Death's Mistress

CHAPTER 73

With the full intensity of a dedicated memmer, Nicci mulled over all the knowledge she possessed, the spells she had been taught, the powers she had stolen from the wizards she killed. There had to be another solution.

Wanting to be alone as she grappled with her thoughts, she went to stand outside under the great overhang of the main cliff grotto. She looked across the hidden, protected canyons to the clustered dwellings in the smaller alcoves scattered up and down the opposite cliffs. All these people had lived sheltered for millennia, guarding this secret archive. They had seemed safe, untouched by the outside world until young Victoria had accidentally brought down the camouflage shroud and revealed the great library after thousands of years.

The knowledge contained in the archive was dangerous enough, Nicci knew, but far worse were those amateur would-be wizards who did not understand the powers they foolishly unleashed.

Now, late in the afternoon, the secluded canyons felt peaceful and quiet, as if unaware of the monstrous flood of life that approached like a destructive wave from the opposite side of the plateau. Nicci had to stop Victoria, who had transformed herself into a monster. She knew how to accomplish the task, how to defeat Life’s Mistress, but whether or not the price was too high, Nicci didn’t know how to pay it. The answer seemed impossible.

Nicci, a gifted sorceress, had the dragon-rib bow, she had arrows, and she had the will. She was ready to face Life’s Mistress and kill her.

But she did not have the necessary poison.

Nevertheless, Nicci refused to accept the impossible. She never had.

Tension filled the halls of Cliffwall as the scholars tried to find some way to help. Nathan mourned the death of Mia, and Nicci knew he would do anything to destroy Victoria and her rampaging fecundity, but he had no magic to offer … or if he did, the wild and uncontrolled backlash might cause even more destruction than Victoria.

There had to be something else.…

Lost in thoughts, Nicci stared into the brooding canyon silence, where shepherds, farmers, and orchard tenders went about their business as they waited for what came next. Sheltered, peaceful, oblivious … A grim weight pressed down on her shoulders. These people all counted on her to save them, because no one else had the ability.

Yet Nicci wasn’t sure she had the ability either—the ability to love.

It seemed laughable and tragic that, for all her knowledge, for all the great magic she possessed—and every skill she had learned or power she had stolen—Nicci’s great failing was a simple human emotion that any child could produce at will.

Her eyes stung as she looked at the secret canyon where so many people had lived undisturbed for generations. She wanted to preserve this peaceful home for the inhabitants of Cliffwall—and especially for Thistle, who had already endured so much, lost so much.

As a child, Nicci had loved her father, although she had been convinced otherwise. Without understanding the depth of his devotion to his employees, his business, his future, Nicci had watched her father work in the armory. She had observed the workers’ respect for him, but she gave him no credit for his skills, thanks to her mother’s corrupt influence.

Her mother had made Nicci feel worthless, feeding her the debilitating philosophy of the Order until Nicci choked on it, all the while believing she was being fed a fine feast. Only after Richard pulled the blindfold from her eyes and showed her how to break those lifelong chains had Nicci understood her father’s devotion and exactly how much harm the Order had done to him, as well as what they had stolen from her with their twisted philosophy.

But Nicci’s father was long gone and the Order defeated, Jagang dead by her own hands, and she could not make up for the past. Instead, she had to look to the future. Now, as part of the new task for Richard that she had taken into her heart, she could save the world from Life’s Mistress … if only she could find a way to use the weapon she had.

Looking nervous, the memmer Gloria emerged from the front stone gates of the main tower, waving to Nicci. “Sorceress! We’ve been looking for you.”

Nicci felt a tiny spark of hope, ready to grasp at any straw. “Did you find another solution?”

Gloria’s round cheeks puffed out as she blew air through her lips. “Why, no, Sorceress. It’s just that the orphan girl asked us to look for you, says it’s extremely important.”

Nicci was instantly alert. “Is Thistle all right?”

“She’s waiting in your quarters to talk with you. She said it was urgent, but wouldn’t tell any of us, only that we had to find you right away.”

Leaving Gloria behind, Nicci rushed back inside the main buildings, hurrying along the corridors. She was worried about the girl. Thistle had watched her village collapse, fought dust people, sand panthers, and a dragon, and if she claimed that something was urgent …

Or maybe she had remembered some detail that they could use?

Thistle was waiting for her inside their quarters, sitting on the sleeping pallet, her scuffed knees drawn up against her chest. Her body was shaking. When she saw Nicci, her large honey-brown eyes filled with relief, but also fear.

Before Nicci could speak, the girl said, “I’ve already eaten the seeds. I knew you would try to stop me, but now you can’t. It was the only way I could be sure, so now you have to do it.”

A chill like a trickle of ice sliced down Nicci’s back. She stepped forward. “What do you mean?”

Thistle clutched dried petals and leaves in her hands. Nicci instantly recognized the shriveled plant, the distinctive violet-and-crimson flower, the crumbled stem. The girl held it out to show her. The deathrise flower, the poisonous bloom that Bannon had clumsily given her, not knowing its awful potency. As a sorceress, Nicci had kept it because she knew that such powerful tools were not to be wasted.

Thistle’s eyes flashed. Even as Nicci lunged toward her, the girl shoved the rest of the dried petals into her mouth.

Nicci threw herself upon the girl. “Stop!”

Thistle swallowed.

Nicci grabbed the girl’s chin and tugged at her jaw, trying to remove any remnants from her mouth, but Thistle kept her teeth clenched together.

“Too late,” she mumbled. She was already starting to convulse.

Nicci summoned her magic. Maybe she could force the girl to purge herself. Maybe she could find some way to neutralize the deadly substance.

But Nicci knew that no healing spell could cure the deathrise poison. She remembered Emperor Jagang’s tortures, how he had tested variations of the deadly plant in camps that he called Places of Screaming. This was no chilling tale to be whispered over ale in an inn. The deathrise flower was truly the worst possible poison in existence.

If Nicci could kill Jagang all over again, she would.

“There is no cure,” Thistle said defiantly. “You told me so yourself.” Her mouth was empty now. She had swallowed every bit of the deadly flower.

In anger and despair, Nicci shook the girl’s narrow shoulders. “What are you thinking? Why would you do that?”

“To give you no choice,” Thistle said. A vicious shudder racked her body, and her voice came out in a gasp. “To make the valley beautiful again, so everyone can live their lives … just like I always wished for.”

Nicci wrapped her arms around Thistle, as if afraid the girl would try to escape. “That was a stupid, useless gesture. It won’t help.”

An image flashed through Nicci’s mind of Jagang sitting outside his tent to listen to the prolonged agony of the test subjects after they consumed the poison. Some took hours to die, some took days. Even the mildest dose caused eyes to hemorrhage and made blood ooze from ears and nostrils. Some victims writhed so wildly that their convulsions cracked their spines. They screamed until they coughed up their vocal cords in bloody strands. Their skin would swell, their joints burst. Some clawed off their own faces trying to escape the pain.

The orphan girl shuddered in Nicci’s arms, and she began to cough. Her skin was already chalky, her lips bloodless. Her mournful honey-brown eyes were bloodshot.

Nicci knew what was going to happen to the poor girl. “There is no cure, child. Why would you do this to yourself?”

“For you,” Thistle choked out. “To give you what you need. To make the choice for you.” She squirmed and thrashed, and Nicci tried to hold her tight to keep her still. “What you can do—is give me a quick and painless death. End that for me.” She looked up. “Take one of the arrows, pierce me through the heart, quick and clean. Before it’s too late.”

“No!” Nicci called up her magic, tried to find healing spells. She sent power into the girl to keep her strong, but the deathrise poison raged like a wildfire through her body. “I can’t!”

“Take my heart’s blood. You need it against Victoria.”

Nicci glanced over at the razor-sharp, iron-tipped arrows she had left on the writing desk.

“If you love me, you’ll save me from what you know is coming,” Thistle said. “Kill me. Use the arrow to stab me through the heart.”

“No!”

The girl continued in a hoarse voice. “You’ll have the blood you need. The necessary poison.” As she began convulsing, her small hands clutched Nicci’s black dress. “Stop Victoria and save my land.”

Nicci was torn, her heart broken. She held the orphan girl, felt her spasms grow worse. She knew the pain was only the start of what would be long hours, possibly even days as Thistle slowly tore herself apart, screaming the whole time.

“I know you love me,” Thistle murmured, lifting a trembling hand to touch Nicci’s cheek just for a moment.

“No…” Nicci whispered, and she wasn’t sure the girl even heard her.

Thistle coughed and shuddered, pressing her face against Nicci.

Not wanting to release her hold on the dying girl, Nicci extended her other hand and reached out with magic to pull one of the arrows from its resting place. It slid through the air, across the room, and landed in Nicci’s palm. She wrapped her fingers around the shaft, saw the silver sheen of the sharpened edge, the pointed tip.

Thistle could no longer hold back her pain. She convulsed and cried out.

Nicci squeezed her tight, knowing the agony would only grow worse. She held the arrow in her right hand, turning Thistle just slightly with her left arm, finding a vulnerable place in the girl’s chest. As tears came to Nicci’s deep blue eyes, she drove the arrow forward, taking away the pain as gently as she could.

And when she pulled the arrow out, its tip and the end of its shaft were red with a thick layer of blood from Thistle’s heart. The necessary poison.

Nicci bowed her head and unwittingly added even more poison to the bloody arrow—a single tear. The first tear that Nicci had shed in a long time.