The Carnelian Way

Prologue

Hypat, Denea, Day of Devastation (DD).

Mai's boots crunched as he made for the glint of gold at the top of the rise. Bleached bones cracked like dried shells beneath his feet, and dust drifted through the air, leaving a smokey, gritty paste in his mouth. As he walked, his heart thundering, skeletal pieces skittered away, exposing a darker trail of steaming ash. Despite the hot wind, Mai shivered and brushed a spiral of black hair away from his eyes.

Behind Mai, in the azure water of Hypat Bay, his small flotilla waited. Even from this distance, he could feel the tension radiating from the soldiers. He'd broken his uncle's orders coming here with the remainder of the army. All for nothing. They were too late.

When he reached his destination, a mound of human and equine skeletons near the centre of the battlefield, Mai stopped, crouched down and swept aside debris of ivory splinters and a quarter mandible. The burn of metal against his skin made him grimace as he picked up the crown. My crown. It shook in his hands as he examined it, the delicate pattern of filigree leaves now twisted into tangles reminiscent of a briar bush.

Breathing deep, he willed calm and thumbed the gold as he took in the devastation about him.

Ozone crackled, and the sun shone hot and white, burning away the dark clouds to reveal a too-turquoise sky where not half an hour ago there had been thunder and lightning and rain. A long shadow stretched to his right, thrown by the carcass of the citadel where walls and terraces of limestone blocks still clung to the cliff face. The sentinel statues of past kings and mages had fallen, though, resting in beds of rubble that once housed gardens of date palms, oleander and rose.

Pivoting on the balls of his feet, Mai turned full circle. The city of Hypat lay devastated. Probably the whole of Denea too—that once fertile crescent. The painstaking centuries of desert greening undone in a matter of minutes. All to keep the bloodlines 'pure'.

Damned, stubborn mages. Mai gritted his teeth. He knew what they'd done. To them, Denea was better returned to dust and sand than left in the hands of someone like him. A tick twitched at his jaw, and his body trembled with the suppressed fury that he shoved deep, deep down. Control, he needed to stay in control. Because he might be a half-blood, but he was as strong in the magic of the Carnelian Way as any mage. Proof 'clean blood' was unnecessary. Just the right blood—and determination.

He shook his head at the ruined city. Such a waste. Yet the method intrigued him. One corner of his mouth tugged up. If such a force could be safely harnessed and redirected...

The thought didn't keep him long. Now his uncle was dead—along with almost all the Euran military. His remaining kingdom, a kingdom he had not been raised to lead, was as exposed as the underbelly of some once-great beast.

A rustle pulled Mai's eyes up the incline. It couldn't be, and yet it was. A memory of indigo blue, there in the burnt-out pyre of a civilisation. He approached the crumpled robe and reached out his hand to touch the faded material. It disintegrated beneath his fingertips, like the curled embers of burned paper.

Two bright-yellow eyes flashed open beneath what was left of the hood.

"You."

A flush of ice washed down Mai's back, but he kept his face impassive, his words flat. "Hello, Arkis."

Mai dusted the remains of the fabric to reveal Arkis' melted face. A ragged red line of charred skin had replaced the mage's silver circlet, and the yellow Carnelian crystal it held was now embedded in the flesh.

Cupping Arkis' cheek with his hand, Mai said, "It's been a while."

Arkis started to cough, his chest making a hollow sound like the clanking of a dead branch dangling in the wind, and blood spurted.