“Abelzowadyo is Zamanzi for sacred shapeshifter. Yari told us,” Awa said. “Djola will explain. He’s a wise man, good at explaining.” Let him tell of Yari’s death and their trip to Samina’s cold realm. Awa leaned onto Fannie’s neck, urging the warhorse to follow the elephant. She whispered, “While they save the Empire, we can rescue Meera, Rokiat, and Bibi.”

Fannie snorted, not eager for this journey either. She reared and kicked before reluctantly trotting on to save their friends.

BOOK
V

1

Hidden Faces: What Fannie Knows

“Fannie, my heart, we can’t go back.”

The whirlwind of dust, ash, and sparks leaking from the border-void blows itself out. Afternoons have the worst leaks. Fannie looks back toward the Mountain Gates.

“Not that way.” Awa gestures at the Empire Road, at tree ruins in the storm’s path. “Only forward.”

Every day Awa says this, for many days. She sounds like clover and sweetgrass even speaking nonsense. Still, Fannie flattens her ears, angry. The elephant drops a bushel of dung and plods down the mountain toward Arkhys City, a few days’ march at elephant pace. Fannie follows even though she hates leaving her herd on the other side of a bush gate with hairy cowards from Holy City. She worries she’ll never see Bibi and the others again. Bibi nipped tender flanks to chase Fannie away.

Fannie knows no way to untie knots or chew through chains and rescue the herd. And why abandon Awa or Djola to become a slave, even when they head the wrong way? After traversing the light bridge too fast (and burning her eyebrows off), Awa can barely stand. Walking a great distance is impossible. Awa carries too many heavy weights—a mountain, a river, and pieces of the sky. Djola is mortally wounded. “Abelzowadyo!” he rasps, but no matter the wheel at his heart and the crystal in his foot, he leaks spirit into the void.

Still, Awa and Djola are hope.

Two years ago, Fannie was war sick too, ready to abandon everyone, ready to lie down and not get up, ready to be smoke in the void. Awa sang Jumbajabbaland songs till Fannie stopped jolting at every rustle or flicker. Awa cleaned the battlefields from her hooves, brushed terror off her back, soothed her from withers to tail. Awa (and her bee and crow friends and Soot too) faced down drunk acolytes to protect Fannie, Bibi, and the herd. And before Ice Mountain came crashing down and the Amethyst River lost its banks, Djola opened rusty Green Gates and called the herd to freedom. So, despite the horrors Fannie glimpses in the gloom as they march closer to Arkhys City, she matches her gait to the elephant’s—an unwieldy fearless creature—who rumbles, bellows, and flaps giant ears. Rogue warriors scurry out of their way. Predators keep their distance. Fannie is grateful for elephant conjure protecting them.

The wrong direction might be the shortest way home.