Death's Mistress

CHAPTER 27

They followed the river inland from the town of Renda Bay, looking forward to “Lands Unknown”—the farms, logging towns, and mining settlements that Thaddeus had described for them. Someone along the way would know more about Kol Adair and give them guidance.

Occasional flatboats drifted by on the river as farmers or merchants brought goods down to Renda Bay. The flatboat pilots used poles to guide the loaded vessels downstream. Some of them would wave in greeting, while others just stared at the strangers walking the river path.

After the ordeal with the shipwreck, Nicci felt as if they had been given a fresh start. Her long black traveling dress was cleaned and mended; Nathan wore the homespun shirt from Phillip, and Bannon also had a new set of clothes.

As they went farther up the river valley, Bannon seemed to recover his pleasant fantasy of life again, but now Nicci realized that his smile and his optimism were just a veneer. She saw through it now. At least he no longer tried to flirt with her; she had frightened that foolish attraction out of him.

But the young man wasn’t entirely daunted. He approached her, striking up a conversation. “Sorceress, it occurred to me that like prophecy, wishes sometimes come about in unexpected ways. And your wish did come true.”

She narrowed her blue eyes. “What wish?”

“The wishpearl I gave you on the Wavewalker. Remember?”

“I threw it overboard to appease the selka queen,” Nicci said.

“Think of the chain of events. After you made the wish, we sailed south, the selka attacked, and that storm wrecked the ship, but we found the stone marker, which confirmed the witch woman’s prophecy. Then we made our way to Renda Bay, where we fought the slavers, and the town leader told us what he knew about Kol Adair. See, that was your wish—that it would help us get to Kol Adair.” He spread his hands. “It’s obvious.”

“Your logic is as straightforward as a drunkard walking down an icy hill in a windstorm,” she said. “I make my own wishes come true, and I make my own luck. No selka magic bent the events of the world around my desires just to put us here at this exact place. We would have found our way in any case.”

“Wishes are dangerous, like prophecy,” Nathan interjected, walking close beside them. “They often lead to unexpected results.”

“Then I will be careful not to make any more frivolous wishes,” Nicci said. “I am the one who determines my own life.”

* * *

They continued inland for days and found several settlements, large and small. While Nathan and Nicci gathered any information they could, they explained about the D’Haran Empire and about Richard’s new rule. The isolated villagers listened to the news, but such obscure and distant politics had little bearing on their daily lives. Nathan marked the names of the villages on his hand-drawn map, and they moved on.

Once, when he introduced himself as the wizard Nathan Rahl, the villagers asked for a demonstration of his powers, and he faltered in embarrassment. “Well, magic is a special thing, my friends, not to be used for mere games and showmanship.”

When Nicci heard this, she flashed him a skeptical expression. When Nathan had possessed his powers, he did indeed use them for just that, whenever he considered it useful. Now, however, he had to pretend that such demonstrations were beneath him. When the village children learned that Nicci was a sorceress, they pestered her instead, although one glance from her made them quickly reconsider their requests.

Bannon offered to do tricks with his sword, but they were not interested.

As they left that village, Nathan quietly vowed, “I won’t mention my magic again … not until I am made whole again after Kol Adair. For now I don’t even dare make the attempt.”

“You should still try,” Nicci said as they continued along the forested road. “Can you feel your Han at all? You may have lost your gift, but you could regain it.”

“Or I might cause a terrible disaster.” Nathan’s expression turned grayish. “I didn’t tell you what happened in Renda Bay when I … I tried to heal a man.”

They walked along a good path up into foothills, as the main river branched and they took the north fork. “I saw you helping some of the injured,” Nicci said.

“You didn’t see everything.” Nathan waved at a fly in front of his face. “Bannon saw me … but we have not discussed it since.”

The young man blinked. “I saw so much that night, I think my eyes were filled with blood and I couldn’t absorb it all. I don’t remember … I don’t remember much at all.”

“One of the Norukai spears had pierced the man’s chest, and he was dying,” Nathan said. “Even the healer women knew he couldn’t be saved. But I felt a hint of my magic. I was desperate, and I wanted to prove myself. I had seen you save the town with your gift, Sorceress, and I knew how much I could have helped. I was furious and I grasped at any small spark of magic. I felt something and tried to use it.”

He paused on the path, seemingly out of breath, although the route was quite level. He wiped sweat from the side of his neck. The weight of his tale seemed so great a burden that he couldn’t walk and speak at the same time. “I wanted to heal him … but much has changed inside me. Dear spirits, I don’t understand my gift anymore. I thought I touched my Han, and I released what small amount of power I could find. It should have been Additive Magic. I should have been able to knit the man’s tissues together, repair his lungs, stop the bleeding.” Nathan’s azure eyes glistened with tears.

Nicci and Bannon both paused beside him.

“I tried to heal him…” Nathan’s voice cracked. “But my magic did the opposite. It ricocheted, and instead of sealing his wounds and stopping the bleeding, my spell … tore him apart. It ripped that poor man asunder, when I was only trying to save him.”

Bannon looked at the wizard, aghast. “I think I remember now. I was staring right at it, but … I didn’t see, or I didn’t trust what I was seeing.”

Nicci tried to understand what he was saying. “You felt the magic come back to you, but it did the opposite of what you intended?”

“I don’t know if it was exactly the opposite … it was uncontrolled. A wild thing. My Han seemed almost vengeful, fighting against whatever I wanted. That poor man…” He looked up at her. “Consider, Sorceress—if I had unleashed that kind of magic in a fight against the Norukai, I might well have annihilated all of Renda Bay. I could have killed you and Bannon.”

“Can you feel the gift inside you now?” Nicci asked.

Nathan hesitated. “Maybe … I’m not certain. As I’m sure you understand, I’m afraid to try. How can I take the risk? I don’t even want to practice. What if I try to create a simple hand light—and instead I unleash a huge forest fire? Those village children who asked to see a little trick … I could have killed them all. Magic that I can’t control is worse than no magic at all.”

Nicci said, “That depends upon the circumstances. If we are being pursued by an army of monster warriors, even an uncontrolled forest fire might prove useful.”

As usual, Bannon tried to inspire them with his cheer. “Obviously, our best solution is to find Kol Adair as soon as we can. Then we will have our wizard back.”

“Yes, my boy,” Nathan said. “A perfectly simple solution.” He set off down the road at a brisk pace.

* * *

Three days later, while passing through wooded hills with few signs of habitation, they came upon a wide imperial road that cut straight through the uneven terrain, then down into a broad valley. The road headed northward like a straight spear that Jagang had hurled toward the New World.

From the crest of the hill they looked down at the abandoned thoroughfare, which had been carved by great armies, but not in recent years. The road looked weathered and overgrown.

Nathan turned to Nicci. “When you were Death’s Mistress, did any of your expeditions come this far south?”

She shook her head. “Jagang did not consider this wilderness to be worth the effort, although from his ancient maps, we knew there were once great cities and trading centers beyond the Phantom Coast.”

“This road may have been a built by another emperor.” Nathan smiled. “The history of the Old World is full of them. Have you heard of Emperor Kurgan? The warlord they called Iron Fang?”

They descended to the wide, empty road. Nicci raised an eyebrow. “I remember some of the history I learned in the Palace of the Prophets, but I’m not familiar with his name. Was this Iron Fang a ruler of any significance?”

“I spent a thousand years reading history, dear Sorceress, and countless rulers have laid claim to historical significance, but Emperor Kurgan might well have been the most infamous ruler since the time of the wizard wars. At least according to his chroniclers. I’m surprised you didn’t know of him.”

“Jagang preferred that I help him make history, not ruminate about it,” Nicci said. She had certainly made history when she killed Jagang herself, without fanfare, without spectacle, exactly as Richard had asked.

“We have a long walk ahead of us, so plenty of time for the tale.” Nathan strolled ahead, following the great empty road, which took them in the general direction they wished to go. “Fifteen centuries ago, Emperor Kurgan conquered much of the Old World and the vast lands to the south.” He quirked a smile at Bannon as the young man walked on the weed-overgrown paving stones. “Not long ago at all, only five hundred years before I was born.”

“Only five hundred years?” Bannon seemed unable to grasp that span of time.

“Kurgan was brutal and ruthless, but he earned the name Iron Fang mostly because of his affectation. He had his left canine tooth replaced.” Nathan opened his mouth and tapped the corresponding tooth with a fingertip. “Replaced it with a long iron point. I have no doubt that it made him look fearsome, although I can’t imagine how it was possible for him to eat with the thing in his mouth.” He snorted. “And he had to replace it regularly, due to rust.”

“Doesn’t sound very terrifying to me,” Nicci said.

“Oh, he was fearsome and powerful enough. Iron Fang’s relentless armies overwhelmed land after land, conscripting all available young fighters, which increased his army … and thereby helped him conquer more lands and conscript more fighters. It was an unstoppable flood.

“But, as I’m afraid dear Richard is now beginning to realize, conquering territory is one thing, while administering it is quite another. Kurgan’s downfall was that he actually believed the praise heaped upon him by the minstrels and criers, when as far as I can tell, Iron Fang’s true genius was his main military commander, General Utros.”

“Even an emperor needs excellent military commanders to conquer and hold so many lands,” Nicci said.

Nathan waxed poetic. “General Utros was the strategist who led Kurgan’s armies to victory after victory. Utros seized all the territory of the Old World in the name of Emperor Kurgan.” Walking along the easy path of the ancient imperial road, he kept glancing to the foothills in the east, in the supposed direction of Kol Adair. “And once Utros was gone, Iron Fang simply could not function without his general.”

“What happened to Utros?” Bannon asked. “Was he defeated or killed?”

“Oddly enough, that is not entirely certain, but I have my ideas. The story is far more complicated than a list of military campaigns. You see, Emperor Kurgan had married a beautiful queen from one of the largest lands he seized. Her name was Majel. Some say she was a sorceress, because her beauty was indeed bewitching.” He gave Nicci a wry smile. “Perhaps like our own sorceress.”

She frowned at him.

He continued his story. “Majel’s beauty was so entrancing that General Utros was put under its spell. She found him to be a handsome man, not to mention brave and powerful—certainly he was a mate superior to Iron Fang himself, who might not have been as awe-inspiring as his propaganda would suggest.” He gave a dismissive wave of his hand. “Or maybe there was nothing magic about it at all. It could just be that Empress Majel and General Utros fell in love. It’s clear to me, and to many historical scholars, that Utros intended to conquer the world, then overthrow Kurgan and take Majel for his own.”

“What happened then?” Bannon asked.

Nathan stopped at a shoulder-high pinnacle of weathered rock that had been erected at the side of the road, as a mile marker, although the carved letters had long since worn away. He removed his life book, opened to his map, and glanced at the foothills, trying to orient himself. None of the foundation rocks gave any hint about the chilling prophecy or Kol Adair, though. Nicci was almost relieved.…

“Utros took the bulk of the imperial army, nine hundred thousand of Kurgan’s best soldiers, on a campaign to conquer the powerful city of Ildakar. And he simply vanished—along with the entire army.

“It’s generally believed that they deserted, all nine hundred thousand of them. Maybe they even joined the forces of Ildakar. Suddenly finding himself without his army, Emperor Kurgan was weak and utterly lost. Then he discovered evidence of Empress Majel’s affair with Utros, and in his rage at this betrayal, Kurgan stripped her naked and chained her spread-eagled in the center of the city square. He forced his people to watch as he used an obsidian dagger to peel away her beautiful face in narrow ribbons of flesh, leaving her eyeballs intact so she could watch as he skinned the rest of her body, strip by strip. He finally gouged out her eyes and made sure she was still alive before upending urns of ravenous, flesh-eating beetles onto the raw, bloody meat that remained of her body.”

Bannon looked queasy. Nicci gave a grim nod, imagining that Jagang could well have done something similar. “Emperors tend to be … excessive,” she said.

The wizard continued, “Iron Fang did that to strike terror into the hearts of his people, but he only appalled them, for they had loved Empress Majel. His people were so disgusted and outraged that they rose up and overthrew Emperor Kurgan. He had no army to defend him and only a handful of imperial guards, many of whom were just as outraged at the crime they had witnessed. The people killed Kurgan and dragged his body through the streets until all the flesh was ripped off his bones. They hung his corpse by the ankles from a high tower of the palace until jackdaws picked the skeleton clean.”

“That is what should happen to tyrants,” Nicci said. “Jagang himself was buried unmarked in a mass grave.”

Nathan strolled onward, smiling. “And, of course, the citizens chose another emperor, who was just as ruthless, just as oppressive. Some people simply don’t learn.”