Shroud of Eternity

CHAPTER 34

In the ruling tower, Nicci turned at the shouts and commotion. The duma members rose in alarm from their benches, and even Maxim stood, curious, while Thora remained ensconced in her chair, as if it would take more than an ordinary crisis to make her stir from her place.

High Captain Avery marched in with a leather-and-steel rustle of his personal armor. Six city guards escorted a dangerous-looking warrior whose entire body seemed bleached, his armor and skin coated with a whitish film. His dark, close-cropped hair seemed dusted with white powder. The prisoner moved sluggishly, staggering under the burden of heavy iron chains draped over his shoulders and encircling his chest. Avery stared ahead, his expression grim. Nicci could tell he was afraid.

Sovrena Thora finally rose to her feet. “What is this?”

Recognizing the stylized-flame symbol on the prisoner’s breastplate, Nicci guessed what had happened even before the wizards did.

Avery marched up to the dais. “Sovrena, Wizard Commander, one of the petrified warriors awakened. Your son and his friends were among the ranks of stone soldiers when this one came alive again.”

The strange warrior spoke in a deep, heavily accented voice. “My name is Ulrich.” He struggled with the chains. “What have you done to my comrades? What did you do to me?”

Maxim’s normally cocky expression changed to one of alarm. His face turned nearly as pale as the ancient soldier’s. “The spell wore off? How is that possible?”

Thora snapped, “What did Amos do? Did our son cause this?”

“It seems to have occurred spontaneously, Sovrena,” said Avery. “The young men brought him to the city gates, where he was seized.”

“Wisely,” Ivan said.

Fleshmancer Andre did not try to control his curiosity, scuttling across the blue tiled floor. The city guards crowded around the warrior in his antique armor, tense and wary, but Andre showed no hesitation. He poked and prodded the armor, then the man’s exposed cheek. Ulrich grimaced, thrashed his head, and snapped his teeth as if trying to bite off the fleshmancer’s fingers, but Andre was nimble and snatched them away. “Skin is stiff and hard, still partially faded.” He looked up. “Good news, Wizard Commander—your spell is only partially faded, hmmm?”

“Good news, indeed.” Maxim did not sound the least bit pleased. “Let’s hope it doesn’t happen again.”

Quentin tapped his fingers on the table, accusing Avery. “You bring a fully armed enemy into the duma chamber, Captain? Why didn’t you strip him bare?”

“We could not remove his armor,” Avery said. “We took away his shield, helmet, and sword, but other parts are still … fused to his skin.”

“His skin is still partly stone as well.” Andre rapped his knuckles against Ulrich’s bare arm above the spiked band that wrapped his biceps. “Very interesting. It would make him a very tough enemy to kill.” Ulrich flinched, then glared at him, but the fleshmancer did not seem to notice.

Chief Handler Ivan slammed a meaty fist against the stone tabletop in front of him. “He is an enemy of Ildakar. This man intended to overthrow our city, rape our women, torture our children.”

Damon glanced at the sovrena with a disrespectful sneer. “I always thought your son and his friends were foolish to go out and vandalize the statues. Now I think I understand. Perhaps we should have them do more of it. Send out entire crews to smash the stone warriors.”

“Waste of time,” Quentin muttered. “There are hundreds of thousands…”

Still angry, Ivan rose to his feet, his arms bent to show off the bulging muscles beneath his panther-hide jerkin. “Turning that army to stone granted us an unprecedented victory, but it failed to give us a modicum of justice. Now we have one of the enemy in our hands!” He looked around the chamber, scowling at the confused ancient warrior, who was barely able to stand with the weight of shackles. “Let’s throw this one into the combat arena and make him fight. All of Ildakar can watch him be torn to shreds.”

Nicci spoke up, and they turned to look at her, surprised at the interruption. “Interrogate him first, find out what he knows of General Utros’s plans. This is an unprecedented opportunity.”

“For history as well as for the city’s defense,” Nathan said.

“Another waste of time,” Quentin said. “How could his knowledge possibly be relevant after so many centuries? Emperor Kurgan is long dead; the army is stone.”

“Besides, he is just a foot soldier,” Damon added. “He would know nothing.”

From her own experience, Nicci knew that foot soldiers often understood many details that others didn’t realize. This ancient soldier would have kept one of Jagang’s interrogators busy for months, and the questioning would not have been quiet or peaceful. Not only did they need to understand why the spell had dissipated, but she imagined all the intelligence even this mere foot soldier could provide. To discard him seemed a waste of resources to her.

“Ildakar is a peaceful city,” Maxim said. “We know little of torture and interrogation techniques.” He sniffed. “Better that we use him for something else. Like the arena.”

Ulrich stood in his chains, filled with confusion, his face a knot of anger. “I will fight whatever you throw against me. I will fight all of you in the name of Iron Fang.”

“At least it would be something, hmmm?” Andre said. “I agree with the suggestion.”

“If the petrification spell is faltering, then we may be in great trouble,” Maxim muttered, troubled. He tapped the left corner of his lip as if it helped him think. “We have to eliminate this anomaly and make sure the weakness doesn’t spread.” He nodded at the sovrena. “Yes, I agree. Send him into the combat arena for another great exhibition. Chief Handler, do you have something interesting to throw against him?”

“I always do.” Ivan narrowed his hooded eyes, as if the wheels of his mind were turning.

Thora agreed. “Summon the citizens. We will give them a spectacle unlike any they have seen before.”

* * *

The hot sun shimmered on the sand of the combat arena. The merchants, tradesmen, gardeners, tailors, and craftsmen dropped their daily work, closed up shops and smithies, and hurried to see the fight. General Utros had nearly destroyed their city centuries ago, and that ancient army was more hated than any other. Now that one of the stone warriors had broken free of the petrification spell, they would have a chance to see justice served. They wanted to watch that enemy soldier defeated, slaughtered.

Deadly combat had been a part of Ildakaran culture for as long as the city had existed, and the people seemed to enjoy it as a release of their increasing frustrations and anger. Now that Nicci witnessed the tensions brewing among the populace, she wondered if this was the duma’s calculated plan to direct unrest toward a specific target and distract them.

Nathan followed her into the nobles’ observation tower as the crowds gathered with a drone of voices and jostle of bodies. Splashes of colorful fabric and furs among the wealthier patrons stood in contrast to the drab brown garments in the lower seats, clearly delineating the classes of spectators.

Through the grace of Maxim, Nicci had been invited to sit on one of the high platforms again. On the other side of the stand, Thora was closely attended by Avery, although not because she needed his protection.

Nathan continued his conversation with Andre, but the fleshmancer seemed preoccupied by this unusual reanimated warrior, no longer thinking about restoring the wizard’s gift. “We will work on it, my dear Nathan. There’s no hurry, hmmm?”

The burly Norukai slavers also came to watch the bloody combat. Kor and his muscular, scarred companions jostled for seats in the lower levels, shoving spectators aside and claiming benches down at the edge of the arena among the lesser workers and unwashed slaves.

Sovrena Thora had invited the Norukai to sit among the nobles in the high observation seats, but Kor spurned the offer. “I want to see the sweat, smell the blood, and hear every grunt of pain. We might learn something we can bring back to King Grieve. This is the sort of amusement he might like.”

Deeply disturbed, Bannon worked his way up to join Nicci and Nathan. “Sweet Sea Mother, it’s shameful,” he said in a low voice. “When Ulrich awakened, he was lost and confused, and he asked me for help. Amos lured him to the city walls with promises, but as soon as we brought him through the gate, the guards seized him. He’s going to be killed!”

“He is their mortal enemy,” Nicci pointed out, “A warrior from the army that tried to destroy Ildakar.”

“That was fifteen centuries ago!” Bannon said. “He’s no threat anymore.”

“Maybe not a threat, my boy,” Nathan said, his lips turned down in a frown, “but for millennia, the people in this city have been seething over Emperor Kurgan’s plans to rule the world. They have seen that army of half a million warriors turned to statues. This is their first opportunity for revenge.”

“It’s still not right,” Bannon muttered.

“No, it is not,” Nicci agreed. “There is much about Ildakar that isn’t right.”

Men in sleeveless tunics hammered on gongs with a crashing metallic clamor that drove the spectators into silence.

From the top of his high stand, the announcer cried out in a booming voice, amplified by magic, “Today Ildakar will witness an execution, and not an easy one.” The crowd muttered until the speaker drowned them out again. “An enemy from the past shall receive the punishment he deserves—the punishment they all deserve! He will die in our combat arena.”

The crowd began to cheer, hiss, and boo, venting their emotions, ratcheting up their hatred.

Wizard Commander Maxim seemed entertained, while Sovrena Thora was pleased to channel the citizens’ anger in an appropriate direction. When the spectators in the lower benches rose up for a better view, the people behind them also had to stand, triggering a ripple of motion throughout the crowd.

The Norukai down at the lowest level leaned forward. When one man stood up and got in Dar’s way, the raider knocked him off the edge. The man tumbled down into the pit and scrambled back to his feet on the sand. In panic, he gaped at the opening gate and jumped, clawing for the rim, which remained well out of reach. His friends reached down to grab him, hauling him up and out of the way before the ancient warrior emerged.

The cheering shifted to grumbles as the reawakened warrior marched onto the combat sands. Ulrich moved sluggishly in his antique lapped armor, which was still dusted with gray from stone that had not yet been restored. He held his curved sword, which had been returned to him for the fight. He strode into the arena, moving uncertainly. He looked up at the crowds, still disoriented. Their mutters turned into a chorus of angry threats.

Ulrich stepped to the middle of the sands and turned to stare at the high platform where the wizards sat. He bellowed, “What do you want of me?”

“We want you to die, you fool!” said Maxim, and then giggled.

Elsa sat next to Nathan, primly holding her hands on her purple skirts. He said to her, “Where is Chief Handler Ivan? I would have thought he’d want to watch the combat.”

“He is down in the arena,” she said, “where he can manage the beasts.”

Remembering the combat bear, Nicci felt a chill. “What beasts?”

Down on the sands Ulrich turned as a second gate opened.

Nicci stiffened as she saw three tawny and muscular felines. The troka of sand panthers bounded out onto the fighting field, looking much like Mrra, their hides branded with spell symbols to make them impervious to magical attacks.

The panthers moved forward in a coordinated unit, tails thrashing, lips curled back to expose saberlike fangs. Ulrich planted his booted feet apart and held his curved sword, ready to face the feline attackers. The crowd cheered, energized and titillated.

Nicci watched the troka split apart. One sand panther approached the target directly, while the other two cats spread out to each side, assessing their enemy, studying his reactions.

Ulrich turned slowly, trying to watch all of them. The flanking panthers circled, then switched sides while the ancient warrior rotated to protect his back, then swung back to face the closest panther.

“Dear spirits, I know Mrra, but I’ve never seen a troka work together,” Nathan said. “Is that what attacked you and poor Thistle in the canyons?”

“Yes,” Bannon said. “We fought them. We had to.”

“We killed Mrra’s sister panthers, but I healed her,” Nicci said. “Her troka must have escaped from the animal pits here.”

“Just like the combat bear,” Bannon said.

“Perhaps the animals were intentionally let loose.” Nicci thought about Mirrormask and his rebels, how they meant to instill chaos, how they had also freed other slaves and sent them fleeing into the countryside.

Down in the arena, the foremost panther sprang ahead in a frontal attack on the ancient warrior. Ulrich brought up his sword and slashed, but the cat dodged and received only a scratch. A red stripe of blood stood out on her ribs, not a deep wound. The attack had just been a feint.

The impact of a second panther struck Ulrich from the side and sent him reeling. The cat lunged in, raking claws down the warrior’s biceps. In a normal human, such an attack might have ripped his arm off, but the claws left only white gouges in the grayish skin, which quickly hardened over. The crowd muttered and gasped.

Nathan leaned forward, fascinated. “He’s still part stone!”

Bannon said, “I think he’s only half recovered from the spell.”

Even Ulrich seemed surprised at his invulnerability, looking at the wound. With greater anger, he raised his curved sword and brought the pommel down hard on the sand panther’s flat skull. The crack of the blow resounded throughout the arena.

The people cheered, as if they didn’t really know which outcome they preferred. The third panther pounced from behind, slamming into Ulrich and driving him facedown in the sand. The cat tried to claw his back, raking white gouges down the armor, which should have been shredded.

The second panther bit down on Ulrich’s wrist, dragging his sword arm, but the ancient warrior pummeled the cat with a stone-hard fist. The injured cat limped away, obviously wounded. Ulrich heaved himself to his feet again as the other two panthers closed in, but now they were wary.

One of the cats lunged, and the warrior slashed viciously with the short sword, leaving a gash in the tawny fur. Ulrich was damaged, too, his armor broken in places, white gouges marking his neck, his arms. But he fought as if he considered himself invincible. The battered sand panthers circled out of his reach.

“Such a warrior seems hard to kill,” Nathan observed. “Imagine hundreds of thousands of them.”

The crowd grumbled when the cautious panthers refused to press the attack. The troka circled, made tentative advances, then backed off. Nicci felt sorry for the cats, knowing they had been manipulated by the chief handler to become killing animals. The sister panthers were united but confused by this unusual opponent.

Finally, another figure strode through the barred gate from which the panthers had emerged, a burly man who wore no armor. Chief Handler Ivan.

He walked forward as if he had a hurricane in his veins. For a weapon he carried an enormous war hammer with a thick shaft and a head a foot wide, weighted with stones and capped with iron on each end. Ivan moved without hurry, letting the huge mallet swing like a pendulum at his side.

Ulrich turned to his new opponent. The wounded panthers kept circling, but the ancient warrior ignored them, knowing they had been injured physically, defeated psychologically.

Ivan let out an animal growl of his own. Without speaking a word, he began to sprint, taking heavy strides, using the giant mallet for momentum.

Ulrich raised his curved sword, cocked back his claw-marked arm, but the blade was laughably small. When Ivan swung the giant mallet, the impact struck the hilt of the sword and broke off the ancient warrior’s entire forearm at the wrist. Ulrich staggered backward and looked down at his stump, which looked like broken rock that oozed thick strands of red.

He roared a hollow, incomprehensible challenge to the chief handler, but Ivan was impatient, not wanting to continue the sport. As the big man ran forward, he drew back the mallet, and when it reached the extent of its swing behind him, he put all of his strength into the weighted war hammer. He lifted it up in a smooth arcing motion, timed perfectly so that his last footfalls brought him right up to Ulrich.

The massive mallet crashed full into the ancient warrior’s chest—and it was as if a mountain had struck him. The mallet shattered Ulrich, broke his torso, splintered his ribs like kindling, plowed through what would have been his heart.

He collapsed, a mixture of gore and stone, the rubble of what had been a living being.

The audience cheered, but Nicci detected an uneasy undertone in their cries. Ivan did not revel in the adulation of the crowd. He stood with the mallet over the destroyed warrior; then he raised the huge weapon over his head and brought it down again, obliterating the gray hardened face of Ulrich into the sand of the arena.

The spell-bonded panthers were pacing, obviously in pain from their wounds. The chief handler turned from his victim, stretched a hand toward the troka, and released his gift. He manipulated the big cats, nudged them, forced them. All three snarled and resisted, fighting back. One even made a tentative lunge toward Ivan, but the chief handler grimaced with additional effort, twisted his fingers, and released a burst of magic. The rebellious sand panther seemed hobbled, forced away. Ivan drove the three animals back through the barred gate and into the pits beneath the arena.

“Quite an exciting combat, hmmm?” Andre sounded delighted. He looked to Elsa, Damon, Quentin.

“Too bad Renn couldn’t be here to see it,” Elsa said.

“He’d better hurry and get back in time,” Maxim said. “Otherwise we may need to find a new duma member.” He didn’t seem dismayed by the prospect.

Bannon hunched in his seat, wrestling with grief and anger. “Ulrich just wanted help. We don’t know why he woke up, why the spell wore off.”

Nicci looked around the arena, watched the citizens shift and jostle as they departed from the stands. She said in an ominous voice, “And that warrior was only one of many thousands.”