They ran to the horse barn, Ben trailing after his fast, determined sister while he silently dreaded the night ahead. Wind and Night, their horses, were waiting for them at the fence. Ben knew Isika had been calling to them in her mind as they ran. He reminded himself that he wanted to see how the rangers fought the fire, even as his stomach dropped with anticipation of the trouble they were going to be in.
Where were the Othra? Where had they disappeared to, when the guard came in and announced the fire? Keethior would be a huge comfort right now, but he was nowhere to be seen.
Ben stood with the two horses while Isika went to get the saddles, listening to their music as they tossed their heads and danced away from the glow in the sky. Panicky notes were threaded through their calming song. Ben loved to listen to the music of animals; so much more than merely peaceful. It was like a clear pond. The notes didn’t tumble over one another in a web of sound, the way human music did. The sounds were distinct and clear, different for every kind of animal, and within the types, different for individuals.
But the horses were clearly afraid. Isika came around the corner, carrying the saddles, and Ben told her what he was hearing.
“Are you sure you can calm them?” he asked. “This is a lot of poison.”
Isika furrowed her brow. She turned and held her hand out to her tall, gray horse, Wind, who walked to her and laid his muzzle in her hand. Immediately his music changed. The panicky notes disappeared, and he whuffled a sigh.
“I think so,” she said, stroking his nose. “If there is trouble with the horses, though, we can come right back.”
Ben nodded. Isika reached out to his black horse, Night, calming her. They saddled up with the cloth saddles the Maweel used, mounted, and were soon on their way, heading in the direction of the enormous glow. The fire was outside the city, and Ben was surprised by how far they had to go, considering how huge the ominous light was. He shuddered to imagine a fire any closer. They crossed the long meadow that took them on a roundabout way to the north road, past fields and farms Ben had never seen before. Isika seemed deep in thought, quiet as she rode.
The color of the sky was like nothing Ben had experienced, orange and deep purple, glowing as though it were alive. He heard tendrils of deep, disturbing music, that seemed to be coming from the smoke itself. His stomach hurt.
They drew close to a farm and a little stand of trees, and just beyond, the first sight of the flames themselves, like a slap in the face. Ben reeled from it, tears springing to his eyes.
“Isika,” he murmured, but she was ahead, she didn’t hear him, so he followed, hoping to call to her, to warn her. There was a roaring, the flames and the wind were loud, and underneath the fire, the music he had been trying to escape his whole life. Why was it so familiar? Ben didn’t understand. He needed to stop and think, but Isika’s horse was far ahead, and Night needed to be in Isika’s presence, the only thing that could calm the horses when they were this close to poison. He pushed his horse to catch up.
Just beyond the next stand of trees, Isika halted. Beyond was a wall of flame, and Ben saw the dark silhouettes of the rangers working at the fire, but he couldn’t tell how, because his vision was blurring, lights crackling at the edges of his sight.
“Isika,” he croaked, and this time she heard him, her face full of worry as she turned to him.
“Your room, Ben,” she said. “Put the sounds in your room.”
He shook his head, frantically, eyes wide. This was not that; this was something different. He had enough sense, as his vision swam again, to slide down the side of his horse before he fell off. He leaned against Night’s side, but the horse was skittish and danced away from Ben as though his hands were sparks. Isika reached out to try and calm the horses, and Ben couldn't help it, he crumpled on the ground, cursing his weakness as he did.
Then all was fire and noise. He heard horrible, discordant music. Wave after wave of sound and memory hit him, things he hadn’t remembered since he was a small boy.
He saw bright colors, white sand. Dunes that stretched until forever. Hands, reaching for him. Saying goodbye to his mother, never enough time. Pain as blow after blow hit the backs of his legs. A caning, he remembered, huddled on the ground. Watching another slave boy being caned. Crying in his bed. Sleeping in a tangle of other boys. Plucked from sleep in the night to scrub floors after the king had a party. The king! The Desert King. Ben had been one of his slaves. He remembered. Remembered the face of the man he was never supposed to look at, but couldn’t help seeing. Then, even then, Ben had heard the music, had looked around its source as it taunted him and made him crazy.
The king kicking a slave away. Dropping more wine on the ground and ordering the woman caned for clumsiness. Ben sitting in the corner, exhausted, trying to keep from falling asleep.
“And this one?” The king saying, pointing at Ben. Dread and terror. “What will we do with this one? Bring him here.”
Hands again, pulling him from under his arms, dragging him across the floor to the king. Ben limp with fear, the horrible music growing louder, filling his mind.
“What is he doing? What’s wrong with him.”
“This one is always afraid, Brightness.”
“Boy? Boy?” Lying with his face on the floor, unable to look up.
“Worthless. He’ll be a cleaner all of his life. What a waste.”
And then, the man who once again plucked him from sleep. But this time, no more scrubbing, only a quick walk into the women’s quarters, where perfumed smells came from every corner and there was his mother. Walls that billowed with fabric, sounds unlike any he’d heard. Sounds of sorrow and beauty. His mother, her beautiful face. Running to him, holding him close.
A quick intake of breath from her, a tight squeeze, and then her face, scared and gaunt. Her round belly.
“You think we can make it?”
“Yes, lady,” a voice, the voice of the man who had taken him from sleep. “We will go at night. I know someone who will help us get out.”
Behind his mother’s robe, the girl, his sister, someone he had only seen a handful of times. Her eyes big in her face, her music soothing, even then. Rounded cheeks, happy eyes. A fierce stab of jealousy. She lived with their mother. And he had scrubbed floors under the eye of the terrifying king. His mother held another sister; a sleeping toddler. Family, he thought, and the word was strange in his mind.
They left through a secret door in the walls of the city. Then, the desert. For months and months, the desert. Sand and heat, night cold. The infinite sky. Happiness.
The desert was clear of poisonous sounds, and he was with his mother. He learned to lock away the memories of the city, of pain, of the cruel king. He wanted to be friends with his sister, who seemed to be afraid of nothing, so he locked away his jealousy, too. He stayed close to his mother, touching her at all times, if he could, so nothing could ever pull him away from her again. Her face, smiling down at him. Gently tugging his hand from her robe so she could adjust the little sister on her back.
Another memory, then. The sand rolling down. The man saying farewell. The little tent. The four of them, alone. Ben’s perfect happiness.
“Benayeem,” a voice called. “Ben, come back.”
He heard Isika but didn’t want to follow the sounds of her voice. He didn’t want to leave his mother there, in the desert, but it was too late because his eyes opened a crack and she was gone, her face disappearing from sight, and someone else’s face was very close. It took several heartbeats to understand where he was. The sounds were so loud, the music of his nightmares, the fire licking at the edges of his vision. But the music was muffled, he realized as he came back to where he was. Isika. She was holding onto him, holding the music away.
Benayeem remembered. He wasn’t a five-year-old boy anymore. He wasn’t helpless. His mother was long gone and he was a singer. He was nearly fifteen and he was taller than his foster father. He had learned to control the terror and fear.
He took a deep, shaky breath.
“What happened?” Isika asked. Her eyes were huge, her mouth a line in her face. “You were talking, you were calling out to Mother…”
He shook his head once, hard, focusing on pushing the sounds back.
Ben saw how shaken she was, and the firelight reflecting in her eyes. He collected the fear, the sense of helplessness, the longing for his mother, and he put all of it into the room he had built in his mind. He sat up.
“This is the magic of the Desert King,” he said.
She stared at him. “What? How do you know?”
“I think I was one of his slaves, in the Desert City, when I was a small boy.”
“What? Didn’t you live with us?”
“You really don’t remember?”
“I’ve told you that a thousand times… no I don’t remember. You know I wanted you to tell me, because I can barely remember anything. It’s all… blank. Like an empty wall.”
He was silent, looking at her. He knew now, why he refused to remember, all those times she begged him to talk about it. It was the misery beneath it all, the fact that she had been with their mother always, and he living with a lot of other little boys, beaten for mistakes, always in the presence of the terrible king. Deep under everything, the pain of those days could still break him. Somehow, deep inside, the jealousy and anger still lived. His pain had nothing to do with her, he knew it, she had barely been older than him. So he had pushed it away, so the anger couldn’t ruin the friendship they had formed, out there in the desert, playing with sticks and the baby goats of the nomads. They had been like little goats themselves. They had learned how to be friends.
“I remembered a lot,” he said, “just now. I wasn’t with you. I lived with the slave boys in the palace, and you lived somewhere else, with a lot of women and our mother.”
He turned to look at the fire. “It doesn’t matter now.” Though his mind seemed to feel differently. “But this is his work. What does he want? Remember, the priests said they captured us for him. What does he want with us? Do you think he knows we escaped?”
Was all of it some wild plan to get back an escaped slave boy? But his voice, when he said Ben was only good for cleaning. Why would he care?
Isika stood, offering Ben a hand. He took it and stood beside her, feeling his strength coming back to him, feeling himself return. He was Benayeem the discerner, the gifted one. He had helped save them in the Worker City. He wasn’t that same little boy, hearing the word, “worthless,” echo in his head again and again, wondering why it mattered so much.
Just then, voices, nearby.
“Oh, you two, here? Really?”
He turned just in time to see the look on Jabari’s face when Isika’s full anger turned on him. The look returned Ben to himself, as did the sight of her stomping toward Jabari.
“Don’t you dare say a word, Jabari, you hypocrite. You know we should be here.”
Ben smiled.