A man walked over,

tall, beak-nosed, gulping noisily,

white robes crumpled.

Nahr’s father set the urn down,

folded Xau in his arms,

Xau whom his son had poisoned,

Xau who had slain his son,

but had let that death slip,

lightly,

a thing of no weight,

no guilt, no cost,

that he would do again

if it would bring back

one of his guards.

Xau shivered, despite the heat,

as Nahr’s father held him,

as he lifted the death

he had let slip,

heavy as granite.

Salt on Xau’s face.

Sunlight on the burnished splendor

of King Tahj’s thousand soldiers.

Of King Tahj himself, no sign.

Xau helped Nahr’s father lift the urn,

fastened the saddlebags,

put his boots back on.

“King Xau!” called out a woman

as he mounted his horse,

as the crowd knelt.

INTERLUDE

Two hours into the forest

its timelessness entered Heng,

as if he had always been riding

behind King Xau, beneath the ribs

of oak and pine, the oak leaves

on the cusp of crisping brown.

The spare horses followed the king

without lead rope, without halter,

as if they had always done so.

The three guards rode to left,

right, front of the king

as if they always would.

Almost out of sight, their escort:

one hundred and twenty of Tahj’s cavalry

who had met them in the mountains

thirteen days or a century ago,

the horses’ hoofbeats softened

by distance and leaf-mulched dirt.

The rhythm of Heng’s horse unhurried;

the parched air resinous.

The gap between Heng and Xau narrowed

until they rode beside each other,

the king humming to himself

a tune Heng half-remembered.

An ease between them

that had not been there

on the outward journey;

an ease in the king

that had not been there

before he gave back the ashes.

Five hours, six hours,

the slow onset of dusk;

unsaddling the horses,

sharing dried meat and pickles;

Atun, one of the guards,

laughing like a boy.

Heng careful not to ask for more,

not to look beyond this day.

FIRE

Shouts, Li’s hand on his shoulder:

King Xau comes awake before he understands

that the smoke is not dream.

In the distance, fire:

a lithe, live light leaping tree to tree.

Li saddles a horse,

helps Heng mount,

hoists Xau up onto Narson,

who is unsaddled and snorting,

but quiets to Xau’s touch.

Xau looks to the fire: a mile away?

In the dark, he cannot gauge distance,

but Tahj’s soldiers, Tahj’s horses

between him and the fire,

and Tahj’s horses will panic—

No. He calls his own horses over to Atun,

whom they trust.

“Ride for the river,” Xau tells Atun.

“Wait for us across the bridge.

Leong, Heng, follow Atun.”

Atun tries to turn his horse back,

but Xau wills the horses gone

and they run from him,

would race their hearts out

but that Xau calms them,

knowing the river miles ahead,

further than they can gallop.

Li, ahorse beside Xau,

shouts, “Follow Atun!”

Xau shouts back, “No! Tahj’s soldiers!”