Glass Eye
The tradition of Munafasa, a contest before the gods, has existed since the earliest days of human history
The sun had begun to crest above the horizon, spilling hues of amber, crimson, and gold across the bleached expanse of the desert. Sadie could feel the first vestiges of heat beginning to prickle against her skin. With wide eyes she watched as a pair of figures carved a stage amidst the shifting sands. The two warriors stood facing each other; bandit leader versus Aspbad Paladin. There was a stillness to the air, a silence as deafening as the toll of funeral bells.
Executioner put a hand on Hashem’s shoulder. “You don’t have to do this.”
He lay his hand on hers. “Protect Sadie for me.”
She nodded, taking her hand off his shoulder and folding her arms. Hashem and the bandit leader approached one another, stopping once they were about ten meters apart. All around them, a motley gathering of weathered faces and hardened eyes eagerly watched their contest. Executioner watched them like a hawk, ever suspicious of the bandits. Not just bandits, Sadie thought. These were no ordinary people, but servants of the laughing snake. There were probably magi among them.
Ali Reza grinned. “It’s been a while since we did this, huh, Hashem?”
“Just get on with it,” Hashem growled.
The bandit leader chuckled. He raised his fist to the sky. “In the name of the Eternal Destroyer, Arihman, I invoke Munafasa! I challenge the Paladin Hashem to a duel. No interference from either side’s allies. If I lose, I promise we’ll let you all go without any trouble.”
“In the name of the warrior goddess, Susa, I accept your challenge,” Hashem said. “If I am defeated, I promise to give you my glass eye.”
As if in acknowledgment, a sound like thunder rumbled in the sky, though there were no clouds in sight.
“The terms are set,” Ali Reza said. “Ready when you are.”
“Ready,” Hashem replied.
The bandit leader’s grin widened. “Begin!”
Hashem materialized before Ali Reza in the blink of an eye. His bident soared toward the lanky man’s chest, but Ali Reza deflected the polearm with a twist of his knives. Sadie gasped. So fast! She hadn’t even seen them move, much less seen the bandit leader draw his weapons.
The men became a blur of motion, attacking and defending with fury. They moved so quickly that Sadie couldn’t even track the motion of their weapons. Tattoos across their bodies glowed as brightly as the dawn rays shining over their fight.
Ali Reza proved to be incredibly skilled. He moved like a serpent, the swirling desert wind manifested in human form. His twin knives cut through the air with spellbinding grace, each strike mirroring the other in a dance of lethal symmetry. The sand beneath his feet shifted and flowed as though alive, moved by the relentless rhythm of his deadly attack. Each strike was relentless, his twin knives flashing like the cruel teeth of a predatory beast.
He managed to duck beneath one of Hashem’s jabs, then closed the distance, aiming to cut Hashem’s throat. Hashem evaded at the last second, though Ali Reza succeeded in scoring a shallow cut across his forearm. A drop of blood fell to the sand. Sadie’s eyes widened. That strike had left actual damage! Neither the sandstorm nor the weapons of the Ikitan had been able to hurt her father. How was this bandit leader able to get through his defenses?
A number of the bandits cheered.
“Yeah, that’s our boss!”
“Fuck him up!”
“Nobody is stronger than Ali Reza!”
Ali Reza laughed. “You’re slower than I remember, Hashem! That left leg still giving you trouble?”
Hashem ignored the taunt and continued attacking. Ali Reza was good, but Hashem proved himself every bit as skilled. He met the bandit leader’s onslaught with the tempered calm of a seasoned warrior, parrying and redirecting Ali Reza’s attacks with a measured cadence, slow and steady like a pulsing heart.
The battle raged with an intensity that seemed to ignite the very air around them. Sand kicked up in plumes, shrouding the duelists in a cloud of stinging grit. The men pushed each other back and forth. Sparks flew between them and metal rang against metal. Around them, the onlookers watched with bated breath. The bandits continued to jeer.
“Cut his throat!”
“Slice and dice!”
The pace of the battle abruptly changed. With a sudden burst of alacrity, Hashem swept Ali Reza’s feet out from under him. The bandit leader gasped as his back hit the sand. Wasting no time, Hashem bore down on him, aiming to skewer Ali Reza with a downward thrust of his bident. The bandit leader barely rolled away in the nick of time.
He twisted to his feet, but the momentum of the battle had shifted. Hashem began to push the bandit leader back, each thrust of his bident swifter and more acute than the last. He scored a glancing strike on Ali Reza’s cheek, drawing blood, then another on Ali Reza’s upper bicep, followed by a third on the bandit leader’s upper thigh.
Sadie watched, unable to tear her eyes away from the battle. “Dad’s really awesome, isn’t he...?”
The two men stopped momentarily as their weapons met with a resounding clash. Their arms shook as they struggled for dominance. The long silver tines of the bident remained locked against the twin curved blades, beginning to push them back.
Despite being at a disadvantage, Ali Reza smirked and nodded toward Hashem. “Last time I saw you, you still had both eyes! Tell me, was it Stormwall who gave you that injury?”
“Give up now, Ali Reza,” Hashem replied. “You can’t win. I’m better than you, and we both know it.”
“Heh. Bold words, but can you back them up?” Ali Reza pivoted, attempting to circle around Hashem’s guard.
Hashem twisted his bident and again caught the bandit leader’s blades. Their breaths came out in ragged gasps, eyes locked in an unbreakable gaze.
“You’re still a damned monster, I’ll give you that,” Ali Reza said. “If we continue fighting like this, you’re right, you probably would defeat me. I wonder, though... What happens if I do this?”
Sadie felt the world lurch beneath her as something suddenly yanked her from the wagon. She cried out, panic setting in as she began to rise into the air. Magenta vapor coiled around her torso and shoulders, cold to the touch like the desert air at night. She struggled against the vapor, but it was like trying to break free from heavy set chains. Before she had even fully processed what was happening, she was fifty meters in the air, legs dangling over the sand.
Hashem and Executioner froze simultaneously. They turned toward Sadie, eyes wide.
“A djinn!” Executioner exclaimed.
Ali Reza smirked. He held his right arm up, causing the sleeve to fall to his elbow to reveal a golden circlet around his wrist. A glistening sapphire was embedded into the aureate metal. “What will you do now, Hashem?”
“Let me go!” Sadie bellowed. She kicked and flailed against her smoky bonds, but the more she struggled, the tighter the vapor seemed to constrict around her. She ceased her struggle, instead opting to glare at the bandit leader.
“What are you doing, Ali Reza?!” Hashem demanded. “We’re in the middle of a duel!”
Ali Reza shrugged. “That’s the treacherous nature of promises, Hashem. You’ve got to be specific, and you never thought to include any stipulations about events happening outside of our duel!”
A wisp of the vapor undulated upward and expanded above Sadie, coalescing into a wide-chested man’s upper body, magenta like the smoke. The smoky man’s face was cruel and unnaturally smooth, seemingly ageless. The strange creature was bald, and had a thick black beard that flowed like a lion’s mane.
Sadie looked at the ground and felt her stomach lurch as she realized just how high up she was. She began to panic. “Dad, help!”
Hashem ran toward Sadie, but abruptly stopped as an invisible force seemed to yank him back, like there was some unseen boundary he could not cross.
“Nuh uh uh,” Ali Reza teased. “It’s like you said. We’re still in the middle of a duel! You made a promise to the gods, remember?”
“Let her go, you coward!” Hashem shouted. For the first time since they’d set out, Sadie heard genuine fear in his voice.
“Sure thing,” Ali Reza purred. “How about this? I’ll let her go if you concede and give me your glass eye.”
“You...” Hashem growled. “Where is your honor?!”
“Honor?!” Ali Reza repeated, laughing. “Didn’t the war teach you anything? Honor is meaningless in battle! Dead is dead.”
Hashem took a step toward the bandit leader. “This isn’t you, Ali Reza. I know you.” The bandit leader hesitated. “We can still talk about this. Just let my daughter go.”
Ali Reza sighed loudly. “Just give me the eye, Hashem.”
Hashem took another step forward. “Let me help you. It’s not too late.”
“Hmph,” the bandit leader sneered. “You haven’t changed at all. Unfortunately, the time for talking is over.” He pointed at Sadie, still dangling high in the air. “I’ll make this simple. Give me your glass eye or I’ll kill your daughter.”
“Dad...” Sadie begged. “Help me.”
She had never been so afraid before. Her heart slammed in her chest so hard she thought she might throw it up. She thought back to her encounter with the guard in Tel Kellah, back when community service and a scolding from her parents had been her greatest fears. Back then Sadie had never realized how safe Tel Kellah made her feel. Now, dozens of kilometers outside the city walls, legs dangling fifty meters in the air, she realized how terrifying a place the world could be.
“Ali Reza, please!” Hashem exclaimed.
Ali Reza’s lips drew to a line. “This isn’t a negotiation.” He nodded toward the djinn. “Kill the girl.”
The djinn’s arms snaked down and seized the sides of Sadie’s head with viscous, oily hands. She felt pressure on her head and neck as the djinn began to twist. Her eyes widened as she realized what was about to happen.
“STOP!” Hashem roared. The djinn halted. Hashem threw down his bident, plunging the tip into the sand so that his weapon stood upright. “I concede. You win, Ali Reza.”
The cloudless thunder boomed again.
“No...” Sadie whimpered. “Dad...”
The bandit leader sauntered toward Hashem with a jovial bounce in his step. “Pleasure competing with you,” he said.
Hashem glared. “Ali Reza, you bastard.” The bandit leader smirked as wide as the famed grinning cat as he reached Hashem. “Release my daughter at once.”
“Certainly.” Ali Reza snapped his fingers.
Gently, as if cradling a newborn fawn, the djinn began to lower Sadie to the ground. Her breath hitched as her feet touched down on the sand, a silent shiver of relief rippling through her slender frame. The smoky creature began to recede, dissipating into fine mist. Tears began to trail down Sadie’s cheeks. She clenched her fists at her sides, nails biting into her palms.
It was all her fault. She never should have stowed away in her father’s wagon, never should have come to the desert. She didn’t have any special skills, nor was she particularly clever. It seemed the only thing she was really good at was crying. How many times had she shed tears in the past two days alone? The truth was she was just a crybaby, a burden to her father.
The bandit leader held out his hand. “Now, about that eye.”
Sadie’s father turned to regard Executioner.
“Hashem...” the Arash Shara woman murmured.
The two of them shared a look before Hashem turned back to the man who had defeated him. Sadie watched silently, a mute spectator to the peeling back of her father’s pride and honor.
Hashem reached for his face, his armored fingers tracing the contours of time-worn scars before finally settling upon the cool glass orb that had been his eye for a decade. He hesitated as his fingertips traced the rim of the glass, then with one swift motion he gripped it and pulled, dislodging it. The sunlight glinted off the orb's surface as he brought it forward.
The sight of her father removing his own eye exacerbated Sadie’s nausea. She turned away and vomited into the sand. The sour smell of her bile mixed with the heavy metal scent of blood and caused her to gag, vomiting a second consecutive time.
The bandit leader chuckled. “Your daughter’s cut from a different cloth than you, eh, Hashem?”
Bloody fingers trembling, Hashem held the eye out toward Ali Reza. The bandit leader grinned, reaching for the stained, glass orb. Hashem curled his fingers around the eye, tightening his fist.
“What’s wrong?” Ali Reza asked. “Give it to me.”
Against all odds, Hashem smirked. “Didn’t the war teach you anything? Honor is meaningless in battle. KANNA, NOW!”
He bellowed the last two words, causing the bandit leader to flinch. Then Hashem hurled his glass eye across the desert. Sunlight reflected off the orb as it careened through the air, passing over shocked faces and landing in Executioner’s waiting hand.
“Hashem, you bastard!” Ali Reza exclaimed. “Do you understand what you’ve done?! You just broke a promise to the gods!”
As if on cue, the sky rumbled again. A bolt of sizzling, blue lightning materialized amid the cloudless expanse, as if forming from thin air, then crashed down on Hashem like an ethereal blade of pure energy.
“DAD!” Sadie’s scream came as a raw, primal sound, tearing her throat as she watched the bolt descend.
The electric blast was blinding, forcing Sadie to shield her eyes. Hashem's body convulsed as the lightning coursed through him. The crack of thunder resounded across the desert expanse like deafening applause from a standing ovation. Gradually, the lightning dissipated.
Hashem continued to stand, body steaming. His once gleaming armor was blackened and pitted, his clothes singed and smoking. Where the lightning had kissed his flesh, strange, electric patterns traced a convoluted path, twisting across his skin like tree roots burrowing in the dirt. His skin was charred in patches, some of which still smoldered red. Even so, he did not fall.
The desert descended into chaos, bandits scrambling and drawing weapons as Ali Reza barked orders at them. Sadie tried to run for her father, but stopped short as an iron grip closed around her arm. She looked back at Executioner. The Arash Shara woman shook her head.
“Let me go!” Sadie exclaimed. “I need to go to my dad!”
“It’s too late for him. Come on!”
She yanked Sadie away, pulling her by the arm. Sadie kicked and screamed, her voice raw, but Executioner held firm. Her grip was like a shackle, immovable and resolute. With her other hand Executioner swatted the air, generating shockwaves that knocked incoming arrows out of the sky.
"Let me go!" Sadie's cries were guttural, hoarse, each word a wrenching sob that tore from her throat.
“Don’t let them get away!” Ali Reza barked. “Get the eye!”
Dozens of bandits bore down upon them, thundering forward on horseback. Some were armed with bows, others with spears, and some with spiked, metal nets. Smoke began to billow from Ali Reza’s jeweled circlet, a curtain of undulating magenta haze. The smoke coalesced into sinister shapes, horned creatures with purple and blue skin: more Ikitan, at least thirty of them, screaming as they ran toward Sadie and Executioner.
“Ibinhaknas!”
“Haronat!”
Executioner shot into the air, launching to the same height the djinn had risen to earlier. The wind generated by Executioner’s speed roared in Sadie’s ears and stung her eyes, forcing her to squeeze them shut. They landed with a crash. She opened her eyes again just in time to see the Arash Shara woman use her bare hand to literally carve through a pair of bandits that had been investigating their wagon and karkadann. With that same hand Executioner slashed the ropes connecting their karkadann to the wagon, then mounted the beast and whipped the reins.
The karkadann blasted forward, leaving behind the wagon, the bandits, and Sadie’s father. Executioner continued to hold onto Sadie despite her screaming and kicking as they rode away.
“No! We have to go back for my dad! Please, we have to go back!” She clawed and shrieked, her heart and eyes locked on the smoking figure of her father.
Horses galloped after them, but proved too slow to catch a karkadann. As the seconds ticked by their pursuers continued to fall behind. The two women crested the top of the sandy hill, then descended down the other side and rode away. The sight of Hashem’s back as he faced the bandits was the last look Sadie got at her father before he disappeared behind the hill.
With his one eye Hashem watched as the silhouettes of Sadie and Executioner disappeared into the dunes. He could hear the distant echo of his daughter’s cries. Though each one was a blade that carved deeper into his heart than the lightning ever could, Hashem felt relieved. He knew he should have spent more time with Sadie, more time teaching and mentoring her. It was too late for regrets, however. She had gotten away safely. That was what mattered.
The former Paladin grinned. “Looks like... they escaped with my eye... Ali Reza,” he rasped, voice cracking from the strain of speaking. “You’ll... have to... return to the laughing snake... empty handed.”
Ali Reza stared at Hashem. His shoulders began to tremble. “You fool! You could have lived, damn you! No one had to die over this!”
With effort, Hashem shrugged. “Better this... than giving Stormwall’s sword... to that monster.” The motion sent sharp tremors through his shoulders, like tiny blades cutting into individual cells in his body.
Hashem knew he was in bad shape. He could taste death. The iron tang of blood lit by godly lightning lingered on his tongue. Each breath he took scraped at raw nerves, as if burning him anew. The worst part was probably the smell, as saccharine as a foxy woman’s smile. He knew without a doubt that he was going to die. How long he had left depended on the man standing before him.
“I... I didn’t want to kill you...” the bandit leader murmured. His eyes fell to the sand.
“I know.” Hashem reached out and cupped Ali Reza’s chin with trembling, blood soaked fingers. He raised the bandit leader’s face, meeting his eyes. “There’s... still time... You can still... be redeemed... Ali Reza...”
Ali Reza's face was turbulent with raw emotion, conflict flickering in his eyes like the tongues of a desert flame. His expression hardened. “I’ll make sure you don’t suffer.”
For a fleeting moment the two warriors regarded one another, acknowledging the final act in their long and tumultuous tale. Then Ali Reza took one of his knives and plunged it into Hashem’s heart.
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