Siege of Stone Read online

  “Nicci may be a powerful opponent with great magic of her own,” Ava said. “But she is a fool to leave us a weapon such as this. My sister and I would never make such a terrible mistake.”

  Holding the strand, Ruva carried it close to the brazier so the ruddy light sparkled along its delicate length. The hair looked as fine and ephemeral as a spiderweb. She dangled it over the glowing coals, and her sister bent close, both of them looking hungrily at the single hair.

  Utros could sense the magic building between them. Though he didn’t have the gift himself, he had watched the twins perform for him before. They would not let him down.

  Ava lifted the strand high. “We have a day or two of preparations to make, but with this single golden hair, we can work great magic. And we can target Nicci.”

  CHAPTER 16

  Now that Nathan had looked General Utros in the eye, he realized the ancient commander would never withdraw his siege. He had seen the determination in the legendary leader’s eyes and his refusal to give up. With everything else lost to him, the siege was all Utros had left.

  After Ildakar closed the gates and sealed itself tight again, the duma would spend days debating the reports he and Nicci had brought. Nathan knew in his heart that the city needed some other means to fight back. No straightforward clash was going to defeat the gigantic army.

  “We have to find another way out of this siege, my dear,” he said to Elsa as they walked together the following day. “And considering the legendary glory of Ildakar, I’m sure its gifted citizens can come up with unexpected magic. It might not be another petrification spell, but surely they can offer something.”

  “Oh, we will.” Elsa was a handsome woman with a smooth face, a little too broad to be delicate. Her warm brown eyes were filled with intelligence and humor as well as patience, and she had certainly been patient with Nathan, especially when he couldn’t use his gift. She had helped nurse him back to health after Fleshmancer Andre replaced his flawed heart with that of the dying Chief Handler Ivan. Nathan felt a twinge in his chest, a flare of pain along the scar. Thump, thump. Thump, thump. But the new heart was strong, his gift was restored, and Nathan was a wizard again.

  “When Utros first came against us with his army, the wizards experimented with many types of magic,” Elsa said. “They didn’t fear the effects of their power and paid little heed to the consequences. They wanted to protect Ildakar, no matter the cost.”

  The two of them walked along the edge of the bluff that dropped in a sheer cliff to the river below. The uneven rock face was dotted with a succession of platforms and walkways that led into tunnels for supplies brought up from the river. She gestured farther downstream, toward the tangled swamps that infested the land to the south. “Look there, the ancient wizards flooded the river valley and turned it into a deadly swamp.”

  Elsa wore a purple silk robe, which was comfortable rather than extravagant. Even as a duma member, she wasn’t concerned with the pomp and finery of her position. She had always been considerate, trying to strengthen the society of Ildakar, keeping others content. She had owned household slaves, but treated them well. She even purchased extra servants she didn’t really need, just to keep them from the combat pits or other reprehensible jobs.

  After Mirrormask’s uprising, Elsa had spoken to her restless household slaves, riled up by the mob mentality sweeping through Ildakar. That night, Elsa herself had been covered with dust, ash, and blood from fighting alongside Nathan and Nicci to defeat the cruel sovrena. She had told her own servants they could go where they wished, but she hoped they would stay here in their home. Most of them had remained.

  Knowing Elsa’s gift, Nathan asked, “Is there any way we can use your transference magic to defend ourselves? Or to attack General Utros?”

  “It’s always possible.” She stroked her chin in an unconscious imitation of his mannerism. He found it endearing. “I could put an anchor rune here in Ildakar, but in order to work the transference magic, the complementary symbol has to be at the target. For example, I could draw a rune next to a roaring fire inside my villa and then transfer that heat and make General Utros burst into flame.” She paused. “But someone would have to draw the corresponding rune on his chest. I don’t think he’d stand still for that.”

  “I doubt it. Still, let’s use our imaginations. Think beyond the usual possibilities. Maybe there’s something else.”

  They watched a barge arrive from upriver filled with crates, casks, and sacks, food supplies that Ildakar would need, because of the renewed siege. Ildakaran workers climbed down the walkways and staggered platforms to meet the barge at the docks. The river workers appeared tiny at the base of the bluff as they unloaded the cargo. Straining laborers pulled on ropes, turned cranks, and lifted the heavy containers up the cliff to platforms and receiving tunnels.

  “We’ll send word up and down the river,” Elsa said. “Ildakar needs all the supplies other villages can provide, and we’ll pay dearly for it.”

  “The city can last quite some time against a siege,” Nathan said. “You were self-sufficient under the shroud for all those centuries.”

  Elsa nodded. “But as you said, the underpinnings of magic have changed. The petrification spell faded away. The changes from Richard Rahl’s star shift are only beginning to show their repercussions throughout the world.”

  Nathan’s new heart twitched, as if reacting to the suggestion. “At least the breach in the veil to the underworld is sealed, and we no longer need to worry about the Keeper or an undead army.”

  Elsa said, “We have enough enemies in the real world.”

  As they walked, she told him about her life in Ildakar. She had been happily married to a wizard named Derek, a kind man with a strong gift and an interest in crafts and music. Derek had demonstrated genuine magic when he played his lute, which could produce music more moving than any spell.

  After years of marriage, Elsa had teased him about his growing potbelly, and Derek had responded by telling her it was to make sure her love for him was genuine. Then one night Derek had choked to death on a fish bone after dining late in his quarters. No one had been there to help him, and Elsa found him the next morning. She had mourned his loss for the better part of a century, but now she was able to tell stories of her lost husband with a wistful smile and a sparkle in her eyes.

  Having listened to her tragic tale, Nathan asked, “And you took no other husband, not with all the other nobles and wizards in the city?”

  She glanced shyly at him. “I never found a man who could match Derek’s kindness or his charming interests.” She made a dismissive gesture with her hands. “I’m no longer a flighty young woman looking for the excitement of romance. I have a good life as it is.”

  Nathan self-consciously stroked his white hair behind his shoulder. “Ah, my dear, I’m sure you still have that flighty young woman in you somewhere. I can see it behind your eyes and in your shy smile.”

  She turned away, but not before he saw the flush on her cheeks.

  Elsa mentioned ancient vaults in the lower levels of Ildakar, which had been used as chambers and laboratories by the earliest wizards. “The gifted were more powerful in those days. They developed magic so terrible that they were afraid to use it. At the time, there was no need for it.”

  Nathan thought briefly of the powerful magical lore in the Cliffwall archive, but Cliffwall was far out of their reach now. “It appears we do have the need at present. If you have any suggestions…”

  “There are places here in Ildakar that no one has thought about in more than a thousand years,” Elsa said. “Behind the shroud of eternity, we didn’t face any outside dangers, and we never dreamed the stone army would reawaken.”

  “Do you remember where some of these places are?” Nathan asked.

  She led him down one sloping street to the next, emerging into broader open areas, marketplaces, stockyards, warehouses, the sprawling districts of noisy, smelly crafts, such as blacksmiths and tanners.
Elsa and Nathan greeted carpenters who were sawing logs, furniture makers busy at their craft, despite the siege outside. Weavers stood outdoors by their huge looms, making fabric with intricate patterns that might have been magical, or just decorative.

  Some workers looked at the two strangers with suspicion, but Nathan gave them a warm wave. Elsa led him past roughhousing children, a barking dog, a smith snipping thin strips of iron and pounding them into nails, which he tossed into a wooden bucket.

  Where the city met the plain, large sandstone hummocks like weathered tan bunkers were all that remained of crumbling old structures that had once been the towers of weathermancers and astronomers. After the gifted had moved up to the higher levels of the city, these ancient buildings had become storage silos, communal dwellings where workers lived, or simply piles of scrap material to be reused. Some of the sandstone hummocks had stone doors leading to inner chambers, still sealed.

  “This one here.” Elsa took him to a sandstone island that had been the foundation of a grand building weathered away long ago. She found the door bricked shut. “It was a vault of some kind. Only the most important wizards were granted access, but I could never find any record as to what it was exactly.”

  “Then shall we find out?” Nathan paused in front of the bricked-up barricade, touching the solid blocks with his slender fingers. They seemed as impregnable as the base rock itself. “I see one problem, however.”

  Elsa touched the thick stone next to Nathan, letting her fingers brush against his. “That’s easily enough solved.”

  Nathan stepped back. “I can unleash my gift and blast this open.”

  “Yes you could, but let’s not resort to that. I’ll use my transference magic instead.” She went to the nailsmith, who ceased his loud hammering when Elsa asked if she could borrow a bucket of water.

  Handing her an empty wooden pail, he pointed to a trough. “Anything to help Ildakar,” he said, with no apparent irony.

  Nathan filled the bucket for her and carried it to the bricked-up barricade. “Do you mean to splash water on the blocks and make them dissolve?”

  “Of course not.” She dipped her finger into the water and drew a symbol on the side of the bucket. Before the pattern could run or evaporate, Elsa dipped her finger again and drew a larger version of the symbol on the solid barricade. “There, anchor rune and corresponding rune. Watch.”

  When she completed the design, the bucket trembled. The surface of the water rippled with concentric rings that shuddered inward, then reflected outward. The stone barricade also shifted.

  The water in the bucket grew murky, muddy, silty. The stone blocks in the barricade softened and slumped. The mortar holding them together ran like liquid, while the water in the pail solidified into cement. The bricks loosened, several of them dropping to the ground.

  When her magic was complete, Elsa said, “Now, just knock them aside.”

  “Remarkable.” Nathan pressed his palm against the stones and shoved. With alarming ease, the blocks tumbled inward to expose the large inner vault. “That was far simpler than I expected. It seems transference magic is quite effective, if one knows how and when to use it.”

  With the barricade gone, Nathan and Elsa entered, each calling up a globe of light in the palm of a hand to illuminate the chamber. They found themselves in a cool shadowy place that smelled damp, with a tang of metal, not just rust but the indefinable undertone of silver and brass. Instead of a store of magical devices or a great library of secret spells, though, the chamber held only a low circular wall in the center of the room, like a well. That was the source of the odd smell.

  Elsa frowned. “I was hoping for more. Is it another water source? Why would they keep it enclosed and hidden?”

  Nathan felt a chill, and with it a sense of exhilaration. “I’ve seen something like this before. That’s not just a well. It’s a sliph.”

  * * *

  Nathan gave only hints of what he and Elsa had found as he persuaded Nicci to accompany them with all due haste. “Even with my gift restored, this discovery does me no good, Sorceress, because it requires both Additive and Subtractive Magic. You will be the one who has to use it.”

  Entering the newly unsealed chamber, Nicci stepped forward and ignited her own light as she studied the low circular wall. Damon, Quentin, and the pale sorceress Lani had also joined them, curious about the find that had sparked such enthusiasm from Nathan.

  “What is it?” Damon asked, glancing at Elsa. He seemed skeptical. “What could possibly be so exciting about finding a hole?”

  “It is more than a hole,” Nicci said, stepping forward. She could feel the possibilities rise within her. “It’s a sliph well, a kind of transportation network.”

  Lani frowned. “What is a sliph? I’ve never heard of it.”

  “The sliph is—was—a woman transformed into a creature of great power. Anyone who has both Additive and Subtractive Magic can travel great distances in the sliph, in almost no time. I have used it before.”

  “Do you think this sliph is still alive?” Nathan asked. “Can you travel through it?”

  Nicci placed her hands on the stone rim and peered down into the moist, metallic-scented depths. The well seemed to have no bottom, no standing water, just an emptiness that went on forever. She sensed no stirring, heard no noise. “I have experienced two different sliphs before, and this could be one of those, or another one entirely. Ildakar is far from any other destination I know of. This could be part of a separate sliph network with destinations throughout the Old World.”

  Thoughts circled in her mind. Could she perhaps travel back to the People’s Palace to tell Richard and the entire D’Haran Empire about the ancient army? For now, Ildakar was isolated, under siege, and far from any help.

  “Maybe once I see what Utros intends to do to Ildakar, I will travel and spread a warning to other cities.”

  CHAPTER 17

  Much as he’d come to despise the city of Ildakar, Wizard Commander Maxim began to reconsider leaving civilization behind. On his fifth day out in the treacherous swamps, he was bedraggled, wet, muddy, and hungry. Clouds of bloodthirsty insects were constantly on the attack.

  As he crashed through thornbushes and razor-edged sawgrass, Maxim used his gift to disentangle himself from a ropy spiderweb. He reached a mound of mossy dirt, rotten branches, and clumps of reeds. With resignation, he realized this was likely the best spot he would find to camp.

  His black pantaloons were rumpled and muddy, but at least the tough Ildakaran silk had not torn. His yaxen leather boots kept his feet dry, except when he plunged up to his knees in the muck, and then water ran inside.

  He paced around the disappointingly small island and listened to the burble and splash of creatures moving through the sluggish waters. He dragged together slimy fallen branches covered with moss, making a pile of sodden wood for his fire. It would take great mastery of the gift to keep himself dry and warm throughout the night, but he was one of the most powerful wizards in Ildakar. He could certainly manage a campfire.

  He arranged the rotting wood in a haphazard stack, giving up on finesse. With a wave of his hand, he released his gift into the branches and logs, and flashed the moisture into steam, which hissed out and dried the wood. He sent a spark into the middle, careful not to explode the whole pile into a conflagration. Soon enough he had a crackling, popping fire as the darkness deepened.

  Claiming another log for a makeshift seat, he brushed away the rough bark before settling down. It would be another uncomfortable night. He thought longingly of the spacious beds in his grand villa in Ildakar. He could have slept on silky sheets, feeling cool breezes wafting through the windows, no doubt sated from sex with one of his many partners in the pleasure parties.

  Or, he might have lain beside the cold and venomous Thora, whose icy demeanor extended beyond her flesh and deep into her spirit. Maxim shuddered now and leaned closer to his fire. No, even this was better than being with her.

 
; Nearly two thousand years ago, his love for Thora had been genuine. Thoughts of her consumed his emotions, his actions. They’d been inseparable, loving each other with a passion that even minstrels could not adequately chronicle. Together, the sovrena and wizard commander had built great magic to rule the city they had claimed, like guardians. Thora had dreamed of shaping the perfect society, every slave, every worker, every merchant serving Ildakar in their own way.

  That had been Thora’s dream, and because Maxim’s mind was dulled by love, he had let his wife have her way. The thought sickened him now as the night swamp buzzed around him. He couldn’t believe how gullible he had been. Maxim was such a powerful wizard himself, why had his heart been so weak? He could have stood up for himself and shaped Ildakar according to his wishes, rather than hers. At the time, he’d been a fool to think that was what he really wanted. And maybe it had been, but desires changed, needs changed, and Maxim’s interests had waned. Ildakar had been his greatest triumph, but over centuries of stagnation, he’d grown bored with it.

  When fighting the siege of General Utros, Maxim and Thora had been united with the other wizards of Ildakar. Such triumphant days, days with purpose! Even a passion that burns so bright, however, will eventually run out of fuel. The greatest love could not last forever; that was simply human nature.

  Thora had a perfect body, a face whose beauty went beyond the ability of sculptors to capture, but her once-sweet kisses had grown tasteless, the soft curves of her body and her warm flesh felt like an old worn garment. His adoration for her turned to scorn.

  The city of Ildakar, built upon the map of dreams that Thora had drawn, became bitter and stale. Most citizens didn’t even notice the changes. Ildakar was like a beautiful porcelain vase, shot throughout with countless hairline cracks. Maxim wanted to smash it.

  He had become Mirrormask, toying with unrest among the slaves and lower classes, feeding their doubts and anger. It had been a delightful exercise, which amused him for some time. The downtrodden people had been so hungry for a savior, a hero, and by playing a mysterious gray-robed figure who hid behind a reflective mask, Maxim had given them what they longed for.