Siege of Stone

by Terry Goodkind

  When she had completed her preparations, Adessa discarded the stolen cloak she had used as her disguise and stood to fight in only her morazeth leather. When she faced Maxim, she wanted him to recognize her before she killed him. She tucked her dagger and short sword into her waistband. She would not need them, or the agile knife. In the darkness, the wind continued to stir the spruces, some of which creaked more loudly than others, as if groaning in pain.

  She waited in the forest shadows for hours, until Maxim at last strolled back up the path, well satiated from his catfish pie and a tankard or two of ale. He whistled to himself, oblivious to any danger. Using his gift from a distance, he ignited the lamps inside the cottage, and light shone through the windows. He strolled up to the cottage.

  Adessa stepped out of the shadows, placing herself in exactly the right position. The dark spruces were dense and close, swaying back and forth. Maxim stumbled to a halt, staring at her. “You are damned persistent.”

  “I made a promise to kill you.”

  She felt a rippling defensive shield he manifested in front of him, but the markings on her skin protected her against any magic he tried to use against her.

  “This is Thora’s doing, isn’t it? Do you know if she is even still the sovrena?” He sniffed. “By now, I suspect that Ildakar has fallen, one way or another.” He quirked a smile. “I ended the petrification spell and freed the army of General Utros. And I saw an entire Norukai invasion fleet sailing up the river. Maybe you should have stayed to fight for the city instead of chasing me through the swamps?” He raised his eyebrows.

  “I keep my promises.” She braced herself. The wind grew louder, the trees rushed and creaked.

  “This is tedious,” Maxim said. “I do not fault your determination, but your power is no match for mine.”

  “I trust in what I can do,” Adessa said. Leaving the short sword in its sheath at her side, she drew her dagger. “This knife is all I need to kill you.”

  He had a maddening smile. “And how do you expect to accomplish that?”

  Although wizards had powerful magic and numerous defenses, they could be killed in a normal manner, so long as they were taken by surprise. Adessa had the most tremendous surprise.

  Raising the dagger, she kept her gaze locked on Maxim’s, and flung the blade to the side with perfect aim. The sharp knife sliced through the rope she had used to tie down one of the tall, supple spruce trees. Using her strength and the blood magic within her, she had bent and anchored the trees, and then fastened the heavy log, which hung on a cradle of the rope, dangling like a battering ram. The trees trembled like a strung bow, straining to be loosed, and Adessa’s thrown knife cut the rope.

  The coiled energy within the bent spruces suddenly released, and the supple trees surged upward and released the suspended dead log. Maxim had just enough time to turn and see the log hurtling toward him like a ram powerful enough to smash the gates of Ildakar. He heard the thrash of pine boughs, the creak of ropes, the groan of wood. He had only an instant to raise a shield before the log slammed into his chest with such force it shattered his torso.

  As the log swung back into its relaxed position on the ropes, Maxim lay sprawled on the ground in a pool of blood, his face filled with astonishment. His chest was crushed, his ribs were splintered like a thistle, but he was still alive, spasming, choking. Even with his great magic, though, the wizard commander couldn’t heal himself from this.

  Adessa loomed over him and slid her short sword out of its scabbard. “Sovrena Thora commanded me to bring back your head, and it gives me great pleasure to do so.”

  She touched her flat stomach, thought of the child that was no longer there, felt the shadow of Ian’s presence in her, and she convinced herself that the sacrifice had been acceptable. She’d had enough power to kill the wizard commander. Only that mattered.

  Maxim lay gurgling, coughing blood. “I am a wizard … cannot kill me so … easily.”

  “It was not easy, but I will kill you,” Adessa said.

  His fingers curled, and light flickered in his hand as he tried to summon scraps of magic, but his chest was shattered, his life fading away. She had to hurry. “Oh no, Maxim, I am not going to let you simply die. I have to be the one to kill you.”

  He groaned, tried to form words: “I will still … be…”

  She hacked down on his neck, cutting through the muscles and neck bone, until she lifted his dripping head by the beautiful dark hair. When she killed Maxim, a rushing glow flowed out of his body and whipped through the now-still spruces. She felt a shudder in the magic as if some last threads of an ancient spell were finally severed, although nothing touched her rune-protected body.

  Maxim was hers. She stared at his slack face, his dull and open eyes. She would deliver the trophy back to Ildakar, back to Thora. It would be a long, hard journey home, but with the wizard commander’s head, Adessa would have all the companionship she needed.

  CHAPTER 85

  Even after the conflagration burned the front ranks of his army, General Utros was not willing to admit defeat. But with Ildakar entirely gone, he no longer had a city to conquer. Despite his losses, he still had more than a hundred thousand brave fighters. They stood on an empty, burned plain without an enemy to face.

  He stared at the remnants of his stunned army and knew that he needed to give them a new goal, another reason to exist. His separate expeditionary armies were already on the march to find other lands to conquer. Utros had hoped to use those victories to get back into Kurgan’s good graces, yet he had less and less respect for the man to whom he had sworn his loyalty and his life.

  Loyalty is greater than love. Was that even true anymore? Majel, his love, had been destroyed, and his loyalty toward her murderer was frayed and full of questions.

  Utros returned to his makeshift command tent beyond the fringe of the great fire, where the tall oval lens to the underworld stood out in the open. Ava and Ruva were with him, determined to support him, whatever he should decide to do.

  First Commander Enoch had also miraculously survived, much to Utros’s relief, but he would never know the names of all the dead. A good commander owed that much to his fallen soldiers, but there were too many. Far too many.

  The first commander sat on his warhorse, bowing to Utros. “The soldiers await your orders, General. They will follow you wherever you may lead.”

  Utros stared across the empty plain, still unable to believe that the city had simply vanished. Without Ildakar, the orders Iron Fang had given him were no longer valid, though in truth the emperor had never understood the situation on the ground, had never grasped his own empire. Iron Fang knew how to make people fear him, but he didn’t know how to rule. He was a pompous, self-absorbed man who achieved power only through others, like Utros.

  The general didn’t know how he had been so blind before. No wonder Majel had sought love in someone else’s arms. If it hadn’t been Utros, would it have been another man? She had been so beautiful, so perfect, yet even after Kurgan had inflicted his horrific punishment upon her, she had gone back to him. Utros couldn’t understand it, nor did he need to. His duty was to his hundreds of thousands of soldiers. He was their leader, their general, not some spirit that spoke only through a bloodstained lens.

  Utros stopped in front of the scorched but still functional lens to the underworld. At his command, the sorceresses activated the glowing runes, and the greenish mists cleared, letting him see through to the realm of the spirits. Utros stood bravely before the glass, staring at the ravaged landscape of the dead, which looked all too similar to the blasted landscape of his own camp.

  Emperor Kurgan appeared before him again, grinning to show his hooked iron tooth. Majel was beside him, her face a raw mask. Her brown, lidless eyes stared at Utros, but now he saw her more clearly. No love remained there for him.

  “You summoned me again, Utros,” Kurgan said. “If you have finally conquered Ildakar, then I am ready to issue my first orders. Execute
all those who defied me, and when they come here to the underworld, we will punish them further.” He seemed to relish the idea.

  “Ildakar is gone,” Utros said. “Vanished.”

  “Gone?” Kurgan was taken aback. “How do you lose a city?”

  “How do you lose an empire?” Utros retorted, allowing the harsh tone to erase all the awe and respect he had once held for this man. “How do you lose your wife, the most beautiful woman in the world? How do you squander all the lands I conquered for you, while I continue to fight for your foolishness?”

  Kurgan was outraged. “I forbid you to speak to me like that. I am your emperor.”

  “You are dead. You are no longer my emperor, and I no longer follow your orders. Neither loyalty nor love is strong enough. I am strong. I have my army, and I will conquer the Old World for myself. My soldiers are loyal to me, and we will create a new empire, a worthy empire. You corrupted everything you touched.” He lowered his voice as the emperor snarled, unable to form words. Utros shifted his gaze and spoke to the other image inside the lens. “Majel, I did love you, but our love was doomed from the start. I should have been wise enough to know that. Maybe I could have saved you, but I will not mourn for what happened fifteen centuries in the past. Instead, I will make my own future without you.” He turned back to Kurgan. “And without you, Iron Fang.”

  Leaving the emperor fuming behind the veil to the underworld, General Utros stepped back from the lens. He picked up a heavy war hammer he had taken from one of his soldiers, a weapon that felt solid in his hand, real and heavy and deadly. With a cry that encompassed all his rage and despair, Utros swung the weapon and smashed the center of the blood lens.

  Golden magic crackled and flared around the fissures that shot through the glass. The central impact left a white crater, and the cracks spread, branching out toward the edge. He heard a final echoing howl of Iron Fang’s rage before the blood lens shattered, crumbling into chunks of glass that fell in a pile on the scorched ground.

  Ava and Ruva smiled at him with satisfaction and relief. First Commander Enoch pressed a fist to his heart in a salute and then shouted, “For General Utros!” The twin sorceresses took up the cheer, as did thousands of voices from his army.

  Suddenly, unrelated to the shattering of the lens, Utros felt a strange force vibrate through the air like a magical lightning storm, a distant shock wave that rang through the fabric of the world. He instinctively clutched his chest, and his half-stone skin crawled.

  Ava and Ruva stared at each other, then spun to him for answers. First Commander Enoch grasped his arm, touched his face, grimaced. The soldiers began to mutter. Some cried out, staring at their hands, bending their waists, flexing their arms.

  Utros felt a shudder, and his skin tingled, warmed. The feeling was similar to what he remembered when he had reawakened from the nothingness of stone. But now he felt restored, even more human. The stiff petrification faded away.

  His skin softened. His muscles loosened. With a sigh, he felt the dust go out of his lungs. He reached up to touch the gold half mask on his face, then ran his fingers over his other cheek. His beard was softer than before, silky. He looked at Ava and Ruva and saw that their pale, chalky skin had become warm flesh once more.

  “The stone is gone from us!” Ruva said, holding up her delicate hand.

  The twins touched each other, stroked their skin, caressed their faces. Ava said, “The spell is broken. Completely.”

  Utros listened to the rising murmur of wonderment throughout the camp. One soldier leaped into the air and kicked his legs in joy. “We are human again!”

  Whatever wizard had created the ancient petrification spell centuries ago was gone now, likely dead. There were no lingering remnants of the spell. They were free again, completely free.

  Utros raised his hand, clenched his fingers into a fist. “We’re alive!” A resounding roar rippled across the hundreds of thousands of armed men camped on the burned plain.

  The general allowed himself a moment of satisfaction and tried not to let them see the deep concern on his face. They would realize it themselves soon enough, and come to the same conclusion.

  More than a hundred thousand warriors were camped in the middle of a vast, burned plain, far from the nearest city. They had no supplies at all, no Ildakar to defeat, and all those mouths to feed.

  With gnawing dread, General Utros realized that he was hungry.

  CHAPTER 86

  The Norukai raiders caused tremendous damage to Serrimundi. Even though the people had succeeded in defeating the serpent ships, Nicci wished she could have prepared them better. But there had been no time.

  Peace and prosperity left entire cities vulnerable because they let down their guard, but Nicci never underestimated the potential for hatred and evil in the world, since she herself had caused so much harm.

  When she had left the People’s Palace on her mission with Nathan, Nicci had been convinced that Richard’s heartfelt code of freedom and independence throughout the D’Haran Empire would bring a true change for the world. But in her travels it had not taken long for her to see that the world was still a dangerous place.

  She and Nathan had encountered many worthy men and women who would fight for what was right, hardworking farmers and craftsmen, even warriors who wanted a good life and a better world. But there were also many enemies, and it was Nicci’s job to fight them, to make a safe haven for those good people, and smother the ambitions of would-be conquerors, like the Norukai.

  King Grieve’s large invasion fleet was out there, supposedly attacking Ildakar. Captain Kor had revealed the grandiose plans of the Norukai, and now Nicci knew she had another great enemy in addition to the threat of General Utros and his half-stone army.

  Harborlord Otto and Captain Ganley had brought the damaged Mist Maiden back to the wharf, where final mopping-up operations were under way. Thousands of evacuated Serrimundi citizens returned from the hills and helped extinguish the dockside fires. The emboldened citizens also stood against the last of the raiders. The stranded Norukai showed little concern for their own lives and simply kept fighting until they were brought down by archers launching volley after volley of arrows.

  Aboard the bloodstained decks of the Mist Maiden, angry and shaken crew members heaved Norukai corpses overboard into the harbor for the fish to feast on. The bodies of their own dead crew members, though, were lined up with great reverence, their arms and legs straightened, their faces smoothed, as the harborlord intoned the blessings of the Sea Mother upon them.

  Nicci stood at the prow of the ship, covered with blood, her blond hair caked with red. She faced Harborlord Otto as the Mist Maiden tied up to the damaged docks and shouting people raced along the harbor’s edge. Captain Ganley waved as he saw his betrothed running toward him, laughing with relief. The harborlord looked as if he might burst into tears at seeing his daughter.

  When they disembarked to a triumphant crowd of merchants and dockworkers, Nicci raised her voice. “I came here to warn you of an enemy threat, but the threat is even greater than I imagined. I hope you believe my warning now.” She gestured out to the harbor to indicate the burning ships, the bodies of the Norukai, and the Serrimundi dead that crew members solemnly carried off the decks of the returning ships. “Prepare yourselves for worse. It is not over.”

  “Didn’t we defeat them?” asked a gruff and lanky man in stained captain’s clothes. His face looked similar to Harborlord Otto’s.

  “This was just a raiding expedition, ten serpent ships,” Nicci said. “The Norukai have an empire, which has decided to go to war.”

  Otto said, “This is my brother, Jared. He captains a kraken-hunting ship, like the one that burned at the mouth of the harbor.”

  Jared scratched the back of his head. “We know how to kill tentacled monsters in the open sea, but we don’t usually worry about pirates. No one comes close to a krakener.”

  “Maybe it’s the smell…” Otto joked.

 
“The Norukai will burn any ship they find,” Nicci said.

  Jared shook his head. “They are not going to burn mine. From now on, all of my crew will be armed. The Norukai are just a different sort of monster to kill.”

  “Every ship must be prepared to fight,” Nicci told the harborlord. “Spread the news throughout the harbor and to all the outbound ships so they can carry the word as well. Other towns have been preyed upon by the Norukai. Open trade will no longer keep you safe. Even if you have a strong city, someone will want to take it.

  “I have already delivered a warning to Tanimura and asked Lord Rahl for his help. An entire D’Haran expeditionary force will be ready to march, but Serrimundi and all the cities along the coast will have to help themselves. The Norukai may have already struck several targets. Send messengers far and wide, even to the cities inland, because the armies of General Utros might be coming as well. Be watchful and ready. Build up your defenses.”

  The people made promises. She could tell they wanted to be reassured that all would be well. Nicci couldn’t afford to let them grow complacent again. She unwrapped the pane of glass she had carried with her. “This is another enemy that awaits you, a vast army awakened from fifteen centuries ago. They have laid siege to Ildakar and already sent out satellite armies to ravage and pillage. They will conquer the lands in the mountains, then make their way to the coast.”

  She needed to return to Ildakar if the Norukai were attacking, as Kor had boasted. She had to let the people of Serrimundi build up their own defenses without her. “I might not come back here for some time, so I leave the task to you. Rally the Old World.”

  She turned slowly, showing them Elsa’s pane of glass, in which the image of Utros’s army had been imprinted. “This is proof of the enemy that is coming for you. Show everyone.” She intentionally dropped the pane onto the hard boards of the pier, and when it struck, the glass broke into eight uneven pieces. Each of the shards contained an identical image. She picked up one of the fragments and handed it to Harborlord Otto, handed a second one to the kraken hunter Jared, then distributed the remaining pieces among those who might spread the word.