The Warrior God (The Ares Trials #1) - Eliza Raine Page 0,21
the sound of roaring wind, and my hair whipped up into my face as the sand around us began to spin into peaked tornadoes. Within seconds I could see nothing but the beige of the sand whirling around us, and even though there seemed to be a pocket of clear air surrounding the three of us, panic surged through me, instinct taking over. But as fast as the sandstorm had started, it stopped. The sand didn’t fall back to earth like it should though, spinning off into the sky and disappearing into clouds instead. I looked back down to see that the sand had left a massive sunken clearing in its place, filled with the most magnificent walled city I could have possibly imagined.
My immediate impression was that it looked like Agrabah from the Disney movie Aladdin. But as I looked closer at the jewel encrusted walls that surrounded the shining metropolis before us, I began to notice the darker details. Skulls were set between the pale stone and the jewels, and the bulbous spires on the buildings that peaked high above the walls were decorated with swirling carvings of weapons. Swords and flails and axes and hammers were all intricately entwined in huge patterns across the impressive architecture.
From our elevated position I could see that the grand spired towers were mostly in the middle of the square city, and the further toward the walls I looked, the smaller the buildings became. But they were all made of the same stone, and they all glittered in the sun, as though wealth was built into the structures themselves. Broad courtyards filled with fabric marquees occupied the spaces between the buildings, and I could just make out figures bustling around. Surrounding the city, beyond the walls, were six or seven sunken pits lined with rows of stepped benches, with circular stages in the center. The fighting pits, I realized with a pang of morbid curiosity. Between the pits were hundreds of brightly colored tents in clusters and I frowned at them.
“Why are they outside the city?” I asked, pointing at the tents.
“You must pay to enter Erimos. The people who live in those tents can’t afford to go inside the walls.” Ares stamped down the sandy dune, and I followed him.
“I’m guessing you have money?” I asked, suddenly aware of how penniless I was. Ares just grunted.
“They use drachma here.” I looked down at Zeeva, the cat seeming to almost float across the sand, effortlessly graceful.
“Right. Good to know,” I said, even though it meant nothing to me at all. But I would take any and all of the information offered to me. Eventually some of it would surely be useful.
When we got to the bottom of the dune, the gates of Erimos loomed large and imposing in front of us. Up close I could make out lots of bones embedded in the stone walls, not just the skulls visible from further away. Diamonds glittered amongst femurs, sapphires glinted against ribs, and amethysts shone around collarbones. It was creepy as hell, but I burned to explore a city such as this. It called to me.
But when he reached the intricate iron gates and the two armor-clad guards collecting coins from the trickle of folk moving through them, Ares turned left sharply, walking instead along the outside of the wall.
“Why aren’t we going in?” I asked, walking fast to keep pace with him. The sounds of people calling out, selling wares and greeting each other died out as we moved further along the wall.
“We may be able to get the information we need without entering the city.”
“But I want to enter the city!”
“I don’t care what you want.”
“Clearly,” I snapped.
“He is avoiding the King of Erimos,” offered Zeeva.
“Why?”
“Ask him.”
“Why are you avoiding the King?” I asked Ares, and he turned sharply, snarling at the cat.
“Meddling beast,” he hissed at her. She flicked her tail. “He is not just a King. And it will be best if he does not know I am here.”
“But you’re in disguise.”
“I will not take unnecessary risks!” he shouted, drawing to a stop and rounding on me. “This is my realm, my world, my rules, and you will stop challenging me!”
I glowered back at him, but stayed silent, remembering my resolve to behave. To an extent, he was right. At least about it being his world. He definitely knew best here, and the fastest way to get to Joshua was to let Ares do what he needed to do.