Upon the seventh day of Our Most Revered Defender's foray into the deep sands, Your Executor has lain eyes upon what has until now been unseeable. The passage was arduous, and it often proved difficult to follow the Opalescent Road as it lay buried throughout most of the journey. As was written in previous correspondence, unanticipated discoveries have followed our every step. The evidently recent burning of the Sentinel City of Marwin remains the most disturbing, however there has been no shortage of other such irregularities. Though the passage was long, the destination has been reached.
The Imperial City of Shan Alee conveys a sense of the grandeur their empire once embodied. The scale upon which the city was constructed is staggering to Your Executor. It is the belief of Our Most Revered Defenders that the Imperial City was residence to no less than three million. These figures dwarf the population estimates for the far east who have long been known to be sparse in numbers, save for the Spired City of Althandor. Even the Cities of Jade within our own empire are not comparable. Ancient structures lay half-buried in the dunes, yet the storied craftsmanship of that era remains evident. Your Executor mourns and begs forgiveness for the deficiency of visual artistic skill that prevents an adequate representation to be conveyed to Our Glorious Emperor.
Ji Min paused and lowered her ink brush. She rarely did this, but she believed the occasion warranted an indulgence. It took a moment of rummaging through her writing case to find her pencil. She returned to her journal and wrote an annotation beneath the primary script. This additional commentary would not be recorded by the imperial scribes, and few outside of the emperor's immediate family and most trusted servitors were likely to ever see it.
Father, the city is remarkable. A lifeless ruin, but remarkable nonetheless. It is beautiful without equal. I must be circumspect within the text, but here I may say without reservation that the Cities of Jade are collections of hovels in comparison. I have not yet seen so much as a tool shed that is not spellwrought.
There was more Ji Min wished to add, but the sound of footsteps approaching her secluded spot within one of the Imperial City's structures drew her attention. The steps were lightly placed. Ji Min didn't need to look up to recognize them as belonging to Lita, hallah'ha of the Harkh'alash.
Lita entered the ancient building through the open entryway. Her wide-brimmed hat, long duster coat, and scarf covered nearly the entirety of her. A khopesh hung at her hip, none other than Emerald's Wrath. It was another masterwork of the sword sages and the ancestral weapon of the Harkh'alash.
Ji Min became abruptly anxious. She took deep breaths so as not to reveal how nervous Lita's presence made her. Calm yourself, she thought. Simply remain collected, and all will be as it will be.
Only Lita's brown eyes were exposed to the sun. As Ji Min interacted with more Espallans from more varied tribes, she'd begun to realize that the Amak'talan's tendency towards light eye-coloring was a rarity. Most of their race possessed brown, black, or hazel eyes. The green and silver Ji Min was used to must have come from the Amak'talan's foreign lineages.
Ji Min nodded to Lita and made her journal ready to be put away. Her inkwell and brush were placed back within the writing case, and she took out the lacquer to preserve what she had written so far. The rest could be completed by day's end.
Lita's eyes traced about the interior of the building. The ground was covered in a thick layer of sand, and the elaborate mosaics upon the sandstone walls were cracked and faded from centuries of neglect. Two walls were open to the air outside, supported by delicate columns whose spellwrought nature was the only reason they hadn't collapsed. A staircase behind Ji Min rose to the second story, and scattered remnants of wood were the only evidence of the furniture this room once contained. It was believed due to the large kitchen and storages in the next rooms that this had once been a sort of public eating establishment.
The notion of such a place was lost on Ji Min. The Espallans, however, seemed to think it only natural, and it had been they who had identified the building's purpose.
Lita was one of four hallah'ha taking part in the expedition. In addition to the Amak'talan and Harkh'alash, those of the Sha'shara and Hohk'ita came along with cadres of their warriors.
"We are leaving soon," Lita said in Espalleese, her voice muffled by her scarf. "Your hallah'ha is returning from his search of the surrounding buildings. The tribes move out once Hagen brings word."
It was a good thing that Ji Min was growing more comfortable with the local language. Otherwise, she wouldn't have caught a word of that, muffled or not. She was beginning to understand more now that she was spending her evenings among them at the cooking fires rather than secluding herself within her tent. Her proficiency improved by leaps and bounds. She still didn't trust her accent to speak clearly, but she believed she could understand most anything that was said to her.
Ji Min finished lacquering her entry. She pulled the scarf down from her mouth to gently blow the lacquer dry.
"Did you not hear me?" Lita asked. She came a step closer. "What's that you're writing?"
Ji Min turned the open book towards Lita, allowing her to see the calligraphy of the Script of Jade.
Lita stopped short, and her eyes went wide beneath the brim of her hat. They then went to Ji Min, astonished. "Sun's light," she whispered.
Oh dear, Ji Min thought. It only occurred to her then that it hadn't been made known to the other tribes exactly who she was.
Since leaving the holdfast, Ji Min had forgone her usual white robes and veil. As she insisted on accompanying Hagen to the Imperial City, he suggested that her traditional attire would be insufficient for an excursion into the deep sands. At first, Ji Min thought that the bulky clothing would positively murder her beneath the desert sun. A long-sleeved cotton shirt, leather leggings, sturdy boots, long duster coat, gloves, muslin scarf, and a wide-brimmed hat should have turned her wardrobe into an oven. Quite the opposite, it kept her cool in the daytime, warm at night, and protected her pale skin from burning in the sun.
It seemed to have also disguised the fact that she was not Espallan.
Lita took off her hat and prostrated herself before Ji Min. She adjusted her speech to broken Tongue of Jade. "I no did aware, Executor. Please, forgiveness."
That is not how I sound to them, is it?
The thought was humiliating, and Ji Min couldn't allow Lita to be humiliated in the same fashion. That would show disrespect she could never allow towards the Espallans. Ji Min spoke slowly, and she knew her accent was thick, but she made herself use Espalleese.
"No forgiving needed. I must ask for yours. I had believed Hagen told the other hallah'ha that I was coming along."
Lita's brow furrowed, though she didn't raise her eyes. Ji Min's first thought was that Lita was trying to sort through her accent, but she instead was showing signs of indignation. "Sun take that hoerna," Lita muttered.
"Pardon?"
Lita pulled the scarf down. Her mouth was small with full lips. The angular cut of her face was marred by a broad scar across her hook nose, deforming the shape of her right nostril. Apprehensive, her eyes darted from side to side. "I asked Hagen of his unarmed ish'ri when our warriors joined. He claimed you were an Amak'talan scholar he brought to make record of what was found in the Imperial City. When I asked why you didn't speak to any but the Amak'talan, he..."
Ji Min wrinkled her nose when Lita hesitated. "What did he say?"
It was sometimes difficult to tell when an Espallan blushed. The color didn't readily show through their brown skin. However, when Lita's cheeks darkened three full shades, her mortification couldn't have been more obvious.
"Hagen said... that you were shy and that I should be forthright if I meant to pursue you."
The admission took Ji Min so completely off-guard that she fumbled her writing case, spilling leafs of loose paper over the sand. She barely noticed her clumsiness until Lita came forward to help gather them up.
"I will not, amah," Lita assured her. "I wouldn't dream of dishonoring one of your position in such a way."
Ji Min scrambled to pick up sheets of blank paper, crumpling several in her haste. "No, not at all. That is, it would not be a dishonor." Her words were breathless and frantic as she rushed to get them out. "Though rare, it is seen as a great honor when one in the Jade Empire weds an Espallan. The law rules such unions the same as marrying into a family of higher position. It brings Glory to the whole clan and even allows an elevation of caste. That is... I mean..."
Oh dear, I tend to ramble when I become flustered.
Lita had a stack gathered up. She took Ji Min's hand and placed the paper in her palm. "You see? You wouldn't benefit. It isn't as if the emperor's daughter could elevate any higher than she already is."
Ji Min was grateful for the scarf covering her. It hid her own blushing. She made herself look up to Lita's face. The brown eyes staring back at her had a gleam of amusement in them. Something else, also. Ji Min couldn't say that she'd ever seen anything quite like it. Whatever that look meant, it was making Ji Min's heart race.
She'd been mistaken. Her attire had indeed become an oven. She felt as if she were about to burst into flames.
Looking into Lita's eyes, Ji Min was frozen in place. For the first time in her life, she experienced a most disconcerting sensation. She could not think.
"Elevating is not so important," Ji Min heard herself say.
Didn't one of the Canticles of Glory say otherwise? One of the earlier ones. In the state she was in, Ji Min couldn't exactly cross-reference what she'd memorized. Therefore, without any available evidence to refute her observations, it must have been true. The most true thing she ever said. Inviolable.
Lita's rosebud lips pulled into a slow smile, and she leaned a hair's breadth closer. She had yet to let go of Ji Min's hand. It was fortunate they both wore gloves, or else Ji Min would fall to pieces from the direct contact.
"It's time to go, imé," Hagen said as he strode into the building. "Akar spotted movement a half-league towards the center, and... Oh, your pardon. I'll come back."
Hagen performed an about-face and beat a hasty retreat. Lita, however, was not about to let him escape unpunished. Before anyone could stop her, Emerald's Wrath was in her hand, blade shining with green light, and she swung the hooked sword one-handed in a tight arc in Hagen's direction. Draw, strike, and sheathing the blade was all performed in the same fluid motion.
A gust of wind whipped through the chamber, and sand kicked up off the ground in a straight line that passed a bare few inches to Hagen's left. Hagen tensed and stood in place. Slowly, he turned his head to look back at Lita, mouth pulled into a line and eyes contrite. As he did so, a section of wall fell over after it was sliced clean through.
"You..." Lita growled, rising to stand tall. "You scoundrel. Had your father not given water to mine when it was needed, I would slay you where you stand."
Hagen's eyes flickered to Ji Min, who stood with her hands clutched anxiously over her chest. "Is something the matter, Lita?"
"You know damned well what's the matter!" Lita snarled. "We've come to cursed sands where no ish'ri or hallah has walked in six hundred years, and you brought the Jade Empire's Executor?"
Hagen cocked a thumb to where Emerald's Wrath had sliced through a two-foot thick block of spellwrought stone from six paces away. "Even so, seems an overreaction."
Ji Min had to admire Hagen's composure. Having an ancestral sword swung at you must have been an uncomfortable experience that she didn't wish to share.
Lita stalked towards him. She brought her face an inch from his, jaw jutting forward and her mouth fixed into an angry scowl. "I will not forget this."
She stormed off, clipping Hagen with her shoulder as she passed him. Her fists were clenched at her sides as she left the building.
Hagen let out a sigh and scratched at the back of his head. "See, this is why I never married a Harkh'alash. Hearts born from the Maiden's furnace."
Ji Min had her things gathered and approached. She stood on her toes to give him a peck on the cheek.
"What's that for?" Hagen asked, startled.
"Thank you. Lita might not have talked to me otherwise."
Hagen grinned and touched his knuckles to his cheek where she kissed him. "No need to thank me, imé. It was my pleasure."
Ji Min pulled her scarf back up to cover her mouth and nose, mostly to hide her girlish smile. She felt... youthful... in that moment. "I hope Lita isn't too cross with you. But I must say, when I asked you to encourage her to court me, I didn't realize no one knew I was me."
"Lita's tribe is spiky, but the Sha'shara would bury me up to my neck and walk off with my hat. You know how they dote on People of Jade, and they'd declare feud with Amak'talan if they thought I wasn't doing enough to keep the Executor safe."
Ji Min winced. "In that case, I will find Lita and take full responsibility." She brought her fingertips to her lips and suppressed a giggle. "I mean to say, that is a very fine hat, and it would be a shame if it were stolen."
Hagen snorted as he led her outside. "Sun's light. If Lita doesn't kill me, your father will for corrupting you with our ways."
On some level, Ji Min felt guilty for being a devious, little troublemaker. On so many others, she was exuberant and more alive than she'd felt since arriving in Espalla. "I know my father, hallah'ha. I suspect he hoped for such corruption when he appointed me. Now, you said Akar found something?"
"Signs of the steam men. An abandoned camp site. We dug up the latrine pits to get an estimate of their numbers."
Ji Min made a disgusted face behind her scarf. "You can tell how many there are by their poo?"
He laughed uproariously. "Men must poo and can only poo so much. We think there's fifty, but there may be other groups in the ruins."
Ji Min eyed his gloves askance and tried not to gag.
"Once we had a count, we heard clamoring from ahead. We went to the rooftops for a vantage and saw people. Only a few. Likely a patrol. They never saw us."
"And they are Althandi?"
Hagen shrugged. "Too far off to tell. Easterners for certain, but from which kingdom doesn't really matter. They all serve the king of the steam men. What of the apotheoses? The priests sense nothing since yesterday. Have you had more luck?"
"No. I am no more sensitive than your people. A good deal less, I think."
"I hope this doesn't mean they've finished doing what they came here to do."
Ji Min nodded. He was right, of course, but Ji Min secretly wished that they might arrive to find the trespassers already gone. Anything else would surely lead to fighting, and the Canticles of Glory forbade the People of Jade to take part in war. Any war, until the last war.
"Your friend," Ji Min said carefully, "has she sent you further word of the Dragon Empress?"
Hagen shook his head. "Only that Empress Enfri has left the White City. My friend was unable to stay at her side, but she sent others to watch in her place. The Dragon Empress is marching north, but I know little else. We'll learn more soon, imé. I'm sure of it."
They reached where the Amak'talan warriors stood in a line astride their mounts. The other three tribes were gathering as well. All together, a hundred of the best Espallan fighters and pathfinders available had ridden to the Imperial City. A number of priests and workers, the ishri, accompanied the hallah but would not take part in any fighting. The Espallans were led by their hallah'ha who wielded the ancestral swords of their tribes.
The camels waited around a large cistern. Long ago, it had been one of the legendary crystal fountains of the Opalescent Road. Broken shards of a crystalline structure glittered from underneath the water.
They'd come across many such fountains, both in abandoned villages and out in the wilderness, all of which were long dry. This one, however, still had clean water bubbling up from deep underground. The ancient theurallurgy that powered this particular artifice had miraculously survived the centuries, and the Espallans took advantage of any water they could get their hands on in the deep sands. The riders refilled their skins before moving on, and they allowed the camels to drink their fill.
"Careful, imé," Hagen cautioned as he assisted her up onto her camel. "If we come across the steam men or other easterners, keep a firm hand on her reins. A camel can get as fierce as a scale lion once the scent of blood hits their nose."
Ji Min patted her mount's neck, and the beast crooned a guttural call in response. She'd learned to associate that racket with contentedness. The animals stank like nothing else and had the thickest, most vile saliva imaginable. She'd wondered aloud at the onset why the Espallans used camels. After all, horses were faster. Hagen had provided the answer to her question. He said camels were wiser and knew to pack supplies in their hump for the journey. Ji Min thought Hagen was joking until Akar explained camel biology to her.
As Hagen went to see to his warriors, Ji Min looked ahead towards the center of the Imperial City. She thought she would have gotten used to the sight by now, but it still took her breath away.
Sandstone gleamed like gold from every direction. Buildings, some reaching heights of ten stories or more, lined the wide streets and boulevards. The glittering Opalescent Road underfoot was mostly free of sand, and Ji Min followed its path towards the city center with her eyes. They'd entered the Imperial City early that morning. Now, it was past midday, and they had yet to travel even a quarter of the way to the center. The Opalescent Road ran far into the distance until it appeared no wider than a spider thread.
There, at road's end, arose the single grandest structure Ji Min had ever seen. She'd seen accounts of the Palace of Towers within the City of Althandor. While the home of the Highest King was without a doubt larger, it could never be more than a fraction as beautiful.
Graceful domes of gold and glass, spindly towers that seemed fragile, vaulted archways, and gigantic statues depicting mortals and mighty. The structure was nearly as large as the city of Marwin, and it seemed to shine as bright as the dawn. No living soul could look at such a wonder and see it as anything but the home of the Dragon Emperor.
Around Ji Min, the Espallan warriors began to stir. A low murmur rose among them, and their camels grew agitated. Ji Min's mount tossed its head and bleated in distress.
"What is it?" Ji Min asked of a nearby Amak'talan. By luck, it was Akar.
"Do you not see, amah?" Akar asked. He pointed towards the palace. "There. The steam men know we're here."
Ji Min raised a hand to shield her eyes from the sun's glare as she peered ahead. The palace was unchanged, and she saw no sign of Althandi soldiers or anyone. She was about to ask Akar for further clarification when she saw what was causing the commotion. What she had before taken as buildings were beginning to rise into the air. From this far off, Ji Min guessed that they were three stories tall.
She gasped. Not buildings, but one of the eastern wonders of technology she'd read about. There were ten of them, wooden structures born aloft by steam-powered artifices, propellers, and canvas sails aligned parallel to the hull. Airships, and each would bear a complement of at least thirty aviators. The appeared much like sailing vessels at sea, except their keels were flat on the bottom, and the masts jutted off to the sides rather than straight up.
"Hallah," a man at the front of the Espallans shouted. He would be the first warrior for either the Sha'shara or Hohk'ita. "Spread out against volleys from above. Call out spell echoes as they are felt. We make for the palace!"
The warriors cried out a battle cry, and they surged down the Opalescent Road. Stealth and caution were thrown to the wind, and they spurred their camels onward.
Hagen's voice rose above the shouting warriors. "Ish'ri will hold and follow in one hour."
Akar nodded to Ji Min before leaving. "Be safe, amah."
"And you."
Ji Min pursed her lips. She hadn't come along just to sit back and wait. Whatever goals the easterners had within the Spired City, the emperor needed to know about them as soon as possible. No, she would not stay back. She intended to give a sending and be ready to pass on everything as it happened. Ji Min snapped her reins and followed the warriors.
The Espallans weren't yet in full gallop. It was more of a determined canter. The road sloped gently downward, allowing Ji Min to see what was ahead of the group. She felt her hands tremble as she recognized a large gathering of men forming up into ranks less than a mile away. They were equipped with spears and steel armor. They were afoot, though there were several on horseback.
I... I am not disobeying the Canticles, Ji Min told herself. This is not taking part in a battle. I am simply close to one. Very close.
Hagen, Lita, and the other two hallah'ha rode in front. They drew their ancestral weapons and held them high for those following them to see. As one, the blades began to shine bright.
Sapphire's Fury, Emerald's Wrath, Arisen of Honor, and Haft Unbroken. All four had songs and legends extolling their deeds, sung throughout both Espalla and the Jade Empire. Four masterworks of the extinct sword sages led the way into battle.
The Espallans picked up speed and charged the enemy. The airships turned lazily and moved to settle overhead. Men began to shout warnings of spell echoes above and ahead, to the flanks, and even behind them. Around her, Ji Min saw warriors swivel their heads to seek out the sources.
Have we run right into an ambush?
The warriors rode on as if unconcerned.
It was like a thousand blasts of spellfire struck all at once. It came from every direction. From the soldiers ahead, from the airships above, and from the buildings they galloped past. It engulfed the Espallans. Camels screeched in terror, but the riders didn't make a sound. They rode on, heedless of the Glory expended to destroy them. Untouched by spellcraft, they charged on.
How? Ji Min wondered. Wards? Who could have placed them if the ish'ri are staying behind?
Four lights lit the way through the storm of magic.
The easterners readied their spears to meet the Espallans. They wavered, clearly unsettled by the ineffectiveness of their arcanists. The hallah'ha were the first to come upon them. Before Hagen, Lita, and the others were ten paces away, the first row of spearmen crumpled. Fountains of blood spurted from wounds inflicted at a distance. As bodies fell to the sand, the Espallans crashed into the easterners in force.
Ji Min pulled back on her reins and steered her camel towards an old ruin. She came to a stop in a sheltered alleyway between buildings. Her voice shook from witnessing such horrific violence, but her incantation was clear. Once the first couplet of Aeldic words of power was complete, she felt the touch of a wind spirit on her cheek.
Before directing the spirit, Ji Min took a moment to pray. She asked that Hagen be safe. For Lita as well. Their conversation had been brief, but Ji Min wished very much to feel Lita's eyes on her again. She asked that Emerald's Wrath would see the hallah'ha of the Harkh'alash safely through the battle. Her prayers said, Ji Min told the spirit who to give her sending to.
"I seek Our Glorious Emperor, Ku Jun Seo."