Alanna The First Adventure - By Tamora Pierce Page 0,55

tell me he’d like to see a green city once again before he dies—” the Prince muttered, his patience obviously worn thin. “What’s up?”

Alanna performed hasty introductions, and the young men followed the governor down the hallway.

“I must admit to surprise,” Ali Mukhtab was saying to Jonathan. “I did not think Alan’s message would lure you away from those who were so anxious to have you like them.”

“You took the sword by the point,” Jonathan replied, tweaking Alanna’s nose. “If I were anyone else, they wouldn’t have two words to say to me. But I’m the prince, and I think every man in that room wanted something from me—except Lord Martin,” he added, nodding to Geoffrey. “I didn’t come here to have people treating me as if I’m made of gold.”

They stopped before a wooden door. Mukhtab produced a brass key that matched the lock and handle. “This is the Sunset Room,” he told them, unlocking the door. “Only the governor of the castle holds the key.”

The five boys looked at each other. This was the room Duke Roger had mentioned, the room built to watch the Black City. Its design was totally different from that of any other room in the castle. The stone floors and walls had been coated with small, brightly colored tiles, which formed pictures. Many were of the Black City and of the Bazhir. Alanna peered closely at the walls, touching them with gentle fingers.

“It’s very old,” she said finally.

“Even we do not know how old it is,” Ali Mukhtab replied. The door opened once again. Servants appeared with pillows and refreshments. The boys wandered over to the wall that looked out to the west. There was no window to block out the desert air. Only the posts supporting the ceiling separated the Sunset Room from the view.

The room was set high in the Persopolis wall. Before them stretched the Great Southern Desert, as far as their eyes could see. It was a magnificent sight, painted red-gold by the setting sun. The view’s only flaw was that it faced the west, and the dying light shone directly into their eyes.

Suddenly Jonathan pointed. “That small black speck—just where the sun is. That’s the Black City?”

Ali Mukhtab nodded. “That is the Black City, the doom of my people for centuries. Ever since we can remember—and our memories reach beyond the days when your palace, Highness, was a palace for the Old Ones—our young people have been called to the Black City. Our masters lived there, the Nameless Ones. They stole our souls and gave us farms and cattle. We swore never to farm again. Legends say we stopped there when we came north, over the Inland Sea. The Nameless Ones welcomed us and asked us to share their land and farm their crops. All this, the legends say, was green and fertile.” Ali’s hand swept over the leagues of empty sand. “When we saw that they were stealing our spirits, we rebelled. We burned them and their city, and all the land turned to dust. After we left, never to return, we built Persopolis, so that we might watch the City, always.”

“How could you burn them out, if they were so powerful?” Gary wanted to know.

“They feared fire above all things,” the man replied. “Their spirits linger in the City, but they cannot pass the circle of fire we placed around their walls.”

“You said they call your young people,” Alex said. “What do you mean?”

The man sighed. “Sometimes a youth or a maiden will awaken in the night and try to ride to the City. If they are stopped, they rave and scream and refuse their food, talking only of the City and of the gods who wish them to come there. If we do not let them go, they starve themselves to death.”

“And if they go, they don’t come back,” Jonathan said quietly.

“Isn’t it better to let them go?” Raoul asked. “Maybe it isn’t the City at all. Your life is—well, it’s harsh. Maybe they really go on to other cities, to live somewhere else.”

“We would like to think so,” the governor of the castle replied. “But we have trained our young to be honest.” His eyes were on Alanna as he said this, and she squirmed. “Those who leave us for the cities go with their families’ blessings—or curses—but they always tell us that is where they go. Those who want the Black City speak only of it, as if they could not lie about