“I know.” Priya shifted and laid a hand on Asha’s knee with uncanny ease. “It is a wild and dangerous thing, but it can be controlled. You’re controlling it now.”
Asha stared at her hands. “How? How did you save me?”
Priya’s hand traveled up to Asha’s face where she gently massaged the herbalist’s forehead around her eye. Instantly she felt serene and sleepy, her eyes drifting closed as she leaned against her friend’s hand.
“Well, if you recall, I actually have a great deal of experience in caring for angry spirits,” the nun said with a smile. “I spent more than an hour chanting the tisarana into your ear before your body changed back to normal and you fell completely asleep. And when that seemed to soothe you, I spent the next several hours repeating the chant over and over again to you. The repetition helps to bury the words in your mind. It was a common practice at the monastery where I trained.”
“Then, am I healed now? Is it under control?”
“No,” Nadira said. She was staring at the foreigners from across the fire with her sword naked in her lap. “You really don’t understand what’s happened, do you?”
Asha frowned. “I tried to kill the dragon by draining its soul into my golden needle.”
“Obviously, the dragon’s soul was too big for your little needle,” the Damascena said. “It was almost too big for you too. And now you’ll have to live with it inside you every day for the rest of your very unnatural life.” She sighed and squinted at the sun. “And you know what will happen if you lose control of it. It’ll consume you. It’ll turn you into a monster.”
“That won’t happen,” Priya said quickly. “We’ve already learned how to control it. And with time and practice, I know that Asha will be able to master the dragon completely on her own.”
“I pray that she does. Or maybe you should pray for me.” Nadira scowled at the fire and slowly lifted her gaze to look at the herbalist. “I’d hate to have to kill you.”
“Fair enough,” Asha said. She took a moment just to breathe and listen and feel. The dragon’s soul was like a ball of fire in her belly, rolling and tumbling gently around and around, sometimes spinning faster and growling, but mostly rocking softly from side to side. Waiting. Asha closed her eyes and imagined tranquil meadows and quiet streams, clear skies and silent mountains. And the dragon fell quieter still, nestling down deep inside her. Asha opened her eyes. “I can do this.”
“And I’ll help you.” Priya turned to the warrior. “Will you join us? Will you come with us? This life of yours hasn’t brought you peace or happiness. Even I can see that. Come with us.”
“No.” Nadira sniffed and spat in the fire. “But thanks for the offer.”
Priya nodded. “Well, where will you go now? Back to Damascus?”
“For now. But there’s talk of another war coming, as always. If the army marches, then I’ll follow them, to Constantia or wherever it is. And you?”
Asha shrugged. “Gideon said there were other immortals in Alexandria. Maybe we’ll go there.”
Nadira nodded. “The Aegyptians may be able to help you. They’re very old, and they know a lot about souls. But keep an eye out for Lilith. She’s out there somewhere too, and she’ll be interested in you. Very.”
“Lilith? Is she the courtesan from Damascus?” Asha asked.
“Yeah. And she’s not your friend. She isn’t anyone’s friend.” Nadira stood up and slid her saber into its scabbard, which she rested across her shoulder. “Well, it seems you don’t need me anymore, so, you take care of each other.” She scratched between her legs, rearranged her trousers, and walked away.
“Wait! Please!” Priya called out. “Please don’t go yet, sister. You don’t have to be alone. You don’t have to walk this path anymore. Come with us to Alexandria, or we can come with you to Damascus. We’re all searching for some sort of peace or truth in life. We can search together. You don’t have to be alone.”
Nadira paused. “Yeah, I do.”
Asha and Priya sat and listened to the soft crush of grass as the woman walked away. The wind whipped through her old armor, making it click and clack softly as her short hair fluttered around her head.
“That poor woman,” Priya whispered. “Such a miserable, empty, dark life.”
“I know,” Asha said. “But I think she’ll be all right. Someday. Maybe she needs to be in a dark place for a while before she can find the light again. I spent eight years in a coma. You spent two centuries in a cave. But we woke up. And maybe someday she’ll wake up, too. Time is on her side, at least.”
They sat and listened to the wind playing through the tall grass. Asha glanced over her shoulder once at the distant shape of the dragon’s body lying at the bottom of the hill. “I should go find my needle, I suppose. We should burn the body too, but I doubt any campfire of ours will consume that creature.” Then she looked down at her hand. “I wonder.”
In her mind’s eye she conjured an image of fire and the sound of angry voices, the clash of swords, and the screaming of eagles. The smooth flesh of her hand rippled into golden scales and scarlet claws. But Asha held the violence in her mind in check, fencing it in to one small corner of her heart, keeping it focused and narrow, directing it only at the memories of a single act of cruelty, a single doctor’s face, a single tragedy from long ago. The transformation of her arm halted at the elbow.
Then she exhaled, banishing her rage and letting the calm meadows and empty skies fill her mind’s eye again, restoring her arm to its original shape and color.
Asha smiled. “This might not be so bad after all.” She turned to Priya. “So. What do you think? Should we go to Alexandria, or should we go somewhere else? Constantia, perhaps?”
Priya smiled and shrugged. “Whichever you prefer.”
The two women stood up and scattered their fire, shouldered a bag and a mongoose, and set out for the road.
Chapter 10
1
They stood on the stone quay overlooking the water. Asha squinted across the sparkling harbor at the steamship as it chuffed toward the dock with two white cloudy columns rising from its two funnels and more than a hundred passengers congregating on its deck. Priya leaned on her new walking stick, an ash pole with a thick brass ring set into its top holding half a dozen smaller rings and bells that jangled and tinkled when she walked. But now it was silent and the sounds of the city of Tyre pressed down on the women from all sides. Merchants, dock workers, carts and wagons, camels and donkeys, birds, fish, and crabs, and machines of all sizes grunted and whined and shouted and clanked and barked, their voices echoing off the faces of the harbor-side buildings.
“I’ve never been on a boat before,” Priya said. “I think the idea of it is a little scary. Just a little. A wooden house floating on the water, all alone, far from help.”
Asha nodded. “I’ve been on lots of boats, and never had any trouble with them. But if you don’t like boats, then be grateful you can’t see the one we’re about to board.”
“Why? What’s wrong with it?”
“Nothing’s wrong with it. Except that it’s made out of metal.”
“Oh.” Priya frowned. “How are you feeling today?”
“Fine. Calm. I slept well last night.”
“Good.”
An urgent shout drew their attention to the right where Asha saw two men high atop a stack of crates. They were struggling to lift the topmost box down, but the crates under their feet had shifted, sliding apart, creaking and crackling as the wooden planks began to splinter. The men balanced precariously as the crate under them rolled up at an angle as it tried to fall between two other crates below it. Both men were shouting at each other in some dialect that Asha didn’t recognize, but she recognized clearly enough that neither man was moving or doing anything at all to get out of harm’s way. The bottom crates slid apart a bit more, edging closer to the stones at the water’s edge.