“Another assassin? Are all of you assassins?” He swept his eyes across them all once more-then put his head back and laughed. “If you have come to kill me, you’ll find it more difficult than you thought!” He dropped Ashi’s knife to the floor of the cavern and plucked at his garments, pulling the cloth out tight where she had stabbed him.
The fabric was whole. There was not a tear, not even a mark. It was as if she hadn’t attacked him at all. Ashi stared in amazement.
“You’re Dabrak Riis?” said Midian. “You’re really Dabrak Riis? Sage’s shadow, how is that possible?”
The amusement in Dabrak’s face vanished. He looked first to Ekhaas, then to Dagii. “To which of you does that creature belong? Silence it. I will not hear its screechings.”
“Your pardon, Marhu Dabrak,” Ekhaas said quickly. “It will not speak again.” She stepped forward and dropped to her knees, gesturing for the others to do the same. It seemed like a very good idea to Ashi, and she sank down. They all did, even Midian. Dabrak sat back with satisfaction on his face. Ekhaas looked up at him and said, “We’re not assassins, marhu. We just didn’t expect to”-she hesitated, then added-“find you still alive.”
At any other time, in any other place, Ashi might have laughed at the understatement. How could Dabrak still be alive? The Empire of Dhakaan had been gone from the world for more than five thousand years. Dabrak couldn’t just have been sitting in the cavern all that time-could he?
He only nodded in response. “So that much time has passed,” he said. “The world thinks me dead. I suspected as much.”
Ekhaas looked startled. “You know that time has passed?”
“Of course I know.” He gestured at the cavern around them. “I may not feel it here, but before they abandoned me, Razhala and my other guards would go out through the shrine and report on the passing of the seasons.” He sighed. “They didn’t have the strength to stay, though. One by one, they left me-faithful Razhala was the last. But eventually the trolls came. They have been my guards.”
“The trolls are your guards?” said Dagii.
“You encountered them, didn’t you, warrior?” Dabrak looked pleased. “They were wild things when they came, but I tamed them. The smallest of them entered the shrine and ventured in here. It was a challenge to work with them, but I had the power to mold them.”
He lifted the Rod of Kings and it seemed to Ashi that even that simple gesture carried with it a swirl of power. For a frightening moment, it seemed that Dabrak wore authority like a cloak-then the cloak vanished as the rod settled back into his lap. “I still feel a distant connection to them,” the emperor said, as if the display of power was something so casual he barely even noticed it. “I know their pack still watches over the Uura Odaarii. You must be mighty indeed to have passed them.”
Ashi could tell from the faces of the others that they had felt the rod’s power as well. Dagii seemed awed by it, Chetiin stunned. Midian looked gray with fear. She felt a little bit afraid herself. This was the power they would bring back to Haruuc?
Ekhaas struggled to speak again. “The Uura Odaarii, marhu?” she asked. “Is that this place?”
Ashi didn’t recognize the words. Chetiin was closest to her, and she glanced at him. “The Womb of Eternity,” he translated for her.
Dabrak’s attention was all on Ashi. “You haven’t heard of it. I’m not surprised. I traveled across the length and breadth of my empire just chasing down the rumors of it,” he said. He sat forward, the movement making the shriveled folds of his face slip like a loose mask. “Tell me, what stories do they tell of me?”
“They say that you left your palace to face the source of your fears, vowing to return and continue your rule,” said Ekhaas. “You were seen now and then across the empire-until one day you disappeared completely.”
“The day I finally located the Uura Odaarii,” said Dabrak. “You speak with the grace of a duur’kala. What is your name?”
“I am a duur’kala. I am Ekhaas of Kech Volaar.”
“The Kech Volaar. I don’t know that clan.” Dabrak sat back. “If you are a duur’kala, Ekhaas of Kech Volaar, you understand the nature of emotion. Tell me: What is the source of all fear?”
“The unknown,” Ekhaas said.
Dabrak gestured angrily, as though her word were flies he could shoo away. “Some would say that,” he said, “but it’s not true. What about someone who was afraid of spiders? They are hardly unknown. He sees a spider and knows it, yet he is still afraid. What is he really afraid of?”
Chetiin answered. “He’s afraid of what the spider might do.”
“Well said, golin’dar.” Dabrak held up a finger. “He’s afraid of what might happen. His fear isn’t in the moment, it’s in the might. What might a spider do, what might happen in the dark, what might happen if I venture into the water? The source of all fear is the future, and the future is inescapable. Except here.”
He rose to his feet and gestured with both hands. Once again the power of the rod washed over them. Ashi thought she could feel an echo of the profound fear that had earned Dabrak the name of the Shaking Emperor. She shivered herself and pressed her hands against the cold stone of the cave floor to keep them from trembling. Dabrak noticed nothing, though thankfully he lowered the rod again.
“I first heard of the Uura Odaarii from an old golin’dar, a traveling midwife who came to the palace to deliver a son to my cousin,” he continued. “She cast an augury during the birth, as was customary, but as she did so, she saw my terror. She was the first to recognize all the fears that plagued me as a single fear of the future. She told me the scrap of a legend, that in the time before Jhazaal Dhakaan brought together the Six Kings, there was a secret shrine in an ancient kingdom where it was said all of the future was born. People would search out the shrine and make offerings there in hopes of staving off a bleak destiny.”
His eyes looked into the distance. “When I left my palace, it was to find this mysterious shrine. I consulted duur’kala and dashoor. I even ventured into the dark marshes to speak with orc druids and onto the dry plains to speak with halfling shamans. If it had been necessary, I would have crossed lines of ancient enmity and spoken with the undying elves of Aerenal. But it wasn’t. I found a name, the Uura Odaarii, and the hint of a location hidden only a day’s travel off one of the empire’s roads. But most importantly, I discovered a clue to its true nature. When I reached the shrine and broke through it to this place, I knew that I had conquered my fear.” He looked down at Ekhaas.
“What the ancient people believed to be birthplace of the future is far more than that. Within the Uura Odaarii, time has no power. The future is out there, but not in here. Within this cavern, there is only an eternal present.” Dabrak Riis smiled. “Within this cavern, I have nothing to fear!”
Ashi couldn’t hold her tongue. “But that’s impossible. Time’s passing right now.”
“Time passes, but it has no effect. Can’t you feel it? Can’t you see it?” The emperor pointed one gloved hand at her torch. “Fire is frozen as soon as it enters. While you are here, you won’t grow hungry or thirsty.” He touched his chest where she had stabbed him. “Nothing changes here. If you were assassins, you couldn’t kill me. However you are when you enter the Uura Odaarii, that is how you remain until you leave. The power even extends into the valley-I’ve always believed that’s why the trees around the shrine are so huge and ancient.”
“And why the stonework of the stairs and the shrine is so well preserved!” Midian burst out. “By the quill, it’s incred-”
“Ekhaas of Kech Volaar, silence your slave!” snarled the emperor.
“Silence yourself!” Midian said sharply. “If nothing changes in this cavern, you can’t hurt me.”
Dabrak thrust out the Rod of Kings. “Be silent!”
Ashi felt the force of the command like a shiver in the air. Midian’s mouth snapped shut with such force that agony crossed his face.