“But now Cliffwall is also gone,” Mab said, “buried in stone.”
Nathan mused, “The world still has many central sites filled with mysterious and dangerous books. Those archives have to be tended and watched—and protected. That could be your order’s new purpose.”
The Sisters looked at one another. Amber kicked a few broken pebbles at her feet. “We came to Tanimura because this is where the Palace of the Prophets was. That is why I joined the order in the first place. I want to do something significant. I need some important task. Prelate Verna told me not to give up hope. My parents are already proud of my brother, and they’ll be even happier after they learn how brave Norcross was today, how many Norukai ships he fought.” She sighed. “I wanted to be important too.”
“You will be,” said Sister Mab. “We’ll rebuild our order. Without the prelate, we have traveled together and fought together as equals, but as Sisters of the Light we must have a new leader. Who will be our prelate?”
Eldine looked at Mab, and Mab looked at Arabella, then slowly all of them turned to Nicci. “You were once a Sister of the Light,” said Rhoda. “You betrayed us by becoming a Sister of the Dark, but we know you have come back to the sacred cause. You are stronger now than ever, stronger than any of us.”
Mab said, “Stronger than any Sister of the Light that ever existed, stronger than any prelate we have had before.” Her eyes shone. “Working together with all the resources of Tanimura, we could rebuild the Palace of the Prophets!” She looked up to the skies as she imagined towers there.
Nicci scowled. “I’m no longer a Sister of the Dark, that is true, but neither am I a Sister of the Light. I am Nicci, a sorceress, companion to Lord Richard Rahl. He gave me a mission for the D’Haran Empire, and I do not intend to be sidetracked.”
Nathan felt more disturbed. “If you mean to rebuild the palace, if you raise even one foundation stone on top of another, I want nothing to do with that.” He shuddered. “I have things to accomplish in my life.”
Nicci actually smiled at him. “We all do.”
CHAPTER 86
The survivors of Tanimura spent the next two days extinguishing fires and killing the last of the enemies. They tracked down the Norukai stragglers, who proved to be cowards after all when they fought alone. Knowing they were hunted, they crawled into storage buildings and fishing shacks; some even hid under the damaged piers, holding on to pilings in the water and trying to remain unseen. When the cornered raiders were discovered, angry city people used harpoons and boat hooks to impale them in the water. Nicci didn’t consider it torture, merely justice.
Leaving Halsband Island, she and Nathan reunited with many other gifted men and women from Tanimura. Together they used their magic to douse fires with rain they squeezed out of the air. Many of the larger buildings, including twenty noble villas in the hill district, had been burned down to skeletons.
And there were thousands of wounded to be tended. Volunteers from Tanimura, as well as earnest refugees from Effren and Renda Bay, formed triage teams. The merchants of the garment district boiled fabric and tore it into strips to make bandages. Oliver and Peretta, along with Scholar-Archivist Franklin, Chief Memmer Gloria, and their Cliffwall followers, used the knowledge they had learned in the archive. They called upon any scraps of the gift they could use to help heal the wounded, saving thousands of lives.
While Bannon had only rudimentary first-aid training, the morazeth had a great deal of experience in tending combat wounds, even amputations. Lila knelt beside a man whose hand had been chopped off by a Norukai axe. His bleeding had clotted in the hours since he had fallen, but he was weak and sickened. Lila cleaned the stump and wrapped it in a damp bandage, gritting her teeth as she pulled the knot tight.
“That will keep him alive for now,” she said to Bannon. “We’ll need the healers and herb women to make vats of salve, or else the wounds will get infected, and more will die in the coming weeks.”
The victim groaned, “My hand! How can I do anything without my hand?”
Lila spoke more to Bannon than to the moaning patient. “A warrior usually dies when he falls in the combat arena, but we remember the story of a champion named Kalef, a slave brought from afar, who reigned in the arena until an opponent hacked off his hand at the wrist. Even as he bled, Kalef kept fighting until he collapsed to his knees, but still he wouldn’t yield. Normally, the challenger would strike a death blow and become the new champion, but the crowd was so enthusiastic that Kalef was allowed to live. Healers nursed him back to health, and when he regained his strength, he returned to the arena with a modified sword, fighting with a blade screwed directly onto his wrist. He killed his next opponent and became champion again.”
Now, Lila looked down at the wounded man who stared in shock at the bloody bandages around his wrist. “That one will never be a champion, but he will learn to be useful. There is much work to do in Tanimura.”
Though tending to the injured was the first priority, the numerous corpses also had to be dealt with. Every one of General Utros’s soldiers had disintegrated, but more than ten thousand other people had died in the fighting, and their bodies were strewn along the streets and piled in the market squares where they had made their last stands.
After several days in the hot and humid Tanimura air, the bloated corpses began to stink. Seagulls swarmed over the city, feasting on any cadavers they found, pecking out the eyes and flying off when the body-handling teams shooed them away. Out in the harbor, larger flocks of the birds landed on the floating dead. Predatory fish picked the bones clean.
Generals Zimmer and Linden assigned soldiers to mortuary detail. Porters who had previously worked at the docks now loaded their carts with bodies and dragged them out of the city. The desolate expanse of Halsband Island became the perfect site for enormous funeral pyres that burned constantly, fed with wood and corpses.
Plumes of greasy black smoke hung like a pall in the air, and the smell of roasting meat was so pervasive that no one had much of an appetite. Even butcher shops closed their doors, because they had no business. The funeral pyres created a layer of ash over the ruins of the Palace of the Prophets, which would become a new foundation of soil. One day, the island might come alive again.
While all of the slain D’Haran soldiers, militia members, and innocent citizens deserved to be burned in the cleansing pyres, no dead Norukai would receive that honor. During the cleanup, when the body handlers gathered the bodies, the raider corpses were separated out and dealt with last. Wearing looks of disgust, D’Haran soldiers hauled carts piled with dead Norukai wearing sharkskin armor, metal adornments, spikes implanted in their skulls or shoulders. By now, all the bodies showed signs of decay, their skin discolored, the flesh swollen. They looked even uglier than usual.
Captain Jared reluctantly offered the Chaser as a corpse ship, piling his deck with the hideous raiders. Nicci and Zimmer watched as soldiers pushed stinking cartloads along the pier, and even the krakeners held their noses in disgust as they lifted the bodies aboard.
The Chaser made repeated trips, sailing out beyond the edge of the harbor to the deep water, where Jared and his crew threw the dead Norukai overboard, one body at a time. Some sank, some bobbed. They would all drift away in the currents to be eaten by fishes and erased from memory.
Jared had even reported, with a shiver and a thrill, that on his last run, when the sharks feasted on all the bodies, the circling triangular fins had scattered. Among the Norukai corpses, other figures surfaced, selka reveling in the abundance of dead enemies. They tore at the meaty flesh as if they couldn’t contain their malicious joy. The krakener crew had stared, horrified, but not frightened. The selka looked up at them with slitted eyes, but made no move to attack. They satisfied themselves with the Norukai corpses and swam away.
Captain Jared’s once-cocky outlook had been replaced with a sad shadow, and beard stubble covered his cleft chin. As he took on another load for disposal, he crossed his arms ove
r his chest and looked at Nicci, who had come to see him on the docks. “It’s loathsome work, Sorceress, but nobody else would do it,” he scoffed. “Once again my krakeners prove their worth.”
Nicci said, “Your ship smelled foul before, but this is intolerable.”
“Oh, I will tolerate it, Sorceress, though this is fouler cargo than any tentacled beast. I can’t wait to dump the last of these bodies.” Jared brightened. “My crews are eager to hunt krakens again. We’ll bring back delicious meat to feed this city while it recovers.”
“Thank you, Captain,” said Zimmer, but without enthusiasm.
As Tanimura made plans to rebuild, they were only one city of many that had been damaged in the war. As the survivors of Renda Bay, Effren, and other devastated towns helped clear the burned-down warehouses, sawmill operators cut fresh lumber, and armies of carpenters worked to restore the city. Bricklayers formed foundations, clay handlers added stucco to walls, whitewashers used buckets of lime to finish the new structures.
Thaddeus and Rendell, who had become fast friends after saving each other’s lives more than once, worked to erect new homes and shops at the waterfront. Thaddeus said, “Now that we no longer have to worry about the Norukai, someday I would like to take my people back to Renda Bay and rebuild our own town.”
“I will go with you.” Rendell had sad eyes, but he managed a smile. “My Ildakar will never return, and I want a fresh start. I liked Renda Bay.”
“There’s still a great deal of work ahead of us,” Thaddeus said, “but we’ll have our freedom and our homes.”
Hearing them, Nicci stepped closer. “You will determine your own destiny, your own rule. You’ll be responsible for your actions, but you also have a strong conscience. Then you’ll truly be a part of the D’Haran Empire.”
Four of the Hidden People, moving quietly in the daylight that was still a blessing to them, came to Nicci, looking concerned and lost. Free of their ancient responsibilities, they had trekked across the land so they could fight for Nicci, but now they didn’t know what to do, since all the battles were ended and they were far from home.
“The bustle of this city confounds us,” said one man with deep lines of concern on his pale face. “Nearly six hundred of us still survive. General Utros is defeated, but what will become of Orogang? That city is still our home.”
“And it is quiet!” said another man.
“Then make it your home,” Nicci said. “Go back there and live in the sunlight. By now, the zhiss are all dead. You no longer need to hide in the shadows. Smash open all the bricked-up windows, let in the air. Orogang can become a grand capital again.”
“But we will be all alone,” said a woman, tugging on her gray hood.
“Not for long. Traders will come to Orogang. You will be one of the key cities in the mountains.” Nicci smiled. “And I’ll make certain Lord Rahl knows about you. He may even set up a satellite capital in Orogang. Would you like that?”
The Hidden People beamed, and it seemed as if light had returned to their features. It was just one more of the many pieces coming together after the defeat of General Utros and the Norukai scourge.
As the most urgent tasks were completed in the aftermath of the war, the refugees began to reassess their future. Scholar-Archivist Franklin, along with his rival and companion Gloria, gathered with the Sisters of the Light. “Cliffwall is destroyed, and all those books are lost. We have to re-create them as best we can.”
Gloria tapped a finger to her temple. “They are not lost if my memmers still know them. We can reproduce thousands of volumes, but it will take time.”
Because funeral pyres still covered Halsband Island, the Sisters had taken up residence in an empty inn whose owners had been killed in the attack. There in the common room, at long tables once used for boisterous crowds with tankards of ale, the scholars sat beside volunteer scribes. They used stacks of paper, ledger books from the harbormaster’s offices, any scrap that could capture words. The memmers sat back with their eyes half closed, muttering line after line as they recited the books preserved in their gifted memories.
The Cliffwall scholars had devoted their lives to learning, to poring over every word in those ancient books, and now they participated in writing them down. By day, they wrote in sunlit rooms, and at night they lit lanterns to continue scribing. The memmers’ voices grew hoarse as they dictated, but they didn’t stop. It would take many years to recapture most of the lost knowledge, but they would keep remembering and keep writing.
CHAPTER 87
After a brief squall the night before, the Tanimura harbor smelled of clean salt air rather than death, blood, and decay. Nathan inhaled deeply as he sat at the end of the dock and looked down at the last page in his life book, considering how he would wrap up his story.
A gray splat struck the boards beside him, and a seagull spun overhead with a shriek that sounded like mocking laughter. Nathan glanced up with an annoyed snort. “I could blast you out of the sky with a tiny ball of fire, you miserable bird.” The gull was not intimidated by the threat and flew away under the bright blue sky.
Out in the harbor, most of the wrecked ships had been dismantled to clear passage for trade. Two large cargo ships remained sunk in the shallows, their hulls tilted underwater, masts protruding like drowned trees. The people of Tanimura would leave those hulks as a memorial, so that anyone who came to the city would be reminded of the battle.
Nathan had nearly filled the life book with adventures, and that fact gave him pause, even stymied his creative efforts. If he’d had plenty of pages left, the words would flow. He would have described every thought, every setback, every victory. How could he sum up so many grand events on the single remaining page? He considered simply purchasing another blank book so he could keep writing, but this precious volume wasn’t just a book from a stationer. This was his life book, given to him by the witch woman Red, in the Dark Lands. The first volume had been written in ink made of his own burned blood, chronicling the first part of his life. He had filled this second book by his own hand, but the leather-bound volume was a special gift nonetheless.
With his boots dangling over the end of the dock, he reread the last pages he had written the night before while he sat on the barracks steps in the Tanimura garrison. Nathan knew he would need to find finer rooms eventually, provided he and Nicci remained here in the city. He already felt restless.
He looked down at his descriptions of the wizards of Ildakar, Mirrormask and the slave uprising, the awakening of the enormous stone army. His eyes stung when he read about dear Elsa, her transference magic, and how she had died. His brief workmanlike lines were sadly inadequate, not because he meant to give her short shrift, but because he didn’t have the heart to write what Elsa deserved.
He had tried to do better chronicling the end of Prelate Verna and the destruction of Cliffwall. His descriptions of the final battles in Tanimura were merely vignettes, but he simply didn’t have the room. Each event deserved a full chapter of its own, if not an entire volume. Still, what he wrote was the truth, and that was what mattered most.
Knowing the importance of his work, he forced himself to keep writing, to finish the job in the paper he had available. With tiny letters and succinct prose, he addressed the brave sacrifices of so many soldiers, Bannon’s victory over King Grieve, and the cataclysmic end of Utros’s ancient army when the underworld reclaimed them.
He had so much more to say, but he reached the bottom of the last page. His final lines were cramped and dense, and when there was no more room he simply wrote, “And thus was the Old World saved.”
The dock boards creaked with approaching footsteps, and he turned to see Nicci walking toward him in her black dress. The big sand panther padded along beside her, her tan fur clean and brushed, as if she were no more than a contented, groomed pet. Nicci stopped beside him at the end of the pier. “If this is how you spend your days, Wizard, you will grow fat and lazy.”
A seagull flew
overhead, scolding Mrra. The panther roared, and the bird flew away.
“It is a well-deserved rest.” Nathan looked down at the last page. “Writing an objective and thorough chronicle is a different kind of battle, but just as hard. I’m afraid I didn’t have enough paper.” He closed the book.
Nicci’s lips tightened in a smile. “I’m certain you found room to include your own exploits.”
“Oh, not all of them. Dear spirits, that would take an entire library.”
She didn’t react to his humor. “When you tell your stories in taverns and banquets, I’m sure you will provide excruciating detail.”
“I am wounded by your attitude.” Placing a palm to his chest, Nathan felt the lumpy scar and his steady heartbeat, and realized that it truly did feel like his heart after all. The heart of a wizard.
Mrra let out a low growl and turned back toward the shore, her tail thrashing. Nicci spun, suddenly wary.
An unexpected form stepped out onto the pier, a slender woman in a gray shift that clung tightly to her body. Her skin was pale, her face gaunt to the point of being cadaverous. Her scalp was a tangle of red locks like ropy twisted snakes, and she smiled at them with unnatural black lips. She strolled forward, ominous, confident as if no one else existed except for the three of them. At her side walked a strange creature with spotted russet fur, pointed ears, and a long muzzle—not a cat, not a wolf, but some other species entirely. Mrra bristled and prepared to protect her sister panther.
Nathan felt a chill. “Dear spirits! It’s Red.”
The witch woman glided up to them. Nathan couldn’t imagine how she had passed through the hills and the entire city of Tanimura without causing an uproar. He climbed to his feet and stood at the end of the dock, still clutching the life book.
Heart of Black Ice (Sister of Darkness: The Nicci Chronicles Book 4) Page 51