“Tell us about Hezram.” Bal picked up Yari’s drum, recognition dawning.

“Yours now,” Awa said, too quickly.

Bal frowned and tied the drum to a sweetgrass belt. “Another good story.” Bal stepped breath-close, straightened Awa’s cloud-silk head wrap, and pouted like the petulant child vie used to be. “We’ll help your friends.”

“You will?” Awa was dazzled by Bal’s ferocity.

“Of course, I would do anything for you.” Bal stroked Awa’s snake birthmark. “But you’re a stingy griot. You owe me several stories.”

“Hezram is danger,” Awa said quickly. “In Jumbajabbaland he was as powerful as … as … as Yari.”

“Basawili.” Kyrie pounded Djola’s chest and shouted in Anawanama. “Good citizens believe poison desert won’t breach Hezram’s Dream Gates and they’re happy to bleed other people’s children. Council and Azizi too. Fools.”

Djola opened his eyes, one black, one red, and scanned from the shimmering cave to piles of ash. He jiggled the crystal in his foot. It flared. “Kyrie, Kyrie. Only bad news. It has been many terrible years. Where’s the greeting?” He slurred his words and sounded drunk. Soot licked his face.

“The People eat each other. Time for salutations is past,” Kyrie replied.

Awa escaped Bal and ran to Djola. “Are you all right?”

He laughed at her stupid question. Death wheezed at the back of his breath. “I presume you’ve introduced yourselves.”

Kyrie shook her head. “No need. Everyone has heard of me, and Bal told endless tales on her beloved Awa.”

Embarrassed, Awa leaned her forehead to Djola’s and whispered, “I worried you might get lost in the void.”

He patted her cheek with a mesh glove. “You saved me. How can I get lost now?”

Awa sputtered, so much sentiment coming at her. “We saved each other.”

“Haints fortifying my gates won’t linger forever,” Kyrie declared. “New sacrifices must be made.”

Djola grunted. “I don’t have much left to sacrifice.”

“I don’t feel sorry for you,” Kyrie snapped. “We must get you to Council. I’ve conjured a corridor almost to Arkhys City. Tembe will do the same for Hezram when they regroup. Can you walk?”

“Not fast, not far,” Djola replied.

Kyrie hauled him to standing and pointed at the mirage cave nestled up in the cliffs. It seemed distant, a steep climb over treacherous cliffs. Djola teeter-tottered. He’d never make it on his own. Kyrie kissed her teeth and poked rocks and dense brush on the ridge. Fannie wouldn’t make the climb either.

“We can’t leave the warhorse behind,” Awa said.

“Of course not.” Bal threw Djola’s blood-crusted arm around vie’s neck and shouldered his weight.

Djola squinted. “Who are you, disappearing in bright light?”

“A shadow warrior,” Awa said. “That’s my Bal.”

Djola gasped. Awa also attended to her breath.

“Did Awa tell tales on me?” Bal kept him from falling over. “I’m no haint or fiend.”