Quo and his sandwreth warriors hooted insults at the failed mages, then swung around to engage enemy fighters who attacked them. The pale warriors managed to kill two sandwreth fighters and an auga before Quo rallied his companions and drove them back.
His sandwreth mages continued their work, now that Thon had neutralized the others at the base of the fortress. Inod, Ulla, and Aoron summoned a scouring wind that picked up dust and pebbles. With their magic, they converted it into a tornado that pummeled the fortress walls.
Angry at the deaths of his two warriors, Quo picked up hand-sized stones and hurled them at the fortress, enhancing his throw with magic so that the projectiles shattered the wide main window. Meanwhile, his mages’ continuing abrasive wind chewed at the frozen walls, scouring holes, tunneling channels, weakening the foundations. One section began to crumble, and the ice shattered and fell down in an avalanche.
Then, the hemispherical cocoon that had engulfed the frostwreth mages shivered and cracked. One pale mage smashed through the frozen shell, shattering the ice into long daggerlike shards. He flung sharp weapons that whistled through the air.
The ice daggers impaled two of Quo’s mages. Inod and Aoron grasped at the deadly projectiles, which melted as the mages collapsed onto the frozen ground. Another shard struck Ulla in the head, stunning her.
Quo cocked back his arm and hurled his spiral-shafted spear. The weapon flew true and plunged through the frostwreth mage’s chest.
Intent on his target, Thon glided forward, sealing the fissure in the lake ice before him. He reached the front wall of the frozen fortress, where the blue-white structural blocks were already cracked and pitted. Thon placed his hands on his hips and looked at the high, glistening structure.
“Ice is easily turned back into water,” he said aloud. He touched the primary foundation blocks at the bottom of the immense walls and simply dissolved them. The melted ice flowed out, and with a loud rumble the entire fortress began to fall.
* * *
Hundreds of human soldiers crashed into the construction site near the new tower, where frostwreth foot soldiers faced the Norterran army. King Kollanan rode in, swinging his hammer, reminded of his younger days with his brother in the Isharan war.
Even though he smashed his hammer into the forehead of one warrior, the enemy rocked back, stunned but not dead. Koll had to follow through with another blow to the temple, and finally the wreth fell. He decided that the enemy must have incredibly thick skulls.
The frostwreths were powerful, but Kollanan’s army vastly outnumbered them. Even if it took five human soldiers to bring down a single warrior, they did so, again and again. His soldiers fought in a great melee, biting like bears this time, rather than stinging like wasps.
Lords Ogno and Cerus seemed to be having a competition. The two men rode forward, hacking any frostwreth they saw. Bahlen’s troops, which he easily identified by Urok’s blazing ramer, circled around and attacked the construction site from the rear, where some workers had retreated into defensive positions.
Shouting encouragement to anyone who could hear him, Kollanan smashed right and left. His arm was sore, but he drew strength from gaining some vengeance for all the people lost at Lake Bakal.
Then a wave of unexpected figures entered the mayhem. They darted in, frenetically attacking the wreths with small weapons of their own. The drones! Amid roars of surprise, Koll saw the wreths retaliate, killing many of these surprising allies.
Storm reared up, dodging a long spear. Suddenly, a drone dove in front of the spear, sacrificing himself to save the king. The poor creature was skewered, but his body weighed down the frostwreth’s weapon, enough to give Kollanan an opening to bring down the war hammer with a furious crack, splitting the enemy’s skull.
Above the din of the battlefield, he heard an ominous rumble and turned toward the great fortress. In a slow-motion, astounding collapse, the ice structure began to fall apart, its façade tumbling down.
Quo and his surviving sandwreths raced their augas away from the devastation. Thon jogged along the shore as if he felt invincible, with the fortress still crashing down behind him.
Captain Rondo bellowed to the fighters around him: “We’ll all be crushed! Ride for your lives.”
“Well, we are in it now,” Sergeant Headan growled, “thanks to King Kollanan.”
Soldiers wheeled about and ran from the crumbling fortress. Some frostwreths raced toward it, as if intending to use magic to shore up the walls, but the damage was too great.
Koll watched with satisfaction as the entire fortress collapsed into a mountain of shards and rubble, destroying everyone and everything inside.
66
WITH Utho gone on his own quest, Konag Mandan felt adrift. His sweet, perfect bride Lira was still far away in Lord Cade’s holding, though he had summoned her to Convera with all due haste. It was time for her to adjust to her new home.
Soon, the Commonwealth would celebrate their wedding, and the hearts of all three kingdoms would beat harder, stronger. Less than a month now, and the city of Convera was abuzz with preparations. Mandan had an army of advisors, protocol ministers, and admired planners of state, and he knew they took care of all the details, even though his beloved would want some say. She would be here soon.
But right now, Utho was gone, and the castle seemed empty and cold.
Mandan entered the elaborate hedge maze with its complex corners and curves, the blind pathways that tried to distract him from the one true route leading to the apple tree in the center. As boys, he and Adan had come here often, challenging each other, tormenting each other.
Adan was a soft and compassionate ruler, and now his people in Suderra loved him, but it was easy to make people love their king during peace and prosperity. These dark and dangerous times demanded a more determined ruler, though, and Konag Mandan was that ruler.
As he walked along the twisting gravel pathways, looking at the walls of shrubbery higher than his head, he shuddered at the memory forever burned in his mind: that night on Fulcor Island, the thunder and lightning of the storm, the clash of swords and the shouts of Isharan betrayers. He had called his father’s name, pulled open the door to his chambers. He smelled the sickening stench, saw the blood—so much blood!—and the mutilated body. Mandan’s throat still felt raw from his endless screams.
Now he wandered the maze, a place with warm memories of happier times. After years of repetition, Mandan knew the correct turns, avoided the blind ends. The hedge maze reminded him of his own situation, the decisions he faced, the blind choices, the unpredictable outcomes.
Long ago, his father had assigned a succession of tutors who trained him in statecraft, geography, history, economics. Mandan had been a passable student, but as he’d recently discovered when he went to see the towns devastated by Mount Vada, the facts and concepts in his head bore little relationship to reality, to the suffering of people, to the true cost of lost lives and homes.
Convera City was still crowded with refugees from that devastation, their eyes red, their skin as gray as the ash that fell from the skies. They had flocked here seeking help, food, shelter, believing the end of the world was at hand, that the dragon would awaken and destroy them all. Utho insisted that the legend was exaggerated, but Mandan had seen the cracked mountains with his own eyes, smelled the smoke, felt the ground shake beneath his feet.…
His Brava had already been gone for more than a week on his mysterious mission. Every day advisors came to Mandan, demanding that he make immediate decisions of great consequence, and he tried to do what he believed was right. But without Utho to shore him up he felt like a table with wobbly legs. Mandan did not know how to run a war by himself, and he couldn’t wait for the Brava to return.
Reaching the heart of the maze, Mandan sat under the apple tree and listened to the birds, ignoring the world. He wished he could just immerse himself in his paintings or think about the lovely Lira. But he knew he had to go back.
Frow
ning, Konag Mandan retraced his steps through the maze and entered the castle. People would be waiting for him. Mandan stalked into the throne room, startling a bedraggled party that had gathered in front of the empty throne. Their hair was matted, their eyes haunted. They wore jerkins embroidered with the open hand of the Commonwealth; others carried the limp banner of Osterra.
Mandan snapped, “Who are you? Where did you come from?”
“Sire, you sent us with Lord Goran to meet the sandwreth queen,” said one of the intense men, stammering.
Quaking with fear, two of them brought forward a heavy chest and set it at the foot of his throne. “Yes, now I remember.” He looked down at the chest. “Was that not filled with treasures to appease Queen Voo? Why did you bring it back?”
The man seemed to shrink from Mandan’s words. “Queen Voo was not appeased, Sire. She was offended that you did not come to her yourself, as she requested.”
Mandan scoffed. “Who is she to demand my presence? I am the konag of the three kingdoms.”
“And Voo is the queen of the sandwreths. She has … great power.”
Another man dropped to his knees and broke down weeping. “Impossible power!”
Incensed, Mandan covered his confusion with indignation. “Where is Lord Goran? I want to hear the report from him.”
“Lord Goran is…”
The weeping man blurted out, “He is not dead.” His voice became a wail. “She did not kill him!”
The escort soldiers stared meaningfully at the closed chest, and Mandan stepped down from the throne and seized the lid, expecting to find his spurned jewels and gold. Instead, there was a man folded up and somehow crammed into the box, which was far too small to fit a human body. Goran was broken into a thousand places, rearranged and stuffed into every corner so that his tortured face looked up from the center of the chest.
Mandan recoiled as if he had stumbled upon a nest of spiders. Though Goran’s bones had been shattered and his internal organs burst and rearranged, his face was still active, his eyes wide and ready to explode with agony. Goran’s mouth opened and closed with a wet sucking sound in the middle of his chest, unable to form words.
One of the escorts spoke. “Queen Voo said that the next time she summons you, she expects you to come yourself.”
Goran continued to mewl and gasp, making gurgling sounds inside the box.
Mandan staggered two steps away, but the fractured thing kept making noises from inside the chest. The sound would stick in his nightmares for years.
He yanked the dagger from his belt. Utho had taught him how to defend himself, and now he lurched to the open chest, raised the blade. The folded-up man continued to choke and whimper, and Mandan plunged in the knife again and again until the sounds stopped. His stomach roiled.
Servants hovered in the doorway, looking at the mess on the floor and the bloody horror inside the trunk. Mandan choked out an order. “Clean this up! Take the chest away. I want this room pristine again.”
Shuddering, he made his way back to the throne and slumped forward, resting his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands. He groaned, “Where is Utho?” He didn’t understand these wreths. Why had they returned from oblivion? He had scoffed when Adan and Kollanan had warned about the ancient race. But who could have imagined this … this horror?
He clamped down on his revulsion. None of that mattered now in the face of the new war. The Commonwealth army was already gathering against Ishara. Every vassal lord in the three kingdoms was expected to provide fighters, weapons, and armor.
Less than an hour after the mangled body of Goran had been taken away, a new messenger arrived, delivering a reply from King Kollanan of Norterra. The courier swallowed hard.
Mandan snatched the message, tore it open, and read the words in his uncle’s bold hand, unable to believe what he saw. “He refuses? But … he cannot defy an order from the konag. I am the ruler of the Commonwealth!” He crumpled the paper in his hands. “Kollanan has betrayed me.”
“He did more than refuse the decree, Sire.” The courier’s voice shook. “King Kollanan sends a formal demand for you to dispatch all capable soldiers to come to his aid and defend Norterra against the wreths.”
“Wreths!” Mandan squawked, reminded of the horror of Lord Goran. “Why do wreths continue to plague me? I didn’t even believe in them until recently.” He lurched from his throne, tossed the folded paper to the floor.
The messenger said, “I saw that Kollanan was gathering a great army. He sent word for his vassal lords to dispatch soldiers to Fellstaff.”
“Did you see any wreths?” Mandan demanded.
The messenger looked away. “No, Sire, but I did see a substantial army.”
“Norterra’s army … is my uncle perhaps planning to use it against me? Would he actually march on Osterra to overthrow the rightful konag?”
The courier blinked as if he had never considered the suggestion.
Mandan’s thoughts whirled as he drew one conclusion after another. “Was Kollanan jealous of my father? Does he want to take the Convera throne from me?”
“I … I cannot say, Sire.”
According to Utho’s teachings, Mandan needed to project the image of a powerful leader, but he just wanted to run away and hide in the hedge maze, where no one could find him.
Without his Brava, the young konag did not know what to do.
67
HEADING back to Serepol, Klovus and an escort of Isharan soldiers rode well ahead of the unruly Hethrren hordes, who would march up to the capital city in their own time. Klovus needed to reach Serepol long before the Hethrren arrived, so he could prepare the ships that would take the barbarians across the sea to the Commonwealth.
Long riding lay ahead of them, though. They were still five days away from the capital. Beside him, the company commander shaded his eyes and looked ahead. “We will reach Prirari by late afternoon, Key Priestlord.”
“That is good news,” he said. “Hear us, save us.”
“Hear us, save us.”
Klovus longed for good food and a comfortable bed. After several days in the saddle, he ached all over, and he felt grimy with road dirt and sweat. “The people of Prirari don’t believe in immersion, but maybe I can command them to draw a bath for me.” He brushed at his face, felt grit on his soft skin. “Moistened cloths won’t be sufficient.”
The marching barbarians would be a week or more behind them, and he didn’t imagine that Magda would hurry. The barbarian leader had promised to keep her people from pillaging the countryside on their way north. He hoped she would remember.
The Tamburdin godling had coerced the Hethrren into compliance, but what Magda had required from Klovus was far worse. Every time he thought of coupling with her under the trees, he was nauseated. She had pawed him and criticized him during the act, demanding that he thrust harder, and then finally rolled him off her, pressed him to the ground, and climbed on top so she could do what she wanted.
Now, as he swayed in the saddle, Klovus squeezed his eyes shut. She had complained about his unthreateningly small manhood, but afterward Magda had laughed and dragged him back to the bonfire, giving him barely enough time to don his caftan. “My new lover!” She held up his hand and clasped his wrist like a manacle. “He promises us a whole continent to conquer.” The Hethrren let out raucous jeers.
Magda had leaned close, whispering in his ear with a breath of rotting meat. “Next time will be even better.”
It had taken all of his composure not to summon the godling to smash her into a puddle of bone splinters and flesh. But Klovus had achieved his goal. That was his sacrifice for Ishara, just as whimpering young women sacrificed themselves to him.
Magda had sent out her call, and the barbarian clans came riding in from the unexplored hills beyond Tamburdin. She promised Klovus that she would gather her people and march to Serepol. The Hethrren were tantalized by the prospect of pillage and conquest.
The company leader jarre
d him out of his thoughts as he pointed ahead. “There it is, Key Priestlord! We are an hour faster than I expected.”
Klovus wiped perspiration from his brow and saw the stately buildings of Prirari ahead of them across the grasses. This district was filled with orchards and grazing meadows, known for its cider, cheeses, and grains. With calm weather and natural bounty, Prirari was one of the gentler districts, and their resident godling reflected that. Such a kind deity might be nice for the populace, Klovus thought, but in these changing times, a gentle godling was not what Ishara needed.
He urged his horse to a faster pace and the escort followed, their armor and tack jingling. Klovus needed to go to the temple first and speak with Priestlord Erical, and then he could relax and enjoy a fine dinner.
The Prirari temple was a lovely work of architecture, with a sloping white roof and triangular glass panels. Graceful arcs and arches made the temple look like a white lily. When Klovus entered to meet the beatific priestlord, he felt as if he had stepped into a cool, safe embrace.
Erical greeted him with a bow and a welcoming smile. He was handsome and soft-spoken, dressed in a blue-trimmed gray caftan. He had a large frame, but bowed his head and stooped his shoulders so as to look less imposing. At the wall near the temple’s altar was a sheet of mounted shadowglass. Within the mysterious substance, glints of light shimmered from the godling’s void, warm multicolored glows like a knotted aurora.
Klovus briskly instructed the priestlord to prepare. “The Hethrren tribes are marching north, and they will come through Prirari District within days.”
Erical recoiled. “Priestlord Neré barely holds them in check down in Tamburdin.”
“Neré does not do enough to control them, but I have resolved the issue,” Klovus said. “The barbarians are violent and destructive, but now they are devoted to our cause. Their leader is my ally, and she is leading the Hethrren up to Serepol, where they will board naval ships and storm the Commonwealth.” Chuckling, he expected Erical to respond with equal delight.
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