, the horses stomped their hooves and sniffed the air.

She sat and waited for him to explain.

“You are going to push the wind,” Korbyn said. “It’s already moving, so this is far easier than starting a sandstorm from scratch. You are simply going to encourage it to blow around us.”

“And you?”

“I’ll keep the sand wolves from eating you when you fail.”

She scowled at him. “I won’t fail.”

“Good for you, goat girl.” He grinned at her. “Go on and impress me.”

Liyana regarded the mass of writhing black clouds. “It’s said that once, the god of the Tortoise Clan spent an entire century inside a sandstorm. The weathering of the sand and wind is what gave the tortoise its distinctive shell pattern.”

“Oh yes, we teased him about that for days.”

She studied him, trying to determine if he was serious or not. “If I make a mistake, will we be stuck in a sandstorm for a century?”

“I hope not,” he said cheerfully.

She drew her sky serpent knife out of her sash. “This seems to work on the wolves. It sliced through the one that attacked me before I met you.” She handed him the blade.

Korbyn examined it. “Beautifully made.” She watched his fingers caress the carved handle. The bone had been worn down to fit smoothly in one’s hand. The blade was lashed to the handle with goat sinew in an elaborate array of knots.

“It’s been in my family for generations,” Liyana said. “Don’t lose it.”

“Your lack of trust wounds me.” He slashed the air with it. “I assume there’s a story about how a sky serpent scale came to be the blade in your knife?”

“It’s a family story,” Liyana said. She watched him cut designs in the air, and her fingers itched to take the knife back. She didn’t know what had possessed her to share it with him. It had never been wielded by anyone outside the family before. She felt as if he were holding a piece of herself.

“You can tell me. I’m like family.”

She snorted like Raan. “You are nothing like family.”

He mimed a stab to the heart with the hand that did not hold the knife. “After all we have been through together . . . you wound my heart.”

“Tell me one of your family secrets, and I’ll tell you mine.” She didn’t know what possessed her to offer that bargain. She simply . . . wanted him to share something of his as he held her knife.

“I don’t have a family,” Korbyn said. “Gods were never born. We simply . . . are.”

She rolled her eyes at him. “Tell me a secret of the gods.”

He leaned close to her. She felt his breath on her neck, warm and soft. She shivered as if his breath touched all of her skin. In a mock whisper he said, “Sendar has horribly bad breath.”

She heard Pia giggle from within the tent.

Also in a mock whisper Liyana said, “Tell me one of your secrets.”

“You want to play confession?” Korbyn’s eyes glittered, and a smile played over his lips. She felt as if she were playing with a flame. She didn’t back away.

“One thing,” Liyana said, “and I’ll tell you about the knife.”

Korbyn was quiet for a while. Liyana watched the sandstorm build in front of them, a wall of blackness. Not far away now, it obliterated the line between land and sky. “I can’t dance,” Korbyn said at last.

Liyana laughed.

“Bayla doesn’t know,” he said mournfully. “So far I have hid my inadequacy by always serving as audience. But she loves to dance. One day she’ll discover my secret and flee from me in horror.”

Liyana patted his knee. “I’ll teach you. Before you’re reunited with Bayla, you’ll be a master of dance. She’ll never need to know about this horrible flaw in your character.”

“I accept your offer,” Korbyn said solemnly. “Now, the knife?”

“My great-great-great-great-grandmother was in love with the chief’s son. But he said that he would only marry her if she was the bravest woman in the clan. She asked how she could prove her bravery, and he said that she had to walk into the forbidden mountains and return with proof that she had been there.”

Liyana heard a gasp, and then Pia stuck her head out of the tent to hear better. “She did that? But no one has ever entered the forbidden mountains!”

“According to the chief’s son, she did it, and he married the bravest woman in the clan. But according to my mother and my mother’s mother and my mother’s mother’s mother . . . she stole it off a sky serpent only a few miles from home while the serpent was distracted with . . . um, mating.”