Prologue

Once, my children, there lived a king of Persia who had two fine sons.  The eldest took his position as heir very seriously, while the youngest was of a more martial temperament and would someday lead the empire’s armies into battle.  Still, in the way of kings and sons of kings, the king knew that boys someday become men, and that young men oftimes do not wish to wait for their inheritance and may yet prefer to take it in the heat of the moment – for young men’s hearts, he knew, are filled with fire to make their mark on the world and have it be a better one that what their elders yet make before their time has come.  And this saddened the king, for he was a good man and a peaceable one and wished the best for both his empire and his family, and he deplored the forces already at work to set his sons’ eyes on his throne before he was yet ready to leave it in a natural manner – and before either of them were fit to hold it against those who would see their line end in blood and treachery.  And so, more than anything else, the good king wished he could have a son who would never, ever betray him.  He wished this wish often, and fervently, and as the gods looked with favor upon him it was granted to him that it should come to pass.  A son would be provided to him who would never think to take his throne, one who could not be bribed, could not be corrupted, and who would be named a hero and fulfill that naming in every way.

It is the way of wishes, however, that should they be granted by the gods they are not without cost.  And so it was foretold that this new son would be a light unto his father’s eyes until his twentieth year, but ere the end of his first true battle a destiny would be sent into motion which would rend the royal family and shake the foundations of the Empire.  The hero although blameless would be branded a traitor and driven from his family, and were his honor not enough to sustain him and his wisdom not enough to overrule his heart, the wrath of the gods would descend and all the world would be destroyed in a storm of sand and fire. And although the king shook his head and did not believe such a thing could ever come to be, he carried still in his heart the hope that his third son might yet come to him and be all that he had desired.

A year passed, and one day more, and on that day it came to be that the king was met with a young orphan in the streets of his own city when that boy saved the crown prince from assassins, and when asked gave his name as Dastan, which means hero.  And the king claimed the boy as his own, and bore him back to the palace and there named him his son.  And young Dastan grew and became a light unto his father’s eyes, most especially in that he was a peacemaker between his older brothers and brought much harmony to the royal family; indeed his honesty and worldly innocence and his great heart won the affections of his brothers and caused them to look unkindly upon those of the court who would whisper intrigues of power and birthright in their ears.  And the king was well pleased with this, and loved his sons the more for it as he now knew that they would likely not kill him for his throne at the behest of schemers and liars, but would instead seek each other’s council and react strongly to any threat against their bloodline.

Destiny was waiting patiently for her due, however, and in Prince Dastan’s twentieth year he and his small band of picked men – who served mainly as bodyguards to his eldest brother when he embarked upon campains war – were thrust into a battle which should not have been waged on the holy city of Alamut, for the king had long decreed that city to be sacred and ordered that it not be molested by the armies of Persia.  The king’s three sons were led to believe there was treachery in this city, however, and it was planned that the army of Persia would attack the front gates of Alamut with Crown Prince Tus at their head, so confident was he in their eventual victory. But Dastan, not liking this plan and fearing for his elder brother’s life, snuck from the camp and led his men in stealth into the city, and there he disabled the fighting force that was ready and then opened the way for his brothers to enter with the army.  And pressing ahead to the palace he encountered a man who was fighting to flee that same location and bested him with his own blade, a dagger like none Dastan had ever seen before.  And he kept the dagger as a curiosity and joined his brothers in breaching the palace of Alamut and confronting the princess who ruled there.  And his eldest brother Tus did offer the princess a place among his many wives as a way of her gaining peace and alliance with Persia, and this offer she was forced to accept for the good of her people although it was plain that to do so did not please her in the least.

This conclusion to their siege seemed to Tus and his brothers to be well and good, but it was not long after that a messenger arrived heralding the coming of the king, and he not very well pleased that sacred Alamut had been defiled by his own sons and their armies, nor that Tus in his greed for loveliness had claimed the princess as another wife instead of giving her to one of his brothers as would have been the more politic thing to do.  And the king spoke long with Tus in private, correcting him and demanding proof of those allegations which had brought about the attack on Alamut.  And he had no thoughts or premonitions, as he was going to the audience chamber to see what might be done to correct the error of Tus and to formally greet his other sons, that here lay the seeds of a great treachery and that his son Dastan was yet twenty and had just joined his first true battle.  So the king entered the chamber with its gathered throng and was greeted by his youngest son and presented with the rich gift of a golden robe of some history, and when he felt his flesh begin to burn and melt beneath the heavily embroidered fabric and saw the horror on Dastan’s face as the robe would not be removed, he realized the cruel trick that had been played upon them all in that it was his own death by treachery which would turn his eldest sons against the younger and brand him a traitor, and that the traitor would be yet among them and, free of suspicion, would be also free to plot and plan and kill until his goals were achieved.  And the king died praying that his youngest son would see the end of this horror and not be destroyed by it, and knowing in his heart that the price of his heart’s wish so long ago would be paid  by his beloved youngest son this very day in pain and loss.

It was as the king feared, and the elder brothers at once turned on their adopted younger brother and ordered him held, to be then executed, for the murder of their father. Prince Dastan escaped the palace with the princess and fled into the desert, and it was there that he learned of the power of the dagger he had captured – the power to move back time, for a few moments only, to put right what had once gone wrong.  It was the power of the Sands of Time, the secret of which the Princess Tamina was guardian as had been all those of her line before her.  The prince did not at first understand the true nature of this secret; he sought only to clear his name and be revenged upon his father’s true murderer, and to this end he sought the council of his uncle, the king’s brother Nizam.  Who it quickly became known to him had been behind the treacherous death of the king, and who had called in unnatural assassins, the Hassansin, to murder all who stood in his way in his quest to capture the Sands and use their power to make the throne of Persia his own.

True to his nature, and as his father had hoped, Dastan’s resolve was strengthened even as his heart was broken by such betrayal from one whom he had loved, trusted, and admired.  He swore to aid the princess in her sacred duty, to return the dagger which controlled the Sands of Time to its safe and rightful sanctuary, and to avenge the death of his father – and later of his brothers, one of whom was killed by the Hassansin and the other by Nizam himself.  That they had died knowing him innocent was little comfort, as they had both died in his arms.  Hardened in his purpose, Dastan gained the aid of a band of desert ghosts from a haunted canyon and took back the lost Dagger.  In the sanctuary of the Sandglass he lost the Princess Tamina, she sacrificing herself to allow him to save the world from the wrath of the gods, which had been released by the greed of Nizam.  Dastan fought with Nizam and bested him, once again binding the Sands and so binding the wrath of the gods as well, and in doing so he was Marked by the Sands and thrown backward in time to stand just as he had been on taking the Dagger, yet with full knowledge of what had transpired to guide him.  He at once set about changing the former path of destiny, confronting his uncle on the steps of the palace of Alamut and weathering his denials until the man in his rage at being thwarted attacked him – and even then, the honorable prince sought only to best him and walk away with a promise of justice.  Nizam drew himself up from the ground like a striking snake as Dastan’s back was turned, only to be killed by Tus as the crown prince defended his younger brother’s life.  The treachery revealed, humble apologies were made to the Princess Tamina and Prince Dastan was offered to her as a husband to make alliance and amends between Alamut and Persia.  Dastan for his part returned to her the Dagger, and was hard pressed to not sweep her into his arms on the spot for sheer joy that she lived again, although she knew him not and would not have welcomed such familiarity with a man whom, to her, was an unwelcome stranger.  Subtly he conveyed his knowledge of the Dagger and the Sands to her, however, knowing that through familiarity she would grow to be the woman he loved again in time.  In the meantime, however, Dastan set out to undo as much of the time-that-had-not-been as he could, and in doing so protect his love, his family, and the sacred secret that had become his duty.

 

Prince of Persia: Mark of the Sandglass

In the aftermath of so many things happening one after the other, and that all in the course of a single day, it stood to rights that the princes and soldiers who had besieged and won Alamut would have been ready to take their ease as much as possible that evening.  Prince Garsiv certainly felt that way himself, which was why he found himself so perplexed to be trailing his younger brother Dastan through the corridors of the palace of Alamut, armed and apparently expected to be expecting trouble.

Not that he doubted Dastan’s word, or his suspicions.  His brother had somehow known of the plot to kill their father, of the treachery perpetrated on them by their uncle at the very least by his arranging false evidence to cause the attack on Alamut.  Garsiv had not yet been able to get out of his brother the exact way in which he had known those things, but an immediate threat was more important than a curiosity which would eventually be satisfied – if not by him than by their elder brother Tus, who was more likely to draw out Dastan’s confidence when it came to delicate matters.

Tus, of course, was back in the central part of the palace, surrounded by trusted guards and servants, sending out messages and making arrangement for their father’s eventual arrival.  Garsiv wished him well at it; he wasn’t one for the intricate diplomacies of court life, being more plain-spoken and also more likely to take offense when insulted.  Tus was less quick to anger than he was; he would make a far more peaceful king for Persia, more like their father.  Which reminded Garsiv that he would need to be finding a gift…

He shuddered even as the innocent thought crossed his mind.  He and Dastan were alike in their tendency to forget some of the more useless niceties when their minds were occupied with other things…which was apparently what their Uncle Nizam had been counting on.  Dastan had said that there would be a gift of some precious metal or perhaps cloth among Nizam’s things and that it might be dangerous to the touch so much care should be taken; he’d spoken of a fluid that burned and blistered the skin, and his suspicions that a robe or some such garment had been treated with it and was to be given to their father by Dastan, who would doubtless have forgotten to obtain something suitable and who would have accepted it gladly and without suspicion from Nizam.  It displeased Garsiv greatly to think that he or Tus might have also been drawn in by such a plan, as Nizam could as easily have handed the gift to one of them with instructions to give it to their younger brother.

They’d found the gift in Nizam’s things, a holy relic packed carefully into a rich chest…and soaked in some sort of liquid fire, the bottle of which they also found nearby and which had been scented with cloves to disguise its pungent odor.  Had their father put on that robe, his death would have been terrible to behold and Dastan, as the giver, would have taken the blame and most likely have had to flee, if he could, to escape being killed on the spot.

Garsiv knew that his younger brother knew this, and believed that it was such thoughts which were even now weighing upon him so heavily that Tus had spoken his worry of it twice since that afternoon.  Garsiv had a soldier’s mind, however, and so was not as concerned; battles and treacheries did things to a man, and he did not see his younger brother acting in any manner which would unduly alarm him – hypervigilance was not unusual in one who had just experienced such betrayal as Dastan had that day, and if trailing through stone corridors was what he required for reassurance, Garsiv would gladly give up some of his well-deserved rest this night to provide it.

Or so he was thinking…until Dastan exclaimed and led him into a narrow gallery where a number of things had been laid ready for guests who had apparently never arrived.  And it was probably a good thing that they had not, as their prepared amenities consisted mostly of weapons, training apparatus, and maps.  Dastan walked to a stack of folded cloth, using a gloved hand to lift a black tunic from it.  He turned to Garsiv with a frown.  “Had our uncle’s plan worked,” he said, “I believe the Hassansin would have been guests of Alamut this night even as we were, hidden from view here in a place we would not have thought to visit them…although they may have been planning to visit us.”

Garsiv stared in shock.  When he had agreed to follow his brother into the bowels of the palace of Alamut…this was not the lack of a threat ending in reassurance which he had expected that they would find.   

 

Prince Dastan was off again the very next morning, taking only Bis and three others of his own trusted men with him and leaving Garsiv peculiarly detailed instructions for the security of both princess and city in his absence.  His brothers had worried for him, Garsiv had even tried to insist on going along, but Dastan had been insistent that he was not just yet going out in pursuit of the Hassansin and that on this journey they would be more of a hindrance than a help.  He’d left before his brothers had awakened, in fact, to avoid arguments.  And following him…well, Garsiv had attempted it and been back within hours, admitting defeat.  Tus meanwhile had gone to the princess to see if she knew his brother’s destination and had been summarily rebuffed.  “He has no proof in blood to seal his claim to Alamut,” she’d informed him haughtily.  “Therefore he must bring Alamut proof of his worth in another way or not return at all.”

Prince Tus had gone away from that meeting feeling very glad that he hadn’t added Princess Tamina to his ‘herd of wives’, as Garsiv called them.  She was lovely, yes, but not very nice.

 

Dastan, of course, knew better.  He knew the secret the princess of Alamut was keeping, the vows she had taken, and the lengths to which she would go to uphold her sacred duty.  But he also knew the warm, spirited woman that others were not privileged to see, knew the touch of her hand over his heart and the softness of her lips upon his.  He knew Tamina.  He loved Tamina.  It was the Princess of Alamut, High Priestess of the Sandglass, who questioned his worth.

And he would be worthy of her.  He knew exactly what would be the best proof of his fitness to stand at her side.  Not a deed of battle or stealth, nothing conquered or stolen, but something bartered and bargained and fairly gained.  Dastan may have been but a foster son of King Sharaman, but he was still his son in heart and mind if not in blood and he knew his father’s ways were good ones.  The gift he brought back would not be stained with blood.

Adorned with feathers, maybe.  But not blood.

In truth, the hardest part of Dastan’s quest was finding a suitable ostrich and keeping it alive on their trip to the Canyon of Ghosts.  He retraced the path he had now never yet taken carefully, found the spot he remembered for the ambush, and then set up a call for Sheikh Amar.  Who appeared cautiously and with great suspicion, and who was surprised almost beyond the ability to speak when Dastan greeted him formally.  “Sheikh Amar,” he said, bowing.  “I am Prince Dastan, and I am honored to make your acquaintance.”

“This should be interesting,” Amar said to his men, none of whom had dismounted although Dastan was on foot.  “Will you still be honored when I kill you for coming here?” he called out.  “I have heard many things of Prince Dastan, but not that he was stupid.”

Dastan smiled and shrugged.  “You won’t kill me,” he said.  “I came to meet you, and to speak with you about a matter of importance to both of us.  And, I brought you a gift.”  He motioned for the two men with the ostrich to bring it forward, although not too near the horses.  “This creature was being kept as a curiosity, but it is my understanding that she was not meant to be away from others of her kind.  I believe you would be a more conscientious keeper for her.”

Amar was off his horse so quickly it almost appeared that he’d jumped, but he approached the hooded ostrich as carefully as a man might approach a frightened child.  His eyes took in every detail of the bird and its handlers, and the hand that caressed its neck was gentle as a breath of wind.  “They do, they pine away if they’re alone,” he confirmed.  “She’s a lovely girl, this one, look at those tail feathers…”  He trailed off, then remembered himself and looked the younger man in the eye.  “It is a good gift, maybe too good – it seems you know me more than you should, since we’ve never met.  But you’re not wrong, I wouldn’t kill you, favored foster son of the king – at least, not as long as your matter of importance isn’t the tax.”

Dastan snorted.  “I’m not that stupid, especially not with only a handful of men at my back.  No, what I wish to speak with you about is a much better proposition than that.”  He grinned.  “And if I were to see your races while we discuss it, so much the better.  I’m sure my men have never before encountered such a spectacle, the experience would be educational for them.”

The sheikh was dumbfounded all over again, but recalled himself to the manners of his station and inclined his head.  “Of course, Prince Dastan.  You come in peace, you’re welcome to partake of my hospitality.  I’ll have my men take the bird, you and yours may ride along with us.”

“Of course.”  Dastan let his men hand over the ostrich, hiding a smile at the proprietary way Amar hovered over the exchange and the multitude of instructions he gave his men as handlers of the creature.  He mounted his horse, and at the sheikh’s wave moved to ride at his side through the maze of rock walls, making light conversation and answering many pointed questions about the previous owner of the ostrich, the conditions she had been found in, and her care and feeding on the journey to the Canyon of Ghosts.  Dastan kept his amusement at the situation to himself, although its cousin was plain to see on the face of the sheikh’s silent companion, the brave and honorable Seso whose sacrifice he remembered so clearly and with such gratitude.

Seso, for his part, maintained his silence only until they had reached the tent city and retired to the private accommodations Amar kept for himself and his special guests at a choice spot beside the racing track.  He stopped Dastan with a dark hand on his arm before the younger man entered the box.  “You know much you should not,” he said in a low voice.  “But I believe you have honor.”

Dastan looked him in the eye.  “I know you do,” was his reply, and then he moved away without a backward glance.  Seso followed him in and took up his place behind Amar, silent once more.  He would watch still, but only because it was his duty.  This young prince was no threat to them.

The give and take of hospitality was a protracted affair and not to be hurried, something Dastan well knew and was not irritated by as his brother Garsiv often was.  He had kept Bis with him as counterpart to Seso, and had sent his other men down into the crowd with a wordless warning not to enjoy themselves too much.  He’d actually found himself enjoying watching the races, and the refreshment provided by the sheikh’s graceful serving girls was everything he could have wished.  Finally, though, it was time to talk business.  “I believe you have a proposition for me?” Amar asked him.

“My proposition should suit us both,” Dastan replied.  “You wish to keep on as you are; I seek to keep my city safer than it has been.  I believe that with cooperation we can both achieve that and more.”  The sheikh nodded for him to continue, so he did.  “I desire to enter into a treaty with you.  I will swear your safety from Persia and your permanent exemption from her taxes, and in return you will be the secret defense of Alamut.  Basically, you will continue to do what you’re already doing now,” he elaborated.  “You’ll just be our ally, and share what secrets may come your way with us.”

The sheikh considered that, tapping one beringed finger on the table.  “And will you be our ally?” he questioned.  “This place, that I built myself from a wasteland of sand and rock, grows richer every day.  On the day the thief comes…”

“We will meet him at your side and drive him away empty-handed,” Dastan said.  “And then we will decorate the canyon walls with his bones and blood, and so add to the legend of fear that protects this place.”

“The ghosts of legend do serve us well,” Amar agreed.  “And in return, I will see that any news is sent to you, that rumor is spread for you, and that this path to your city remains closed through fear and the skill of my men.”  When Dastan nodded, he sat back against the embroidered cushions, nodding.  “It seems a good deal to me.  What will the king and your brothers think of it, or will you tell them?”

“They will think it is an arrangement fairly made, and they will honor it,” Dastan assured him.  He waved his hand, and Bis placed two scrolls into it which he then laid in the center of the table between them.  “We’ll have it in writing, which will make it law in the eyes of Persia.  One scroll to be kept here, one to return to Alamut with me.”

Amar nodded.  He took one of the scrolls and looked at it, then took the other and compared them carefully.  Satisfied that they were identical, he sent for ink and wax and made his mark on both.  Dastan did the same, and then they sipped the spiced drink that had been brought until both ink and wax were dry enough for the scrolls to be rolled back up.

Dastan and his men left the next morning with one scroll and a bride-gift for Princess Tamina.  Sheikh Amar had wished them to stay longer – he’d found he enjoyed Dastan’s company – but the younger man had been adamant that he must not delay returning to the city and his reasons had made Amar afraid.  He knew of the Hassansin, but had thought them mostly reduced to legends, fables to strike fear into kings and conquerors.  But the prince had seen them with his own eyes, and from his description Amar feared that some of them may have been visitors to his own tent city.  His alliance with Persia, even a fostered son of Persia, had come none too soon.

 

When Dastan rode back into Alamut, he went straight to the palace and to his princess, stopping only long enough to change his travel-stained shirt and wash his face and hands.  He gathered Tus up with him to stand as a witness and entered Tamina’s presence with a bow that astounded his brother with its sweeping grace.  The princess gave him a cool look.  “You have returned so quickly, have you given up?”

Tus felt a niggle of irritation, but Dastan merely smiled at her as though he knew some secret behind her words.  “My desire to return to your side was such that I hastened my journey,” he replied, shocking his brother again; such flowery language was not a thing Tus had thought Dastan ascribed to, having never heard him use such save in jest.  “Will you receive what I have brought?”

She nodded regally, and he pulled a scroll from his belt and presented it to her.  “I present you with an ally to the east and south, my lady, sworn to guard the flank of Alamut even as we swear to lend him our arms should he have need.”

Tamina unrolled the scroll, and Tus was verily surprised when he saw her eyes widen with a sudden shock.  “This…this man is a ghost!  He does not exist!”

“I assure you, he is known to me and he is no ghost,” Dastan replied.  “Such tales are his manner of protecting himself and that which he holds dear.  Speaking of which, he also sends a bride gift to you.”  He nodded to Bis, who ushered in two men bearing a box between them, which was then opened to reveal an elaborate headdress of white and gray plumes set in a fair silver crown.  “For you, Princess, from Sheikh Amar, with his good will and good wishes.”

Tus thought his eyes might pop out of his head and roll across the floor from the force of his shock.  His little brother knew Sheikh Amar?  Had signed a treaty with him, and had returned with a gift for the princess as well?  “Sheikh Amar is said to kill any who approach him,” he stammered.  “How…”

Dastan shrugged and smiled.  “He kills those who approach him for the wrong reasons,” he returned.  “He is an honorable man, in his own way and his own place.  I have every faith that he will uphold our agreement so long as we do.”

If it had been at all possible, Tus would have found the nearest chair and dropped into it, princess or no princess, regardless of protocol.  This was his brother, how had he missed such things in him?  But yet, he thought, Dastan since the winning of Alamut had seemed different to him, more thoughtful and mature…more determined, even driven.  Garsiv had commented on it as well, but been less concerned; it had been his thought that the siege had made this change, the heat and acts of battle forging it.  Tus was not so sure, and he was awaiting their father’s arrival to hear his opinion of it.

While he had been musing on his own thoughts, Tamina had unfrozen enough to descend from her dais to examine the headdress more closely.  The feathers were soft as a breath, rich and fat plumes like none she had ever seen before.  The crown they were fixed to was of dainty workmanship but yet gave the impression of strength.  “It is…it is beautiful,” she said.

“Then it is a fitting gift for you,” Dastan told her.  His smile was warm and it unnerved her, sending her back up onto the dais and out of his range; the understanding in his eyes at her retreat flustered her even more.  He bowed again.  “I will take my leave now; I must find my brother Garsiv to hear what he has found of the plot to kill the king, and there are still the Hassansin to be thought of.”  He turned sharply to Tus, frowning.  “You have been taking precautions?”

Tamina saw the worry in the older prince’s face, but he merely nodded.  “Yes, Garsiv insisted.  He said your instructions were most explicit.  And things are as secure as we can make them for Father’s arrival.”

Dastan seemed to relax somewhat.  He grasped his brother’s arm, but quickly let go as though afraid to betray some strong emotion.  “Good.  We must all be careful until the last threat has been dealt with.  I will…”

“You’ll do nothing except take the princess as your wife,” Tus interrupted with a frown of his own.  “You’ve no time to hunt fabled assassins right now.  A royal marriage…”

“If I wait until after the marriage, they will have retreated to the shadows and vanished with the rising sun – and then they will return to hunt me, and you, and our father,” Dastan countered.  “We can’t leave such a threat as that roaming the open desert and wandering unknown and unremarked through any place that pleases them.”  He grasped his brother’s arm again, and this time did not let go.  “I won’t lose you, or Father, or Garsiv, or Tamina.  And so long as the Hassansin live, all that I love is in danger.”    

Tus was shaken, although he did his best not to show it.  “But how will you hunt such hunters, Dastan?  How?  They once killed for the Kings of Persia, and now they kill for gold – and you said yourself that some of them were unnatural!”

“I heard one called a demon,” Dastan admitted.  “But I don’t believe he is one; magical yes, I believe at least some of them to be, but human still.  And even were they to be demons, I know they can be killed.”  He turned abruptly back to the princess.  “Have the traitors within the palace been dealt with?”

She nodded.  “Two.”  That had been a bitter pill to swallow, to know that the secret and duty of Alamut had been sold by those entrusted to protect it.  Had their plans worked out as they had hoped, her only choice would have been to…

Dastan was suddenly right there, on the dais at her side, taking her hands in his; she hadn’t realized they were shaking until the warm strength of his grip enfolded them and stopped it.  His voice was low, pitched to fill her ears alone.  “No, my princess,” he said.  “You are not alone any longer.  I share your duty now, and you have my word that I will see an end to those who threaten to call down the wrath of the gods in their greed.”  He smiled and stepped back, raising his voice to normal range again.  “And in my absence, my brothers will protect the sacred city of Alamut and oversee the preparations for our marriage.”

“Tus will, I’m going with you,” Garsiv stated, stalking into the chamber with a scowl on his face.  “I finished going through the chambers we found last night,” he made a face, “and discovered more evidence of treachery besides in…other places.  He’s right, Tus,” he told his dumbfounded elder brother.  “We have to catch them now, before they vanish like so much sand on the wind and come back as a storm to bury us; the formalities and ceremonies needed to seal the marriage of a prince of Persia and a princess of Alamut would take weeks we do not have if we do not want to fear every shadow and stranger for the rest of our days.  Father’s troops and your own men will do to hold the city safe until Dastan and I return with the heads of the Hassansin, and then the marriage can proceed at leisure and all the more reason to celebrate will we have.”

Tus started to argue, he wanted to argue…but he knew his brother must be right and nodded his agreement.  “Do I want to know what you’ve found that you haven’t told me of?”

Garsiv actually shuddered.  “No, although I’ll have to tell you of it later anyway for your own safety.”  He recalled whose company he was in and bowed to the princess.  “My apologies, my lady, for this blatant display of the familiarity between brothers in your presence.”

She inclined her head to acknowledge his apology for the breach in protocol.  “Shall I also be told of what you have found?”

He looked like he wanted to say no, but he stopped himself.  “Yes, you should be, for your own safety as well.  And I would advise that in our absence you keep to the company of those you trust, and never alone with only one or two unless it be our father or Tus.”  His eyes twinkled.  “Although Tus I might reconsider recommending, for although he is my brother and an honorable man, he is always desirous of increasing his over-supply of wives…” 

“Princess Tamina is meant to be one only, not one of many,” Dastan rebuked mildly before his princess could make a more scathing remark.  He bowed deeply to her again, his smile a gentle apology for the teasing of brothers.  “We will take my brother’s jests to a more suitable location – and I will come to you with Garsiv before we leave, so that you may hear of any perils it would do to be watchful for.”

She nodded, and gestured to the servants to bring the box with her bridegift along in her wake as she turned on her heel and left the audience chamber.  Dastan herded his brothers and lieutenant out of the chamber in the opposite direction.  “We have much to discuss and little time,”  he told them.  “Bis, are…”

“I have men checking the rooms, even down to the water in the basins,” Bis told him.  “No trap or trick will escape us.”

Dastan clapped him on the shoulder with a smile, although there was a grimness about his eyes still.  “Check your own quarters as well, once you’ve found them.  After the liquid fire…”

“Don’t remind me,” Bis requested with a shudder.  “That is no death for an honorable man.”

Tus and Garsiv exchanged a look when their brother’s expression grew old and grim beyond his years or experience.  “No, it is not,” he said shortly, and turned away quickly as though to hide his face.  “To my rooms, then.  We should waste no moment that can be saved, we must ride out at dawn.”   

 

The stars were brightening in the tallest arch of the evening sky, although the horizons still glowed with the sun’s red and gold light, when from out of the desert, from the east and south, rode a man on a strong horse.  He was dark-skinned and grim-faced and well supplied with weapons, and at the gates of the city he stopped and requested Prince Dastan, saying that he had been sent from Sheikh Amar with a message of greatest importance.

Dastan himself came to the gates to get him, and led him to the palace.  “Shall I call my brothers, Seso, or is this message for my ears alone?”

Seso shrugged.  “They may listen, or you may tell them, it matters little to me.”  He did not quite smile.  “I will even tell it twice myself if that is your wish.”

Dastan laughed.  “Only if it amuses you.”

The other man shook his head.  “No, there is nothing amusing about what I have to tell.  Amar checked with all the men, and the women as well, after you had left us.  The Hassansin have been there, on more than one occasion.”  At Dastan’s sharp intake of breath he held up a hand.  “Not the sorcerer, or the demon.  The one who calls the wind, however, he was there, and two others with him.  And in the freely-flowing drink and women and excitement of wagering, and perhaps because they felt safe from reprisal in Amar’s little kingdom of vices, they were more careless with themselves than might have been expected.  So we have an idea of the circuit they travel, and that they had planned to keep to that circuit for at least several more months, as that was how they could be found by their leader when needed.”  The almost-smile again.  “They were fools to think Amar would look kindly on such as them visiting his sanctuary – he has no love of the tax, or the army, but assassins are repugnant to him.”

“On that I agree with him.  You brought a map?”

Seso smiled fully, and tapped the side of his close-shorn head.  “In the safest place imaginable.  I can show you the way they take on your elder brother’s war maps, and give mine and Amar’s best guess on how long they remain at each watering hole before moving on.”  They were at the palace now, and after dismounting he faced Dastan fully.  “I also offer myself as guide, with Amar’s agreement.  I know you will ride after the Hassansin with the rising of tomorrow’s new sun, and it is my desire to ride with you and be of help where I may.”

Dastan’s eyes went wide, but then he smiled as fully and nodded.  “I would be overjoyed to have you ride with us.  You will ride with my own men and I, and share our camp if that is agreeable to you.”

Seso nodded, and then he arched an eyebrow and asked in a low voice.  “You know me, do you not?”

He was not surprised to see the young prince’s face cloud.  “I know you,” Dastan confirmed in the same low tone.  “I cannot say how, and even if I should the story would mean nothing to you and be unbelievable besides…but I do know you, and I would trust you with my life.  Is that answer enough for you?”

The other man nodded.  “Yes, my prince, it is – I believe that perhaps it is better I do not know.”  He led his horse forward toward the gate, adding quietly over his shoulder, “It is not well for a man to know of his own death, no matter how honorable it may be.”

Dastan shook his head and moved alongside him. “Perhaps…but it can be very well that a man knows of other deaths, very well indeed.”

Seso had no answer to make to that, and his own thoughts on it he kept to himself.  It may be very well for those others, but he was still of the mind that such knowledge was not good for the man who had it, even were he to be near to a god and not just a young and honorable prince of Persia.

 

Garsiv was at first distrustful of Seso, and of the sheikh who had sent him, but Dastan was having none of it and soon grew impatient with his elder brother’s suspicions.  “He is a skilled and honorable man, and Sheikh Amar has a treaty with Alamut,” he countered at last, tired of being diplomatic.  “Thanks to them, we now know where to look, and perhaps can take those we find by surprise.”

“Or we could be taken by surprise ourselves,” Garsiv countered, frowning.  “We could be riding into a trap.”

“We aren’t.”  Dastan was certain, and it showed.  “We will be the ones setting the trap.”  He traced his finger along the map.  “Here.  If they’re keeping to their regular circuit in order to maintain contact with the rest of their Hassansin brethren, we should be able to engage them here when their numbers are less and when surprise will be on our side.  The only bodies I wish to return with are those of the assassins and their leader – and preferably that only their heads, for the decoration of Alamut’s main gates.”

The fire in his younger brother’s eyes was such when he said this that Garsiv grudgingly nodded his head.  There was much going on here that he did not understand, and which he doubted he would receive answers for until this last task was done.  And in truth he did want to believe the man from Niger, as killing the mercenary creatures who would have killed his father and thus ripped apart his family would be a great pleasure for him and it would set his mind and heart at rest on many levels to know that they were gone from the world.  “If we’re taking this path,” he said, running his own finger along the same trail his brother’s had inscribed, “Then we won’t be able to travel with many men.  Will a small, fast company be able to win against such monsters as you have described?”

“I believe so, or else I would not have suggested it in the first place,” Dastan told him.  “Our only advantage is surprise, and then only because they are all scattered at the present time rather than traveling in a pack like desert wolves.”

“Which is why he is right that this wolf hunt must not be delayed,” Seso added quietly.  “The Hassansin are a threat to us all, and they are unnatural although I do not know the manner of it.  But the information gathered by us from those in the tent city says these assassins have no compassion, no goodness, and no decency.  They are monsters in the bodies of men.”

“I’ll bring the Vendidad,” Garsiv said wryly.

“It might be well that one of us does,” Dastan agreed, and not in jest.  The Vendidad, a holy book in its own right, contained much description of demons and the like, and many instructions for defeating them as well.  If the one assassin really were a demon as he had been named, it might be best to be prepared for him as such rather than to be unprepared and die regretting it.  He tapped the map again, this time in a different spot.  “If we can take out the first three, then we may take their places at their meeting with the spiked one here.”

“And of the leader?”

Dastan shook his head.  “I feel certain that he will come to us once his men are dead.  We will have to be vigilant in the extreme lest he surprise us in some most deadly way.”  He looked at Seso.  “Do you perhaps know of any way to prevent ourselves being the victims of such power as this sorcerer is able to wield?  I know he can call the desert’s serpents, and the weather…but things could go very badly for us should he be able to call a sandstorm or a plague.”

“Or reinforcements,” Garsiv added wryly.  “Let us not discount the more mundane help this man might summon to himself.”

Dastan shook his head again.  “There are only five – he and his four men.”

“And we have heard of only five as well,” came from Seso.  “And only three of those have been seen in the tent city by our people.”

Garsiv considered.  He had gone into battles with less information than this and emerged victorious.  The plan could work, and it did give them a place to start; he decided that if they reached the first watering hole of the Hassansin and none were to be found there, he would send back for more men and insist that they try a direction of his own choosing.  “Very well,” he said.  “I will give orders that ten of my best-trained men be ready to leave here at the dawn in pursuit of those who would have assassinated the king.”  He pointed at Dastan.  “You will tell Tus, I do not wish this night to argue with him; I need my sleep as he will not need his.”

“I will tell Tus; I will go to him this very hour,” Dastan promised.  “Although he already knows we are going.”

“He does not know that we travel with only a handful rather than an army of might,” Garsiv said.  “And he needs to, as it is he who will have to tell Father what we are about when he arrives here in a span of two days or less seeking answers.”

“Father will understand, I am certain of it.”  Dastan turned to Seso, who could see that the young prince was not quite so certain as he wanted his brother to believe.  “You may share my rooms for the night, I believe it will be safer for us both.  We shall go there as soon as I have spoken with Tus.”

He left the room, but Seso lingered a moment beside Garsiv.  “I trust him,” he said simply, surprising the second prince.  “And I believe it is not in his destiny to fail.”

Garsiv barely had time to nod before he was gone, and then he went to fill his own men in on the situation with worry and hope warring in his heart.  He resolved to pray to the gods this night, something he did not often do, that the man from Niger was correct in his thinking and spoke truly.  For as much as he did not want to lose their father, he did not want to lose his little brother either – destiny or no destiny.  

 

They set out the next morning and headed east, following their chosen roundabout trail which should parallel that of the assassins without intersecting it. On this occasion Tus had roused himself and seen them off at the gates, setting watchmen and guards there in their wake.  And then he went back to arranging things for their father’s arrival, including selecting out a small group of men who would go out of the city to meet the king’s party and escort them on the last steps of their journey.  He also still had to find a gift, even the thought of which made him shudder; but Garsiv and Dastan had uncharacteristically both provided to him gifts to be presented in their absence the night before, so for him to be lacking in this area meant that they would tease him mercilessly for a very long time, as he had often teased and scolded them about their tendency to forget such niceties in the press of other, more martial concerns.

The princess had, of course, refused to assist him with the preparations, although she had informed her people to do as he required of them.  Tus didn’t like it – it was treading the edges of rudeness, to give orders in another’s house even when told to do so – but she had been adamant in her refusal, and had then retreated to her temple with her flock of pretty handmaidens, to do what he did not know.  Possibly to call on the gods to strike he and his brothers dead; possibly only to strike Dastan dead, so badly did the youngest prince of Persia seem to unseat her composure.

Although such a call might not be answered by the gods even were the princess to make it, for Dastan had proved himself, and his worthiness to be in his position.  He had ridden into the desert canyons, sought and found a ghost, and come back with a treaty which had already borne fruit.  Their father was going to be so proud of Dastan, so very proud.

Especially when Tus told him that Dastan had, for once, not forgotten his gift until the last minute.

 

In the temple of the palace of Alamut, self-locked away behind carved doors of cedar inlaid with gold and precious jewels, Princess Tamina knelt before her altar and tried to make sense of what the gods had wrought.  The marks of her calling, painted in white and gold on her skin, seemed to burn as she sat and thought and stared at the dagger that lay in the center of the altar, unable to clear her mind and achieve the state of peace necessary to commune with the gods.  He had used it, she knew he had.  And it had apparently chosen him, claimed him, because had it not then the power of the Sands would have turned on his unworthiness and destroyed him.

The way it had done to her former trusted friend and protector.  Had he also been in the pay of the king’s brother Nizam?  Or of another?  Because had he not been, he would not have died slain near the front steps of the palace, and Dastan would not have acquired the Dagger from him.  He had known the power of the Sands and the uses of the Dagger, yet he had not used them.  The Dagger was rumored to seek its own safety, and apparently it had.

That still didn’t mean she had to like it – or Dastan – though.  Even though a part of her wanted to do so, she had responsibilities, a duty, which his very existence could thwart.  The fact that he knew – or thought he knew – the secret of the Sands and the Dagger made it even worse.  She should have had him killed the first night he slept in the palace.

She should have, but she hadn’t.  She couldn’t.  And she really hadn’t wanted to.

Having a duty was lonely.  Being princess, ruler, and priestess of a sacred city was lonely.  And secretly her heart had thrilled when he had hinted that he knew, and thrilled again when he had so boldly declared that she no longer had to fulfill her sacred duty alone, that he would stand at her side and they both would guard the secret which her line was charged with protecting at any cost.

She was lonely, and he was strong and brave and handsome.  Not to mention young.  So very, very young.

But he had honor, and courage, and cunning – her people had followed him at her order before he had disappeared into the desert on his first errand, so she knew about the ostrich he had obtained, and now how he had used it to gain the interest of the capricious Sheikh Amar.  It had been a bold, intelligent plan, and well executed, and he had returned with a treaty that he perhaps knew the value of better than his brothers.  For Sheikh Amar, having no great love for the Persian Empire, was a most ideal ally for Alamut with her secret which that empire must never, ever be allowed to learn.  And Dastan, apparently knowing this himself, had carefully written the treaty to keep Persia out of and away from the tent city for as long as their line should stand – his father and brothers could not attack Amar without putting themselves at war with Dastan, and so they would not plan nor execute such an attack so long as he lived.

Which, considering where he was going now, might not be a very long time at all.

Tamina shed a single tear for the thought that he might be unsuccessful and that the responsibility for that failure would lie with her.  For at least one of the Hassansin was named a demon, their leader was a sorcerer…

…and the Dagger which might have helped Prince Dastan overcome such impossible odds lay before her on the altar, gleaming softly in reproach in the oil lamps’ gentle light.   

 

Dastan, for his part, had considered asking for the Dagger before he had left, but had decided against it.  For one, he was fairly certain that Tamina would not have given it to him, and he was loath to wrest it from her by force or remove it by trickery.  And for another, there was a part of him which desired to best these assassins without help from a dagger full of magic sand.  He was a warrior, and a good one.  Magic was useful, but becoming reliant on it would quickly make him careless and that would bring shame on himself and his family.

But those thoughts brought on the memories of having his family turn against him and die one by one, and he quickly put them aside before he was sick with it.  He would never be able to explain that to Garsiv – and he never would explain it, or describe it, and he would do his best not to allude to it for as long as they both lived.  It was bad enough that one of them remembered.

He had already made up his mind that he was telling no one about the Sandglass, or the Sands, or the Dagger – well, no one with the exception of his father, but he suspected that Sharaman already knew.  He was most likely also the person who had told Nizam, trusting his brother with a secret too powerful to be carried alone or allowed to be forgotten.  The king would have never expected that his own brother would betray him in such a terrible and thorough manner, destroying not only himself but his sons as well.

Just as Dastan would never have thought his brothers could believe him capable of treachery to their own father…but they had, and he was cursed to remember it.  The banked rage in Garsiv’s eyes when he’d looked at him, the cold distance Tus had put between them.  The looks of grief and horror on both of their faces as they’d died in his arms, killed for knowing the truth by the uncle they had all trusted and the unnatural assassins he had summoned to carry out the plan he would set in motion.  

Not for the first time, Dastan wondered what price Nizam had paid or offered to acquire the help of such as the Hassansin.  Somehow, he did not think gold or silver or coffers of jewels would have been enough.

Garsiv riding up beside him broke his train of dark thoughts, something Garsiv himself did not fail to notice but chose not to comment on.  “The scout has returned,” he said instead.  “He saw passage of three riders who look to be headed for the very spot marked,” here he nodded to Seso, who nodded back placidly, “and so we should be stopping before we draw too near, lest they see the signs of our own passage and either flee or set a trap for us.”

“There is a place that would be good for stopping about one hour ahead,” Seso told him.  “It is sheltered from view, although it has no water.”

Garsiv waved that away.  “We’ll have water when we take their stopping spot, until then what we have with us will suffice.  We can move in on them as soon as the moon rises.”

 

The moon was a silver crescent ascended just a handspan over the distant mountains when their company descended on the camp of the three Hassansin.  Who had been sitting around a small, well-concealed fire – which unfortunately for them was so well concealed that it had failed to illuminate the men creeping in silently on foot from the shadows with drawn swords in their hands, or the four others who stayed back of them, still mounted, with arrows trained on the fire that they might choose targets by its light.  In spite of being taken by surprise, however, the assassins were skilled men who rose ready to face the threat as one and immediately attacked their attackers with not unexpected ferocity.  One of the three dropped back behind the other two, making an arcane motion with his hands, and the wind responded, gusting down the sides of the canyon’s rocky walls.  But before he could call up something larger, or cause the loose sand to do more than swirl around the ankles of the attackers, three arrows found him and the wind died again as he fell.

The ferocity of the other two assassins doubled at this loss of their unnatural brother, but the soldiers of Garsiv and the men belonging to Dastan had much pent-up frustration to work out, having ridden so long seeking a battle which they had so far been denied, and such was their skill and power that after a few moments only of fighting the assassins had fallen and only two of their attackers had so much as a scratch.  Those two were taken near the fire and the daggers that had wounded them as well to be sure that the blades had not been poisoned, and the rest secured the canyon, dragged the bodies of the downed Hassansin into a row for examination, and set a watch lest their fellow assassins appear unexpectedly in the night.

Dastan along with his men was setting up a tent on the safer side of the fire when Seso called to him; he went at once, taking Bis with him, and found the man from Niger near the bodies of the assassins.  Several items were laid out on a cloth on the sand nearby; Seso was apparently going through their pockets as well as their packs.  “Bettors’ tokens from the tent city races,” he explained with a wave of his hand toward the cloth.  “And coins that prove they have been in several other cities as well.  One of them carried a small but powerful collection of poisons and sickening herbs, the other rope and hooks for climbing and tools for entering that which had been locked against thieves and intruders.  The third had no bag, as apparently he did not require more than what he could carry on his body, and I had suspected that he was eating of the food his companions carried for him, being higher in rank above them.  But that was not the case.”  He now waved his hand at the body of the wind-caller, which had three red-stained holes in its clothing where the arrows had been reclaimed by their owners.  Seso scowled at it, then rose to his feet.  “My prince, we have greater problems than the two most dangerous left to catch.  This one was dead.”

Dastan stopped still.  Bis shook his head.  “He is dead, you mean – we just killed him.”

“No.”  Seso shook his head.  “He was dead before – and I suspect, were we to leave his body here alone or even merely unattended, in a few hours he might yet rise up and make his way on to the next part of his circuit, there to send word to the leader of the Hassansin of the deaths of the others.”  He made a face.  “If he did not animate them as well and take them along with him.  And that after killing us in our sleep, of course.”

“He was an animated corpse,” Dastan explained to Bis.  “It’s the blackest of black arts, to defile a corpse in such a manner – what is brought back has knowledge and endurance beyond the reach of mortal men, but it is without heart, or conscience, or humanity save for the shell it moves about in.”

“It is a demon,” Seso agreed.  “A demon attached to dead flesh.”  He shook his head, wiping his hands on his pants as though to wipe the uncleanliness of the idea off of them.  “This one will have to be burned, we dare not bury him and risk having him follow us for revenge.”  Garsiv came walking up to see what they were discussing, and Seso nodded at the corpse of the Hassansin.  “This one must be burned, and we should probably burn the others as well.”

“It was a walking corpse,” Dastan explained again.  “We could probably keep the head, so long as we were careful of its storage.”

Seso nodded.  “And so long as it were blindfolded and gagged, yes, it should be safe enough to take back with us as proof.  A sturdy box of wood or metal would do.”

Garsiv frowned and went to have a closer look at the body…and ended up stabbing it again with a dagger when he saw its hand reaching for the dagger in its belt.  “We have a chest, brought for swords,” he said, straightening and wiping his dagger clean before returning it to its sheath.  “It is heavy wood, and should be of a size to hold five heads.  I had intended to return them in sacks, but after this,” he waved at the newly-killed corpse, “I feel that a sack would not be the safest means of transporting such a thing.”

“Build up a crude pyre for the bodies,” Dastan ordered Bis.  “We’ll behead them, and use oil to speed the burning.”  He smiled crookedly.  “Perhaps we should take an axe to the bones afterward as well.  We’ve no way of knowing how much of a body must be left to house a demon.”

“I have heard stories of walking bones,” Garsiv admitted.  “We’ll crush the bones and scatter the ashes, just in case.”

 

They worked all the rest of that night, burning the bodies of the three dead assassins and then breaking and scattering their bones and ashes, and the next morning when they went on their way most of the men carried at least two swords and they bore along with them the heavy wooden box containing three heads which had been blindfolded, gagged, and then individually bound in sacks tied tightly with strong cords.  Garsiv and Dastan had been busy among their men all through that night to quell the fear that had fallen on some of them and which threatened to spread rapaciously through their ranks – fear of the walking dead, of demons in the form of men striding over the sands to hunt the living, had gripped many as the facts of what they hunted could not be kept from them.  Garsiv was now riding with the Vendidad before him, originally brought half in jest, studying it and occasionally quoting to those who rode near him or sending instructions to others based on what he’d found; for the Vendidad had much information regarding protecting oneself from such demons, and he would have his men as safe as they could be.

Dastan and his men rode closer to the others than they had in the days before, keeping an eye on the box that traveled between them, receiving the information which was passed back to them through Garsiv’s men and in turn hearing and passing on knowledge from Seso regarding how best to tell if a man was truly dead or an undead abomination, be he a fresh corpse or no.  Although they kept to themselves the tale he related of the undead woman who had been found killing unfaithful husbands in a brothel in far-off Cairo in a most unpleasant way.  That tale made Dastan laugh to himself, for several of his men were overfond of brothels when one was convenient for their use, and the uncertainty engendered by such a tale might make them more particular in their choices of bed partners in the future.

The next stop on the circuit favored by the traveling Hassansin was some four days ride from the last, and when they arrived they found the spot empty of life and so decided to camp there for the night.  It was decided at that time to check the heads of the first three assassins in the box, where it was found that while two remained dead one was yet moving in a disturbing manner, although they determined that it would not be possible for it to escape either bonds or box.  The box was reclosed and bound with a chain, and then marks copied from the Vendidad were burned onto it all around to ward the demon spirit which occupied the dead flesh within from escaping to possess – or possibly create – another walking corpse.

Two days more of travel, and the land was becoming more forbidding.  Stark walls of rock rose to border the dry valleys, and stone pillars blasted to curious shapes by wind and sand rose from at startling intervals like earthen fingers pointing to the heavens.  The skies overhead were flat and dull, the clouds high above and offering neither shade nor rain, and the watering places often stagnant and requiring cleansing with sand and ash before their precious, polluted fluid could be used by man or beast. They had come to the area known as the Ruins of the Gods, and it was a place where mortal travelers did not find themselves welcomed.

It was on their third night in the old palaces of the damned that a thudding came from within the box which housed the heads of the assassins, the sound of the undead head trying desperately to make its presence known.  And it was this that put them on the alert, knowing from the Vendidad that demons would call to other demons, so they took precautions and shielded themselves and so were somewhat prepared when the first rain of dagger-spikes came flying out of the darkness – only two men dove behind their shelter cursing, a spike having found them as a target, but neither was wounded fatally.

So began a strange, unnatural battle in the moonlight.  The Hassansin was a shadow that threw a seemingly endless supply of shadow-spikes, moving as fluidly as though he were made of water.  Men advanced upon him as best they could, shielding themselves behind boulders and pillars of stone, hiding themselves in the shadows, or clinging close to the ground – and still the spikes found them.  The cries and curses of those pierced by multiple sharp missiles rang a frightening counterpoint to the screams of the frightened horses and the noises being made by the severed head of the wind-caller, turning the scene into a nightmare.  Little by little, as planned, however, the men of Persia were drawing in on the Hassansin, pushing him back against a wall of rock, buying each step he was forced backward with their own blood.  One man lay still on the sands, his life’s blood pouring out from a dozen deep wounds as he had slipped in the sand and for one fatal moment been fully exposed.  And still the spikes flew.

Seso appeared, advancing behind a sturdy shield of wood – the lid of the sword box which now held heads.  The wood was soon thickly covered with black spikes and yet still he advanced, drawing upon all his strength to move close enough for a killing blow.  Dastan rallied his men to distract the Hassansin, throwing rocks and shooting arrows at him, trying to draw his attention to the forces flanking him rather than the lone man advancing directly in front.  It worked but little, as the spikes flew in all directions as though from a rotating drum, and with each step Seso made forward Dastan could see that the wooden shield he sheltered behind would soon grow too heavy for any man to bear as its burden of spikes increased.  Seso knew this too, and so at the critical moment he allowed the shield to fall toward the Hassansin, into the rain of spikes, and leapt out from behind its falling shelter to strike with daggers of his own.  What he apparently had not been prepared for was that the Hassansin would pivot on one foot and direct his spikes over the falling shield with one outflung hand.  Dastan, however, did see it happening and was not prepared to see Seso die yet again, so he threw himself forward heedless of the danger.  But he was too late; the spikes flew truly to their target, impaling the man from Niger and killing him almost instantly.  Dastan almost screamed with rage, especially as he knew that could he roll back time but a few moments he could save Seso and see the end of the Hassansin.  He well remembered how it felt to flow backwards in time, as though his body had been turned to sand and fire…

The sensation overcame him, the fire burning hotter than he’d remembered, and suddenly he was standing in his place of a few moments before, looking at Seso who was about to drop his makeshift wooden shield.  Dastan pulled a dagger from his boot and threw it, striking the Hassansin’s upraised arm to the bone and thereby giving Seso the opening he needed to dive in and make the kill.  Seso looked back at him and nodded his thanks, a nod which Dastan returned before going to help the wounded men and see about burying the one they had lost. And once that was done, he retired to his tent where he sat long into the night, in the dark that no one might come to disturb him, deep in thought.

Staring at the palm of his left hand, on which had risen a brand in the image of the Sandglass.  Whether it was a gift of the gods or a curse from them he could not be certain…but he apparently did not now need the Dagger to reverse time.

 

The next morning when they rode out, none remarked on the fact that Prince Dastan wore leather covering the palms of his hands, somewhat like to gloves with no fingers, nor did they notice that he did not remove the coverings at all through the course of the day or on into the night.  The minds of the men were occupied with much more frightening and disturbing details, not only due to their last two encounters with Hassansin which had been so obviously unnatural, but also because they were now searching for the leader, a known sorcerer whom Dastan had said could call the asp and the cobra and the viper to do his bidding, and perhaps call the storm and the darkness and the fire from the heavens as well.  That their prince was wearing gloves while he rode was a detail so inconsiderable in comparison that none of them even so much as gave it a thought, much less remarked on it.

Not even when, after three days, he was still wearing them and had not yet been seen to take them off.  In truth, Dastan was afraid of his older brother’s reaction to the brand.  Garsiv was not one for flights of fancy or one to let his imaginings get the better of his reason…but for a week of days now he had been studying the Vendidad and its tales and cures of demons.  Dastan did not want to test his brother’s grasp on reason and lose, as it could possibly cost him the hand so afflicted if Garsiv were to decide that the brand was the work of a demon and therefore must be removed.

It wasn’t like Dastan could explain to him what it truly symbolized.  Ever at the back of his mind was the tale of Sharaman and Nizam, and of the horror of betrayal that knowledge of the Sands of Time had wrought between them.  And while Garsiv was no Nizam, lusting for the throne and crown of Persia…it was still true that he had once, even though it had never happened, believed wholeheartedly that Dastan had cruelly and horribly murdered their father, and that for no logical reason.  Dastan trusted his brother, he truly did…he was just loathe to put that trust to such a test as he knew had already been failed once.  And in that other time and place, Garsiv had not regained his reason until it was far too late, and then at the cost of his own life.

The brand would stay covered, at least until they returned to Alamut victorious.  For the one person Dastan knew he could show the brand to was the Princess Tamina, Priestess of the Sandglass.  She would, he was certain, know the true origin of the mark and that it had not been born of evil.  Perhaps the sight of it, a clear sign that he shared her duty, would even encourage her to think more kindly of their eventual marriage.

 

Alone in her private chambers, Tamina sat deep in thought – as she had been for a week of days, thinking the same thoughts over and over again.  She had not expected any of this, she did not know how to deal with it – with him, in particular.  He knew the secret of Alamut, he knew of her duty and had sworn to uphold it by her side.  He seemed, frighteningly, although she would not have admitted it to another living soul, to know her as well as though for a long time.  He knew her, although they had never met until the day his brother had suggested a marriage between them. And the look in his eyes when they touched her spoke of love.

His love frightened her more than anything else.  How had he come to not only know her but to love her as well.  The Dagger had to be involved, there was no other explanation…except that the Dagger could reverse time by a few moments only, not for days or weeks.

Had he been to the Sandglass?  She shook her head.  If he had penetrated the sacred temple of the Sandglass, either he would be dead or the world would have been destroyed.  Neither had happened.

Had it?  Her eyes widened in the room’s gathering darkness as a new thought entered her mind.  Prince Dastan seemed to know her, but he had also known many other things.  His uncle’s treachery.  The existence and identity of the Hassansin.  The traitors within her own trusted guards and servants.  Did he know these things because they had happened once already?  And did he know her because he had allied himself to her in that time that would not now happen, had he aided her in fulfilling her sacred duty?

Was he even now so grim and careful because he had already lived a time when treachery had won and stolen his father and brothers from him?  She shuddered in unexpected horror and pity.  Tamina did not well recall her own family, so long had it been since they’d lived and so young had she been when they’d died, but she was not grown so cold that she could not see the love Dastan had for his father and brothers.  He would, she was certain, die for them without a second thought or a single regret.  He would most likely die for her as well…and at that another new thought struck her and made her feel cold.  Had she also died, in that time that wasn’t now to be?  Her duty would have demanded that she do so.  Her next shudder was much stronger, and wrung forth a tear of which she was not aware.  Had she died with his name upon her lips, looking into his eyes?  Had he held her hand in his, pleading that she not leave him?   

Tamina was almost certain she had, and he had.  Just as she was suddenly, irrevocably certain that he had turned his grief into fury and killed his treacherous uncle in the temple of the Sandglass, where doubtless the man had been trying to release the sands for his own unworthy purposes.  Which meant that Dastan had stopped the flow of sand, stopped the wrath of the gods…

Turned back time, most likely all unknowing, and found himself back in the newly conquered Alamut with the Dagger in his hand and a weight of knowledge in his mind of what could happen, would happen if he did not take steps.  Which he had done, and quickly; her people had told her of how he had confronted his uncle on the very steps of the palace, exposing Nizam’s treachery with knowledgeable words in a voice of desperate grief.  He had fought with his uncle, bested him, and turned to leave him in the dust to await the justice brought by law…and then Nizam had sprung up like a viper to attack Dastan’s turned back and Crown Prince Tus had killed the traitorous man to save his brother.  There were already poems being written about it, songs to be sung around fires and in crowded halls all around Persia and beyond.

Tamina had already instructed her people that those songs were not to be sung in or near the palace of Alamut.  She did not think that Dastan and his brothers would care to hear them – and in truth, she did not herself for her future husband’s sake.  Her long duty may have made her cold, but she was still a woman…and he was proving to be an honorable man, worthy of that much respect at the least.

 

Dastan and Garsiv and their men had continued to travel along the circuit of the Hassansin for a time, and had then departed from it after several days in order to draw nearer to civilization and its attendant supplies of water and food.  Dastan was becoming nervous at this new course, however; in order to bring them back to a nearby city for resupplying both men and horses, it was taking them through an even wilder land than the one they had passed through before, not as forbidding but perhaps even more dangerous

The leader of the Hassansin found them on the second night.

The first they knew of him was in the nervousness of the tethered horses, then in the muffled clamor set up from the box of heads, and soon afterward he appeared, cloaked and hooded and bearing a light-colored rag on the end of a stick.  He drew nearer and threw back the hood, showing himself to be scarred and pale, and with his one remaining eye cloudy and pale as well like a marble of blue-white agate.  “I come in peace to speak with you, princes of Persia,” he called into their small camp.  He looked every inch a threat, but he had extended the flag to request a temporary truce and peaceful meeting and to disregard it would be to lose honor – and to risk being cursed. 

Although neither Dastan nor Garsiv nor even Seso were entirely sure such things applied if the requestor was already dead – which this sorcerer may well be – none of them were of a mind to take such a risk.  To do so might even give him power over them, while under the flag of truce he should have none.  So they nodded to the men to lower their weapons and allow him into their camp.

The leader and now lone man of the Hassansin walked into the camp and took the seat that had been cleared for him by the fire.  He refused the offer of food and drink with a shake of his head and a sly smile.  “You know, if not me myself then at least of my kind,” he said.  “Such things I have no use for.”

“So you admit you are a walking corpse,” Dastan said.

He nodded.  “I lived once, as one of the Hassansin.  I had heard that in the driest places dwelt demons who would come to those in desperation and make bountiful and terrible offers in return for liberties good men dare not speak of.”  He chuckled, a hollow sound without mirth.  “The loss of my eye had destroyed my career and I had been cast out by my brethren, so I journeyed to the driest place I could find, poured my water on the ground, then my blood, and called the demons to me.”  He smiled in a way that was frightening.  “They were terrible beyond imagining, and yet my desire for vengeance touched them and led to a bargain, and I became as you see me now.”  The smile grew wider.  “I returned, undying and with greater power than any before me had ever known, and I decimated the ranks of the once untouchable Hassansins with my own hands.  Then I raised the bodies of those I felt could serve me best and we continued to serve the needs of men who desired blood to be spilled but wished to not dirty their own hands.  We took in recompense for our services in gold, jewels, horses, sometimes a son or daughter to train in our ways, and used our wages for the rebuilding the Hassansin as I wished them to be, making them answerable to me alone.”  He cocked his head at Garsiv, like a raptor evaluating potential prey.  “I required many things from Nizam in exchange for having our assistance, one of them being your body to add to my inner circle.  I am…disappointed that our contract could not be completed to that end.  Perhaps another can be made, you would be a valuable addition to my ranks.”

Garsiv scowled and Dastan shook his head firmly, which drew another terrible hollow chuckle from the sorcerer-corpse and its demon.  “You may yet reconsider, boy.  I can make you wish he was dead, or make it so for you that he would offer himself to me.”  The horrible smile again, even wider this time.  “Perhaps…like this!”

A glittering cloud flew from his hand, and wherever it touched skin it stung and burned.  Some of it reached Garsiv’s eyes and he screamed, clawing at them.  Dastan pulled him out of the way, seeing the blisters already bubbling up along his own forearms and chest, the flesh of the fingers on one hand as well.  Garsiv’s hands were blistered as well where they covered his burned face and ruined, blinded eyes.  “You came in truce!” Dastan accused, drawing his sword.      

The sorcerer just smiled and shrugged.  “I am dead, and damned as well.  The curse of broken trust holds no threat to me as it would to a mortal bound by the will of the gods.  Now, shall I have him and end his suffering forever, or will you take him home as a disfigured curiosity to hunch in a corner of your dishonorably conquered palace day and night, trapped in a world of loss and pain and darkness from which you may never hope to release him save through his death?”

Dastan’s own smile seemed to take him by surprise, which was not a bad thing.  “Neither,” the youngest prince of Persia said, and time warped backwards until they were all once again sitting unmarked around the fire under a flag of truce.  The sorcerer was speaking again.  “I can make you wish…”

“I’m sure you can,” Dastan told him, abruptly yanking both Garsiv and Bis up and away from the fire.  The glittering cloud was thrown anyway, but a sweep of the traveling cloak he had scooped up drew it down into the fire to burn into harmlessness.  “The walking dead and damned need not fear the curse of a broken oath, am I right?”

The sorcerer rose from his seated position like a cobra, and the men who had been standing nearby to guard stepped back from him, so great was the menace that radiated from his body.  “What a wise little foundling you turned out to be,” he smirked.  “Perhaps I chose the wrong prince to claim; you might have served my needs and the needs of those in service to me much better than this young and upright general, regardless of the authority his face carries.”

Dastan continued to push his brother back and behind him.  “I believe that, had you the chance, you would take us both,” he countered.  “But I would not be so certain that a curse cannot be settled on damned, dead flesh.  You break laws older than those of Persia, laws as old as the open desert itself.  Who knows what keeps those laws, or punishes their trespass?”

The sorcerer snarled.  “I serve the powers of the open desert…”

“You were taken by creatures of evil that were long since banished to the driest places, there to lie in wait, ever hungry, ever thirsty, unless a desperate man or a fool come their way and pave the path to their freedom with oaths and blood,” Garsiv told him.  “Save your lie of serving, as though you were employed by the evil instead of inhabited by it – you are a slave, and trapped by death to do as your master’s whims command, whether he indulges you in your dreams of vengeance and power or not.”

“There is little you have gained, as I see it,” Dastan agreed.  “What worth is wealth, or power, if the enjoyment of it will never again be yours?  You surrendered all for a paltry revenge, like a man who last ate at daybreak giving a thousand drachmas for a single grain of rice that same afternoon; your demon masters must have been laughing at you as your blood fed their hungry sands, so much given for so very little they returned you.”

The sorcerer’s scarred face twisted with rage.  “You dare!  Bloodless filth, how could you know anything?”  He raised his hand, and the sands began to ripple.  “I call forth…”

“You will call forth nothing,” Seso said with more than a little contempt.  “The laws bind you as they bind us.  Invited in under a flag of truce, you have no power over us or ours save we give it to you.”

“Ah, but it isn’t a flag, though I used it as one,” was the nasty reply.  He tossed the stick over the fire, and Dastan caught it with a leather-clad hand.  “See, there, what I brought you.  Your camp is defiled, you allowed it in.”

Dastan glanced at the flag, then grimaced and passed it on to Garsiv, who nearly exclaimed over it.  “Still a flag of truce,” he maintained, setting it aside with a shudder.  “No matter what disgusting thing you made it out of.  And you yourself claimed it as such when you arrived, you cannot change the naming of it now.”

“The gods care not what the flag be fashioned from,” came from Seso, who had a knife ready in each hand.  “You, by the words of your own mouth, entered our camp in deceit.  We are permitted to kill you for that, and no harm come to us.”

“And yet you hesitate,” the sorcerer sneered.  “Good men, all of you – unwilling to kill unless clearly provoked, unwilling to bear the burden of the death and yet unwilling to cast that burden aside once you spend another’s blood to acquire it.”

“We are not assassins – and yours was once a more noble profession than what you and your demons have reduced it to.”  Dastan pushed his brother and Seso back again, gesturing Bis and the others back as well, and moved obliquely away from the fire.  “You came to fight, so be it.  One against one, I will meet you.”

The sorcerer’s eye fixed on him, and a dry chuckle like dead leaves blown by the wind issued from his mouth.  He moved away from the fire as well, so that they faced each other across an open patch of sand.  “You wish to challenge me?”

“No, but I accept the challenge your dishonor presents to me.”  Dastan smiled back at him, a wolf’s baring of teeth.  “If you would fight to reclaim the abomination we hold captive in the chest, then the one you will fight is me.  If you would fight to kill and claim my brother, it is over my body that you must step to reach him.  Now have you a weapon, as the laws you have broken prevent you from calling vipers to do your bidding, or shall we provide you with a blade?”

In answer the sorcerer threw a small dagger at him, which he slapped aside with his own sword.  “Poisoned?”

“They all are.  You expected less of one such as I?” More flew across the space, and to the eyes of those watching it seemed as though Dastan fairly danced between them – and yet he never gave ground or left the way to his brother open for even a moment.  And then he advanced, and the sorcerer produced a scimitar with a blade as black as pitch and shimmering like oil in the moonlight, and as the two blades met men leaped even farther back as black droplets flew away from the clash to land hissing and smoking in the sand.  Dastan dipped and came up with a handful of sand, which he threw, and then threw again, and the oily blackness fell from the sword to make an ugly, steaming mess on the ground; the two combatants moved away from it, as did almost everyone else.  Seso, however, took a brand and set it alight, and the smoke that came from it was black and oily as well with a noxious smell.

“I have no doubt the smoke is poison as well,” he said to Garsiv when he returned to his side.  “It may be some sort of liquid fire, as it would not burn a dead hand and magic would keep it clinging to his blade for a time.”

Garsiv nodded, his eyes never leaving the fight – which had intensified, as now the sorcerer appeared most enraged and Dastan seemed to be taunting him, goading him to grow even angrier.  “It’s like…it’s like he knows where each blow will fall, where each trick or trap will be laid,” he said, almost to himself.  “This is not the way he usually fights.”

Seso shrugged, and Garsiv did not seen the knowing and suspicion in his dark eyes.  “You have never seen him fight a sorcerer before, I would think.  And perhaps the gods lend him their foresight in some way.  They would not love this demon-possessed abomination, your brother may be their champion chosen to remove it from the earth.  Although I believe there must also be some ritual to be performed if it is to be removed permanently…”

Garsiv started, recalling himself to the matter at hand.  Dastan was distracting the sorcerer, and he himself was just standing here when he should be…he ran back to the tents to get the Vendidad.  Even the nearness of the holy book should weaken the demon, and within its pages must lie the means to destroy it.  He prayed to the gods that he had not delayed too long, for his brother’s sake.

Dastan was thinking the same thing.  Those watching could not see it, thinking it to have been but a handful of minutes, but this very short-appearing battle between he and the sorcerer had already gone on for a much longer amount of time…and he was beginning to feel strangely weak as well as tired.  He had already stopped the undead abomination from killing Garsiv twice, and had witnessed with horror the result of spinning the black-oiled blade with a quick incantation which had caused the black liquid poison to shower the entire camp, burning and killing wherever it touched; the double handful of sand he had thrown had been a sudden inspiration gained by seeing Seso pour sand over one man’s burning wound to smother and remove the noxious substance as it ate into fragile flesh.

The sorcerer appeared to be running low on magic tricks now, but being undead and possessed by a demon besides he did not tire as a living man would, and he was stronger than even a much larger opponent would have been.  Dastan was all too aware of his mortality in fighting him, when every clash of their blades felt as though he had swung his into the side of a rock or a tree.  He was now using the power of the Sandglass to stave off wounds that would have maimed or killed him…but he was slowing down, and he knew that soon even that would not be enough.  

 

In the city of Alamut, Princess Tamina woke near to screaming from dreams of fire and blood.  She threw herself from her bed and raced to the temple through the secret ways that lay in her chambers, and once there she dropped to her knees in fear and a terrible knowing.

The Dagger, still laying impotent in the middle of the altar, was yet glowing like a small sun.  Prince Dastan must be using the power of the Sands within him.  He must be fighting…he had to be fighting the leader of the Hassansin, the sorcerer, and using the power of the Sands to combat his opponent’s darker powers against which he and those with him had no natural defense.  She pressed her hand to her mouth in horror as the glow grew ever brighter.  If he continued this battle in this manner he would almost certainly die, as invoking the power of the Sands extracted a price like to losing blood, or to going without water under the desert sun. 

Some of the unyielding pride in her shattered, and she threw herself across the altar and let her tears fall on it unchecked.  She did not want so brave and noble a man to die for her blindness, for her arrogance.  Prince Dastan was more than worthy to be her husband – it was she who may not be worthy to be the wife of such a man as he.  “Please,” she whispered to the gods.  “Please.  Lend your chosen champion the strength to defeat this evil.  Your blessing be on him now as it was on him before!”

 

Dastan could feel himself faltering with weakness, as though he were bleeding from invisible wounds, but still he continued to taunt and parry his undead opponent with words and blades.  And when a flash of heat from the brand on his palm sent an unexpected trickle of renewed strength through him, he pressed the unlooked for advantage it gave him and managed to knock his opponent backward onto the sand.  He went to one knee in the sand himself from the force of it and the expending of all his strength, dropping his too-heavy sword and drawing a dagger from his belt instead in order to continue as best he could.  And then just as he was seeing the triumph in the sorcerer’s eye as the undead Hassansin began to regain his feet, Garsiv’s voice rang out strongly from behind the fire and someone was throwing a ring of water on the ground and the sorcerer began to scream as the sand itself rose up within the ring like a live thing, like the hand of a buried god which held and tore at him, stripping away clothing and flesh alike as he struggled, until the demon fled the ruined shell as it finally collapsed into ashes with a scream of rage in a black and noisome cloud.  Seso this time it was who shouted, and sand fell around Dastan like a soft rain and the demon fell back with another cry and fled in a burst of wind out of the camp to scream its rage and fear and longing across the empty sands as it was banished back to the driest of places from whence it had originally come.

Dastan heard his brother speak his name and felt the touch of the familiar hand on his arm. “He is gone?  The Vendidad…”

“The demon is banished, it may not return,” Garsiv told him.  “And even as we speak men are warding the camp that none other may visit us this night.  Are you wounded?  When you went your knees I thought…”

“No, I’m fine.”  Dastan struggled to stand, but his strength was gone and darkness was enclosing his vision.  The last thing he heard was his brother’s frightened exclamation…and the soft sound of his princess crying. 

 

From the Journal of Garsiv,  
Second Prince of Persia and General of the Persian Army

 

I curse myself for thinking so slowly, for the delay which could have cost my younger brother his life or worse. The answer did indeed lay in the pages of the Vendidad, and even having it near the battle weakened the demon so that he fought more like a man rather than an untiring construct of death. I could see Dastan faltering even as I found the answer, even as I shouted the words over the clash of blades and Seso threw blessed water at the sorcerer to enclose him in a ring of unmaking.

The water made the sands rise up of their own accord against the uncleanliness of the undead sorcerer, and they rent the dead flesh into rags and bones, and then a fire rose that burned blue and white when it touched what remained of the undead flesh, consuming it cleanly, and the demon rose like a black mist and fled with a cry that made us all cover our ears. And then there was only ash floating on the night breeze, and Dastan there on one knee, alone, looking as though he knew not even where he was although he still held in his hand a dagger with which to continue the fight if it should return to him. But he recollected himself with obvious effort, and looked to find me, and when he saw me beside him and unscathed he smiled. And then he collapsed in my arms and the fearful silence of the camp was broken by concern for the living.

For a night and a day my brother lay like the dead; we could barely see his breath, and his face was gray like an old man not long for life. There was no mark on him save the strange brand on his palm, which appears to be old though when he got it I do not know, for I have never seen it before – it appears not in the pages of the Vendidad, and I must trust in Seso’s word that he does not believe it to be a mark of evil. Dastan had no wounds, even a bite from a viper we looked for and did not find. And when he awakened he was well as ever, and asked for food, and would only speculate to my prodding for a reason for his collapse and long deathlike sleep that perhaps his opponent being a sorcerer had had something to do with it.

We head back to Alamut today, where our father awaits our return and the news that the Hassansin have been destroyed. And I must tell Tus that he was right – our brother has changed, something has happened to him and I do not now believe that it was only the rigors of our last battle and the shock of discovering a traitor within our family. 

 

When Garsiv and Dastan rode back into Alamut at the head of their small group of men, many eyes were watching them – many eyes had been watching to see if they would return at all, and in some quarters wagers had even been made.  Quite a lot of money was lost in those quarters when it was seen that most of those who had departed with them had in fact returned.

The flag of the king in residence was flying above the palace, and seeing it the brothers knew that they would be expected to go at once to the audience chamber, without stopping for any thing, to greet their father and present him with the proof that their hunt had been successful.  And Sharaman for his part was waiting with no little trepidation, although he did not show it, for he knew something of the Hassansins of old and he feared what the quest for their destruction may have cost his sons – although at least he knew that they both lived and rode as though they were well, for he had had watchers posted to see them come and report to him the moment they came into view.  Tus waited with him, and the Princess Tamina, who the king noticed – although he thought that Tus did not – was possibly as fearful of the same thing he himself feared.

That made him smile, although he hid it behind his hand.  He was glad to know she had at least some affection for Dastan; he was a practical man in matters of royal unions being more political than romantic, but he would have preferred not to have his beloved youngest son bound in marriage to a cold shrew who despised him.

Garsiv came first into the audience chamber with Dastan a step behind him as was proper, he being the younger brother, and behind them came four men carrying a wooden chest marked all over with symbols of power and from which a faint but most unpleasant noise could be heard.  They both bowed with all formality, and Sharaman saw that they had apparently stopped before entering the city to clean themselves up as best they could.  He inclined his head in acknowledgment.  “My sons, you have returned…unscathed?”

“We have,” Garsiv said, although the look he gave his younger brother told that he had some little doubt on that score.   “And we have brought you proof of the demise of your enemies, those who would have preyed upon our line and others as well.”  He motioned the men with the chest forward…and then he hesitated, glancing at the princess askance.  “Father, I am unsure…”

“No,” Dastan’s voice was low, but firm.  He looked directly at his princess, meeting and holding her eyes.  “My princess, within this wooden box are the heads of the Hassansin.  Some of them were undead, their bodies being animated by demons from the driest places…and one of those is possessed still, and moves still, and it is that which you hear crying out through the bindings we have upon it to keep it from doing what evil it could in the state that it is in.  Do you wish to look upon this abomination?”

Sharaman could tell that she thought about it, and perhaps of other things as well that she read in his youngest son’s dark eyes, but after a moment’s thought only she nodded once.  “I will look upon it; it is my duty to my people to know this abomination and to know that it has been destroyed.”

“It will be, just as soon as it has been seen, that all here might know of what we fought and the truth of what evil lies in the deepest desert seeking the weak and desperate to devour.”  He nodded to Garsiv, who let the men come forward and untie the box.  The noise from within it became a horrible gurgling chant, and both Dastan and Garsiv drew their swords as the lid was removed – fortuitously, as it were, as the head of the demon Hassansin of wind leaped up, having freed itself from the sack it had been bound in although it was still gagged, its eyes unbound and staring wildly around.  The guards leapt to attention, interposing themselves between the horrible thing and their royal charges, and after smacking the head back down into the box with the flat of his blade Dastan looked to his father and shook his head.  “With your leave…”

“By all means, end it,” Sharaman said with feeling. The head was still gibbering, the noise becoming more desperate as it saw the blade descending upon it, and then the man from the tent city, Seso, was there and pouring something onto it from a pouch he had drawn from his belt, and the head screamed but once before there was a flash of blue-white fire and like an unclean black mist the demon rose out of it and howled in rage before being banished by a burst of wind that pushed the doors of the chamber open with a bang.

Silence fell on the hall.  The princess stood still straight but with her hand pressed to her mouth, and Tus looked as though he would like to have been sick on the spot.  Sharaman shook his head.  “That was the only one to be so afflicted?”

“One other was such, but his power was not such to allow his head to escape its bindings – that, and we did them better as we knew what to expect from it.  The last was the sorcerer himself, whom Dastan fought while I readied the banishing words from the Vendidad,” Garsiv said, and the knowing eye of his father saw a pain there in the admission that he had been the one to stand behind in safety while his brother had fought a demon-possessed monster to defend all their lives.  “The ritual tore that one to pieces and then burnt him to ash; the ash is in a sack in the box, but I believe we should burn the whole of the box as quickly as possible now that you have seen what it contains.”

Sharaman nodded slowly.  “Yes, I agree.  Close the box back up and tie it again, that nothing may fall from it as it is being taken to the fire and be used to spread evil elsewhere.”  He summoned servants to his side with a wave of his hand.  “Have a fire built that burns with blessed flame, large enough to consume this box and all it contains,” he ordered.  “The men who carry the box will remain to verify that it is burned until only ash remains, and then the ash shall be gathered and buried outside of the city in no less than twelve deep holes.”  The servants shook to even think of being near the box but went to do as he commanded, the men with the box removing it from the audience hall in their wake.  The king looked back at his sons.  “I rarely speak to the gods, my sons, but this day I give them my thanks that you have both returned to me unscathed.”

Garsiv looked like he wanted to say something about that, but after a moment’s hesitation he bowed his head and left those words unsaid in favor of others.  “I, too, found occasion to speak to the gods in gratitude during our journey, and for this same reason, Father.”

“We shall speak of it together at a later time,” the king told him.  “Tus has told me of the treachery of Nizam, and of how he caused you to be misled into attacking the sacred city against my command; in light of this, you are forgiven for the parts you both played in the siege and conquest of Alamut, as the both of you acted as quickly as you were able to not only repair the damage done but also to end any future threat.  And I approve the marriage of my youngest son, Dastan, to the Princess Tamina of the sacred city of Alamut, in order to seal the breach between us with an alliance of blood.”

“Thank you, Father.”  Dastan was smiling, obviously truly happy with the arrangement, and out of the corner of his eye Sharaman thought he saw the princess blush.  He hid his amusement.  She was lovely, the princess Tamina, and strong besides, and it was plain that his son was smitten with her already.  He could see that this union should be a good one, and not just for Persia.  “Has all been well while my brother and I were away?”

“We haven’t unearthed any more traitors,” Tus answered at his father’s nod.  “It has been very quiet in the city since your departure, and there has been no trouble to speak of.”

Garsiv looked worried.  “None?  Are you sure?”  He looked around the room, taking in the press of people who were gathered there, and the servants and guards as well.  “I would have expected something to happen, given the way we came to be here there must be resentment in some quarters.”

Of course, it was on the heels of his very words that one of the guards let loose a scream of rage and leapt for the king…but just like that, Dastan was there blocking him, forcing him off the dais before any other could react.  And then he blocked the man again when he made for Tus and swung wide in an attempt to harm as many as possible before he was killed.  Which Dastan did with dispatch, cutting his throat and then stabbing him through the heart as he lay on the floor, calling for Seso and Garsiv to bind the demon that was within the body even still.  They made quick work of it, after which he pulled his sword from the body and wiped it on the dead man’s clothing to clean it.  And then he took a step backward and collapsed so unexpectedly that Garsiv was hard-pressed to catch him before he could hit the marble floor.

 “This happened after his battle with the sorcerer as well,” Garsiv told their father and Tus.  “He…he said on awakening a night and a day later that he thought it must be due to the man having been a sorcerer.  But this man, possessed though his body might have been, he was no sorcerer.”

“No, had he been then I am sure he would not have attacked like a berserker with a sword, but would have used some more subtle and powerful method to achieve the deaths he sought.”  Sharaman looked around the hall, his face like thunder.  “If there are any more vipers here today, come try my blade and see what it gets you!” he demanded.  “And if I find that it is a spell which afflicts my son…”

“Do you know aught of this, Princess?” Tus demanded of her, and Tamina saw the light of suspicion also dawn in Garsiv’s eyes although he stayed in his place on the floor, holding his gray-faced younger brother’s limp body in his arms.  “Dastan has been strange ever since setting foot in your city.”

“And now he is marked as well,” Garsiv added grimly, frowning.  “A brand, on the palm of his left hand, and it appears old although I know it is not.  It has a shape like a sandglass.”

The gods had marked him! Tamina knew, then, that her speculations during Dastan’s absence had been correct.  For it seemed obvious, to her at least, that this last traitor had not been stopped in time…the first time.  Perhaps not even the second.

Dastan’s brothers were still frantically demanding answers when she pushed the ruby on the top of the Dagger which hung at her belt, and time flowed backwards.  The traitor was on the floor, his heart’s blood pooling on the tiles, and Dastan stood over him a bare second before taking a step back and then collapsing, grey-faced, to the tiles as well; had Garsiv not caught him, he would have landed in his defeated opponent’s blood.  Tamina stepped forward before Tus could do more than open his mouth.  “I believe I know what this is.  One of the Hassansin was a sorcerer, was he not?”

Relief flooded Garsiv’s angular features, and Tus released the breath he had drawn in to demand answers from her.  “Yes.  And so Dastan said as well when this same thing happened following their battle and the sorcerer’s death.”

She nodded regally, and allowed herself the indulgence of stepping forward to touch her prince’s gray face with a cool hand.  “This is known to me.  He will recover from it, and be well afterwards.  It will just take…time.”

And Sand.   But to say that full truth would have made them demand answers her sacred duty did not permit her to give, and so she kept that truth to herself.

 

Later, as the day faded into evening, Tamina used a back passage to enter the rooms given to the prince who would be her husband; she kept herself hidden instead of entering fully, however, as the king was there and with him Prince Garsiv.  Dastan still slept, and his elder brother, knowing he would not, could not be woken from this sleep, was not bothering to keep his voice down.  “I do not understand, Father,” he was saying, possibly not for the first time.  “That mark…”

“I know of it, although it has been many years since I have seen such on any man.”  The king stood from where he had been sitting at the side of the bed, placing a hand on his son’s shoulder.  “His name means hero, Garsiv, and now he bears the proof that he was named truly.  That is all I can tell you – that, and the fact that he bears this mark means the gods themselves wish him to be here in this city, to rule by the side of their priestess.”

Garsiv accepted that with a slow nod.  “The stories are true, then?”

His father sighed.  “I had not known if you had heard them.  They are.  And best forgotten, save as a warning to defend this place if you would defend all existence from the wrath of the gods.”  He held up a hand when his son looked as though he were going to ask something more.  “No, I will not speak any more of this, it is a thing you should not know, a thing which you should put from your mind as though it had never entered there.  If you require proof of the wisdom of this, think on the fact that it was this knowledge which, paired with jealousy and greed, destroyed my brother, your uncle.  I will not see it destroy yourself or Tus, or rend asunder our family and with it all that we have built in Persia.”

Garsiv hesitated, and then acquiesced with a nod.  “I will take your word for it, Father.  As I should have taken your edict over that of my uncle when he said we must attack this city.”

Sharaman shook his head.  “Had you not – and that in trust of one who should have been as trustworthy as myself or your brothers – we would still have traitors in our midst, as would Alamut, and a greater evil would surely have come from it.”  He smiled reassuringly.  “Have faith that destiny guided you and that your judgment was not at fault, my son.  Or if faith fails you, ask Dastan when he awakens and I know that he will tell you so as well.”

Garsiv nodded again, slowly.  “I shall do that – and I will not press him for answers he may not give.”  He smiled.  “And besides, with him safely married and ruling Alamut, I have only Tus the Wife-Collector to compete with in my search for my own chosen bride.”

The king snorted and resumed his seat, shaking his head but smiling as well.  “I will be talking to your brother, probably many times, about his harem that is growing more fit for a tent-dwelling nomad sheikh than a prince of the Persian Empire.  Dastan may have to introduce him to this ghostly Sheikh Amar, they would most likely become fast friends for they have much in common.”

Garsiv laughed, a much more carefree sound than any he had lately emitted, and took his leave of the room with a bow and the assertion that he would indeed be suggesting that to his brothers at the proper time.  Sharaman turned back to his sleeping son, arranging his robes.  “You may come out now, child,” he said softly.  “It is just you and I and Dastan now.”

Tamina was surprised that he had known she was there, but not overmuch; Sharman may have been a king who valued peace and the arts of diplomacy, but he had not survived his rule in Persia by chance or luck.  She glided out of her hiding place and he greeted her with a smile.  “No wonder my son is smitten with you.  Beauty and intelligence are well matched in you, priestess of the Sands of Time.”

She started.  His words of earlier to Garsiv had suggested that he knew something, but not that he knew all.  “How did you…?”

“I was told, long ago, by a man who bore a mark like that now borne by my son.  He came to me in secret and left like a breath of wind, unknown by any other save myself.”  He patted the side of the bed, and when she sank onto it he captured her hands in his.  “Lovely princess, I know your duty.  Dastan now shares it, does he not?”  She nodded and he smiled again, although it was tinged with sadness.  “He has earned his name, then, and his place as my son – although the earning of my love, or that of his brothers, was in no way required of him.  I, as any father, would wish peace for his children, but for Dastan at least it was not to be.  Vigilance will be his life, although in his duty I believe he will also find happiness.”

Tamina was stunned by this.  “He loves me!” she blurted out, and then colored and looked away in shame as she had not meant to sound so like a startled young maiden rather than the princess she was.

The king laughed and patted her hands before releasing them.  “Yes, he does, and he loves truly and with honesty.  I have no doubt that, in another time, you earned the love he now cannot conceal, as it so fully consumes him whenever he looks at you.”  He waved his hand at the sleeping prince.  “Now, you are here because you have the means to cure this malady which afflicts him, do you not?”

“Yes.”  She took a small pouch from her belt, and dipping her fingers into it removed a single grain of sand.  “It would be better were I to put this in water and have him drink it.”  The king took a cup from the table near the bed and held it out to her; when she dropped in the sand, a golden shimmer as of ghostly fire danced across the surface of the water it held.  Together they gave the water to Dastan, who almost immediately glowed golden as well…and then his eyes opened.  Tamina offered the cup again, and he took it automatically.  “Drink the rest, and then we must talk.”

He drained the cup in a single draught and then sat up, raising an eyebrow to see his father and his princess both beside him.  “The traitor?”

“Dead,” his father assured him.  “He was successful on his first attempt?”

Dastan made a face.  “And on his second and his third, although with different targets each time.  You knew?”

“I knew the sacred secret of Alamut, yes,” Sharaman said.  “I was unfortunate in that I confided in my brother, fearing that if anything were to happen to me he would need to know.  He concealed his jealousy well.”

“I’m sorry, Father.”

“Nizam was the one who should have been sorry,” the king corrected him.  “You carry no blame, and much honor, for your handling of the situation.”  He took Dastan’s hand, turned it over to reveal the brand on his palm.  “And the gods have rewarded you.  Their wrath may be a force uncontrolled, but it is my belief that they do not truly want to destroy the world – they rely on the strength of men such as you to stop them, and their trust has been well repaid.”  He pulled his dumbfounded son into his arms, embracing him.  “I am very proud of you, my son.  Even had you failed to return my life, I still would have been proud of the way you acquitted yourself.”

Dastan clung to him.  “He made me responsible for your death.”

“I know you would never do such a thing, nor be party to it.  Your brothers?”

“Hunted me.”  It was a whisper, so pained Sharaman felt tears come to his eyes.  “Finally I was able to convince them of my innocence, but then the Hassansin killed Garsiv and Uncle killed Tus.”

In front of his very eyes, the king had no doubt, and mentally sent a curse in the direction of his brother’s black and twisted soul, wherever it might have been cursed to fall.  Dastan had always been close to Nizam, at Nizam’s encouragement, so it would have been a betrayal that cut deeper than the sharpest sword could have.  “And your princess?”  The wordless shake of his son’s head against his shoulder made him wince; the gods’ price for saving all the world from sand and fire had been a high one, hopefully their reward would be as great.

And hopefully, they would not ask further payment in the future.  Sharaman hoped that they would be merciful, and know that taking all a man loved but once in his lifetime should be enough. 

 

Hidden deep within another hidden corridor’s concealing shadows, Tus fought to control himself and not make a noise.  He wished he had not done this, spied on his father and brothers – and now the princess as well, although the invasion of her privacy he minded less.  He had gained not enough knowledge to whet his curiosity, but more than enough to disturb his mind and heart.  No wonder Dastan  was so changed!  His brother had survived betrayal after betrayal, apparently – just because Tus had not been able to hear the broken, whispered words did not mean he did not know what they must have been.  He had experienced the rejection and then the death of every member of his family as well as of the woman he had grown to love, and had then been forced to kill their uncle who had engineered it all in an insane plot to reverse time and gain the throne of Persia.  And even after all that, Dastan had still refused to kill Nizam, had instead declared that he should face trial and the justice that would follow.

It was Tus who had killed Nizam the second time, the final time.  And who could still scarcely believe that the man who had helped to raise he and his brothers as honorable men could have been so dishonorable himself.  Nizam would have stabbed Dastan while his back was turned, after he had put away his weapon!  Even had Tus not been able to believe all the rest, he had seen that act himself and had jumped in to stop it with his own sword.  So now he and Dastan had both killed their uncle.  He was sure that some god somewhere was amused by that.

The fact that the gods had done this to his little brother, hero or no, champion or no, did not amuse Tus at all.  Although he did better understand now why Dastan was so besotted with the cold and distant Princess Tamina – familiarity, gained under the most terrible of circumstances, must have in that other time softened her towards him.  He smiled.  His little brother had most likely been her hero as well.

Dastan had always been a hero, though.  Although he was a normal man, and no paragon, he was a man who could be admired without shame.  He was a credit to their family as many a fostered son might not have been, and he had been a calming and unifying influence on both of his adopted brothers.  He had mentioned – but once, in passing – that family was all the more precious to him as his first one had been lost, and that siblings were more precious than gold.  He’d had a sister, apparently; she had died with their parents.  Dastan had never spoken of her, or of his parents, again on any other occasion, and many who knew the three princes in later years would have sworn that he was the king’s blood son, so close was he to his father and brothers and such feeling did he exhibit towards them.

Which made it all the more shamelessly terrible, of course, that Nizam had chosen to brand Dastan as a traitor and make it seem that he had killed their father.  Tus did not know how their uncle’s heart could have been so black and they had not known it, had not even suspected it.

Dastan was still silently crying in their father’s arms, and Tus was suddenly ashamed to be hiding in the darkness to witness such a very private moment.  He slid backwards out of his hiding place, deeper into the shadows, and made his way back to his own rooms with much on his mind to think about.

 

The preparations for a marriage are no small matter, and the marriage being to join a prince of Persia to a high-ranking princess those preparations took on almost unimaginable importance.  The formal meetings of the potential bride and groom and their families, known as the Khastegari, had already taken place after a fashion on the day of the attack on Alamut, and though not as formal as was usually prescribed it was not so unusual as to cause dissent – royal marriages were often agreed upon at sword-point, so the arrangement between Alamut and Persia had been positively restrained considering the circumstances.  The signing of the marriage contract, however, took the entirety of two days and very nearly a third, mostly because the Princess Tamina had no family and so the agreement became a matter much more bureaucratic than the usual contract as settled between fathers or grandfathers or uncles.  And most irregularly, the prince had presented his bride-gift beforehand, on returning from the city of Sheikh Amar, and difficulties were made of that by some who thought a second and more traditional gift should be presented as well.  But this was not to be – for Sharaman would not agree to it – and so finally the agreement was reached, the contract completed and marked with the seals of Persia and of Alamut, and the rest of the arrangements for the various marriage celebrations and ceremonies could proceed.

Any marriage is sacred before the gods and a special time amongst the family and friends and acquaintances of the betrothed, but a royal marriage is all of that and more; it is a spectacle for the masses, a celebratory event for all the city blessed to be the location to host it, and a political union that can strengthen the foundations of empires and turn enemies into allies.  Which is why no royal marriage can ever be simple, or hasty – it must be nothing short of spectacular, an event to be talked about for a year and a day by those blessed enough to be allowed to witness it firsthand.  And because of this, every detail of a royal marriage must be planned to perfection, with not even the smallest detail left to chance.

Having the bridegroom out in the desert chasing unnatural assassins of legend and with no certain day or time or even certainty of return had made this somewhat difficult, but the servants of the Persian court and the palace of Alamut did their best, and even were somewhat thankful for the extra planning time the prince’s absence engendered.  And for him to return triumphant, bearing with him evidence of the demise of Persia’s enemies, and then to defeat one final assassin, an as yet undiscovered traitor who was possessed by a demon besides, there in the very audience chamber before the eyes of the king and and many of the local dignitaries as well as a good number of servants and common folk…well, this only added to his reputation, and made him an even more suitable match for the princess.  Prince Dastan was well on his way to becoming a legend, and had beyond any doubt proved his fitness for the position he was to assume by this marriage.  And yet he was modest, and soft-spoken, and seemed to truly love the princess, which won him the grudging admiration of even those in Alamut who had suffered due to his actions at the close of the battle.  Rumors said that he would make a fine ruler, perhaps even a fine king.

Those rumors made Dastan shudder.  He did not like to think of a world in which the sole survivor of the ruling family of Persia was himself, or of the machinations which would have to take place to allow him to take the throne – he had lived through one such world already, and he never wanted to experience it again.  His father and brothers, seeing this reaction although he guarded it well, took it to heart and did their best to keep such speculations away from his ears and as best they could out of the palace entirely.

A few days after the signing of the contract had been completed, the third ceremony—which included Namzadi, the exchange of rings, followed by Khoran, the sharing of tea and refreshments—was the first of the marriage ceremonies to be disrupted by an assassination attempt.  The rings had been exchanged, exquisitely worked bands of silver and gold, Dastan’s set with a ruby and Tamina’s with amethyst, and as was traditional tea was brought out which the princess served with her own hands to the family which would soon become hers.  In the space of but a few moments from the first sip of the served tea, however, the guests began to waver as drowsiness and strange euphoria overtook them.  Tamina was somewhat less affected, as she had been serving the tea while others had already begun drinking it, and remained aware enough to watch with horror as a female servant entered the room, smiling with pleasure at the state of the guests, and stabbed Prince Dastan in the back.

Tamina pressed the ruby atop the Dagger and time flowed backwards by a few moments only – not enough to prevent the tea from being drunk, but enough for her to reach Dastan before he could become too affected and tell him what had happened.  He smiled, and kissed her, and reversed time himself to a point before more than a sip or two of the tea had been consumed, and then he exclaimed loudly that something was wrong with it, thus preventing the rest of them from drinking enough to harm them.  As he had been touching Tamina, and she was also one blessed by the Sands, she remembered as well and immediately called the guards to round up all of the kitchen servants and bring them to the ceremony chamber immediately.  One of the women was the one she remembered, and on being pointed out went into a screaming frenzy, pulled the selfsame dagger she had previously used to kill Dastan out of her clothing and made to fight her way out of captivity or to die killing her targets.

It was Tus who suggested forcibly feeding her some of the drugged tea to calm her, which was done, and within moments the woman was crying and laughing and unable to control her tongue.

She was the sister of one of the slain Hassansin – one of the few mortal, human members of the group.  She had on her person a bag containing ashes and sand she had reclaimed from one of the pits dug to bury the burned remains of the heads of the Hassansin, and she had sworn to kill both Dastan and Garsiv in revenge for her brother’s death.  Her palpable hatred reached whatever shreds of evil remained in the ashes and a black mist began to swell about the bag, but Garsiv reacted at once by stabbing the bag with his own dagger, upon which he had inscribed some of the banishing symbols from the Vendidad, which had the effect of banishing the demon before it could fully manifest and of killing the woman who had called it with her desire for revenge.

The body was taken for burning, and out of desire to not have the ceremonial sharing of sweetness disrupted again Tamina took her future bridegroom, father-in-law and brothers-in-law to her own private eating chamber where, with the help of two servants she trusted and who also served her in the temple, she prepared tea and served it to them with her own hands, and shared honeyed nuts and sweet cakes while they all avoided speaking of this latest assassin or the others who had preceded her and attempted to keep their conversation confined to more mundane subjects.

And a week later at the Tabag-Baran, Garsiv among the other gifts presented to Tamina a small chest containing a set of fine daggers marked as his was marked, and a scroll written in his own hand which detailed the means which he had used to defeat the demons among the Hassansin, as those demons were of a particular type and kind and so might well be expected to be encountered in or around Alamut again.  Tus presented her with a finely worked cloak for riding, also embroidered with symbols of protection, and she was presented with jewels and lengths of fine cloth from Sharaman – who took great amusement in making his two elder sons carry the gifts themselves, as was traditional, and who in keeping with that tradition also bore his own special gift, a golden lamp filled with a rare scented oil, in his own hands and presented it with them as well.

Tamina went to bed that evening feeling even more pleased with the idea of her coming marriage, and quite thankful to her husband-to-be; Dastan had not only given her his love, he had given her the love of his family as well – and she could not recollect how long it had been, if ever it had been, since such joy and laughter as she had known that day during the Tabag-Baran had been hers to experience. Her dreams that night were happy ones, and she looked forward to the ceremony of Aghd which would take place in three days.

 

The day chosen for the Aghd dawned stormy under an oppressive sky, which some considered to be a bad omen, but in spite of this the preparations went on as planned – or would have, had not forces more mortal than godly attempted to fulfil the curse of bad luck the dark skies of the morning had foretold.  The contracts were signed only after a delay of some duration, as one of the dissenting voices of Alamut chose the signing ceremony – which was supposed to be merely a celebratory formality – to express his displeasure once again with the irregular way in which several of the traditional ceremonies had been observed by the Persian royal family.  The argument only avoided coming to blows right there in the chamber because of the excellent control which Sharaman had over his own temper, and because the other dignitaries on seeing anger grow in the King of Persia’s eyes over the insult being given to his family pulled their fellow out of the argument and forced him back to reason lest he restart a war with Persia which they had already lost once.

The Sofreye Aghd, the formal wedding spread which was the next to the last ceremony and which would mark the permanent joining of the prince and princess in marriage, seemed at first to proceed as planned.  The sofreye was elaborate and beautiful, as befitted a royal marriage, with bowls of coins and jewels, nuts and fruits in perfect pyramids, a colored bowl of honey ringed with flowers, a traditional pattern perfectly formed from the rarest and most fragrant herbs atop a silver platter, and a mirror of pure silver placed at the head.  This mirror, polished until it gleamed like fresh water, was the surface in which the bridegroom would first see his new wife’s face as she unveiled herself – he would see her before any other, as she was to be his alone.

Dastan was nervous before the ceremony, although not because of the weather; like his father, and in spite of recent events, he did not put overmuch stock in the signs and omens that some others saw in every shadow and blown leaf, and his belief in the gods was that they mostly left men alone unless something was needed or they were not treated with the respect they were due.  No, he was nervous because he feared that he would forget part of the ceremony and embarrass himself and his family – or that something would interrupt the ceremony and the solving of that interruption would cause him to forget part of the ceremony and embarrass himself and his family anyway.  For the Sofreye Aghd, unlike many of the other marriage traditions, was observed by many and important guests, and Dastan did not want it to be remembered and retold by them as a time when he had made a silly mistake.

Tus walked him down from his rooms to the chamber where the sofreye had been prepared, fussing worse than the servants had over the white wedding clothes he was wearing, and this more than anything calmed Dastan’s frazzled nerves.  Tus had been married multiple times, so if his greatest concern was whether the wedding tunic was hanging straight or the cloak Dastan wore was pulling it crooked at the shoulders, then obviously the ceremony itself was going to be easier to get through than Dastan had hoped.  He hoped.

On entering the chamber – which had been beautifully decorated, and it had been beautiful already so that was saying something – Dastan greeted the guests politely and then took his place to the right of the sofreye and awaited the arrival of Tamina.  She would probably be late because it was traditional, and because even though she herself wouldn’t care to be late for that reason her handmaidens would delay her anyway – if only to prevent the dignitaries from complaining about one more tradition being ‘abandoned’ by the Persians.  So he waited patiently and with good humor, which had he known it impressed many of the guests who recalled being nervous and ill-tempered at their own weddings.

Finally, the bride was led in by her handmaidens, resplendent in her white gown and so heavily veiled that Dastan thought she must hardly be able to see where she was going – if she could in fact see where she was going at all and was not merely being led along.  She took her place in silence on the right of the sofreye, and the handmaidens raised another veil over top of their heads to catch the sugar which would be showered down on the young couple from a large cone throughout the ceremony.  Sharaman spoke a few words regarding the union of Persia and Alamut, and then Dastan fixed his eyes on the mirror and Tamina lifted her veil.

And then he blinked, because for a moment he could have sworn that he did not see his princess in the silver mirror’s reflection, but rather some other woman, older, and with a look on her face almost like one dead.  But the moment passed and he saw the cool and lovely face of the woman he loved, his eyes meeting hers in the silver reflection and hers looking away as she blushed at his regard.  Dastan could not shake the feeling that something was wrong, however, and to that end he reversed time and watched his bride sit down again, watched her closely as his father spoke, and then at the last minute turned his eyes from the mirror and looked on her face as she lifted the heavy veil away.

She screamed, a horrible shrieking sound like a bird of prey being shot with an arrow, and then began to laugh in a horrible way which Dastan well remembered from one particular night in the desert and a fight which had almost killed him.  He drew away from her even as the handmaidens did, dropping the veil and scattering sugar across the floor, and he heard his father curse even as the dignitaries were demanding to know what was going on and why the ceremony was being disrupted.  Dastan fought his revulsion and grabbed hold of the woman’s dead flesh, shaking her.  “Where is she?  What have you done with my wife?!”

She cackled.  “She will never be wife to you, or to any man – she is gone!  And you will never find her, never!”  She spat an arcane word, and herbs on the tray burst into flame; another, and the sugar ignited as well, making more than one guest swear and hop.  She leaned into his grasp, making him recoil again although he did not release her.  “Did you think you had killed us all, Prince?  Did you think there were not those of us left to avenge the Hassassin?”

“Where did you take Tamina!” he demanded.

“She was lost to you as the marriage contract was signed just past the dawn!  She is no longer in the city...search for her through the breadth of Persia if you like – of Arabia and India as well!”

Dastan, having learned what he needed to know, released his hold and stabbed her, then cast her writhing, screaming body atop the burning herbs and sugar.  Thinking quickly, he grasped the arm of his father, who was looking on in horror and outrage.  “Father,” he said, “I go to rescue my wife.  Never fear, I shall make it as though this never happened – only, if you remember, have Garsiv mark this chamber this morning before we come down with wards for banishing the demons of the dry depths of the desert, as he did to our camp after the defeat of the sorcerer of the Hassansin.”

Sharaman nodded slowly, and grasped his arm in return.  “Be careful, my son.  Who knows how many of these abominations there are.”

“Hopefully this will be the last one we see for a time,” Dastan replied, and then he reversed time to before dawn that morning, leapt from his bed and crept through the corridors of the palace to reach Tamina’s rooms.  A guard was there and Dastan came from the shadows he had been hiding in and approached him.  “Do you guard the princess or those who seek to take and kill her?” he demanded.  The guard attacked him, and Dastan put him down and dragged his body into the shadows; that was how they had done it, then, by using the guard to keep their watch.  He remained in the shadows until he reached Tamina’s chamber, seeing her handmaidens scattered about in the antechamber as though asleep…but it was a sleep he could not wake them from, most likely they had been fed drugged sweetmeats for he could see that several of them had half-eaten ones in their fingers still.  The door to the inner chamber was still closed; he pushed it open, slowly, cautiously…

And had to fend off an attack by Tamina herself, which he did quickly and with dispatch, but as gently as he could.  “It’s me, Dastan!” he hissed, pushing her back and re-closing the door.  “You are in danger, we must get you out of here before the last Hassassin comes.”

“My servants…”

“Drugged – not dead,” he assured her.  “But the guard on this part of the palace was guarding the Hassansin’s safety, not yours.”  He pulled her farther away from the door, and into the room’s shadows where they might easily see both window and door.  “Is there another way to get out of this room, one even your servants do not know about?”

She nodded, and led him to a wall which at her touch became a narrow door in the stone, leading into the darkness.  “This leads to the temple, it is a secret way known only to me.”

“Would demons inhabiting dead flesh be able to enter the temple?”  She shook her head, and he pulled her into the passageway and indicated that she should close the secret door behind them.  But he did not make to go farther into the blackness, and indeed prevented her from leaving as well.  “No, we wait,” he whispered.  “We are in safety here, moreso because we know where the assassin will arrive – she could not arrive from this passageway, as she is one of the walking dead courtesy of a demon and so would not be able to cross into your rooms from the temple.”

“True,” Tamina whispered back, and drew closer to him in the darkness.  His arm went around her shoulders, keeping the chill the stone held at bay, and together they waited in silence, listening for the sound of the assassin who was coming.

Many minutes passed, or so it seemed even though Dastan knew that full dawn had not been that far off when he had come to Tamina’s rooms.  He did not give in to his impatience, however, knowing that his bride’s life was at stake should he not address this last threat from the Hassansin – or at least he hoped it was the last, as he was becoming heartily sick of dealing with demon-possessed corpses of assassins, and that after having to deal with only three before the one that was now even on its way.  Finally, though, the sound of boots on stone was heard in the outer chamber, and low voices began to murmur to each other.  More than one, then, but he had expected that; unless Tamina had the first time been killed or sent away by some dark magic, the female Hassansin had not come to the palace of Alamut alone and had not been working by itself to carry through its quest of vengeance.

The murmuring had by this time moved away from the secret door and over to what Dastan supposed was the chamber’s window; a scuffling and scraping said that some mechanism was being managed, and then shortly thereafter a signal was given and he distinctly heard the words, “She’s coming.”

That was his cue.  Dastan pushed against the door with all his might, making it spring open with great force, and leaped upon the two men by the window; such was his fury that he killed them both before either had time to cry out a warning.  Tamina came out cautiously and found him watching the rope ladder which had been fastened to her window, the jerking and rubbing of which told them both that the assassin was climbing up.  Dastan motioned to her to return to the safety of the passageway, but instead she hurried on quiet feet across into the next room and returned with a dagger in each hand, one of which she offered to him.  They were the daggers Garsiv had gifted her with for the Tabag-Baran, inscribed with symbols of holy power which made them deadly to demons.  Dastan smiled a smile of pure love at her and then motioned that she was to take the opposite side of the window from himself, ready to strike at the assassin when it came within reach; he had his sword drawn as well, as beheading worked quite well to kill most things whether they were already dead or not.

It was not long before the assassin’s head appeared, for she had been climbing very quickly, and the moment she reached the top and began to reach over the marble-tiled opening in order to climb into the room, Dastan’s sword flashed through the air; in that confined space he could not manage to behead her completely, but he was able to slit her throat deeply, thus robbing her of the ability to speak and therefore to cast magic in that manner, and then Tamina pulled her so that she fell into the room and the marked dagger found a home in her heart.  Dastan jerked his princess back as the now familiar black mist rose from the body and howled in fury before being blown from the room on the wings of a banishing wind, and then they both watched in amazement as the body gave a shiver and then crumbled to a pile of dust and bones and parchment skin at their feet.

From somewhere else in the palace, there came a sound of chimes ringing, calling the participants to the final signing of the marriage contract.  Dastan stopped Tamina from drawing her dagger from the remains of the assassin’s corpse and instead drew her out into the antechamber where he threw water on the drugged and sleeping handmaidens and then shook them awake.  “Go fetch guards, and my brother Garsiv,” he ordered the one who first responded to his indelicate ministrations.  “Tell them there has been another assassin, and that it is dead and they must come and remove it at once – the princess cannot ready herself for the Aghd with three dead bodies within her chambers and drugged handmaidens without them.  Go!”

The girl staggered to her feet and ran from the chamber, shouting at the top of her lungs.  Dastan waited, guarding his princess against further threats and being amused by the antics of the waking handmaidens, until Garsiv came thundering into the chamber half dressed but with a sword in his hand and a dagger stuffed into the sash around his waist.  His own men were behind him, and several of the palace guards.  “Dastan, what…?!”

“In the inner chamber, one Hassansin and two of her accomplices, all dead,” Dastan told him.  “And you will find a fourth body of a bought guard down a dark corridor that branches off from the one you just came out of.  The princess’s handmaidens had all been drugged into insensibility, it appears as though the sweetmeats they were eating had been coated with some substance of great soporific power – but only enough to force them into dreamless sleep which would end at such a time as to make them think they had merely overslept.  I believe they would have accepted that their princess had grown impatient waiting for them and readied herself veil and all, merely waiting for them to recover themselves enough to lead her down to the ceremony.”

Garsiv opened his mouth to say something to that…and then he closed it again, shook his head, and waved several of his men to proceed him into the inner chamber; Dastan stopped Tamina from following him, indicating that she should wait, and after a moment came a muffled curse and the sound of a sword hitting stone, followed by a hissing noise and then silence.  Footsteps walked around, low-voiced orders were given, and then two of the guards came out with the bodies of the two companions of the assassin.  Something scraped, and scraped again against the stone floor, and then another man came out carrying a sack which looked to be very tightly closed with string and which had symbols marked upon it as well.  Garsiv came out directly behind that man, carrying Tamina’s dagger but with his sword sheathed.  He handed the dagger back to her with a short bow which held a great deal of respect, and then turned on the still-groggy handmaidens.  “Go clean your mistress’ chamber,” he ordered sharply.  “And count yourselves lucky that the signing of the contract is slowed by stupidity this morning and so will be finished as much lagging behind the day’s schedule as you yourselves are.”  They scurried off, two of them crying and none  of them looking over-well, and he turned back to Tamina and Dastan.  “Are there more?”

Dastan shook his head.  “No more that I know of, no – at least, not today, in the palace, for the Aghd, anyway.”

Garsiv made a face.  “You are well?”  He seemed relieved when his brother nodded, and repeated his question to Tamina.  “And you, my lady?”

“I am quite well, and much appreciative for your gift at the Tabag-Baran,” she said, bowing back to him.  “Although I had hoped not to need it so soon as this.”

He made another face.  “I had hoped you would not need it at all – I had hopes that it would become a curiosity and gather dust, never to be needed.”  There was a noise in the corridor of someone approaching in a great hurry, and Sharaman appeared in the doorway with his own guards behind him.  Garsiv bowed to him, as did Dastan.  “Father.”

“They are all dead?” Sharaman wanted to know.  He came the rest of the way into the antechamber and at once went to Tamina and took her hands in his.  “Princess, is all well with you?  You were not harmed in any way?”

“Only the assassins were harmed,” she assured him.  “Prince Dastan arrived just in time to hide me from them, assuring my safety.”

“He’s getting good at that – arriving just in time,” Sharaman responded wryly as he released her hands and turned to his youngest son.  “And you, you are also well?”

“I am fine, Father,” Dastan said.  “We killed the assassin as she was coming in the window of the princess’s chamber, she had no chance to do any harm save to the cleanliness of the tiles on the floor.”

“I am very glad to hear that,” Sharaman told him.  “Now, go back to your own chambers and ready yourself for the Aghd!  Garsiv, I wish you to go down to the chamber prepared for the ceremony and see that it is marked against demons, the way you told me you warded your campsite in the desert.  Some of my own men will stay here in the princess’s antechamber to assure that no more assassins disrupt the proceedings this day.  Dastan, I will walk with you to make sure you do not find yet more trouble between your bride’s rooms and yours.”

Tamina had to cover her mouth so as not to laugh, and with a bow to the king she quickly swept back into her inner chamber and closed the door tightly.  Garsiv too bowed and left, and then Sharaman took Dastan’s arm and led him away himself, leaving all but two of his guard behind in the antechamber as he had said he would.  He kept his peace until they had arrived at Dastan’s rooms and the guards had checked to make sure that they were empty and all was as it should be, and then he bade them stand outside to guard the door while he spoke with his son about the ceremony.

What he actually did, the moment the door was closed, was take his son into his arms and hold him tightly in relief.  “My son, you do not know how glad I was to see you standing there alive and unscathed when I arrived, and the Princess Tamina as well.  I remember all, although it is like a nightmare and even now is fading from my mind.”

Dastan returned the embrace thankfully.  “I am glad it is fading, Father – mine do not.”

“I suspected as much.”  Sharaman broke the embrace and gave his son a push toward the bowl of perfumed water that sat beside his wedding garments.  “Go, clean yourself up and get dressed; it is permissible for the bride to be late, but for the groom it is not.”

His son did as he was instructed, but he was smiling.  “Somehow I do not think my bride will be late this time,” he said.  “Her handmaidens will be far to chastened to cause mischief to delay her.”

“Most likely true.”  Sharaman took a seat with a sigh, brushing wrinkles out of his own formal clothing.  “They are lucky she is not my daughter, I would have had them all whipped for such carelessness, and let the scars remind them to be vigilant in the future.”

“Don’t think I didn’t consider that myself, when I saw them all sleeping in the antechamber, some of them with the drugged sweetmeats still half-eaten in their hands.”  Dastan quickly made himself freshly clean – he had bathed well the night before, as custom demanded, and only needed to remove the sweat caused by his headlong rush across the palace – and began to array himself in the white wedding garments which had been laid out for him.  He took especial care with the tunic this time that it might be straight, and made doubly sure that the cloak was not pulling on it in a way that would make it crooked.  His father straightened it for him a second time with a smile, and then they left his rooms and made their way to the chamber where the Aghd was to be held.  Tus met them halfway there, somewhat subdued as he had first encountered Garsiv marking the exterior of the chamber and had in that way learned what had gone on while the contract was being finalized.  “You are all right?” he asked his youngest brother, embracing him quickly and then fussily readjusting his cloak in case it had been disordered by the greeting.  “The princess is all right?”

“Everyone is fine,” Dastan assured him with a smile, and they entered the prepared chamber together.  Garsiv was there, and neither the king nor his two brothers were surprised to see that marks had also been made, albeit discretely, within the chamber as well as outside of it.  Dastan embraced him for that, and endured more fussing from Tus about the cloak before he was allowed to greet the guests and then take his place, once again, on the right side at the foot of the sofreye where he would wait for his bride.

This time, as he had predicted, she was not late – which surprised and even dismayed some of the guests – and her handmaidens were indeed much more subdued than might have been expected.  The veil she was wearing had also been changed to another which was made of more diaphanous material, which change also caused some murmuring among the dignitaries regarding discarded traditions, but Dastan was glad to see it and knew she had done it just for his own peace of mind, that he might know who it was that approached him wearing the fine and richly decorated white clothes of the bride.  She swept up to the sofreye and gracefully settled beside him on the left side, and the ceremony began as it should.  And when the time was right, and she drew back her veil, her eyes met those of Dastan in the silver mirror and she smiled at him and all was as it should be.  There was the ritual tasting of honey, the cones of sugar were ground together so that sugar sprinkled like fine snow into the gold-embroidered green scarf which was held over their heads by the still-shaken handmaidens as more words were spoken, and two pieces of fine cloth were sewn together in the same place to symbolize the joining of the young couple.  One of the dignitaries then asked the ritual question of Dastan: “Do you enter into this marriage contract willingly, Prince Dastan?”

“Yes, I enter into this marriage contract of my own free will, and out of the love I feel for the Princess Tamina,” Dastan replied, and several of the handmaidens forgot their shame enough to sigh happily over his words.

The dignitary turned then to the princess.  “And do you enter into this marriage contract willingly, Princess Tamina, Priestess of Alamut?”

There were a few gasps from the guests at that, as the use of the title of priestess was out of place in the marriage ceremony; but Sharaman quelled them by saying quietly, “If the gods themselves did not bless this marriage, then my son should not have returned from his pursuit of the demon Hassansin victorious, nor killed the last of them in this very palace this morning as the contract was signed.”

That caused more gasps, and the dignitary flushed red with embarrassment but repeated his question properly.  “Princess Tamina, do you enter into this marriage contract willingly?”

The princess sat still and did not speak, which was proper for this part of the ceremony.  There was some nudging amongst the handmaidens, who had quite forgotten themselves, and one of them ventured shakily, “The princess has gone to the…to the temple to pray!”

The officiant did not quite wince at the ill-chosen answer, but he continued gamely and asked the second time, “Princess Tamina, do you enter into this marriage contract willingly?”

More nudging, and another handmaiden squeaked, “The…the princess has gone to…to look for assassins in the palace!”

Dastan was doing all he could not to laugh, although he wanted to very badly.  Tamina glanced at him from beneath lowered lashes and he saw that she rolled her eyes, which made him want to laugh even more.  But when the officiant asked for the third time, “Princess Tamina, do you enter into this marriage contract willingly?” it was Tus who answered before anyone else could:

“The princess has gone to find new handmaidens!”

Dastan and Tamina both had to press their hands to their mouths to keep their laughter silenced at that, although the guests showed no such restraint and set up a roar of laughter which quite covered the offended and tearful squeaks of the handmaidens in question; indeed, one of them actually dropped her corner of the green scarf and had to fumble to recover it, showering the floor with sugar..

The officiant rolled his eyes, but he was smiling as well.  “Princess Tamina,” he asked for the final time.  “Do you enter into this marriage contract willingly, and agree to become the wife of Dastan, Prince of Persia and Destroyer of the Hassassin?”

Tamina uncovered her mouth.  “I, Tamina, Princess and Priestess of Alamut, do willingly enter into this marriage contract with the blessing of the gods I serve!”

In the silence that followed, a shocked silence at the boldness of that statement, a long and distant peal of thunder responded, and through the clouds broke shafts of light from the sun which had all morning been hidden from view, turning the scattering of raindrops to diamonds and gold and rubies as they fell through the air.  The officiant paled to see it, but quickly recovered himself.  “The contract is willingly entered by both Prince Dastan and Princess Tamina, and,” he faltered a moment, but continued, “and recognized with approval by the gods served by the priestess of Alamut.”  He took the sewn cloths and held them high over his head that all might see.  “May they be happy in their union for all of their days, joined together as one!”

The guests called out approval and wishes for good fortune, and someone rescued the green scarf from the handmaidens who were really in no fit state to hold onto it anymore.  Servants showered small wax balls containing coins and jewels and other small gifts onto the guests, who laughed and scrambled to get them, and Sharaman moved forward to help his sons and the officiant with the green scarf – and to watch his youngest son’s back in the midst of the pandemonium that reigned in the chamber.  He couldn’t help but smile, however.  It had been a good ceremony, one that would be remembered for a long time in Alamut.  And a marriage consummated with laughter and acknowledged by the gods was certain to be a good one.  

 

That evening, after Dastan and Tamina had grown tired of the feasting and dancing and general merrymaking that was still going on and snuck away to their new chambers in the palace, they lay together in their marriage bed and watched the moon ride high above the clouds, which had lifted and not lowered again all that day once the Aghd had been completed.  “I still find it difficult to believe,” Dastan murmured, pulling his new wife a little closer to him, although she was quite close already.  “I can hardly believe that it has been but two months since I first laid eyes on you, my love.  It seems as though it has been several lifetimes, and I marvel anew each time I think of it that any of us survived to see this day.”

“Much less that we see it blessed by the gods,” Tamina agreed.  “I still marvel that they answered me – twice.”

His arm over her stiffened for a moment, and then he relaxed.  “When I fought the sorcerer, a burst of strength came to me just when I was failing and allowed me to hold him back the few more moments needed for Garsiv and Seso to banish the demon that empowered him.”  He twisted a little so that he could look down into her face where it lay against his chest.  “And when all turned to darkness around me, I thought I heard you weeping.”

She did not look back up at him, but a shudder ran through her body and he felt a new tear fall just over his heart.  “I cursed myself for days, every time I went before my altar and saw the Dagger there.  And that night…that night I awoke from dreams of violence and blood, and ran to the temple, and the Dagger lay there glowing like a small, reproachful sun.”  She patted his chest with her hand.  “I knew, then, that you had the blessing of not just the gods, but of the Sandglass, and that you did not need the Dagger.  And I knew that if you continued to fight as you were…you would die.  So I begged the gods to aid you.”

“And they answered,” he said gently, with a smile in his voice although it was none too steady.  “For love of you…and for your love?”

Tamina could only nod.  “For my love.  We are both chosen to this sacred duty,” and now she did look up at him, the moonlight turning her skin to alabaster and her tears to drops of silver, “and I am alone no more.”

“For as long as I live,” Dastan promised, and his own eyes were not dry in the least, “you shall never be alone again.”

And then he kissed her with all the passion of the love he held in his heart, and the gods smiled down upon their union and the blessing that was upon it.  For they would be the last guardians of the Sandglass to ever be called by destiny, and the protection they gave it would last until the world was ready to accept the wrath of the gods.

   

One more ceremony remained to be observed and that was the Patakhti, a flower-bedecked celebration at which many gifts were given to the newly-married couple…and which also marked the coming departure of those guests who were only in residence for the wedding.  Unlike the feasting and celebrating which had followed the Aghd, the Patakhti spread itself throughout the city – and, if the truth be known, down to the tent city of Sheikh Amar as well.  It was a very happy, joyous celebration with nothing solemn or ritualized about it, and in this particular instance it went on for an entire day and the people of Alamut literally danced in the streets.

At the day’s end, Dastan spirited his bride away from family and guests alike, and took her before him on his horse and rode with her out some ways from the city into the desert.  The sun was sinking, and setting the clouds on the horizon afire, and Tamina allowed herself to lean into the arms of her husband and rest on his strength, something she had never thought she should do with any man.  “You wished to not be overheard?” she asked.

He laughed, the sound as warm as the sun on a child’s face.  “I wished to be alone with my beautiful bride, that we might speak to each other in private and return home with no secrets between us,” he told her.  “Here, our secrets will remain our own.”

“True,” she agreed.  She shifted in his hold, getting more comfortable.  “Your uncle reached the Sandglass, I know this must have been true.”

“He and the Hassansin, yes.”  Dastan sighed.  “They killed all its guardians, and my uncle in his madness used the Dagger to breach the Sandglass and released the wrath of the gods on Persia.”  His arms tightened around her.  “You fell, in the caves, and when I would have saved you at the expense of the world you pulled your hand from my grasp and fell to your death that I might save the world instead.”  His breath stirred her hair with warmth the breeze lacked.  “My heart died within me in that moment – what of it was left after the deaths of my father and brothers.  I attacked my uncle Nizam in a fury, grief lending me the strength of desperation, and I wrested the Dagger from him and his life was ended as his body was unmade by sand and fire.”  He flexed the gloved hand on which rested the mark of the Sandglass.  “I find it strange that the sand and fire which unmade him leaves me unscathed.”

“I do not.”  Tamina took his hand and removed the glove, pressing her own palm over the brand and twining her fingers with his.  “You are a good, honorable man.  He wore but the shell of one, but his heart was black with things he should not have felt, much less acted upon.”  She murmured a word to the gods of the Sandglass, and a golden fire danced over their clasped hands.  “I am not the first priestess to the Sandglass…I am the fourth.  My family are all dead as I have been alive and alone in my duty for many more years than anyone should or can live.”  She sighed.  “The Sands keep me alive, and keep me young.”

He used his free hand to turn her face to his, and he was smiling.  “They kept you young that we might be together.  That is no bad thing.”

“I am over a hundred years old!”

“And I am but a fraction of that.”  His smile widened.  “But such things do not concern me.  I love you, Tamina.  If you choose to live on for the fulfillment of your sacred duty…”

“…We will live on together, it is our sacred duty, now.”

“So it is.  And a hundred years is little enough time to spend at your side.”  His face was very close to hers, so close that they were sharing the same breath.  “We will keep the world safe from the wrath of the gods…together.”

If any had been nearby to witness their kiss, they doubtless would have believed the golden glow which surrounded the young royal couple to be no more than a trick of the setting sun.