This is the real Chapter Nine from the second book, “Charles Mandrake and the Keeper of the Flame.” I want you to be able to see if the book is worth a read by showing you exactly what’s in it. No excerpts here since they don’t really give you a feeling of how the book is going to read. Enjoy!
Izrah-Kul
It was late morning four days after the messages were sent. The line outside the tent already bent along the river bank. Anna had sent two people away satisfied and one pair of brothers away grumbling when a ripple moved through the waiting crowd.
A horn sounded at the edge of camp.
Tseren-Khuu appeared at the tent flap.
“We will pause,” she said. “Stay where you are. This concerns the Orra-Kai.”
The people shifted, mumbling, but no one left.
Anna stepped out into the light and blinked a couple times to adjust her eyes.
A tight group of riders dropped down the slope toward camp from the direction of Skelderheim, coming in so fast that the horses threw dust and dirt with every stride. Sun flashed on bits of metal at their belts and on the buckles of black veils snapped back by the wind.
At the front rode Izrah, with six Veil with her.
Even at a distance, Anna knew her. The way she leaned down close to her horse.
The elders behind Anna murmured, low enough that only those nearest would hear.
Kira leaned forward slightly. “That is Veil,” she said.
Bhan’s eyes narrowed as he counted riders. “Six with her.”
“If they rode from Skelderheim…” Taarna looked over at Bhan for a moment.
“Should have taken fourteen nights,” Bhan murmured. “Even with swapping horses.”
Anna felt something unclench in her chest.
Izrah swung down from the saddle before the horse had fully stopped. She handed the reins to a nearby boy without looking and strode forward. Tseren smiled as Izrah passed, and she nodded in return.
“You took your time,” Anna said smiling. She heard the roughness in her own voice.
Izrah smiled softly for a moment.
“You sent a raven and a rider,” she said. “The raven came first. By the time we were less than a day from this place, we passed the rider. He nodded as we passed so you can be sure he is on his way back. Four days and nights we rode hard, changing horses but not pace. The Line has fully awoken.”
The Claim
They stood a breath apart. Anna stepped forward and put her arms around her. Izrah stiffened for half a heartbeat, then returned the embrace with a solid, brief pressure, and then wrapped around Anna in a full hold.
“You’re thin and look awful,” Izrah said into her ear. “That’s my first report.”
Anna laughed once, a sound that came out more like a cough.
Behind them, Charles and Todd came up. Charles offered a precise nod, then slid in on Anna’s other side.
“You made it,” Todd said smiling. “We were about to start charging admission just to manage the line.”
Izrah stepped back enough to look at all three of them, a small smile on her face.
“I see you kept them alive,” she said to Anna.
“With help,” Anna said.
Kira came forward then, her steps unhurried.
“Izrah-Kul,” she said. “You and your guards are welcomed in this camp. We know your name and trust you as we trust Orra-Kai.”
Izrah inclined her head. “Just Izrah, please. Orra-Kai still waits to be named. I’m here for Zaaya,” she said. “And for the work she says must be done. Veil will require no assistance.”
“But the fact that you’re here…” Kira’s voice trailed off as Izrah put up a hand slightly.
Anna blinked. “How do you know me by Zaaya?”
Izrah tilted her head at Anna, smiling like it was obvious. “Zaaya, I was there at the beginning,” she said. “I prepared myself as Amara-Kul did and rode with her when she found you. I heard your name then, and know it.”
Anna felt the blood rush to her head as she realized just how involved Izrah had been.
But Izrah held Anna’s gaze and continued. “On that ride, in the days after you were born, when Amara was too tired to keep her eyes open, I cared for you as if you were my own while she rested. I too, nursed you and kept you warm until she could take you again.”
Izrah’s voice softened. “You’re her child, and she is your mother. But you’re my kin, because I cared for you, and you nursed from me as well as from her. That is why I came. Not for Orra-Kai, but for my kin.”
Anna stood there, dumbfounded.
The elders stood with mouths dropped open. Todd and Charles stood behind Anna motionless. It was something that no one saw coming.
Izrah caught her and held her close. “I have waited an eternity to tell you,” she whispered. For the first time, Anna saw tears form as Izrah smiled softly at her for a brief moment.
“I thought the ‘-Kul’ was just part of my mom’s name,” Anna said, releasing Izrah.
“It’s a Nominkhuu title,” Izrah said. “It allows me the role of being the Protector of the Flame.”
“Wait,” Anna said, scrunching her face. Her brain was bending, even more so through the exhaustion. “I thought you and Myles said my mom was the Protector of the Flame.”
“It was what you could understand then, and she was in purpose, but her formal Nominkhuu title is Guardian of the Flame because she was primary caregiver,” Izrah said. “I stand between the Orra-Kai and danger. I am Protector of the Flame. We are the only two Nominkhuu women with titles currently, although Tseren also has one, just Khuuransh.”
“-Khuu.” Anna whispered.
Finally, Kira stepped forward, like she was about to speak.
Izrah lifted a hand slightly, small and final.
Kira stopped and gave a single, knowing nod, and a smile.
“Go,” Izrah said releasing Anna and composing herself once again. “Do not keep them waiting on my account.”
Anna opened her mouth to say she could stop, but the eyes on her were too many. She turned, defeated, and went back into the yurt muttering “This is the work I chose…”
Later, when the sun stood high and the line thinned for a moment, Izrah slipped inside and let the flap fall behind her. She stood near the wall, arms folded, saying nothing while Anna finished with the couple in front of her.
When the couple had gone, Anna rolled her shoulders.
“That’s the morning,” she said. “If I’m lucky.”
Izrah stepped closer.
“Tell me for me,” she said quietly. “How do you actually feel?” Veil guards stood just outside the flap. Anna breathed a long sigh.
She kept it simple. The line that never ended. The questions that came in different clothes but the same bones. The way people looked at her as if every word might change the rest of their lives. The man who had surged toward her and been pulled back.
“I wanted to run,” Anna admitted. “Just for a breath. Just to get out from between them and their problems.”
“And you didn’t?” Izrah asked.
“I told myself it was the work I chose,” Anna said. “So I sat there and let the next one in.”
Izrah studied her face for a long moment.
“Next time you feel that,” Izrah said, “you call me. That’s the work I chose.”
Anna felt a small burn at the back of her eyes. She looked toward the entrance.
“There’s still a line,” she said.
“Then we’ll deal with it,” Izrah said. She stepped back to the wall. “You speak. I’ll protect and intervene.”
The heavy day came two mornings later.
The Breakdown
The sky cleared in the night and the air sharpened. It was colder than it had been all week, the kind of cold that made the canvas feel stiff under your hand. Anna’s breath smoked thick as she walked, and it hung in front of her face long enough to taste like metal. Her feet did not want to lift cleanly from the packed dirt, and she found herself scuffing the path like she was too tired to clear it.
Her body was already numb in places. The cold sat in her toes and her fingers, and the rest of her felt waterlogged. She caught on a rut she had stepped over a hundred times and stumbled a half step before she could stop it. The jolt ran up her shin and made her jaw tighten.
Izrah was there at her side, close enough that Anna could feel her presence without looking. She did not crowd her, but she kept her pace matched and her shoulder angled in, a steady presence at Anna’s side. When Anna’s step faltered, Izrah shifted with her and steadied the line of the walk without a word. Her face kept calm for the camp, but the concern in it was for Anna alone.
The line was longer than usual. It bent past the cooking yurts and nearly to the edge of the grazing ground, a dark curve of shapes and waiting. People had come in before dawn to claim their place, wrapped in blankets, hands around cups, faces turned toward the tent. Nobody spoke loud.
Todd came up with a basket of flatbread balanced against his hip. He kept his voice low, like he did when he did not want to add anything to the air.
“Full house,” Todd murmured, carrying the basket toward the tent.
“Tell them to pace themselves,” Anna whispered. “I don’t have extra hours to hand out.”
He grinned at her, but she saw the worry behind it.
Inside the tent, the air was warmer. Kira and Bhan sat against the far wall. Taarna wasn’t there; she’d gone out with riders to check a herd. Izrah stood near the entrance, close enough that anyone who came through would have to pass within arm’s length.
The morning began.
The stories came in and slid past her. A woman’s tight voice, a man’s stubborn jaw, the scrape of a mat as someone shifted to make their point. Anna saw hands worrying at a cord, eyes flicking to the flap, a blanket pulled higher over a shoulder. Names blurred. Reasons blurred. She listened anyway, asked the same few questions, and gave answers that felt solid enough to stand on.
People left, and she watched their backs more than their faces, looking for the small signs. A shoulder dropping. A breath finally leaving. A pace that didn’t rush. She needed it to count, so she told herself it did.
Somewhere near the middle of the day, Todd appeared at the flap with a bowl and a cup.
“Break,” he said.
“There are still people waiting,” Anna said.
“There will still be people waiting if you collapse,” Todd said. “Eat five bites. Drink three swallows. Then you can go back to saving the world.”
She made a face at that, but the smell of broth reached her anyway. She took the bowl and ate with the next visitors standing in the entrance, watching like they weren’t sure if this was allowed. Her voice came back rougher when she handed the dish away.
“Water,” Charles murmured, passing her a skin without looking up from his notebook.
She drank because it was easier than arguing.
Hunters
Anna had gone back inside when Izrah caught Kira near the edge of the elders’ circle during the break. She didn’t draw her far. Just a few steps into the darker space between tents.
“The hunters are sure to hear,” Izrah said lowering her head. “If they haven’t already.”
Kira’s face tightened. “I know.”
“They’re many,” Izrah said. “And they move fast. They use western horses. Bigger and faster. If they find the Orra-Kai here, they won’t come to talk. They’ll come to destroy and kill.”
Kira’s eyes went to the river bank, to the tents, to the cook smoke still hanging low.
“This camp can’t hold against that,” Izrah said. “Not even for a night. It would be wiped out. Even with Veil here.”
Kira didn’t argue. Kira’s breath came out slow. “We protect Orra-Kai,” she said. The words came out flat, like a law.
Izrah nodded, but her voice was blunt. “Protecting her here may cost everyone.”
Kira’s breath fogged in the cold. “If that’s the price, we pay it.”
Izrah watched her. “There’s another way,” she said. “She leaves. She moves before they can close a net.”
Kira looked past her, toward the smaller tents where the trio slept. “To tell Orra-Kai to leave for our own protection? How do we even tell her to go?”
“We don’t know how,” Izrah said. “Not tonight.”
Kira’s shoulders sank, then squared again. “In the morning,” she said. “We speak to Orra-Kai. We speak plain. We ask for her thoughts.”
Izrah gave a single nod.
They talk further. When they parted, they said nothing to Orra-Kai or to her friends.
By late afternoon, the light in the tent had gone dim. The lantern cast soft light, and the canvas looked the same color no matter where she turned. Her head ached in a dull, steady way that never spiked and never quit. Her neck felt stiff from holding her posture, and when she shifted her shoulders the movement brought no relief.
The voices in front of her started to sound alike. A complaint, a fear, a small anger, a plea dressed up as a question. She caught herself watching mouths move and then forcing her attention back to the words. She pressed her hands flat in her lap because if she let them fidget she was afraid she would not be able to stop.
A woman finished telling her about a dispute over grazing. Anna heard the heart of it, found the part that made sense, and gave her suggestions on who to speak to first, what to bring as proof, what to offer so the other side could say yes without losing face. The woman thanked her, and the gratitude landed on her and sat there. She watched the woman leave and tried to reset her mind for the next person the way she had been doing for days.
Another figure stepped in. A man, middle-aged, with a worn coat and a tight mouth. He bowed, but only barely, but before he crossed, Anna stirred.
“If I see one more person today,” Anna said under her breath, “I’m going to say something I’ll regret.”
She looked at Izrah.
“I’m done,” she said quietly. “I need to stop.”
Izrah’s eyes met hers. She nodded once.
“You’re still a person,” Izrah said in the same low tone. “This is a reminder.”
She stepped forward.
“Orra-Kai is finished for the day,” Izrah said. Her voice carried, calm and clear. “Those of you still waiting, go to the elders with what cannot wait. The rest of you, come back tomorrow.”
Murmurs rose. A few faces showed open frustration. No one pushed forward. Kira stood and moved to Izrah’s side.
“You heard,” Kira said to the line as a whole. “You won’t be forgotten. A tired mind makes poor paths. Let her rest.”
The man who’d been about to enter hesitated. He looked past Izrah into the tent and saw Anna sitting there, shoulders low, hands slack on her knees. Whatever words he’d brought with him shifted.
“Orra-Kai,” he said, voice quiet, “If you are finished, then I’ll come another day. I’ve walked far, but I can see you’re tired.” Anna looked up slowly as he removed the bundle he carried over one shoulder and held it out to her. “This blanket is all I have with me. But if it can help give you rest and peace, please accept it as what I can give.”
Anna blinked. For a moment she wanted to refuse. Then she saw the hope on his face. She nodded to Izrah to let him pass, and he stepped in to give the blanket to her.
“Thank you,” she said. She took the bedroll and set it in her lap. “I’ll use it well.” She turned to Kira. “Please see that he eats his fill with us,” she added, “and that he has a warm place to sleep in one of our yurts tonight. I will hear him first when I am rested. That’s the return I can give for such kindness.”
Kira inclined her head nodding that Zaaya’s words were final. “It will be done,” she said.
When the man stepped back, Kira looked at Zaaya.
“That’s true Orra-Kai work,” she said softly. “The words you provide, and the way you allow people to carry some of the burden with you.”
Izrah nodded. The truth was there.
Anna didn’t know what to do with that. The tent, the line, the bedroll in her lap. It felt like the beginnings of something she couldn’t see yet.
The line dissipated, people peeling off in small groups, some heading toward Bhan, who’d gone outside to catch those with urgent matters.
Anna’s knees felt shaky. Now that she’d said she was done, the tiredness came on fast, like a tide that had been held back by will and had finally found an opening. The sounds of the tribe seemed farther away now. She blinked and the world took a fraction longer to come back into focus.
“Come,” Izrah said softly.
Izrah came in close on Anna’s left, not pulling, not rushing, just making sure Anna had something solid to move against. Anna felt the weight of Izrah’s arm around her before she felt her own feet take the next step. Izrah nodded and Veil closed in around them, a quiet tightening of bodies that made its way through the camp.
They walked back through the paths, past the cook tents, and past the horse corrals. People moved around the group, wood carried, buckets passed, voices rising and falling in short exchanges. Anna tried to hold her posture like she still had something to prove, and then gave up and let Izrah set the pace.
Inside, the air of the small oval of canvas yurt was dim and quiet. The heat was held in the felt, and the smell of smoke clung to the mats the way it clung to coats and hair. The space was simple and familiar now, a place her body recognized even when her mind wanted to keep running. Anna dropped onto her mat without bothering to take off her coat.
Izrah knelt down, called Tseren in, and and then gave instructions to Veil to stand watch. She helped Anna out of the coat and into something looser, moving in the practiced way of someone who had done this for injured riders and sick children. Tseren gave Anna the canteen Finch had provided and she drank.
“I just need to close my eyes for a moment,” Anna said laying down.
Izrah set the travel lantern from Skelderheim on the crate table and lit it, the small flame catching and steadying. The light did not push the dark away so much as make a small island inside it. Tseren sat down in front of the flap, and Izrah took a seat next to Anna’s bed and rested a hand on her shoulder, just a reminder that she was there.
Anna meant to argue that they didn’t need to stay. The words didn’t come. The thought itself slid away, and then there was nothing but sleep.