The banquet hall sounded like a battlefield, with boasting Norukai, pounding fists on tables, calls for food, and shouted insults. Six long tables were crowded with Norukai warriors who sported an array of hideous disfigurements on their faces, heads, and shoulders. The women raiders looked just as ugly as the men, and they growled at one another, striking and then being struck back in what Bannon realized was a brutal form of courtship.
At the front table, King Grieve slumped in a blocky throne that looked like a torture device. The bone spurs implanted in his shoulders poked out of his sharkskin vest like upthrust teeth. He hunched, brooding and bristling, deaf to the roar of conversation and the rowdy guests. He rested his clenched fists on the tabletop and just stared ahead. At the empty place beside him, Grieve had upturned a much smaller chair and smashed it on the table surface so that no one would ever sit there again. Bannon realized that must have been Chalk’s seat.
The coarse woman Atta sat on the opposite side of the throne, as if she owned Grieve, but the king paid little attention to her. At the second table, the newly returned raider captain Lars sat like some kind of celebrity. Bannon recognized the man from Ildakar, and hated him. Lars was already half drunk, and Bannon wondered if the disgusting raider would remember him.
King Grieve suddenly sat up and pounded his fist on the table. “I gave you a death sentence, Lars.” The conversation fell swiftly into uneven muttering.
The raider captain paused in midboast, set down his tankard, and turned to his king. “You told me to go out and die in battle, King Grieve. I launched raid after raid and killed at least a hundred weaklings by my own hand. I will die as you commanded, but I don’t intend to die until I’ve killed a lot more.”
The other Norukai cheered at his bravado, but Grieve did not seem amused. “You are still a coward for your failure at Renda Bay. You must atone to the serpent god for being defeated by mere walking meat.”
Lars’s cheeks flushed red with embarrassment. “I understand, my king, and I will make them pay. I would not have returned here had I not needed provisions and crew. Countless more serpent ships have been constructed, in preparation. If you want me to leave the entire coast in flames, then I require more ships.” He lifted his tankard in a toast. The Norukai roared.
“We have more ships,” Grieve said. “Chalk’s visions promised we would have more ships.” He stared down at his empty plate.
The servants carrying the steaming goat carcass hurried forward and settled the ends of the spit into the forked branches of the stand. The roasted animal wafted a savory aroma that filled the hall, briefly overwhelming the stench of so many unwashed and bloodstained warriors. Grieve grimaced.
Bannon carried his urn of preserved fish and purposely set it in front of Lars without comment. The Norukai captain leaned forward and inhaled deeply, then belched. “Perfect for the next course.” He looked up at Bannon, met his eyes, and hesitated. The young man waited for him to explode with recognition, but Lars said only, “You are ugly.”
Lars reached into the urn with his hand and scooped out the top gobbets of gelatinous fish. Bannon’s wad of spit was indistinguishable from the mess, and Lars slurped it with a grunt of satisfaction.
Platters of fish were served at the head table, but King Grieve ignored them, apparently without an appetite. Atta hungrily regarded the goat carcass while everyone waited for the king to make the first move. Finally, Atta took the king’s plate and stood. “It is my pleasure to serve you, Grieve. And you can service me with pleasure later.” With her dagger, she stabbed the steaming haunch and carved out a portion of rare meat, which she added to the plate. She set it in front of him before she served herself a similar amount, then sat down and fell to eating beside him.
Grieve finally began eating, although he didn’t seem to taste the meat, didn’t enjoy the celebration. “Soon we go to war,” he said, and by the tone of his voice, that was the only thing he looked forward to.
Lila entered with her pitcher of wine, unrecognizable in her loose wool dress. She walked with confidence, as if she had already defeated every single person in the room. She came stiffly forward and poured wine into Grieve’s goblet. He dully drained half of the wine in a single gulp, ignoring her. As she turned to fill Atta’s goblet, clearly resenting the effort, Grieve lashed out in his angry sorrow, shoving Lila away. He didn’t even seem to know what he was doing in his red misery, but Lila lurched, and half of the wine pitcher poured down on Atta.
The Norukai woman exploded. Like a viper striking, she lurched to her feet, knocking her platter aside and dumping the goat meat on the floor. Lila reacted with morazeth reflexes to defend herself. She dropped the brass pitcher, which clanged on the flagstone floor and spilled the red wine like blood. Atta pulled back her fist, and the muscles in her meaty arm bulged.
Bannon pushed forward to help, frantic to save her, but Lila needed no help.
Her hand flashed up and caught Atta’s fist as it slammed toward her. The Norukai woman strained, her muscles bulging as Lila thwarted her blow. Atta glowered, pressed, while Lila gritted her teeth and pushed back. She whispered through clenched teeth, “It was an accident.” She flashed a glance at Grieve, who remained ignorant of what he had instinctively done. She turned back to Atta. “I am … sorry.” It sounded as if the words were ripped from her throat.
With a heave of effort, Atta snatched her fist away. “An accident!”
Before Lila could move, the anvil-faced woman struck her across the cheek. Lila caught herself, coiled, but forced herself not to hit back. She said in an icy voice, “I am a morazeth. You have my apology, and that is all you will get.”
Grieve finally took notice. He stood up and punched Lila on the side of the head so that she buckled to the floor. Atta loomed over her. “I give you a death sentence too, but just as Grieve did with Lars, I can take a long time to kill you.”
“Do your best,” Lila retorted.
At the entrance to the banquet hall, Emmett and several slaves hurried in with baskets of bread and trays of roasted and smoked fish as well as bowls of pickled saltweed. “Next course!” the old man said, distracting them. “There’s more food to come, and countless desserts.”
Emmett limped to the head table as the gathered raiders anticipated the second round of food. Moving deftly despite his limp, the old man maneuvered among the tables and took the stunned Lila by the elbow. “Come, don’t just rest there! You have work to do in the kitchens.” He also hooked Bannon’s arm and escorted them both away. “Quick! We dare not make King Grieve wait.”
While Atta continued her murderous stare, Emmett ushered the two into the shadowy corridors and whatever small safety the kitchens could offer.
* * *
Over the next few days as the slave staff in the Bastion kept their heads down and continued their duties, Atta singled out Lila for torment. The Norukai woman found ways to confront her in the corridors and slam her against the wall in an attempt to provoke her. “Go on, fight me and I will kill you!”
Bannon tried to intercede. “Stop! We’re just doing our tasks.”
“This one’s task is to die.” Atta pressed her face closer to Lila. “Grieve is my lover. I know you want him.”
“I want him dead,” Lila said, “but if I have to kill you first, that would be fine with me.”
Bannon whispered quickly, “If you kill Atta, the king will murder you himself.”
Lila disagreed, and loudly. “If I kill her, then the king will laugh because she is weak.” She challenged Atta directly. “Do you wish me to fight you? Give me a weapon and we’ll see who walks away.”
With a meaty hand Atta slammed her into the wall. “I will give you nothing, not even death. Not yet.” The Norukai woman stalked off, but Lila remained standing. She plucked at her loose woolen garment as if it offended her.
She and Bannon worked together whenever possible. Emmett helped them by giving them similar assignments, but when the Norukai realized the two were close co
mpanions, the workmasters forcibly separated them. Still, Lila managed to meet with Bannon often enough, and together they looked for any opportunity to escape the Bastion. But with so many armored and angry Norukai crowding the fortress, they found no possibilities.
“Old Emmett knows every corner of the Bastion,” Bannon said. “He could help us escape.”
Lila was skeptical. “After so much time here, he doesn’t even remember freedom. He only remembers to be afraid for his own life.” She shook her head. “I promised to rescue you, and I will find a way.”
“And I promised to fight at your side. You trained me to face combat bears and sand panthers. I can handle a few Norukai in a fair fight.”
Lila smiled. “You have potential after all, boy.”
* * *
The next day, while Lila was tending a cauldron of boiling fish stew, Atta barged into the kitchens, raising her nose to the air. “It is midday. King Grieve is hungry.” She stalked over to Lila at the large soup pot, sniffing loudly. “Something smells bad. I thought it was the cooking.” She sniffed again. “But it’s merely the stench of this vermin.”
She grabbed the iron ladle, pulled up a brimming scoop, and slurped it while Lila glared. Then Atta purposefully poured the scalding liquid on Lila’s shoulder where the bare skin showed from her garment’s ragged neck hole. The morazeth flinched, but let out no sound of pain as the hot soup dripped down her arm. She just glared defiantly, enduring the burn.
Emmett hustled forward with his lurching gait. “Please, Atta! Don’t kill my staff. King Grieve told you not to kill the staff.”
“I didn’t promise not to damage them.” Atta looked at the healing bruises on Lila’s face, the fresh red scald mark on her shoulder. Satisfied for the moment, she left the kitchens.
Bannon ran over to Lila with a washrag soaked in cool water and pressed it against her burned skin. Now that Atta was gone, she let herself wince.
Emmett shuffled his feet, and Bannon rounded on him. “This is why you must help us escape! We’ve got to find a way.”
CHAPTER 54
Nicci was devastated to hear the news from General Linden. She realized only then how much she had been counting on Richard and the D’Haran army. “What do you mean he’s not sending troops? Did I not convey the threat of the ancient army, of the Norukai fleet?”
“Yes, of course, Sorceress,” Linden said as he nervously shuffled the papers in front of him. “Lord Rahl says he can’t spare the army right now, and besides, such an army would never reach you in time.”
Nicci paced off a short distance as she struggled to control her worry over how serious the situation was. She knew Richard. She knew him perhaps better than anyone other than Kahlan. Richard would know that she would ask for that kind of help only if she was desperate. And, she also knew that Richard wouldn’t turn her down unless it was impossible for him to help her. Now, she had the added concern of what kind of problem Richard had on his hands, but she also realized that it was now her responsibility to defend Tanimura and the other cities in the south. Richard was putting his trust in her.
She turned back to Linden, her focus shifting. “Richard wouldn’t have left it at that. He must have said something else.”
Linden nodded as he pulled open one of the drawers in his desk. He gave her a shaky smile. From the desk drawer, he retrieved a leather-wrapped parcel. “He did. He sent this.” He placed the package on the desktop. “He said you would know what to do with it.”
Nicci cautiously unfolded the leather, worried about what message she would find. To her surprise, instead of a message, she found only a bone box in the leather pouch, a cube barely an inch on a side.
As she turned the cube in her fingers, studying it more thoroughly, she realized that, despite its size, this was an object of great importance.
“We were afraid to open the box, Sorceress.” Linden was intent and curious. “What is it?”
With her nail, she found a crack on the top edge and worked it open to reveal a cavity inside the box. The small cube held a floating, rotating orb of light no larger than a pea. The glowing sphere was lit from within by a network of faint lines and tiny sparks of light.
She recognized what it was, which only deepened her concentration. “It is a newly constructed spell.”
Probing with her gift, she was able to recognize that this compact nugget had the same type of power as the original magic from the design of the Wizard’s Keep, something that only Richard would understand. She realized that the spell was somehow keyed to the actual, ancient defensive nature of the Keep itself.
Linden looked on, his face full of questions.
“Whatever it is, Lord Rahl must mean for it to help defend us,” Nicci said. “To help me.” Still looking for answers, she felt inside the leather pouch again, but there was definitely no other message from Richard, no clue. She would have to figure this out for herself. The message must be on the bone box itself.
She closed the lid again, snapping it into place to hide the glowing pearl of the spell. The hard white sides of the cube bore fine etchings, lines, designs, and inscribed symbols. At first she couldn’t read them, but then she recognized the language of Creation—which Richard understood, and he knew that Nicci also understood. Here was her message!
She knew that if General Linden or the courier had opened the pouch and looked at it, and she assumed they had, they wouldn’t have known what those symbols were or what they could mean. Only those who could read the ancient language of Creation would be able to read those emblems and open such a box.
She also knew that only Richard could have made it, and Richard would know that no one but Nicci would be able to decipher those symbols. Until she could translate them, she could only wonder at the ancient power those symbols protected.
Richard would not have used spells in the language of Creation unless whatever was inside was both profoundly important and profoundly dangerous. This was personal, from Richard to no one else but Nicci. As she stared at the small bone box in her hand, she had to take a steadying breath at the connection to Richard she was holding. It was almost as if he was whispering a solution to her.
But what solution?
After long concentration and working through the symbols until she could read the markings, she still did not understand the answer. Life to the living. Death to the dead. How was she supposed to use that?
Nicci was mystified. With the stakes so high, why didn’t Richard just explain clearly? She had told him about the enormous threat of the reawakened army. She had counted on Richard, needed Richard’s wisdom and strength, and now she was upset that he hadn’t given her a plain answer.
Linden was smiling tentatively at her, hoping for good news. Distracted by the puzzle, she issued brusque orders for what she needed now. “I have to ignite a verification web to see what sort of constructed spell Richard created. I need space to work, an empty room where I won’t be disturbed.”
Linden jumped up from his desk and called soldiers. In only a few moments, they had pulled and scraped chairs from a meeting room down the hall. Nicci followed them into the empty chamber, preoccupied with her own investigation.
She knew she needed to do more than a standard verification web on this bone box, but rather an aspect analysis of a verification web from an interior perspective. That would allow her to examine the constructed spell down to its core element. She steeled herself, realizing that casting the web would require her to use Subtractive Magic. She had no other choice.
Nicci stood inside the large empty room in the garrison headquarters and looked around the whitewashed walls, the wooden floor. Linden and the soldiers waited eagerly just outside the door. “This place will do,” she said, looking down at the tiny box. “Make sure I am not disturbed as I work. Much depends on what I learn here.”
Fascinated by the enigma of the constructed spell, she paid no attention to the soldiers, who retreated farther from the door.
Using one of the da
ggers at her hip, she slashed her palm, interested only in the blood that welled up. She would need a lot of it.
Standing in the middle of the wooden floor, she used the dripping blood to draw a careful Grace across the boards. The Grace was a powerful device, and drawn in blood under only the rarest of circumstances, but Nicci needed that power now. An inner and outer circle represented the underworld and the world of the living, separated by a square, and then at the center an eight-pointed star indicated the Creator’s light, which radiated lines throughout the Grace. The entire process of drawing the complex symbol took her the better part of an hour.
When she was ready, Nicci stood in the center of the magic-infused emblem on the floor. Closing her eyes, she held the bone box in her intact palm, while she lifted the small lid with the other. Then she opened herself to her power.
Surrounded by her thoughts, keeping her eyes closed, Nicci felt nothing other than a kind of weightlessness. She drifted, searching, probing, and reached out with a verification web in search of answers.
Only when Nicci opened her eyes did she realize that she was floating upright and frozen in midair, drifting and slowly rotating several feet off the floor above the blood-drawn Grace. Through the open door to the room, she saw Linden and the curious soldiers watching her, astonished, but they were as still as statues. She heard not a whisper of air, couldn’t even hear her own heartbeat in her ears. As she floated, life itself seemed to be suspended.
Extending her sight further, she saw that she was surrounded by lines of glowing green light that formed an intricate geometric framework tangled around her. Nicci herself was the living core of a verification web for a constructed spell. Shifting her head, she also realized that one of her feet was suspended over the Grace’s outer circle that represented the underworld.
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