Oberon's Dreams Read Free Page A

you find it, then?”
    Corin nodded, his eyes fixed on the towering cliff wall to their left. Iryana’s gaze raced on ahead, searching not the high walls, but the uneven, twisting footpath. What she sought was some way up the slope, but she spotted it soon enough. The pirate crew had cleared a pit from the valley’s sandy floor. Corin heard her gasp.“Godlanders should not come here!” she said. “This place remembers what you’ve done.”
    “This place is only sand and stone,” Corin said. “And, with any luck, some relics worth a huge amount of gold.”
    “Your people care for nothing else.”
    Corin glanced at her. He shrugged. “My crew, at least. They have not enjoyed the hospitality of your sands. But when the door is opened—”
    She shook her head frantically. “This is no place for you. The shadows remember your people’s sins. The fires will consume you, the soot will choke your lungs, and you will leave here empty-handed.”
    “All except the last, perhaps.”
    “This is no joke! You are always laughing, but Jezeeli is a place of grief. It is a memory of loss, and nothing more.”
    Corin held her gaze for a moment. “I mean no disrespect to you or yours, but this is my life’s work. It is my destiny to find the lost city.”
    She snorted. “You have been searching for three years.”
    “Three long years!”
    “Using a map you stole.”
    “Stealing is my other life’s work. You must admit I do it well.”
    She shook her head. “I owe you my liberty. I’ll grant you that. And you were not a cruel captor even when you dragged me from my own people’s tents. But I will not assist you in this plot.”
    “I do need you, Iryana. You said it before, and you were right. My men tire of the burning sands, and if I don’t show them some reward soon, I’ll have far more to fear than just Ethan Blake’s ambition. I’ll be the first captain to face a mutiny a hundred miles from the sea.”
    “Then leave! Take them to the sea and steal Godlander treasures as you’ve always done. Forget this place.”
    “I can’t,” Corin said. “Perhaps a month ago, but now we have spent too long on this adventure. We must uncover the lost city.”
    “Why? Why is it so important to steal a memory better left forgotten?”
    “Because I am not the only one who’s searching. Rich men, powerful men, and tyrants all are searching for this place. I will not let them have the glory.”
    “You mean the gold?”
    “I mean the glory.”
    She sniffed in open disdain. “Is your name not grand enough for you?”
    “I care little for my name, but theirs is far too grand. They already own the histories of my nation. I would prefer to rob them of the chance of robbing yours.”
    Iryana shrugged. “You bear a strange kind of generosity. You’ll rob this memory to prevent other men from doing so. You rescue me from a slaver’s block so that I can be your slave.”
    Corin suppressed his first response and shrugged instead. “Wicked as I am, I make a better steward of precious things than the men whom I oppose. But if you chafe so much at my authority, I set you free. Turn and run. Now. If I end in chains, you will not much enjoy the hospitality of the ones who take my place.”
    “I have known little enough of hospitality in my time,” she said. “I will find my own way free.”
    “Please,” he said, serious at last. “Don’t underestimate what they could do.”
    She cocked her head and stared at him with a crooked smile. “I just said these things to you.”
    “But I am their captain.”
    “And I am just a slave. Why do you care so much for my destiny?”
    “I learned to sail from a man who’d fled his chains,” Corin said. “But more than that, I grew up in the streets of rich Ithale. I have seen the sins of my people. I come from a land that would make slaves of all men, and that has borne in me a certain sympathy for those who suffer.”
    “Such nobility from a thief!”
    “It isn’t hard. The only