The weeks wore on and the toll became all too obvious. Aerolis and his city could fly through the sky forever, an eternity apart from the rest of the world, but we could not. The ferals could not. We were all starving. Our supplies ran out, even rationed as they were. All of us lost flesh, and some days our hunger was all we could talk about. Some people get angry when the hunger takes them. I am not one of them, but Ishtar is, and she has the wit and the tongue to back up her anger with insults that sting as bad as sword cuts. She reduced Imiko to tears on one occasion and I rounded on her so sharply I thought we would come to blows. Not the type we dealt each other in sparring, but true blows meant to wound or even kill. We were friends, and more than that, she was a mentor. I respected Ishtar more than I ever told her. But anger and hardship do not mix well together, and we both said some things I wish we hadn't.
The ferals became vicious. As a whole, their fur was never as well-groomed or healthy as Ishtar's, but even I could see it was becoming dull and mangy. More than once I came across one of the creatures gnawing at its own leg, as though it were so hungry it was willing to cannibalise itself. I couldn't help but remember the Damned down in the ruined Djinn city. How they had been in some sort of hibernation until we came along, and how they were willing to fall upon each other, devouring the dead and wounded. How different were the ferals, really? Were they already devouring each other down in the depths of Do'shan? There couldn't be much else to eat. Even Tamura was struggling to find rats to catch.
Hunger is a horrible thing. A gnawing ache inside that feels as though something is twisting unnaturally. Hunger clouds judgement and makes everything sharp and fuzzy at the same time. It frays nerves down to the very edge of snapping, and makes the skin sallow and sunken, waxy. I may never have been the most vain woman in the world, but I was well aware that sunken cheeks only made my scar stand out more, and that made me look worse than a Ghoul.
Aerolis seemed either unwilling or unable to rectify the situation, so I took it upon myself. What we needed was a way down to the surface. We needed to be able to allow the ferals to hunt or trade, and gather wood for fires. We needed a flyer but had not the materials to build one. I had no doubt Aerolis could get the engine working, nor that he had Kinemancy Sources to power it, but the only thing we had plenty of was stone, and no amount of whirring gears and propellers could make stone fly. Whatever magic could do that seemed to be beyond even the Djinn now that there was only one of them left.
When I approached the edge of the mountain, I did so with the intention of puzzling out a solution. I had magic and the will to use it, which, I was certain, counted for something. Do'shan was above land, broad expanses of fields, green forests that looked small from so high up, mountain ranges that grew from nothing to reach up into the sky. And I realised that I recognised the land. We were above Isha. In the far distance I recognised the Forest of Ten, and beyond it the Atare mountain range. We were close to the Pit. A plan formed in my head. It was a plan Ssserakis counselled against. Vehemently.
"Aerolis!" I was at the foot of the tower once more, my shout echoing along its length. I was no Vibromancer, but I could pitch my scream to carry when the will took me.
Do you enjoy making a mockery of the Djinn?
"Yes," I said with a smile that was all for my horror and I. "Don't you?"
Ssserakis was silent for a long moment. Yes.
Horralain stood nearby, arms crossed and the hammer resting against a nearby wall. He had taken quite a liking to Shatter, and I saw no harm in him carrying a weapon that could destroy a god. As long as he remained loyal, at least, and I was certain Horralain's loyalty would never again be in question. Tamura and Hardt had followed me to the tower as well. They had spotted me in the approach and recognised the determined gait of my stride, the set of my shoulders. They knew I had in mind to do something historic. I was making something of a habit of it.
"Aerolis. Stop hiding in your little tower and face me." It was a deliberate choice of words. After the way he fulfilled his end of our last bargain, I was in a confrontational state of mind when it came to Djinn and their deals.
The ground shook beneath my feet. I took it as a good sign, though it was probably anything but. Making people angry before you gamble with them can be a choice tactic. Anger clouds the mind and causes many to act too swiftly which leads to mistakes. When they have the power to snuff you out with little more than a thought, it is probably wiser to prepare them with flattery than insults. I thought maybe I'd give that a go.
"Oh, great and powerful Aerolis, the Changing. Stop trying to impress me with cheap tricks and threats, and listen to my proposal." I'm not very good at flattery. "You want to impress me? Then listen to me. And agree to the deal that will save the lives of everyone on Do'shan." The ground continued to shake. "Or you can let us all starve to death and sit up here, alone, for eternity, or until Mezula comes to complete her treachery. Whichever comes sooner."
The Djinn burst up through the ground in front of me, his body already fully formed and towering over me. The rocks of its form rotated, loosely connected by barely visible swirls of translucent magic. It was a grand entrance that showered me in sand. I will admit, I was impressed and a little intimidated, but I refused to let it show as I wiped sand and dirt from my fraying jacket and looked up into the vaguely head-shaped rock at the top of the Djinn's form.
"Good to see we've done away with the pretence that you can't be summoned." It was mockery, pure and simple. I was pushing the Djinn, seeing how far I could go before he snapped. Believe it or not, it was a calculated move on my part. Aerolis needed to know what I was capable of.
"I am done with your insolence, terran." No sooner had the words rumbled around the square than rocks rose up either side of me. They pushed out from the ground, each as tall as myself, and rushed towards me. The Djinn truly was done with me, he was trying to crush me.
I drew on the Sources inside, Kinemancy and Pyromancy, and thrust my arms out, releasing a fiery shock wave that shattered the rocks and sent the Djinn in front of me staggering. He had not been prepared for that. Of course, I knew the trick would not work a second time. But I didn't need it to.
"You figured it out, I see." Aerolis' words rumbled with the sound of an avalanche in full flow.
I hope you know what you're doing, Eskara. This plan makes no more sense now than it did yesterday. The horror wasn't wrong, but in truth it was less a plan and more a gamble.
"Your cryptic lesson?" I nodded. "It was quite simple really, though I admit it has taken me some time to get to grips with controlling the extra power." I took another step forward, so close I could reach out and stab the rocks floating in front of me. "Do not try to harm me again, Aerolis. I don't want to fight you, but if I have to, it will not go down like last time."
A low laughter echoed around the square and along the length of the tower. "You can't kill me, terran."
I grinned, putting as much malice into it as possible. My eyes flashed with the Arcstorm inside, and my shadow rose around me like an aura of black flame. "Don't be so sure." Intimidation was the key here. For the most part, Aerolis knew what I was capable of. But the Djinn had never encountered someone who could absorb the magic of Sources. Before Josef and I, no one like us had ever existed. Neither did he know what my horror was capable of, and Ssserakis had grown fat and strong with all the fear surrounding Do'shan in the past few weeks.