Chapter 6
Summer, TA 2945 - Saldís almost 17
Caeldor, Tovennen
Saldís adjusted her head scarf to shield all but her eyes. The sun blistered down upon the senior Weapons-Novices with such strength that she could feel rivulets of sweat running down her back. Each day this summer, those in her age group had been led out of Caeldor's cooler valley onto the plateaus above.
Truly, the Scorched Wastes had been aptly named. 'Twas nothing but crackled, dry, and lifeless red dirt in all directions.
A new type of Test—one of endurance. Her eyes descended to her scar, and her left hand smoothed across the leather of the whip at her left hip.
Endurance. At what price?
Her lips twisted with bitterness. Pieces of her soul had already gone missing. Novices had died upon her blade. Some had deserved it, wretched creatures who would stab their own dam in the back if it would advance themselves, but some…hadn't. Some had done nothing but be born to Breeders, Black Númenórean children not equipped to handle this stark existence. She'd looked into their eyes, known her fate if she faltered, and cut them down like a slave butchering a chicken for the evening's stew.
What else could she do? She couldn't find it in herself to accept either death or a nightmarish life of hard use as a Breeder. As she matured, she'd realized it was not only herself who would suffer if consigned to a Breeder's status. Nay, it would be her children, too.
That, she would not permit.
Saldís felt buried under the weight of the many fears resting upon her shoulders. By Durin, she was tired.
Worst of all was the newest fear to rear its monstrous head—a fear that threatened to topple her terror of the Breeders' Den from supremacy. The persona of Akhora that had once been her shield had slowly accumulated bulk and substance. With each passing season, Akhora assumed a life of her own. And Akhora was a creature consumed by rage.
Saldís had discovered her greatest enemy now resided within her own head. Akhora had developed a taste for violence, finding on the training sands an outlet for the fury and hatred that rode her. She savored those moments when her superiority was proven and her opponents fell at her feet. She didn't much care if they lived. The world and everyone in it had betrayed her, promising such sweet lies to her child-self only to rip them away and leave her in this nightmare that refused to end. Rage ruled Akhora, and bitterness, and she was more than willing to vent each upon any available target.
After all, who cared what happened to men? Men, she was certain, had been Eru's greatest mistake. She saw evidence of it daily.
Saldís thought she must be mad. How else to explain the feeling that there were two women sharing her skin? Her Saldís-self waged a perpetual war against her Akhora-self, but for how long could she hold against such a fierce adversary? The khuzd she'd been was desperately fighting for her existence. If she could see Adâd one more time, she thought she could hold on. Without him… All she could do was try. For his sake, and in his memory, she battled to remain Saldís.
But by Mahal, she was tired of the struggle.
A rustling among the lines of Novices returned her attention to the immediate. Pale, black-haired Guitan, the most frightening of the Duumvirate's Hands, walked between their lines to the front of their assembly. Like many of the Black Númenóreans, he possessed a shocking male beauty, one derived from the elvish blood these men so disdained. Their long lives, too, were a gift from that bloodline—an irony, given the Black Númenóreans' hatred of the First Born.
Aye, Guitan unnerved any with wits. Unlike the rest of them—even the other Hands and the Duumvirate—the male had not one scar upon his body that any had seen. Their life was hard, and they all bore evidence of it. No one was that good, especially one trained not as a Weapon, but an Arcanist.
No one but Guitan, that was. She'd seen the Hand fight. Once. That had been enough to convince her to never be at cross-purposes with him.
Another wordless stir among the Weapons-Novices as the Arcane-Novices joined them. Row by row of them, male and female, lined up on their right flank, their heavy medallions bearing the image of the Eye dangling across their chests, and their cat's claws—marks only bestowed upon those mastering the dark arts—bared proudly. The single stud earring in onyx betrayed their rank, just as her single ruby did hers.
A cold chill emanated from the new arrivals despite the sun's harsh rays. Mayhap it was the pall caused by the shades of the many victims these had slain. Saldís knew herself guilty, but these… These had soaked the altars with the blood of slaves imported in droves from the north. Gondorians. Rohirrim. Any poor soul sold to them by the Corsairs was bound to meet his end at an Arcanist's hand.
A sudden intuition. This day would once again alter the course of her life. For good or ill, change scented the hot, dry wind swirling around them. She quietly braced herself, Akhora-fury mixing with Saldís-despair.
"The time of training is done," the slender man said at last, his face bared to them with his headscarf hanging free from one side of his turban. No murmurs arose. Each Novice stood in absolute silence, but Saldís knew each must be as stunned as herself. This had been their life for so long, she suspected she wasn't the only one to lose sight of the fact that it would not last forever.
"Congratulations to you survivors. You have proved your blood runs pure. True sons and daughters of Numenor, each of you."
Chins lifted to Saldís's left and right, but her hands went clammy. Training. Over. Mahal. She'd been so focused on survival and avoiding the Breeders' Den that she'd forgotten…
She stifled a shiver, but a core of ice formed in her belly. To fight for survival, the Khazâd would forgive if not endorse. To take this next step, to go to war or raid and pillage innocent people…
Saldís felt a wave of illness as her Akhora-self purred with a dark excitement. The world had stolen all from her. Now, it would pay. Saldís thrust the Akhora-response from her mind as best she could, but a part of her—Mahal protect her—agreed with the Akhora-rage.
"You will have one last Test." Guitan gifted them with a cold smile. "A real campaign. Each House will be its own team, judged against the others. For the first time, you Arcanists will work beside your Weapons. Decide among yourselves who will lead each team." A sharp, sweeping look. "No debilitating injuries or deaths as you debate the matter. Any infraction of this rule will disqualify that House in its entirety."
Meaning that group of Novices would be Breeders or fodder for the altars the instant the injury or death occurred. A cold knot of outrage crackled in Akhora's belly, and she speared her House members with a dire look. If one of them failed here, she'd hunt them all down and slit their throa—
Saldís suppressed Akhora with difficulty.
"One more instruction. Once you pass this last Test, you will no longer be Novices but assets the Duumvirate and the Six Lords have invested much time and effort into producing. When you leave the training sands this day, there will be no more duels or assassination attempts among yourselves. Nothing not sanctioned by the Duumvirate. Such play ends today. Understood?"
No more quiet knives in the dark? On this, her Saldís-self and Akhora-self were in agreement. They didn't believe it. Welcoming an asp to her bosom would be safer than dropping her guard among these people.
As one, the thirty-odd surviving Novices crossed arms before their chests, dipped into small bows, and intoned, "At your will."
Not a handful of minutes later, the challenges began. Though no laming or death was allowed, the Novices of each House decided their leadership as they ever had: through combat.
"You should accept Tarthir's offer," her opponent jeered as they circled one another.
Saldís faced Valkthor. This being the first round, it should have been unlikely that they'd cross swords, but given his rabid hatred of her, it was not shocking he'd stormed to her like an arrow loosed from the bow.
Tarthir's offer? Akhora's eyes slitted with the force of her outrage. To share Tarthir's bed alone, bearing child after child as the Arcanist's personal Breeder?
"You must truly fear me," she hissed, "if you must displace me through indirect means. The great Arcanist," she scoffed. "What a joke."
His eyes ignited above his face covering as they locked with hers. Green narrowed. Gray crinkled at the edges.
The muzm burst into a flurry of strikes, his long knife joining his scimitar. Saldís blocked the curved length of his scimitar with hers, kicking the wrist of his other hand away before it could connect with flesh.
A chanted phrase, a wave of his hand, and beetles erupted from the ground beneath her feet, swarming over her body. The suddenness and outlandishness of the attack threw her from her stride. His blade slipped through the rising tide of insects to slice at her. Saldís failed to react in time…
…but Akhora did not. Akhora surged to the forefront, dominant in an instant. Steel clashed with steel as her blade parried his at the last moment.
"Breeder," he hissed.
Something dark and furious lifted its head, something birthed by years of taunts and treachery. Akhora's sight turned red. This was the last time he'd dare utter that despicable name near her. The absolute last.
Coherency fled. Akhora became a mindless creature of war, the beetles forgotten. Her body and sword moved as one like never before. Every lesson clicked into place, and her blades blurred. The clash of metal upon metal was a music whose tempo increased with each verse.
Thought returned only when Valkthor lay on the ground, her scimitar to his throat and her dagger cuddled close to his privates. A handful of beetles yet scurried over her, but without his guidance most had fallen away and burrowed back into the desert soil.
Green eyes spat venom at her. Guitan declared her the winner, but before she rose, she whispered, "Call me that again, and you will never sire children." A dark and gentle smile curled her lips, one she showed him by lowering her face veil. "I do not threaten. Remember this."
Saldís walked away from the fight victorious but shaken to her innermost being. For a few minutes, she'd become Akhora. She was so unsettled, she lost her next match at the onset.
That night, Saldís snuck out of the barracks into the infirmary while most of Caeldor slept. A few bribes, a few threats, and her path was cleared. Collecting the herbs she needed from the dispensary, she mixed them and choked them down dry.
The cramping in her belly started almost immediately, and she bit down on the heel of her palm until she bled. She couldn't cry out.
Saldís hadn't expected the pain to be so severe nor last through the night as it did, but she schooled her body to remain passive upon her bunk. Pain was a small price to pay. She'd take a handful more doses to be sure, but likely, the deed was done.
Saldís would never be a Breeder.
The day after House Sangahyando selected blond-haired Novice-Arcanist Dugoran to lead them to victory on their first mission, the senior Novices emptied out of the barracks in full desert gear. Heads and faces were covered with sand-colored turbans and veils, bodies were protected by loose linens coupled with stiffened leather vests, vambraces, and boots. From belts hung weapons, packets of rations, and water pouches.
The six teams departed in silence. Their orders? To march to Umbar. That, too, was a part of their final Test. Wiry, desert-bred cats fell in behind them at no signal they could see. Spies to mark their progress.
Once they'd left the valley, the six teams parted ways, some veering more northward, while others fell back or hurried forward to distance themselves from the other Houses. A single cat kept with each, and Saldís couldn't help but glare at the cat padding next to Dugoran.
She loathed the beasts. It was one such as this, influenced by Kimilzor's magics, that had lured her from the marketplace at Thorin's Hall. That, Akhora—Nay, Saldís, she hastily amended—would never forget. Nor forgive. She hated cats almost as much as she did the race of men.
It took the better part of two months to reach Umbar by foot, largely due to their orders to avoid detection. No Haradrim could spy them. This, too, was a part of the Test. To be spotted, even if they slew the soul to preserve their secrecy, would mean instant failure. The cats would ensure the truth came out.
The five subsisted on their rations and woody tubers native to the harsh climate, and when their water pouches ran out, they did without until they located a well from which they could draw while the Haradrim clan in question slept. The two Arcanists ensured the villagers never saw them.
At last, they reached Umbar, successful in the first leg of their journey. From there, they found themselves assigned to a Corsair ship under the command of a bow-legged man named Hirrim. They had two weeks to learn everything they could about piracy.
Then would come the final part of their Test: an actual assault upon a coastal town of their choice in search of booty.
Saldís stood upon the deck of the Corsair ship, the other four members of Sangahyando House milling about elsewhere. For the first time, she and her team wore the traditional black jerkins and close-fitting trousers that was a Black Númenórean's war attire instead of the looser desert garb that had been their uniform throughout their training.
The Corsairs whispered, eyes often turning towards herself and the other Black Númenóreans with fear and curiosity. Though the Númenóreans had been with this crew for three weeks now, two to learn as much of sailing as possible, the last to choose a target with Captain Hirrim's guidance, there was no intermingling. Allies, yes, but not trusted and certainly not friends.
She didn't care. The noose was closing around Saldís's neck, and panic trembled through her fingers as they slid across the ship's railing.
Mahal, help me. Adâd…
What to ask? Adâd was not here. He'd never be here, and mayhap he never had been. More likely, the toymaker had been nothing but a product of a child's mind all along. A people such as his could not exist. The bleak world she knew wouldn't permit it.
In the end, it mattered not if he was delusion or real. She was alone. It all rested in Saldís's hands. Akhora's hands.
The ship glided in silence towards the distant coast of Anfalas. Soon, they'd row to shore on the dories packed with their gear. Then, the carnage would begin. Their target was a small fishing community farther along the coast than any Corsair had raided in decades. It was a bold move, but the town should be relatively undefended. She and the other four members of her House would lead this crew as they laid waste to the village, taking what they wished and torching the rest.
A press of eyes. Valkthor, she assumed. He'd be watching. He was ever watching, hoping she would falter. It was what he longed for, her destruction. Always, he'd yearned to be Kimilzor's eldest offspring for the prestige he assumed it would bring. While it was true Kimilzor's eldest was most likely to be named his heir one day, it didn't ensure the position.
But Valkthor left nothing to chance. He'd removed the first impediment to his ascension. He'd be only too happy to see her removed, too. Even better if she did it for him by shrinking back now.
Panic clawed at her. She was not yet seventeen years old. The part of her that insisted the Khazâd existed remembered young Finnur and his proud proclamation that he was nineteen. None of the dwarves' children would ever face this. It was unfair, all of it.
Familiar anger surged at her anguished indecision. What was she supposed to do? Tears pricked her eyes, weakling and stupid. Akhora sneered. She would do what must be done.
Saldís's next inhalation was ragged. Mahal. What was she becoming?
Adâd?
A signal from steel-eyed Dugoran, and her time of debate ended. Saldís tucked her face scarf info place, hiding her features, and followed the other four Novices into the boat that would carry them ashore.
Saldís was embroiled in battle all too soon, swept along in events out of her control. Mahal help her, she little wanted this. An outcry to her right, and Saldís spun around, scimitar and sword-breaker both dripping crimson blood.
Someone had set the village ablaze, alerting the countryside that something was amiss. Fool! Summoned by the fire, men burst upon the scene from more than one quarter.
One group stood out from all the others: Swan Knights. Bearing the device of Dol Amroth upon their tabards, the heavily armed troop made short shift of the Corsair lack-wits who'd drawn their attention so precipitously. Saldís's anger climbed higher. What were Swan Knights doing here?
Mahal. Finished with the Corsairs that had inadvertently summoned them, the Swan Knights charged in her direction. Prickles raced up her spine, and she shouted orders to face them to the fifteen Corsairs under her command. Her response was automatic—she'd been trained for this.
A moment of doubt. Hate men or not, these had not earned her enmity. They were not her enemy.
They are today, her Akhora-self coolly proclaimed. Enough had been stolen from her. No one—no one—would rob her of life or consign her to the Den.
But they aren't my enemy. Her sight wavered as tears burned her eyes and clogged her throat. Thus far, she'd managed not to slay anyone. Lame, yes, and disarm. All done in such a way as to look unintentional. Saldís suspected her tricks against the villagers would not work as well against these trained knights.
The Swan Knights slammed into her small band like a steel battering ram. Saldís found herself on the defensive, reluctant to kill them. The sword-breaker that'd been so successful in snapping the blades of the villagers' poorly-made swords did nothing but capture and block the Gondorians' superior weapons.
The Corsairs in her team died in bloody sprays at her sides. They had not been without some skill, but against these, they hadn't had a chance. Saldís was soon outnumbered. Sweat trickled down her face. A flare of frustrated anger kindled. She'd spared the knights before her, time and again. Did these knights not have the wit to realize?
"Your days of murdering and pillaging are over, Corsair witch," one growled, his eyes shadows within his conical helm.
A grunt, and the knight to her left collapsed, revealing Dugoran in his wake. In silence, the Arcanist slipped to her side.
Her hand was forced. Frustration turned to fury. Dugoran would see her punished if she shied away from doing as commanded now. Saldís bowed to the inevitable but hated what she was being made to do.
Why, she longed to scream to Eru. Why had He allowed this?
She changed tactics. From holding the men off, Saldís moved to strike at any weaknesses she spotted in the knights' armor or formation.
Why did they have to be here? They shouldn't have been here!
The first, she took down with a jab into his kidney through the joint above the hip. With a cry, he fell to his knees. Saldís turned from him to counter the attacks of two other knights, then kicked the wounded knight in the neck, snapping his spine and killing him.
The second knight, she felled with a flung dagger to the eye. One after another, she and Dugoran executed them with cold efficiency. The tenor of the fight changed. Fear began to grow among the knights. Better trained than the Corsairs, the knights might be, but they were as outmatched by the two Númenóreans as the Corsairs had been by them. A fact they began to realize.
One cut and ran. Whether his intent was to alert someone or merely to escape, Dugoran's short, "Yours," robbed her of the option to let him go.
Spitting curses to herself, Saldís obeyed, feeling the walls close in around her. Trapped. The noose was so tight about her neck now that she could scarcely breathe. Why, why, why pounded through her brain.
Her frustration climbed. Asking why hadn't solved a thing since she'd been torn from the life she'd wanted, and she didn't expect it to now. Eru, it seemed, didn't care. Bitterness swelled to new heights, joining the anger. Perhaps the Hands were right. Perhaps Eru was a lie and the Valar no better than the Duumvirate, playing games with the lives of lesser peoples. They'd certainly abandoned her.
The knight ducked between squat, stone structures, delving deeper into the village. She pursued after the briefest hesitation. All around, anything not stone burned. Heat radiated from both sides of the street, stealing her breath and giving the air itself an undulating shimmer. From the western part of the village, Saldís heard shrill screams.
Down one lane then another, he raced, leading her in a convoluted path that circled back upon itself. But then he stopped, planting himself before a small family, and Saldís's steps slowed to a halt. Two children. Husband. Wife. Mahal. Her heart stopped beating. The little girl… That could be her. And the little boy, someone very much like Finnur.
Her sword tip dipped, and the blood drained from her face.
The Swan Knight flicked a lightning-quick look at the other man. Then to Saldís, "You don't have to do this," he said, his voice assuming a calming tenor.
Images of the Breeders' Den, of the bloody altars and the Shadow flashed through her mind. What use, resisting? What hope had men, really? Her blade wavered. Lowered another inch. Two.
Hope flashed upon the Gondorians' faces.
The knight took one step towards her, and her blade snapped up, shaking.
He stopped, his own blade steady.
Footsteps from behind. Dugoran. He came closer. Closer.
She firmed her grip on her blade. There was no escape for these. The village was lost. Why, Eru? She felt the cornered canine, and the pressure built and built. She had to do something. A tidal wave of disaster neared with every crunching footstep of Dugoran's approach.
Frustration flashed to unmitigated rage. In that moment, the Gondorians before her became the cause of every woe she'd endured. They were men, and men had stolen everything from her. Everything was their fault. Why did the knight stand there? Why didn't these people run as they should have? Why did they put her in this position?
Saldís's eyes narrowed as her fury turned colder. How dare they remain in their safe houses in their peaceful town when children were being brutalized elsewhere? Where were they with their lily-white morals when she'd been beaten? When she'd been forced to kill?
No different. They might wear a gentler visage, but these men were no different than the Black Númenóreans. The Gondorians had allowed this. They'd caused this. By letting Berúthiel go, a known sorceress. Instead of executing her for her crimes, the Gondorian king had put her on a boat and sent her off, uncaring where she went…the very same woman who would later single-handedly begin the rebuilding of the Black Númenóreans far from Gondor's gaze.
Their fault. All of it. By their foolishness. Their refusal to act when they should. It was their fault, their fault… Reason fled behind a veil of sanguine rage and hatred. Her mind screamed in fury and an anguish so deep it shredded the soul, her ears ringing with the sound.
When sanity returned, Saldís's scimitar and dirk dripped blood. She panted, hair plastered to her skull from sweat. Her body shook with exertion.
A sick feeling welled up, turning to horror as her eyes focused beyond her blade tip. Very little remained of the knight or family, and most of it unrecognizable. Those footsteps she'd heard before finally arrived, and she turned numbly. A teenager. Not Dugoran at all, but a villager. The kid stared at her, the whites of his eyes showing. He moaned in terror, turned tail, and ran.
What had she done? Her scimitar and dirk clattered to the stone pavement. What had she done?
"Nay," she gasped. Saldís stumbled and dropped to her knees. "Nay." She stared at her blood-covered hands in horror.
And screamed.
The rest of the night blurred. A cold numbness had replaced her heart, and she knew she'd never be warm again. Evil. She was evil. All the honor she'd believed in, all the Khazâd—
No. She stopped the thought. She didn't have the right to use that tongue anymore. She tainted it. All the dwarves had stood for, she had betrayed.
Coward. If she'd had any spine, she'd have fallen defending those knights and these people. Instead, she was the monster who'd destroyed them. Monster, monster, monster rang through her mind with condemnation. She'd become the villain she'd always despised in Ori's stories, and she wished for death, but even death now was barred to her. She would find no peace in a grave. She'd find Eru…and His justice.
Had He any.
Her steps were heavy as she ransacked the town with the others, taking valuables and trying not to look at the townspeople's bodies.
There was nowhere to run. Kimilzor would always find her. Life was a burden she was terrified to be divested of.
Adâd… But even Adâd would turn from her now. She loathed herself.
It was over. The struggle. All of it. With tired, heavy steps, she walked to a building engulfed in flames, its heat hot enough to scorch her flesh. Her fingers dipped inside her boot and pulled out the flute, rotating it between two fingers. For a split-second, she could almost hear Uncle Bofur playing a merry tune on his clarinet as a younger, innocent Saldís giggled with delight.
She hurled into the flames, chest heaving and throat tight with tears. As it burned, Saldís willed herself away, too. Better to fade, to just disappear. She'd murdered an innocent family, and there was no going back.
She was damned. Eru and the Valar would never welcome her. Everything she'd been, everything she'd valued, they were lost to her. Better to forget who she'd been, to wipe the past from her mind. This was her life now. Darkness. Violence.
Akhora firmed her spine. If this was all she had left, then by the Eye, she'd hold on to every minute of her life with both hands. Death would see justice upon her, but in the meantime, the world would know her fury. The world had turned her into this.
With a tilt of the head, she pivoted on one foot. Time to rejoin the others.
Elsewhere…
Bifur shot upright from the inn's narrow bed, his heart a-thumping and hands clammy. Saldís. Chilled pinpricks raced up his spine. There he sat, gasping for breath, trying to calm his heart.
At long last, breathing freely once more, Bifur flopped back upon the thin mattress. A nightmare. 'Twas just a nightmare. Mahal, preserve me. With both hands, he scrubbed at his face, unsurprised to find his cheeks damp with tears. Aye, such nightmares had hounded him, they had.
But tonight's… Tonight's had been something altogether different. The images faded, not coming to mind, but his heart remembered the terror of his Saldís in mortal peril, and he not able to find her. "I'll not let you go, my lass," he whispered into the dark room. "Not while I have breath in me." He cared little if the odds were against him. Saldís was his daughter. He was her adâd. Naught would change that.
From the other bunk, his cousin's low snores sounded. Bofur had stayed with him, he had, after they departed Gondor. To Dol Amroth, they'd traveled, and from there north and west. Dori and Ori had headed to the Wold, spreading word of their missing lass from town to town among the horse lords.
And Nori… Well, Bifur owed Nori more than he'd ever be able to repay. Nori risked the Harad Road to the south.
I should have gone with him. Nori had been adamant he go alone, but Bifur should have put his foot down. By Durin, the thief was without fear. Valar keep you, my friend. My brother.
'Twas the truth, Nori could go where the rest of them dared not. The thief had connections from his less-honorable days that Nori intended to contact.
Do you remember how loved you are, my Saldís?
He and Bofur were almost done searching this patch of Middle Earth. Once they spread word of the reward to the next town over, it would be time to return to Gondor to await Nori, Ori, and Dori's return. And from there…
If there was no sign of Bifur's daughter, it was time to return to Thorin's Hall and then on to Erebor. His heart warned he'd receive no good news from either, but it was the next logical step.
She was but a month from her seventeenth birthday now. A young lady. He imagined what she must look like with her black hair, her gray eyes, and that bonny widow's peak.
A pang. Did any treat her as the blessing she was? Did his lass even live?
Hang on, Saldís. Live, my lass. Someday, somehow, I'll find you.