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The Arai recruits rode on during the night, now far behind the general. At dawn Cal spotted tendrils of smoke lifting from the horizon. The horses stumbled out of the bush and onto the dirt track, their heads bent and hooves dragging.
Twin pillars of basalt with sundiscs carved into their bellies flanked the road, marking the border between Yándemar and Korelios. It was still two full days’ ride to the mountain training camp the recruits called home. Cal had lived there since he was twelve years old. The day he was taken, he’d been playing with his little sister in the fresh snow. The Arai had come out of nowhere, lifted him onto a horse, and clamped a smelly cloth over his mouth. By the time he’d woken up, they’d already marked him with their tattoo and the mileskúlos brand.
‘You belong to the king now,’ they’d said. ‘You are Arai. Forget your family. If you ever try to leave, they will be the ones to pay.’
Shaking off the memory, Cal nudged Artemis, who’d fallen asleep on his shoulder.
She yawned. ‘Are we home?’
‘We’re at the border,’ Cal replied.
‘Is that all?’
‘Don’t complain. You’ve just had a nice rest on my back.’
‘Nice? It was bony.’ Her stomach growled. ‘What I would give for some decent food.’
‘What would you give?’
‘You, of course.’
‘Ha! You’d have to catch me first.’
Something sharp prodded his spine. ‘Got you,’ she said, with a smile in her voice.
‘Traitor.’
Roan frowned at them, and Artemis returned the dagger to her boot.
Once they’d crossed the border, Roan reined in his mare and scanned the area with the acuity of a predator. Then he dismounted, unwound his mask, tugged off his helmet, and ruffled his curly black hair. It was the sign they’d all been waiting for – permission to let down their guard. There was a flurry of movement as face masks, helmets and jackets were flung into saddlebags. Artemis dismounted, kicked off her boots, and waded into the nearby creek. Cal filled his waterskin and took several deep gulps then washed away the charcoal from around his eyes. The water was cold and delicious. A few recruits sat on the bank, maybe remembering the twin who’d died. Cal was still unsure which sister it had been – he didn’t want to ask. The surviving twin stared at the smoky horizon and wiped away tears.
Roan leant against a tree away from the recruits. The three red stripes on his armband marked him as a captain in the king’s elite guard, but he could’ve been so much more if he’d wanted – an engineer, or maybe even a palace advisor. Instead, he’d chosen to remain in the mountains and prepare young Arai recruits for service. He was brilliant, intuitive and, when he thought no one would notice, compassionate. Qualities that in Cal’s mind elevated him to a much higher standard than General Alexander, though Cal would never admit this aloud. Cal was glad to have Roan as their captain. Their lives would’ve been very different if they’d trained under someone like the general.
Cal trusted Roan with his life – they all did. The recruits relied on each other too, and while most of them regarded one another as brothers and sisters, Cal had never been able to forget his real family. Safía, the little sister who’d dogged him like a stray dingo pup. Jakob, their father, whose soot-blackened smile and gruff laughter Cal sometimes thought he heard in the north wind. Lately, it was Safía who had been walking through his dreams, crying to him across the snow like she did the day he was taken. He was afraid he’d wake up one morning to find her at the mountain training camp, a fresh mileskúlos recruit to add to the expanding Arai ranks. She’d be the right age now – thirteen years old.
Cal shut his eyes and turned his face to the sun so he could see the redness through his eyelids. None of the other recruits had seen their families since they’d arrived at the mountain camp either, and nobody talked about their lives before the Arai. It was either too painful or too distant to remember. Artemis had trusted Cal, and only Cal, with her history. She didn’t remember her mother and didn’t know who her father was. She’d been brought to Roan as a baby. He’d raised her and she’d lived at the mountain training camp her whole life. Cal had told her his story as well – snatched from the doorstep of his father’s smithy – but he hadn’t revealed his fears about his sister.
The recruits knelt before the border stones and said a brief prayer of thanks to Basilias, the Korelian sun god. It was spoken without feeling. Cal suspected he wasn’t the only one who hated the gods for abandoning him to the Arai.
Roan mounted his horse and ordered, ‘Move out.’
Cal climbed up behind Artemis and they rode through the border town in silence. The cracking mudbrick houses were all occupied, some with two or three families sharing a single room. Cal saw threadbare rugs and rickety furniture through the split shutters. An old man leading a malnourished horse moved off the road and rested a hand on the animal’s muzzle to keep it quiet. Four skinny children in rags ran into the street, running circles around the smallest. When they caught sight of the black-uniformed recruits, they swallowed their laughter and scooted into the nearest doorway.
A frail woman sat on a step, her grey hair pinned in a bun and her bare, dusty feet sticking out from beneath a tattered dress. When Roan reined in his horse, she said in a voice hardened with bitterness, ‘There’s no point, sir. The general and his troops helped themselves to all our supplies. There’s nothing left.’
‘Oh,’ Roan said quietly. He paused, studying her and the half-hidden villagers for a moment, then flipped open a secret pocket in his saddlebag – one that the general’s guards must have overlooked – and drew out a purse full of coins. He dismounted and offered the money to the woman.
‘I’ll pay you for the food that was taken and whatever else you can spare.’
Her wary gaze flicked across the recruits.
‘We won’t hurt you or anyone else,’ Roan said. He pressed the purse into her hand then crouched down and whispered something in her ear. She went still, looking at him with a clarity that hadn’t been there before. She peered into the purse, rattled the coins to check whether the were real, then beckoned to a young man.
‘Give them some emergency supplies.’
The young man looked about to protest but her hard stare silenced him. He vanished into a dilapidated barn further down the road.
Dozens of faces peered out from windows, staying well clear of the sunlight. No one spoke, not even the youngest children. Cal shifted uneasily. He couldn’t help but wonder whether they were about to be ambushed.
Several long minutes passed before the young man reappeared with a sack in each hand. Roan took the sacks and distributed portions of bread, cheese and dried meat to each of the recruits. It was barely a handful for each of them, but no one complained.
‘Thanks, sir,’ someone said.
‘Yeah, sir. Thanks.’
Roan inclined his head to the old woman, who stared stonily back. Cal got the impression that Roan had told her something forbidden, something that could get them all in trouble if she repeated it. But that secret had won her trust and got them food. Cal wondered what the captain had said to her.
As they passed the last house, Cal glanced back and saw the town’s small population rush to the woman as she distributed the coins.