As the Minions set down, citizens screamed, scattering with their burdened animals as fast as they could. Dax had harbored a slight hope that he might speak with some of them. But it was clear that he wouldn't get the chance.
Accompanied by his warriors, he walked closer to the river and looked down.
The once beautiful Sippora had become a terrible sight. The water-if one could still call it that-had turned black. As thick as molasses, it moved at about one-third of its normal speed. At first its soft, pliable surface seemed unbroken. But occasionally it would crack open, hiss noisily, then send pent-up energy high into the air.
The Minions could easily feel the damaged river's intense heat, and see the steam that rose from it. Then the Sippora's awful stench reached them. It smelled like a cross between rotting fish and human waste. Everything the river touched, it turned black; the ground on either bank was scorched for quite some distance. In places where the banks had been dry, grass fires had ignited. Many still burned.
The river looked like death itself. Nothing could live in that, Dax thought. But what had caused this horror? Suddenly he understood.
The energy spraying from the ruptured orb had polluted the river, he realized. During the darkness of their night flight, he and his warriors hadn't been able to tell the difference. But in the light of day it was clear that the river's toxic flow was headed straight for Tammerland. When the stinking, superheated mass finally reached the capital, the entire city would go up in flames.
Dax made up his mind. He looked over at one of his fellow warriors and he pointed to the river.
"Arius, see if you can take a sample of whatever that is," he ordered.
"If possible, I want to take some of it back to the wizards. But be careful."
The warrior named Arius clicked his heels. He took up his water flask from one hip. Standard issue for each warrior, the flask was made of metal and had a leather strap. After dumping out its water, Arius walked to the river's edge.
The overpowering heat and stink nearly made him faint. He opened the flask and touched it to the top of the black, slowly moving mass. The flask began to hiss and melted away immediately; the strap burst into flames. Jumping back, Arius realized he had been lucky not to lose his hand.
As Arius walked back, Dax shook his head. Opening his own flask, he took a generous gulp of water, then handed it to Arius to replace the one that the river had just destroyed.
"I want you to fly back to camp and report this," Dax ordered him. "Tell the warriors to gather water only from the glaciers. Under no circumstances are they to approach the Sippora. Go now."
Arius clicked his heels again. "As you wish," he answered. He took several running steps and launched himself into the air. Climbing quickly, he turned northwest, back toward the camp. Soon he was merely a speck in the sky. Then he was gone.
As Dax looked back at the river, the refugees filed grimly past him and his remaining escort; their expressions cautious and hateful, they gave the warriors a wide berth. Many of them were wounded-either by the orb, Dax assumed, or by the strangely mutated waters of the Sippora. Some were hurt so badly that he doubted they would live to see Tammerland.
He shook his head. Tammerland was about to become a living nightmare. For a brief moment he wondered whether the refugees would blame this new calamity on the Jin'Sai as well.
There was nothing more the two warriors could do here. Dax nodded to his escort, and they both took to the air. As the Minion captain gained altitude, he cast his gaze southeast, down the length of the steaming, stinking river.
Even from this height, the refugees lined its banks for as far as the eye could see.
CHAPTER LIX
Deep inside the redoubt, Tristan sat once again at the inlaid table in the ornate meeting room. His dreggan and his sheath of knives hung over the back of his chair. Around him were the other members of the Conclave, a circle of long, discouraged faces.
The prince, Wigg, Celeste, and Jessamay had returned to Eutracia the previous day by way of Faegan's portal, which the wizard had been able to reopen once he had returned from Valrenkium. Tyranny's enchanted litter had finally reached the Reprise and then the group had eventually found the portal Faegan created for them. The return trip had been even harder on the privateer's already mangled flagship. Minion carpenters and Tyranny's crewmen were already hard at work to get her seaworthy again, but it would not be an easy job. The captured demonslaver they had brought back with them sat bound in a chair in another room, guarded by watchful Minions.
Exhausted and disheartened, Tristan wiped his face with his hands, then grabbed his wine goblet and took a drink. They had all been talking for a long time and it wasn't over yet. By now they had all told their various stories to one another, but they had come to no conclusions about what to do next.
Failee's grimoire of tooled red leather lay on the table before Tristan. He knew that Faegan was eager to plumb its depths, but so far the ever-curious wizard had managed to contain himself.
Tyranny sat on Tristan's left. Beside her sat Wigg and Abbey. Faegan-still wearing the Paragon around his neck-was next to Abbey. Adrian, Traax, and Shailiha rounded out the company. Everyone seemed unharmed, save for Traax, whose left arm was in a sling due to the dislocated shoulder he had suffered when some of the falling latticework struck him. Celeste sat quietly on the prince's right. The toddler Morganna sat nearby on the floor, gurgling and batting at some toys. Jessamay occupied what had been Geldon's chair, in between Celeste and Shailiha.
Tristan still couldn't believe that the hunchbacked dwarf was dead. Geldon had proved a good friend-staunch, loyal, and incredibly brave-and his death had left a hole in all their hearts that would be a long time healing. Tristan hadn't known Lionel the Little particularly well, but he knew the diminutive herbmaster would be sorely missed, especially by Faegan.
Faegan had told everyone of the assassin Satine: how she had managed to breach the palace walls, do her dirty work, and then brazenly walk right out again-or so they surmised. The prince was stunned not only by her creativity, but also by her daring and her skill. As he thought of her, his fingers tightened around the wine goblet. It would be pointless to search for her now, just as it would serve no purpose to scour Eutracia for the displaced Valrenkians. Shifting his thoughts back to the present, he looked over at Tyranny and Shailiha.
"You're both sure that it was Wulfgar you saw?" he asked.
Tyranny and Shailiha nodded.
"He was standing on the shore," the privateer said. "There was a woman by his side. She looked pregnant, but I couldn't swear to that. A man stood there, as well. He wore the traditional dark blue robe of a consul. Far more demonslavers guard the Citadel and crew Wulfgar's Black Ships than we ever knew existed. I'm also sorry to say that a substantial demonslaver fleet still exists, patrolling the waters around the island."
Tristan sat back in his chair. For some time now he had suspected that Wulfgar might still be alive. He could even accept Tyranny's report about the remaining demonslaver fleet. But he was having a very hard time believing what the privateer and his sister had just told them all about the Black Ships. Had anyone else been spinning this tale, he would have thought them mad.
"You say that these vessels can not only run submerged, but also fly above the waves?" he asked. "And that they are not only crewed by demonslavers, but commanded by skeletons in tattered military uniforms?"
"That's right," Shailiha said. She shook her head, as though she couldn't believe it herself. "You simply have to believe us, Tristan. We saw what we saw. We were lucky to get away with our lives."
For the first time that day, the prince smiled.
"I believe you," he answered. Then he turned to Wigg. "First you mention the Black Watch, and now come the Black Ships. I'd say there's more than just a passing coincidence in the choice of names here, wouldn't you?"
"Indeed, First Wizard," Faegan chimed in. As was usually the case when he knew that he had Wigg in an uncomfort
able position, Faegan's eyes lit up. "I'd say you have some explaining to do."
Wigg laced his fingers together. "The Black Ships once sailed in the service of the Directorate," he said at last. "They were the maritime branch of the Black Watch during the Sorceresses' War. Jessamay captained one of the vessels for a time. All of the captains were accomplished wizards or sorceresses whom we trusted implicitly. Like the Black Watch, the ships were manned by handpicked civilians. Some of those civilians were of endowed blood, although they were not trained in the craft." Pausing, Wigg looked around the table. When no one spoke, he went on.
"Failee had begun to form an armada of her own, and we needed to be able to strike back at her on the sea. The war was going poorly, the Coven's land forces advancing rapidly from the west. Tammerland was quickly becoming a fortress, its walls bursting with refugees. Famine and disease threatened. Worse yet, if the Coven gained control of the coast, they would be able to launch troops from their vessels, and we would suddenly be fighting a war on two fronts. We conjured the Black Ships to hold her off. The Tome had only recently been discovered, and the calculations for the vessels' conjuring were found within its pages. As the leader of the Directorate I oversaw not only the Black Watch, but also the Black Ships." He sighed and glanced at Jessamay again.
Faegan leaned forward in his chair, his eyes alive with curiosity. "I never knew about any of this," he said. "It must have all happened after the Coven captured me."
"Yes," Wigg said.
"Where have the Black Ships been all this time?" Abbey asked. "And can they really do everything that Tyranny and Shailiha claim?"
"Indeed they can," Wigg answered. "They are an absolute marvel of the craft." He shook his head, frowning. "Near the end of the war, all seven Black Ships disappeared while on a mission to engage part of the Coven's fleet. We assumed that they had been overwhelmed by Failee's armada and sent to the bottom of the sea."
Wigg rubbed his chin. "And now, it seems, they and their captains have resurfaced.
"Even the Black Ships cannot fly on their own. It takes one skilled in the craft to make each do so. The training is long and arduous-and was known only by a few."
Wigg looked grimly around the table. "Aside from Jessamay and me, everyone who knew how to fly a Black Ship is long dead-and yet there are these seven mysterious captains. Then there is this business about their uniforms looking eerily familiar. Our naval uniforms during the Sorceresses' War looked much like those worn by the late royal guard. Given all of that, who else could these captains be, eh? It all fits!"
Turning, Wigg looked into the aging face of his beloved daughter. Every time he gazed upon her now, his heart broke a little more.
"And now, too, we may at long last have a clue to the riddle of the Necrophagians," Wigg said. For several long moments the room was quiet.
"Please explain," Faegan said.
"For as long as we can remember, no vessel has been able to sail more than fifteen days into the Sea of Whispers," Wigg answered. "But when the Directorate banished the Coven three centuries ago, Failee found a way to cross-by way of her so-called bargain of tenfold times four. She promised that in the future she would pay forty dead bodies to the Necrophagians every time she wished to traverse the sea. But there has always been a part of this tale that bothered me."
"And what is that?" Traax asked. Wincing a bit, he adjusted the sling that supported his right arm.
"Why would the Necros agree, when they could have just as easily devoured the Coven right then and there?" Wigg asked. "For all they knew, her promise was no more than a trick, and Failee might never return. Indeed, it took a full three centuries for her to prepare for Succiu's return to Eutracia to steal the Paragon and to kidnap Shailiha. By then, the Necrophagians must surely have thought they had been duped."
"So what is the answer?" Jessamay asked.
"At the time we banished the Coven, Failee already knew that the Necrophagians were there," Wigg answered. "And she must have had some kind of partial hold over them."
Slapping one hand upon the arm of his chair, Faegan cackled. "By the Afterlife, you've figured it out!" he shouted. "Finally-after all of these years! Well done, I say!"
Tristan scowled at them both. "Figured what out?" he demanded.
"It's really quite simple," Faegan answered, wiggling his bushy eyebrows up and down. "The current-day Necrophagians were at one time the captains and crews of Wigg's Black Ships. Failee caught them at sea and she used the craft to condemn them to an eternity deep below the waves, forever feasting on the dead for their sustenance. And that has been their punishment ever since. I'm right, aren't I?"
"Partially," Wigg said. "But how do you explain the fact that even long before the Sorceresses' War, no vessel could sail for more than fifteen days across the Sea of Whispers? The Necrophagians must already have been there; Failee only added to their numbers."
"But then how did the first Necrophagians get there?" Adrian asked.
Suddenly everyone heard Faegan take a quick breath. "But of course," he said. "It's all so clear now."
All eyes turned to look at him. Even he seemed stunned by his sudden conclusion.
"It's all a part of the War of Attrition that the preface of the Tome speaks of," he whispered. "The great struggle that took place aeons ago between the Heretics of the Guild and the Ones Who Came Before. There is a passage about that ancient war-one that had long eluded my comprehension. Now I understand."
Closing his eyes, Faegan called upon his gift of Consummate Recollection. The members of the Conclave watched and waited. Eyes still closed, Faegan began to recite a passage.
"During the War of Attrition, many of us practicing the Vigors were resigned to the sea by those who would seek to divide us and attempt to cause the rise of the dark side of the craft. Those vanquished souls were left with no recourse except to exist in the cold depths and to feed upon human carrion. But one day those of endowed blood-either of the Vigors or of the Vagaries-may acquire sufficient knowledge of the craft to bring them up and turn them to their cause."
Faegan opened his eyes. "Do you understand now?" he asked. "The original Necrophagians were members of the Ones who were captured by the Heretics of the Guild during the War of Attrition. Instead of being killed outright, they were condemned to eternal torture."
Astounded, Tristan sat back in his chair. Suddenly another thought hit him.
"And if the captains of the Black Ships can be recalled after three hundred years, then perhaps…" The prince didn't dare give voice to his suspicion.
"Then perhaps members of the Ones still suffer as Necrophagians to this very day," Shailiha finished for him. "They await their descendants of the Vigors to acquire sufficient knowledge to free them."
Wide-eyed, she looked first at Faegan, then at Wigg. "Could it really be true? Could there really be members of the Ones still living among us, albeit in an entirely different form?"
"Very possibly," Wigg answered. "But even if it is true, we do not have the knowledge required to free them."
"But Wulfgar was apparently able to free the captains of the Black Watch," Shailiha countered. "And despite the quality of his blood, he is still very new to the craft. So where did he acquire such training?"
"Presumably from the same source he has acquired all of his other gifts," Wigg answered. "The Scroll of the Vagaries. Remember, the Scrolls were written to supply 'shortcuts,' if you will, to one's training in the craft in the form of Forestallments. Your ability to commune with the fliers of the fields is a perfect example of this, Princess. You have never been classically trained, yet you are able to perform that feat. And unlike us, Wulfgar has an entire group of highly trained consuls to research the Scroll for him. While it's true that we have the acolytes to help us wade through the Scroll of the Vigors, their skills don't yet match those of the consuls. And don't forget that at least one third of our scroll was burned when Wulfgar tried to pollute the Orb of the Vigors. There is no telling how many secrets
turned to ash that night. I must say that I fear that Wulfgar is far ahead of us in his understanding of the Scrolls-at least the one in his possession."
Wigg gave Adrian a little smile. "No offense meant about your abilities, First Sister," he said. "The acolytes simply haven't studied and practiced the craft for as long as the consuls." Then he gave her a wink. "But your time will come."
Adrian smiled back. "No offense taken," she said.
"But some of this still doesn't make sense," Celeste argued. "Why bother to condemn the captured Ones to the sea at all? Why not just kill them outright? The Ones and the Heretics were mortal enemies, were they not?"
"I think I may have the answer to that," Jessamay said. This was the first time the sorceress had spoken during the meeting, and everyone turned to look at her.
"The Heretics wanted to protect the Citadel," she said. "It is supposedly one of the aeons-old birthplaces of the craft, is it not? I propose that it was upon that island that the Vagaries were first conceived and then perfected. What better way for the Heretics to guard their precious knowledge than to ensure that the Ones could never reach it? Unless they were in Heretic vessels, of course-in which case it's quite reasonable to assume that if they could create the Necrophagians, they could demand safe passage from them as well." She looked around the table.
"I agree with Wigg," she added. "The Citadel holds far more secrets of the craft than even Wulfgar may realize. True, he is the Enseterat. But his future powers-and even those still unrealized gifts of the Jin'Sai and the Jin'Saiou-may pale in comparison to what was once accomplished by the Ones and the Heretics. The truth is that we simply don't know."
Tristan was about to speak when an urgent pounding came on the doors. He looked over to one of the Minion guards and he nodded. They swung the double doors open to reveal Ox.
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