Orestes has a secret that he wishes he could hide even from himself.
To everyone else at Warrior Peak, Orestes is the model military student—top of his fighting class and son of a powerful division leader. But Orestes knows better. He knows he is from a land far from Warrior Peak, and he knows that the only reason he can swing a sword well is due to his brutal upbringing among the sinister Morroks, who build up their army by kidnapping the children of other races.
But when the Morroks start attacking Warrior Peak and its colonies, Orestes has to make a choice. Does he stay quiet even when his past may unlock the secret to defeating the Morroks? Or does he risk alienating those around him—including the woman he loves—by revealing his shameful origins?
Orestes’s choice might be taken from him, however, as the Morroks begin sending him messages—often written in the blood of others—reminding him that he may not be as far out of their reach as he’d like to think.
Chapter One: The Intruder
I was in the tower the day that the intruder came to the Facility.
I was only five years old at the time, but I still should have suspected that something was amiss. Trainees were rarely kept inside for longer than it took to wait out a sandstorm or recover from a particularly bad injury. At the time, however, it made little difference to me whether I was inside or outside our jagged tower planted in the heart of one of the desert’s great dunes. For when we were outside, my fellow trainees and I were pelted constantly by tiny grains of sand that banded together to become harsher fists than those of our trainers. Our bodies were never free of sand and grit, so much so that we couldn’t recognize each other’s faces without that familiar outer layer and so that our bodies felt cold without that coarse blanket. Inside the tower offered little more comfort. We were confined to our dark, solitary rooms where we lived in our own filth and blood and where, after a while, we longed to face the elements outside instead.
Some preferred the security of the tower’s uneven stone walls because the trainers didn’t harass them here. But the other trainees didn’t have a guard outside their doors, and none of them had to endure visits from Dirth. Those two things were reserved for me.
Dirth’s footsteps were the same that day as they were every other time he came. There was no mistaking his gait—hulking and deliberate, accompanied by the gentle singing of metal on metal as countless weapons bounced against his every limb. My heartbeat fell in line with his stride as the footsteps moved down the stone corridor and warned every other living being to scramble against the wall. When my guard muttered his salute, I jumped to my feet and straightened my shredded tunic. It was always better to start out standing.
He actually grinned at me when he entered this time. He was dressed in his typical hodgepodge of ripped and frayed cloaks, no more elegant than the rest of his army, mostly in colors of brown and tan. Although he covered as much of his skin as he could, there was no hiding his blotched face, as erratically colored as his clothing, and the dirty, straw-like hair that hung to his shoulders.
Though trembling, I stood my ground even as he came toe to toe with me. At eight feet tall, he towered over me, and I stared straight ahead at his thigh as I waited to see what abuse awaited me. I heard the air whistle as his arm swooped down and grabbed what was left of my tunic. My jaw clenched to stem the oncoming vomit as he lifted me to his eye level as easily as if I were a piece of cloth.
“You are a stubborn one,” Dirth laughed.
His jagged teeth glinted in the brown hues of sunlight that squeezed through the tiny window behind me. Never having been tall enough to reach it, I was tempted to glance through my window now, but I knew better than to break eye contact.
“I would expect nothing less, of course,” he continued, “but I wonder, do you know why I’m here, Orestes?”
Orestes. I hated the word because he was the only one who used it, but I loved it because it was mine. I was Orestes, and he was Dirth. No one else in the Facility had his own word.
“No,” I said. In vain I tried to keep my body still and my voice from betraying the terror behind it. Dirth and his army thrived on fear.
His patchy face stretched more tightly against his skull as his smile widened. “Stubborn but not clever. Well, Orestes, I’ll tell you a secret. There is an intruder in our desert, and he’s coming to the tower.”
I said nothing. What could I do about an intruder? I was only five then and still small; I had eight years before I was even allowed to compete for a chance to join the army. And once a trainee turned into an army member, he could kill any intruder three times over singlehandedly.
“I haven’t decided what I will allow the intruder to do here, but in case he tries to follow in Zachaes’s footsteps, I want to remind you of a few things, pathetic though you still are.” His left hand slipped into the layers of ragged cloaks piled onto his body. From them he drew a glass vial no bigger than one of his claw-like fingers. “Do you know what this is?” he asked. He shook the vial before my eyes so that the red liquid inside swirled hypnotically.
“Serum,” I murmured.
“Right, serum—what separates you from me. Do you want to be like me, Orestes?”
Although I knew the serum was what could one day change me into an army member, the thought of looking like Dirth—towering, disproportionate, angular, and clawed at every tip—was suddenly too horrible to bear. Still, “yes” seemed to be the right answer, so I forced myself to say it.
Dirth cackled. “Little fool. No matter what happens today, you are under my control, under Lernuc’s control. You will never do anything he won’t be pleased by. Kill me, kill Humans, kill Morroks—prove your power the only way you know how, and we will have won.” With the tip of one of his yellow nails, he uncorked the vial. “So that you remember where you come from—what you are.”
Before I could react, he had dropped me to the ground and pinned me there with his arm. While I was still dazed, he shoved two of his fingers into my mouth, prying it open. I thought my cheeks would rip from the strain and my tongue burst from the foul taste. Then he tipped the vial and drained its contents into my mouth. The liquid burned the back of my tongue and inflamed the roots of my teeth.
Petrified but with a sudden burst of courage, I freed one hand, grabbed Dirth’s fingers, and squeezed them together until I could close my mouth enough to spit the substance into his face before it invaded my throat. Undeterred, he shoved the vial further into my mouth, but I bit down as hard as I could, breaking the glass and drawing blood from his fingers. He recoiled with a growl as I doubled over, spitting out blood, glass, and that horrible liquid. The last I knew of Dirth was his pointed boot piercing into my stomach and the door slamming behind him so hard that the stone floor trembled.
I didn’t know how long I lay there coughing and massaging my aching stomach. Before I even tried to sit up again, there were more footsteps outside my door. A whimper escaped me as I forced my body up to its knees. The door opened again long enough for two bundled babies to be dropped inside near the threshold. Their wails drowned out even the slam of my door as the guard resumed his place in front of it.
At first, the noise didn’t bother me as much as the fact that they were in my room at all. Babies were always kept together on the first floor until they were big enough to walk around and get their own food. Then they each got their own room, just as I had mine. No one ever shared, least of all with me.
After watching the babies for several minutes, I decided no one was coming back for them. I thought it best to move them from right in front of the door in case Dirth or my guard stepped on them when they walked in. When I picked up the first one, I was surprised at how heavy it was; none of the babies on the first floor were this fat. I dropped them a few feet away from the door, which only made them cry more. Now the sound was starting to wear on me. Tears were a sign of weakness, but they wouldn’t know that for a few more years. Figuring it wasn’t a good idea to cover their mouths, I instead shoved my fingers into my own ears and retreated as far away from them as I could.
Hours passed. Besides the babies, all I could think about was the intruder Dirth had mentioned. Where was he? Dirth had said that he wasn’t from the desert. I knew that there was a land somewhere outside the desert, but all we heard about it was that it was where new trainees came, usually when they were babies. But why would an intruder come here all on his own? I had never heard of such a thing. A fleeting image of a creature greater and uglier than the members of Dirth’s army flashed through my mind. I wasn’t sure if it comforted or frightened me.
Suddenly there were murmurs in the corridor; someone was in the tower who shouldn’t have been. Another event out of place. No one could enter or leave our dune unless we let them.
Thankfully the babies had stopped crying. I listened eagerly for further disturbances inside, but none came for several minutes. There seemed to be something happening outside, but I couldn’t reach my window to check. The shouts and clangs from without almost made me miss the sounds in my own corridor.
A single set of footsteps, light and quick, was coming toward us. Silently willing the babies to keep quiet, I padded across the room to the door and pressed my ear against it. My guard was reacting to the footsteps as well; I could hear him unsheathing his sword and moving toward the sound.
Suddenly two swords clanged together. A younger voice joined my guard’s grunts as a duel began, right outside my room. In less than a minute, there was an almighty crash as something slammed against the other side of the door with such force that I leaped backward, nursing my ear. The babies started to cry again.
After a few moments of silence, something smashed against the door’s lock, and the door swung forward. There stood a lanky boy with my guard dead and bleeding at his feet. He was about of age to join the army, but he was bigger and healthier than any thirteen-year-old I had ever seen, and like the babies, his clothes were clean and free of holes. He held a sword that was nearly half his height, and despite the blood dripping from his blade, I did not fear him.
He cast me one curious glance before crouching over the babies. Although he seemed reluctant to do so, he sheathed his sword and picked up one in each arm. He straightened up and made it as far as the doorway before he paused and looked back at me.
“Do you want to come?”
It was a simple question, but I had never been asked what I wanted before, not until today—not until Dirth had asked if I wanted to be like him. If I stayed, I would most surely become like Dirth—if not now, then certainly when I turned thirteen and had to take the serum with the rest. But if I went with the boy, maybe I wouldn’t have to join the army. Surely this must be the intruder, the one from outside the desert. He must have been going back to where he came from, and this was my one chance to see what was beyond the desert.
“Yes,” I said. I winced as I straightened up and felt Dirth’s blow again, but I was determined to show the intruder that I was strong enough to go.
“I can’t carry you, so you’ll have to keep up,” the boy said. He hoisted the babies more securely on each side and set off down the hall. I climbed over my dead guard and scurried after him.
As we hastened down the many winding stairs of the tower, it became clear that the noises I had heard outside were those of a battle taking place in the dune. When we reached the first floor, we found it free of army members. They were all outside, shooting arrows at the top of one side of the dune, where several dark-skinned people stood shooting back at them.
The boy ignored the battle and hurried to the other side of the dune, where the army members weren’t paying attention. With great difficulty, he started the steep climb upward without the use of his arms. I got down on my hands and knees to follow him.
At the top of the hill waited a four-legged animal that stood taller than the boy. It was covered in short, brown hair, and its face was long with eyes bulging out to the sides rather than facing straight ahead. A long tail swished behind it, and a leather pallet was thrown across its broad back. The boy seemed unconcerned by the creature’s odd appearance as he grabbed the rope tied around its face and looked over his shoulder at the dune.
“If I get on first, can you lift the twins up to me?” he asked me.
I had no idea what “twins” were, but I assumed he meant the babies, so I nodded. Leaving the babies in the sand, the boy clambered onto the beast, pulling himself by its longer hairs, until he sat with one leg on either side of its back. He reached down as far as he could without falling off, so to do my part, I picked up the first baby and held him over my head so the boy could grab him with ease. The second one was a bit more difficult because one of the boy’s arms was busy with the first baby, but we managed it, in spite of both babies’ incessant wailing.
Then there came a terrible moment in which I was sure the boy was going to leave without me. I hadn’t been afraid up until this point, but now I began to imagine what fate awaited me if Dirth found me outside the dune. He would make me go back to my little room and put more than one guard outside it, and the next time he wanted me to take the serum, there would be no refusing him.
But no sooner had that image invaded my mind than the boy’s arm came down again, this time for me. I grabbed ahold and jumped as he yanked me upward, far enough for me to pull at his clothes and the animal’s hair and position myself to sit behind him.
The moment I was settled, the boy dug his heel into the animal’s side, and it took off at a faster run than even the long-legged army members could have done. I screamed and threw my arms around the boy’s waist to keep from falling off.
After a few minutes, I settled into the rhythm of the animal’s jostling movements and chanced a look back at the tower. Only its black tip was visible poking from over the top of the dune. I tried to remember all of what Dirth had told me and wondered if he had meant for this to happen. But no matter what his threats meant, no matter who Lernuc was, no matter what the serum did, Dirth had given me at least one memory that wouldn’t haunt me: my word—Orestes.
*
I looked on in amazement as the sand disappeared from under the four-legged animal’s feet and was replaced by thousands of tiny green blades. The air also emptied of whipping grit, and the sky burst into a bright blue and the sun a bright yellow. I had never seen colors so brilliant.
Just as the last grains of sand disappeared, we came upon a man whose face was hidden by a cloak. On his chest was a picture of a sword framed by what looked to me like a large, solid triangular dune. The man held up his hand for us to stop, and the boy tugged on the ropes attached to the animal’s head so it slowed to a halt in front of him.
“I was instructed to take the boy,” the man said.
“Which one?” the boy asked. He held up the babies and glanced back at me.
“Him,” he replied, pointing at me.
The boy looked back at me again. “Instructed by whom?”
“He will be safe. Don’t you recognize this symbol?” He pointed at his chest. “You must go back to defend your village. The Morroks will be angered by your actions. They value these boys highly, and it is important that we keep them safe, especially the one behind you.”
The boy glanced back at me yet again, this time with a frown and a cocked eyebrow. I didn’t want to go with the man, but the boy and I seemed to have no choice.
Before the boy could say anything, the man spoke again. “You’re wasting precious time. Don’t make me take him by force.”
“You should go with him,” the boy said to me, too softly for the man to hear. “But if he tries to take you back to the Morroks, you fight like hell to get away.”
I nodded, wondering what Morroks were and why I had heard them mentioned so many times that day. Before I could say anything back to the boy, I felt the man seize me around the waist and lift me off the animal. He didn’t put me down but instead pinned me to his side as if I were a bundle of spears and set off at a run.
Although I had agreed to go, I resisted his hold with all my might. Despite my struggle and my various threats and insults, the man said nothing but only gripped me harder. Once we were far away from the boy, he stopped and set me down. No one else was within sight. I considered running, but I didn’t even know what the ground was made of outside the desert, much less where a safe place to hide would be.
“Okay, boy, you and I need to get a few things settled before we continue,” the man began. He threw back his hood and crouched down so that we were at eye level. I balked at his appearance. I had never seen anyone like him. He looked like a big trainee; he was taller and broader than my rescuer, but his face was wrinkled and his hair gray. Still, he was nowhere near Dirth’s size, and his skin and body weren’t distorted like the army members.
Unsure of what he meant, I said, “I could kill you.”
“No, I don’t believe you can,” he said. When I opened my mouth to tell him how sorry he would be, he added, “Not yet, anyway. Listen, I have no desire to harm you. I am taking you to Warrior Peak. It is my home, and I will see to it that you will be safe and grow up normally. I will not treat you like the Morroks did, but in order for me to do that, you have to stop acting like one.”
“What’s a Morrok?” I asked, my curiosity overriding my better judgment for a moment.
The man gritted his teeth and looked away. “Those monsters that were holding you prisoner.”
“I was not a prisoner. Those stupid babies might’ve been, but I wasn’t.”
The man chuckled. “Whatever you say, son. But if you come with me and listen to what I say, I promise you that we will train you to be strong enough to fight the Morroks or anyone you wish.”
I considered his words for a moment. This new world was becoming increasingly overwhelming, but I didn’t seem to have a choice but to go with him. “Okay,” I said when he didn’t continue.
“Very good,” the man replied, reaching for my hand. Thinking he was going to pick me up again, I snatched it away and called him a few nasty names. He persisted, though, and ended up holding me in place with one hand and shaking my hand with his other. “My name is Alec. What is yours?”
I thought for a moment, wondering if he meant my word. Then, for the first time in my life, I said, “My name is Orestes.”