Kings of Ruin (Kingdoms of Sand Book 1) Read online

  Epher groaned. He had heard this talk a thousand times before. Koren was the only one in his family who knew about Claudia; the others would have reacted far worse.

  "An hour," Epher said. "I beg you."

  "I don't see begging." Koren pointed at the ground. "I want proper groveling. A good kissing of my horse's hooves to start, followed by a poem about my magnificence, then perhaps a donation of fifty shekels to appease my wrath."

  Epher groaned. "Wait for me, or when we come back home, I'll tell Ofeer about that time I caught you wearing her dress."

  Koren blanched. "You know I was just rehearsing for a play!" He groaned. "Go. Go! Take your hour."

  Epher nodded, his nervousness only growing. He pressed his heels into his horse's sides. Old Moosh, a brown gelding, headed downhill toward the city of Gefen.

  The gates of Gefen were normally open to all, only a single guard yawning at them. Those gates were closed this night, and many warriors stood on the gatehouse battlements. All here, however, knew Epher's face and name. He was Lord Epheriah Sela, heir to this city, the port, the coast, and the hills. His father ruled these lands, and his mother was sister to the late queen. The guards bowed before him and pulled open the city gates. His fingers tingling, Epher rode into Gefen.

  The streets were silent tonight. The people hid inside their small brick homes, peering through the windows. Epher heard no sound but the clanking of Moosh's hooves along the cobblestones. When he turned a corner and crested a hill, he could see the harbor down the street, the lights of the Aelarian ships there. Thousands of legionaries stood on those decks, waiting for dawn, waiting to storm through this city.

  Soon he was riding down Cypress Road, named for the palisade of trees that grew alongside, offering privacy from the busy streets of Gefen. Here was the wealthiest road in the city. The manors of merchants and lords rose behind the cover of trees, and the sea whispered beyond them. Epher rode, holding a lantern. Not that he needed the light; he had ridden here so many nights. But those had all been nights of secret excitement, of joy. Now as he rode, the cypresses alongside the road seemed to close in around him, and stones seemed to fill his chest.

  Finally Epher saw it ahead: an iron gate blocking a pebbly path. He dismounted, tethered his horse, and reached into his pocket for the key. Past the gates, the path led him through a garden toward a white villa. This was nothing like his family's villa outside the city walls. His family's home was a place of comfort and warmth. This villa rose twice the size, all icy marble, its columns supporting a pediment engraved with the Aelarian gods. Glass lanterns—real glass, costlier than gold—hung from poles in the garden, shining like moons. If the coast of Zohar had anything akin to a palace, it was this—home of Tirus Valerius, Aelar's ambassador to Zohar . . . and his daughter.

  Epher was walking toward the villa's portico when a pebble hit him, and a voice whispered from the trees to his right.

  "A thief! I'm going to have to crucify you!" A giggle sounded in the shadows. "Come here, you swarthy intruder."

  Epher couldn't help but grin—even with the fear, even with looming war, just the sound of her voice kindled joy inside him. He walked toward the cedars, and he saw her there.

  Claudia smiled at him, that old mocking smile of hers, her chin raised, her hands on her hips. She wore a silk stola garment in the style of wealthy Aelarian women. The azure fabric shone with silver embroidery, complementing her pale skin. A string of sapphires shone around her neck. A delicate net strewn with diamonds held her hair back in a bun, allowing a handful of carefully arranged curls to fall across her brow—a hairstyle popular in Aelar this year, one some wealthy women in Zohar had even begun to emulate. Claudia was everything he was not—pale, delicate, refined. If he was a wild desert lion, she was a splendid bird of many colors.

  "Claudia." He took her hand in his. "I had to talk to you. I—"

  She hushed him with a finger to his lips. "Shush. I haven't ravaged you yet."

  She tightened her grip on his hand, turned, and ran through the dark garden. Epher followed, and she took him past a palisade of cypresses toward a moonlit lawn. A stone table rose here by a pool, and flowers bloomed in vases. The villa rose farther back behind the trees. Epher tried to speak again, but this time Claudia silenced him with a kiss. She pressed against him, her hands in his hair, tugging at his tunic.

  "Take this off," she mumbled. "Make love to me. Here on the table."

  He wanted to. Oh God above, he wanted to. For three years now, he had loved Claudia, had been coming here into her garden, meeting her on the beach at night, even—sometimes, when everyone else slept—sneaking her into his family's villa on Pine Hill. For a moment, he surrendered to her warmth, her love, her soft lips, the joy she brought him. He kissed her, letting her pull off his tunic, feeling her body move beneath her silken stola. But then he pulled back.

  "Claudia, wait. We have to talk."

  She pouted. "First sex. Then talking. I haven't seen you in three days." She hiked up her stola around her hips, pressed herself against him again, and whispered into his ear. "Take me here on the table. Please, Epher."

  Gently, he pried her hands loose, and he looked into her eyes. "Claudia, there's an Aelarian fleet in the port. They bear three legions, all ready for battle. It'll be war, almost certainly. You have to leave this city, at least for a while. Every Aelarian here will be in danger."

  Claudia sighed and looked away. She spoke in a low voice. "I know, Epher. I've known for a long time. My father has been recalled to Aelar. Our ship already waits, loaded with our belongings. We're setting sail before dawn."

  Epher blinked, for a moment speechless. "You . . . you knew about this?" He frowned. "For how long?"

  She shrugged. "A few months." She reached for him again, tried to kiss him, but he held her back.

  "A few months?" he said, too loudly—loud enough that her family in the villa might have heard. "And you didn't tell me? You knew my land was in danger, and . . . All those times we met here, all those long walks on the beach, all those dinners with your parents, and you told me nothing?"

  She touched his cheek, her eyes soft. "Oh, Epher, I couldn't tell you. My father made me promise not to tell anyone. If your people knew, they would suspect trouble. They would muster a larger army, raise greater defenses. And . . . well, now the legions are in the port, and now I'm leaving, so . . . well, now you know."

  He blinked again. "Claudia! I . . ." His voice dropped to a whisper. "You should have told me."

  Now her eyes flashed, filling with sudden anger. "I should have done nothing of the sort. I'm the daughter of an Aelarian lord, Epher. My duties are to my empire. Not to you."

  He winced. "I thought you loved me, Claudia. I thought you would care more that you were recalled to Aelar. I thought you'd—"

  "What, shed a tear?" Claudia rearranged her stola and raised her chin. "Write you a love song? You know I'm not a sentimental girl. You've always known that. You wooed me because I have great tits, because I love to fuck you, and because I'm an exotic beauty of pale skin. Not because we had any sort of future. You've always known that."

  He pulled on his tunic. He felt frozen. He turned away, then looked back at her. "Why do you only tell me now? When I came into the garden, why did you . . . why did you try to . . ."

  "What, let you fuck me first?" She shrugged. "Because I like that. I wanted that. I deserved that—at least one more time before I leave. And I knew that if I told you first—told you I'm sailing away tonight—you'd do what you're doing now. You'd get upset."

  "Of course I'm upset!" His eyes stung. "Aren't you? You should have told me. And what if I hadn't come here tonight? Would you have just slipped off before dawn without a word? After all these times we've spent together, you at least owe me a—"

  "I owe you nothing, Epheriah Sela." She glared at him. "Nothing. I'm the daughter of an Aelarian praetor. I'm among the most powerful women in the world. You are a Zoharite, nothing more. I enjoyed our time togethe
r. Truly I did. But do not ever think that I owe you a thing."

  "I loved you once," he said. "But now I don't know who you are."

  Claudia fixed him with a dry stare. "Or maybe now you know exactly who I am."

  Epher could bear it no more. He turned and left the garden. He rode back to the hills outside the city, and he rejoined his brother.

  At first Koren opened his mouth, perhaps prepared for another jape. Then he looked away, remaining silent, perhaps seeing the turmoil on Epher's face. The two brothers rode on through the darkness, leaving the city behind.

  SENECA

  He stood on the prow of the Aquila Aureum, flagship of his fleet, staring at the heathen city.

  "Pathetic." Seneca scoffed. "Look at them. They barely have a hundred candles among them to cast back the darkness. Aelar shines with a million lanterns, while the barbarians lurk in shadows."

  Fifty thousand Zoharites lived here in the city of Gefen. It was the second largest city in their kingdom, following Beth Eloh in the eastern mountains. Yet there was no splendor here. The walls were tall but crude, the bricks carved of craggy limestone. A temple was barely visible beyond them, its dome simple clay, no gilt or statues adorning it. Back in Aelar, a city of a million souls, colossal statues of gold soared taller than these walls. Armies marched under archways engraved with scenes of battle. Palaces and temples glittered, shining with many lanterns. The night never fell upon Aelar, they said, but here the night cloaked the land like a shroud, and even during the daytime, the sunlight had illuminated only crude stone and the dregs of humanity.

  "The Zoharites will not open their gates," said Remus Marcellus, commander of the fleet. "It will be war."

  Seneca looked at the general. The man towered over him, as he towered over most men. Remus wore splendid armor, golden eagles embossed upon his iron breastplate, a red crest of horsehair rising from his filigreed helm. Yet despite his regalia, Remus Marcellus seemed less like a creature of splendor, more like a prowling beast whose fine coat belied its cruelty. The face was leathery, and deep grooves framed thin lips.

  But more than anything, people noticed Remus's eyes. They were dark eyes, dark as a viper's heart, cold and hard. As those eyes stared at the port, they vowed death more surely than a prophet of doom. Seneca remembered the stories told about Remus Marcellus, that the general had crucified two thousand children on the coast of Leer. Not because Remus was bloodthirsty. Not because he was cruel. But because he was efficient, and fear was more efficient than iron around the Encircled Sea.

  He scares me, Seneca thought. On a whim, he can turn against me. I must keep him on a short leash.

  "I don't want war," Seneca said. "Not here on the coast, so far from Beth Eloh. Not with only the three legions my father gave me." Gave me, not us. "We need Sela's help if we're to reach the capital."

  Remus Marcellus turned those cold, hard eyes upon Seneca. The gaze wasn't a glare, barely even a stare, just a blank look—and yet those eyes still pierced Seneca. Eyes that were windows to a hundred past battles, to a thousand men killed. Eyes that danced with the dead. It was all Seneca could do to meet Remus's gaze, to resist taking a step back.

  "My prince," the general said, "what is Beth Eloh but a hive of rats on a hill, a place where heathens dance to their invisible god and priests rut in the sand with desert whores? Aelar reigns because she rules the ports around the Encircled Sea. Our strength has ever been in the sand of the coast, not the sand of the desert."

  Beth Eloh is the key that unlocks the chest of my inheritance, Seneca thought. Beth Eloh is the trophy my sister races toward. Beth Eloh is my father's love. Beth Eloh is Aelar herself and my ass on her throne.

  But he could not say these things to Remus Marcellus. What did this general care for the battle between a prince and princess of House Octavius? The man was a soldier, that was all. A mighty soldier, yes, one who commanded many, one who wore the finest regalia, one with eyes like stones, but a soldier still. And soldiers always obeyed. Soldiers did not ask questions.

  "If he doesn't open the gates at dawn, he's a fool," Seneca said. "I offered to make him a king. A puppet king, yes, but a king nonetheless. I want his forces. I want his three thousand warriors leading our way to Beth Eloh. I want them dying on the front lines of their civil war, paving our road to their capital." Seneca clenched his fists, staring at the city beyond the water. "But if he refuses, we will shatter those gates. We will kill his men. We will enslave his women and children. We will tear down every building in this city and plow a field where it stood."

  One way or another, he vowed silently, I will win the lume for Father. I will become his heir. And when I'm emperor, Porcia won't be worthy of licking my sandals.

  He turned away from the prow and walked across the deck of the Aquila Aureum. She was a large quinquereme ship, a gift from his father, given to Seneca last autumn for his nineteenth birthday. Her hull was painted crimson and inlaid with golden filigree, lined with ninety oars and shields per side. Her great sails were now folded, but when unfurled, they revealed glorious eagles between laurels, wings spread across bloodred fields. A wooden fortress rose from the deck, topped with battlements and archers.

  Many legionaries stood at attention as Seneca walked by, geared for war. Many more slept within the bowels of the ship. Across the port, other Aelarian ships waited in the shadows, the moonlight glinting on their legionaries' armor. Some of these men had seen battle in the great wars against Leer and Gael. Others had never thrust a blade outside the practice yard; soon they would be tested.

  Seneca grabbed a lantern, stepped through a hatch in the deck, and entered the body of the ship. A ladder led down to a dusty, elongated chamber. Hundreds of galley slaves sat here, chained to their oars. They stared up with hollow eyes, their backs whipped. They had not left this ship for three weeks. As Seneca stared at their blank faces, he imagined the Sela family chained here to the oars, forced to propel his fleet to future victories.

  "Soon you'll sit here with them, Atalia," Seneca whispered as he walked through the ship. "You'll carry me across the Encircled Sea, chained and whipped, until I finally allow you a slow death in the arena. No lions for you, I think, but a nice, slow crucifixion that lasts for days."

  He licked his lips to imagine the tall, beastly woman on the cross. He vowed to nail her in himself, right beside the rest of them—that brute Jerael, his meek wife, and all the others.

  "But not you, Ofeer." Seneca's blood heated at the memory of her. "You'll be there with me, laughing as they die."

  He savored the thought of Ofeer the half-Zoharite. There was something about her more intoxicating than wine. The noblewomen in Aelar were fair, to be sure, but too proper, too dull—pale beauties who knew everything about the gods and nothing about how to suck a cock. Ofeer was different. With her olive skin, black eyes, and mocking lips, she was exotic, endlessly tempting. Her body had wriggled nicely under his, and her breasts had perfectly fit his hands. He wanted her. He wanted her again and again, every morning and every night—a woman with the grace of Aelar and the wild beauty of the desert.

  But now—now another woman of Zohar awaited him.

  Past the rowers, he opened a wooden door and stepped into his cabin. It was no imperial chamber such as those in his Aelarian palaces, but it was comfortable enough. Curving cedar panels formed the walls, polished to a sheen, supporting shelves of scrolls. Nurian rugs covered the floor, embroidered with ibises and elephants. Candles burned in eagle-shaped sconces, casting golden light onto a giltwood table, an upholstered chair, and a bed topped with quilts far too thick for this hot eastern realm.

  Taeer was reclining on the bed, awaiting him, staring from under thick lashes. She wore red silk hemmed with gold, and a belt of coins encircled her waist. A Zoharite, she had deep brown eyes, full lips painted crimson, and curly black hair that cascaded across her shoulders and onto the bed. A golden eagle pendant hung between her breasts, sigil of the empire she now served.

  "They wil
l fight you," Taeer said, voice as dusky as her skin. "I've foreseen it in the luminescence."

  And suddenly everything that Seneca had been above deck—the noble prince, the great warrior, the commander to strike fear into men's hearts—suddenly here, standing before Taeer, that man seemed to shatter. Seneca lowered his head, and his breath trembled.

  "Taeer," he whispered, eyes stinging. "Taeer, I'm afraid."

  She rose from the bed like red smoke unfurling from fire. Her eyes shone like her jewels. She walked toward him, smiling thinly, and embraced him. He laid his head against her shoulder; she was tall enough for it. She embraced him, cooing into his ear, and he held her close. She smelled of myrrh, of rose oil, of his childhood.

  "My sweet, noble prince." She trailed her fingernails down his cheek. "You're not afraid, sweetling. You're merely eager for battle."

  Taeer had been with him for most of his life. He had been only a toddler when she had arrived in Aelar, a tribute from Zohar, a girl of twelve—a lumer to serve him. And all his life, she had served him—changing his swaddling clothes, singing to him, and eventually, when they grew older, joining him in his bed. Now, standing here in his cabin, she pressed her lips against his, and they kissed. Her kiss was hot, wet, her tongue seeking, her hands gripping his hair.

  "I'm only eager for battle," he repeated.

  She nodded, smiling crookedly, and played with his hair. "You are a great warrior. The Zoharites cower before you."

  Seneca thought back to the villa on the hill. He had tried to intimidate the Sela family. To show them he was a conqueror. But Atalia had grabbed a knife, pointed it at him, nearly killed him. Soon Seneca was shaking.

  "There was a woman," he said. "Her name is Atalia. She . . . she tried to kill me. She'll be standing on the walls of Gefen now, waiting for me."

  Taeer pulled him toward the bed, sat him down, and sat beside him. She stroked his cheek. "The people of Gefen wait for you to liberate them, to welcome them into the Empire as you welcomed me. Atalia cannot hurt you, my prince. Nobody can hurt you. If you fight your enemies, you will emerge victorious."