Heart of Black Ice

CHAPTER 21

As Adessa continued north along the river, the channel widened to create a maze of marshes, tall reeds interspersed with sluggish rivulets and stagnant pools.

Carrying her stained sack, she splashed along, stepping on grassy hummocks or sliding into loose muck. Once, she sank up to her waist in a slurry of silt, but she hauled herself out, disappointed in her clumsiness. If she wasn’t careful, she might lose her trophy. She had carried the wizard commander’s head for many miles and many days. Adessa was eager to see the expression of warm gratitude on Thora’s face when she opened the sack and pulled out the rotting horror.

As she made her way through the marsh, she felt the bloated burden at her hip. By now, Maxim’s head was growing softer, squishier. The marsh was full of unpleasant odors, but the sweet nauseating stench of decay hung like a cloud. She skirted several fishing towns at bends in the river, not wanting questions or company. The closer she got to Ildakar, the more threatening the swamps would be, the deadlier the predators. For now, she wanted to make good time.

She pressed her fingers against the sack to feel her victim’s clumped hair, the oozing skin. Liquid seeped through the fabric, making a new stain of pus and spoiled blood.

“Do you remember these marshes?” she asked aloud. “That town where you thought you were safe? Tarada, I think it was called. I killed your followers there, and you ran.” She paused, expecting his mouth to move and speak. “What? No reply?”

Sure that she had not imagined it the first time, she kept trying to provoke the wizard commander’s spirit to come again. She knew for certain that Maxim’s eyes had opened, that he had truly spoken to her. Since then, she had kept the head tied inside the sack to stifle his reanimation.

But Maxim could not speak to her because he was dead! It must have been her imagination. And even if the wizard commander did utter words, he was defeated. He had nothing to say to her.

That night Adessa made a solitary camp on a hummock of brown grass and peat, where she could sleep. Setting the sack in the matted grass, she found a dead swamp oak with wood rotten enough that she could break off the branches. She piled the twigs and dry grasses to start a fire. The orange flames were the only light for as far as she could see. Adessa heard the constant buzzing of marsh insects, night birds, and slithering creatures that hunted in the darkness. She sat cross-legged on a mossy rock that was solid, if not comfortable. Adessa needed no comfort.

She peeled thick reeds and roasted the bland but edible pulp. She had found berries during the day, even killed a small marsh hare with a thrown knife, which she now skinned and roasted. It was enough to satisfy.

Maxim’s head remained wrapped in the sack, but she couldn’t tear her eyes from it. She saw only the lumpy outline inside the fabric, but she knew that he was staring at her with jellied eyes. His puffy purplish lips would be twisted in a mocking smile.

She heard a whispered voice above the undertone of swamp sounds. “You can’t hide from me by keeping me in this sack.”

“You cannot speak.”

“Then why are you answering me?”

“You’re dead.”

“I don’t dispute that fact.”

“Then stop talking to me!” She bit into the roasted rabbit leg so viciously that she broke the bone between her teeth. She spat out the hard shards.

“I am still the wizard commander.” Maxim’s voice was muffled by the sack. “You tricked me, surprised me. That was the only way you were able to kill me, but I still have great powers you can’t understand.”

Adessa lurched over to yank open the sack. She pulled out the head. “Be quiet!”

His blackened skin sagged in all the wrong places, and his oozing eyes came bright and alive, turning toward her. “I merely thought you might like some conversation. No need to be rude. It’s lonely out here in the swamps, and you don’t have any company.” His gruesome face grinned at her. One of his loose teeth fell from his gums and dropped into the grass. “My many lovers have told me I’m very good company.”

“I don’t want your conversation.”

“I know what you fear, dear Adessa. You’re afraid that you might be going mad.”

“I’m not mad!”

Maxim’s lips parted. “Would a sane woman talk to a rotting head in the middle of a swamp?” His smile broadened so that the decaying skin cracked and yellowish pus ran down into his goatee. “Would a sane woman hear him answer?”

She carried her grisly trophy to a stagnant eddy at the edge of the hummock and submerged the head. “Now I don’t have to hear you.” She stood up, smug.

Through the still water she could see Maxim’s eyes looking up at her, but his mouth made no sound.

Satisfied, she went back to her meal, finished the rabbit with a handful of berries, but she couldn’t stop thinking about her trophy. She worried about the decomposing head under the water. What if the current was stronger than she expected? What if he drifted away?

She knelt on the edge of the grasses to check on the head. She was alarmed to see half a dozen brown fingerlings nibbling on the decaying face. The little fish darted in to peck at the open eyes, to eat flakes of putrid flesh. If the fish devoured what was left of the wizard commander, Adessa would have nothing more than a skull to show Sovrena Thora!

In disgust she plunged her hand into the water, and the fish scattered to hide in the reeds. Grasping his hair, she lifted the head back onto the grass. Some of the stains had rinsed off, but Maxim was no more attractive.

Once out of the water again, he opened his mouth and continued the conversation as if he’d never been interrupted. “You will not make it back to Ildakar.”

She snorted. “You said I would never kill you either, yet I succeeded in that.”

“This is different. I told you before, by now Ildakar has fallen. The wizards raised the shroud of eternity, and the city is gone. You have no home.”

“I will still go there. I don’t believe you.”

Maxim continued to taunt. “Even if you complete your journey, you will never find Thora. Alas, my dear wife is already dead. Her spirit is in the underworld—I have seen her myself. The Keeper is quite happy to have her. I think he has a lot in common with the unpleasant bitch.”

“You lie!” The thought of the sovrena being dead hurt Adessa more than any of his other statements. “You lie!”

“Poor Adessa, am I not in a position to know? After all, I’m dead, too—as you yourself reminded me.”

“Then stay dead. Stop speaking.”

“The dead are not the same as they were, and I have drifted back and forth through the veil. We arrogant wizards of Ildakar caused our own damage to the order of the universe by turning General Utros and his army to stone. We stole all those souls from the Keeper, held them away for centuries. The shroud of eternity also kept our nobles out of the stream of time. But the Keeper is patient. He will claim what he is owed. He will come for you too, Adessa.”

“The Keeper always does,” she said. “You don’t frighten me.”

“Maybe I’ll stay here to keep you company after all. Or maybe I can call the Keeper’s attention and have him come for you now.”

“Be quiet!”

Maxim laughed.

Her voice rose to a shout, or maybe it was a scream. “Stop laughing!” Thoughts echoed inside her head, and a dark inner doubt made her wonder about her sanity. The wizard commander and his insidious taunts would be enough to drive any morazeth insane.

The campfire crackled and popped as the flames hit a loose knot of wet wood. Trembling with anger, Adessa stuffed the head back into its sack, hoping that would shut the man’s mouth. “There, you can rot in the dark.”

She heard a rustle in the underbrush nearby, a splash in the water, something large approaching. Wary, Adessa grabbed her short sword and stood by the campfire. The movement didn’t sound like a marsh deer or a bear. She had thought the campfire would keep large predators away. She crouched, holding her silence, her ears attuned to any sound.

A lean mud-spattered woman stepped forward into the circle of firelight as if she feared nothing. Adessa was astonished to recognize the scant black leather outfit, the protective runes on the skin just like her own, the pale brown hair.

“I didn’t expect to find you,” Lila said, “but I need your help.”