The Bones of the Old Ones (Dabir and Asim) by Howard Andrew Jones Read Free Book Online Page A

now. Farbod, perhaps, knows more.”
    It was then Najya lunged suddenly past Dabir and grabbed the weapon.

 
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    I darted after without thinking. Neither Dabir nor I were ones to touch women unasked, but we both lay hold of her arms.
    Yet there was no moving her. Najya’s whole body had gone rigid and she was fastened to the spear as surely as if she were bolted to the thing. She began to shake, as men will when they have the falling sickness, and she gripped the haft so tightly that her knuckles turned white.
    “Pry free her thumbs!” Dabir shouted to me.
    As I slid my hand beneath hers, my palm pressed against the surface of the spear, and a cold spread through me such as men must face when they die upon the mountaintops. I shuddered violently in the sudden chill and my mind flooded with jarring and disjointed images. I stood upon a plain sheathed everywhere in ice and snow. The sky was a slate-gray tombstone. A village of thatched round huts lay beneath a thick sheet of frost and snow. Strange beasts stomped across a frozen river, followed by giant manlike beings with long silvery hair and shining white skin. Fur-clad warriors charged with flint-tipped spears. Bodies lay strewn like leaves over the icy ground, stained red beneath them. A bearded man stared back at me through a slab of ice, his mouth open in a silent scream.
    The visions vanished the moment I pulled Najya free with trembling hands. She collapsed senseless in my arms.
    Dabir was there on my other side, demanding to know if she was all right, and what had happened to me. I lifted the woman in my arms and spoke with a trembling jaw. “The weapon is cursed,” I told him. “Its touch froze me to the bone.”
    “Place her upon the settee,” the governor ordered, and this I did, casting a blanket over her that I found upon the back of the furniture. By this time the guards had rushed forward, and the governor sent Kharouf running for the hakim.
    “She lives,” Dabir said, and he pulled fingers back from Najya’s neck.
    The woman’s face was pale as the white marble inlays in the patterned floor. She shifted very slightly beneath the blanket, but did not open her eyes.
    The governor frowned down at her, then turned to us, drawing himself up to his full height. Though we each topped him by at least half a head, we bowed in deference. “Explain,” he commanded.
    Dabir then relayed, in short, succinct sentences, all that we had experienced since Najya’s arrival. I would have left to stand over a brazier, but I did not wish to appear disrespectful
    The governor’s expression grew more and more grave as he listened, but he asked no questions. My friend finished by pointing to the weapon on the column. “It seems, Your Excellency, that the wizard Koury captured Najya to aid him in finding this unusual spear.”
    “That thing?” the governor asked. “But why should anyone want it?”
    Before Dabir could answer, the reception doors thumped open and Tarif of the palace guard walked in. He was trailed by four soldiers, each holding the corner of a canvas. Upon that canvas lay the blackened figure of the wooden man I had consigned to flames. One of the arm joints still smoldered. Tarif came to a halt six feet from the dais, and bowed.
    The governor descended to speak with him. I glanced down at Najya; she was still pallid but breathing regularly. Dabir was scanning me with concern when I turned to him, but I waved him off, and we followed the governor down the steps. I managed at last to put hands over some hot coals, and breathed a quiet sigh, for the warmth was most pleasant.
    “Set it down and return to your posts,” Tarif directed his men.
    Some called Tarif ugly, but that was not entirely fair, for when seen only from the right side he was a striking figure of a man. A Greek spear had smashed into his left cheek, ruining his lip and taking out a number of teeth in the bargain. He was better off than some with like injuries, for he could close his