The city came into view as I crested the hill, and I stopped.
Something was wrong.
Arazon was never silent. Even at night, there were people: merchants closing up shop, guards making their rounds, lovers stealing moments in shadowed doorways. The city breathed with life, messy and loud and alive.
But tonight it was silent.
Usually at this time there are still people around, I thought, unease crawling up my spine like spiders.
The streets were empty. Doors closed. Windows shuttered.
It looked like the city was hiding.
Or mourning.
I moved forward anyway, because I was apparently the kind of fool who walked toward danger instead of away from it. The kind of fool who heard the tree weeping and listened. The kind of fool who thought answers were worth dying for.
My grandmother would say I was my mother's son. That I had her recklessness, her pride, her inability to leave well enough alone.
She'd be right.
I found the spot where Sebtenius and I had been practicing that afternoon, the small square between the baker's shop and the clothier's where we'd spent countless hours beating on each other with practice swords and pretending we were warriors.
The stones were still there, the ones we used as markers.
And sitting on them was an old man I'd never seen before.
He was waiting. Sitting like he'd known I would come. Like he'd been there for hours, patient as the stones themselves.
My stomach dropped, but I kept walking. Kept my face neutral even as my hand drifted toward where my sword usually hung.
The old man looked up as I approached, and his eyes, sharp and cold despite his age, locked onto me.
Then they dropped to my chest. To where the amulet hung beneath my shirt, invisible but somehow not hidden enough.
His face went hard. Carved from stone.
"You," he said, and his voice was dry as sand, old as the city itself. "You're the exact image of your mother."
Every muscle in my body tensed. "You knew my mother."
It wasn't a question.
"That thief." His lip curled with pure contempt. "She shamed the sun holders' dignity. Ran away like a coward and took what didn't belong to her."
The words hit like physical blows, but I forced myself to stay still. Stay calm.
"Who are you?"
"I am Rables." He stood slowly, and despite his age there was a deadly grace to the movement. "I served under High Priest Awsar for forty years. And three days ago, he was murdered."
The world seemed to tilt.
Murdered. The High Priest was dead.
"The man who chose every sun holder for two generations," Rables continued, his eyes never leaving mine. "The man who held this kingdom together when the nobles tried to tear it apart. Dead. Cut down in the temple by assassins who disappeared like shadows."
I didn't know what to say. Didn't know why he was telling me this.
"And now," Rables said, taking a step closer, "now I find you. A bastard boy wearing the amulet of Kii Hore around his neck like it's a trinket. The amulet that should have been in the temple. The amulet your mother stole when she abandoned her duty."
My hand went to my chest, protective. "It was my mother's. She left it to me."
"It was never hers to give!" His voice cracked like a whip. "That amulet belongs to the sun holder. To the chosen one. Not to some runaway who threw away her destiny for a nobleman's bed. Not to her bastard son who doesn't understand what he carries."
"Then enlighten me." The words came out sharp, defensive. "Because all I know is that my mother is dead, my grandmother is terrified, and apparently I've been walking around with a target on my back without even knowing it."
Rables stared at me, and something in his expression shifted. Not softness, nothing that kind, but maybe a grudging respect.
"That amulet," he said slowly, "belonged to the first sun servant. Kii Hore, the first king of Arazon. The man who made the covenant with the sun that built this kingdom. For a thousand years, it has been passed down through every sun holder chosen to lead us. Every single one. Until your mother."
The amulet burned against my skin.
"She was chosen young. Too young, some said. Chosen by the sun itself, marked by signs and visions. Given the amulet as proof of her calling." Rables's voice was bitter. "And then she met your father. Fell in love, or whatever she called it. And she ran. Took the amulet and disappeared, and with her went the proof of divine choosing. The symbol that legitimized our leaders."
"That doesn't—"
"Don't you understand, boy? Without the amulet, we cannot prove the next sun holder is truly chosen. The nobles have been waiting for this. Waiting for any excuse to claim the choosing is false, that they should rule instead. And now Awsar is dead, and the amulet is around the neck of a bastard in the streets."
The weight of what he was saying settled over me like a shroud.
"Have you heard," Rables said, his voice dropping lower, "that Khrma is losing its hold in Kushna to Meroe? The nobles there are making their move, claiming the right to rule as gods again. Breaking the law of Noz."
I shook my head, lost.
"The law that ended the god-kings," Rables continued. "The covenant that gave us sun holders instead of tyrants. That's what the amulet represents. That's what your mother stole. And now it's happening here, in Arazon. The nobles are moving. Awsar was killed because he stood in their way. And you..."
He pointed at me, finger trembling with rage or fear or both.
"You're walking around with the one thing that could stop them. The proof of divine right. The symbol that could unite the people behind a true sun holder. And you don't even understand what it means."
"But the nobles are right about one thing," came a voice from behind me, and I spun.
Sebtenius stood there, wide-eyed. His father Tet stood beside him, one hand on his son's shoulder, his face carefully blank.
The same face he'd worn when he taught me to fight. The face of a man trying very hard not to show what he was thinking.
"I'm sorry," Tet said to Rables, not looking at me. "My son followed your voices. His curiosity gets the best of him."
"Does it?" Rables studied them both, something dangerous in his expression. "Then you should teach him better. Curiosity means death in times like these. The boy should learn to keep his head down and his mouth shut if he wants to survive what's coming."
Sebtenius shifted uncomfortably, and his father's hand tightened on his shoulder.
"Go home," Tet said to him, voice gentle but firm. "Now. And don't speak of what you've heard here. Not to anyone."
"But—"
"Now, Sebtenius."
The tone left no room for argument. Sebtenius looked at me once, worry clear on his face, then nodded and ran toward his house.
For a moment, we all watched him go, the sound of his footsteps fading into the night.
But Tet didn't relax. He looked past Rables, toward the shadows, and his face went tight.
"Aret," Rables said, and I realized he wasn't talking to Tet at all. He was talking to someone behind him.
A man stepped out of the darkness. Lean, dangerous-looking, with the kind of scars that said he'd earned his survival. His eyes found me immediately, assessing.
"To think you'd be brave enough to even come here baffles me," Tet said, and his voice had gone cold. Dead. "I paid my debt to you long before coming here."
"To me?" Aret interrupted. His voice was soft, but there was steel underneath. "Have you forgotten the honoring pledge between us Serpents?
"They're starting to get rid of us," Aret continued, his eyes on Tet now. "Anyone who remembers the old ways. Anyone who might stand against them. Awsar was first, but he won't be last. The Serpents are being hunted, Tet. All of us who served the sun holders, who kept the faith. They're erasing us."
"Then why are you here?" Tet's hand had moved to his belt, where I knew he kept a knife hidden. "Why risk coming to me?"
"Because the boy has it." Aret's eyes shifted to me, to the amulet burning beneath my shirt. "The amulet. The proof. And if the nobles find out—"
"They'll kill him," Rables finished. "They'll kill him and destroy it and claim there never was divine choosing. That the sun holders were all a lie, a trick played by priests to keep the nobility from their rightful power."
My hand went to the amulet, pulled it out so they could all see it. The metal was warm now, almost hot, and in the moonlight it seemed to pulse with a faint inner light.
All three men stared at it like it was a holy relic.
Or a death sentence.
"Listen to me, boy." Rables took a step closer, and his voice had lost its anger. Now he just sounded tired. Old.
"You need to hide that. Bury it somewhere no one will find it. Forget you ever had it."
"Or," Aret said softly, "he could bring it to the temple. Let the remaining priests guard it. Use it to choose a new sun holder before the nobles can consolidate power."
"The temple is compromised," Rables snapped. "Half the priests are dead or missing. The nobles have eyes everywhere. If he goes there, he dies."
"Then what?" I heard myself ask. "What am I supposed to do?"
Rables looked at me, and for the first time I saw something other than contempt in his eyes. Something that might have been pity.
"Run," he said simply. "Take that amulet and run as far from Arazon as you can. Change your name. Hide your face. Forget you were ever your mother's son."
"That's surrender," Aret said.
"That's survival."
They stared at each other, and I felt the weight of their conflict pressing down on me. Two paths. Two futures. Both of them ending in blood.
"There's another option." Tet's voice was quiet, but it cut through the tension like a blade.
We all turned to look at him.
"Tell them," he said, looking at me now. "Tell them about the eclipse."
Rables went very still. "How do you know about that?"
"Because Awsar told me. Before he died. He knew they were coming for him, and he sent me a message. Told me to watch for the signs. To be ready." Tet's eyes were hard. "The eclipse is coming. The nobles know it. That's why they're moving now. That's why they killed Awsar."
"What eclipse?" I demanded. "What are you talking about?"
But Rables's face had gone grey. "The prophecy. The old words from the Lost Books."
"When the sun goes dark," Aret recited softly, "the covenant breaks. When the covenant breaks, the god-kings return."
"Unless," Rables continued, "the true holder stands in the darkness with the mark of Kii Hore and renews the oath."
They all looked at me.
At the amulet hanging from my neck.
"No," I said. "No. I'm not... I'm just a bastard. I'm nobody. I can't—"
"You're the only one who can," Rables said. "You have the amulet. The symbol. Whether you wanted it or not, whether you deserve it or not, you're the only one who can prove the choosing is real. The only one who can stand against the nobles when they try to claim divinity for themselves."
"I don't even know what that means!"
"It means," Aret said quietly, "that you're going to have to decide very quickly whether you're your mother's son. Whether you're going to run away like she did, or stand and fight."
The amulet burned against my skin like a brand, and in the distance I heard it.
The Weeping Tree.
Screaming.
Not weeping. Screaming. A sound of pure anguish that echoed across the city, that made every window rattle and every door shudder.
The tree knew. Had always known.
The eclipse was coming.
And I, Rhohar the bastard, wearing my dead mother's stolen legacy, was somehow standing at the center of everything about to break.