Blood Of Gods (Book 3) (23 page)

It seemed a promise too good to be true, and he instinctively distrusted it.

“Wielding such power would break me,” he said. “My mortal form would not endure.”

The beast laughed, and the endless space seemed to ripple along with it.

The soul is limitless. With our help, you will become as mighty as the gods themselves.

Velixar found his consciousness assaulted by tiny pinpricks of light that gradually built up within his ethereal form, expanding it, filling him with knowledge. The pain was exquisite, and when he screamed, his voice seemed to rip through the heavens, pulverizing stars, exploding galaxies, causing time to fold in on itself.

“Why!” he screamed amid it. “Why would you help me?”

Laughter was his only answer, and then he opened his eyes. He was back in his pavilion, the head of Donnell Frost a heap of liquefied flesh and bone stuck to his fingers. He fell back, his rump splashing in the puddle of melted snow behind him. Rising to his feet, heart pounding, mind racing, he pulled the pendant from beneath his tunic and watched the bas-relief of the lion atop the mountain pulse and throb with a dark purple glow.

The soul is limitless.
Velixar gritted his teeth and squeezed the pendant, feeling its warmth thump in his hand like a heartbeat.

“As mighty as the gods themselves,” he whispered.

C
HAPTER

19

N
ot much farther now,” said Nole, one of the soldiers leading Rachida Gemcroft and her band of six
hundred
sellswords through the frozen white north. Nole and his six mates were thin to the point of malnourishment, their flesh pale and covered with ugly purple splotches and raised veins. Despite being young—Nole in particular looked to be barely out of his teens—they moved with the awkward gait of much older men. Each time their feet touched the ground, breaking through the thin sheen of ice and into the powdery snow beneath, it looked as if they might fall over.

Rachida shivered against the cold as she sat atop her horse, pulling her cloak tight around her. For fifteen days she and her legion had marched through cliffs and valleys, circling the bases of mountains, the last half of the journey spent trudging through snow, ice, and freezing rain while hungry wolves haunted their nights. At last they had arrived on the outskirts of Drake. Only instead of the people of Paradise, they’d happened upon this small band of Karak’s soldiers. The soldiers’ eyes had widened with what looked like relief when they’d emerged from the frozen wilderness, greeting her and her men as saviors. Rachida had introduced herself as Commander Mori, breathing a sigh of relief that her hired army still bore the standard of the lion on their chests.

Quester sidled up to her, pulling at his blond beard and appearing amused. “So what do we do now, milady?” he asked. “Draw swords?”

“Not yet,” Rachida whispered back. “Our enemy thinks us their ally still. Best we see the state of our opponent before we act.”

“Yes, milady,” Quester said with a grin before falling back into line with the others.

The snowy path they traveled veered into the forest, revealing the soldiers’ camp. There were numerous tents scattered about, and though a great many cookfires burned, the scent of food was noticeably lacking. It was the middle of the day, yet there was a gloom in the air. The tree branches above were weighed down by a thick coat of ice, glimmering in the murk like crystalline, skeletal fingers.

Men emerged from their tents as they rode through the center of the camp. There were so many of them. Countless eyes, deep-set and bloodshot, gazed hungrily in Rachida’s direction. She felt a chill and shivered once more, pulling her cloak even tighter around herself. Many of the men were hunched over as if their spines weren’t strong enough to hold up their bodies any longer. Others simply stood with their mouths hanging open, revealing rotting teeth and blackened gums. Still others sucked on handfuls of snow like sweet combs of honey.

It was one of the more frightening sights she’d ever seen.

At the head of the camp, set against a backdrop of trees with thick, imposing trunks, was a large pavilion. “Dismount here,” said Nole as they approached it. The young soldier then disappeared into the pavilion. Rachida patted her horse and swung out of the saddle, then looked back the way they had come. The sellswords formed a line through the trees, the rear of the procession concealed by fog. Her men eyed the soldiers warily, fingers dancing on the hilts of the swords on their belts. They dismounted and gathered around the wagons they’d brought with them, those containing what was left of the provisions harvested in Conch. Karak’s soldiers ogled the wagons, wantonness showing in their eyes.

Quester appeared beside her. His air was serious, much different from the flippancy he usually displayed.

“Get the captains,” she whispered out of the corner of her mouth.

“All of them?”

“Yes. And be prepared for the worst.”

The Crimson Sword nodded.

The captains of the other five sellsword companies gathered, nary a word spoken between them. A moment later Nole stepped out of the pavilion.

“Captain Blackwolfe will see you now,” he said, gesturing to the tent flap. Rachida took a deep breath, then stepped into the pavilion, Quester and the other captains on her heels.

The men awaiting them inside looked like death warmed over. Their flesh was pale, eyes rimmed with purple, hair snarled into oily tendrils. The plate and mail armor they wore was rusting at the joints, and the roaring lion sigil on their chests appeared somber, not threatening. They looked like men who’d been lost in the wilderness for an age.

Despite their downtrodden appearance, the one in the center, a tall, lanky sort with a matted beard and intense eyes, smiled. “You came,” he said. “You actually came.”

“We did,” Rachida said, though she had no clue what he was talking about.

The man stood boldly upright, as if he’d just remembered protocol, and bowed to her.

“Captain Talon Blackwolfe at your service,” he said. “It is an honor to receive you, Commander Mori.”

“It is an honor to be received,” Rachida answered. Behind her, the sellsword captains fidgeted.

“Please know we appreciate your arrival,” the man told her. “It wasn’t expected. To say we’re relieved would be an understatement.”

The others in the pavilion hastily nodded their agreement.

A cold wind blew, billowing the sides of the tent around them. Talon Blackwolfe shivered and looked at the soldiers standing on either side of him, as if seeking guidance from them. It was such a strange thing. To Rachida, these men appeared much too green to be officers, and Talon was in no way captain material. He was too young, too gruff; a foot soldier, not a leader.

“Captain,” she said, “what has been going on here?”

Blackwolfe gave her a queer look, glancing at his eight officers. “Were you not told already?”

“Would you prefer to waste my time with assumptions, or would you answer the question I asked?”

The man sighed, his shoulders slumping. “There were five
thousand
of us here, making life miserable for those spellcasting bastards
in Drake. Casualties were low, supplies good. But then our first
commander
, Wallace Ball, was taken from his pavilion in the
middle
of the night. We looked, found some footprints leading to the river, but that was the last trace of him we’ve seen since. Not long after,
Captain Joseph Marten took command and ordered us on the
offensive.

“We were just meant to harass, you know. Those were Karak’s orders—just harass, not assault. So long as the people of Drake stayed up here instead of going south to help Ashhur, we were doing our job. But our new captain wanted blood, though truth be told I think he was just spooked and thought he’d vanish like Wallace did. So we crossed the river, like good little soldiers.”

Rachida had heard stories of the spellcasters of Drake, but had yet to witness their power. A part of her ached to have been here during the assault.

“How did you fare?” she asked.

To that, Talon laughed.

“We died, Commander Mori. That’s how we fared. Arrows, lightning, fire, shards of ice . . . if it exists, and can kill you, they threw it at us. But we took the tower, just like Joseph said we would. Course, the only reason we took it was because the people fled back to their homes. After that they created a . . . barricade of stone around the township, and we’ve kept it besieged ever since.”

There was defeat in his voice, and Rachida felt a morsel of pity for him.

“We brought our supplies with us from the Tinderlands camp when we crossed the Gihon,” he continued. “But it wasn’t enough for how long we’ve been here. There were less than a thousand citizens in that damned township, and after they sealed off their homes, they should have starved. But if they have, they’re hiding it damn well. Us, though? Captain Marten died in our last attempt on the township, as well as his left hand, Remmy, which meant a duty I wasn’t prepared for fell to my sword. Winter has driven the deer and elk into the mountains. We’ve lost more than half our original numbers, be it from sickness, arrow, or spellcaster magics, and Omar over there even caught a couple of the men roasting one of their dead brethren over a fire out of desperation.” One of the younger soldiers, obviously Omar, nodded grimly. Talon said, “We dealt with those men accordingly, but the seed had already been planted. No one expects to find victory here, yet if we abandon the siege and travel south, we will die by Karak’s hands for our cowardice.”

Rachida knew she should be pleased with how poorly things had fared for Karak’s men, but hearing the exhaustion and frustration in Talon’s voice as he told his tale kept such easy emotions away. Lion on their chest or not, they still suffered and endured terrible hardships, and for what? Fear of Karak’s retribution? When first entering the tent, she’d thought to kill them all, but now . . .

“You say we weren’t expected,” said Rachida. “Why is that?”

Talon appeared unsure how to respond. “Well, shortly after Captain Marten died, I sent word to our god of our troubles,
pleading
for reinforcements and supplies. We received word back from Karak’s prophet three weeks ago.”

“What did this prophet say?”

The disgust on the man’s face was plain as the snow on the ground outside.

“That we are on our own now. That we disobeyed orders, and our current predicament is of our own making. The letter said we would receive no reinforcements, no supplies, though our mission hasn’t changed. We are to keep the spellcasters here in Drake, and abandoning that duty will be considered treason against our god.”

Rachida could plainly see the anger in the man’s eyes, anger that was echoed by the other eight advisors in the pavilion. That
was good
.

“So you have two options,” she said. “Remain here and perish, or flee and perish.”

“Exactly.”

“I can see now why you’re so relieved we are here.” She glanced over at Quester and the other sellsword captains. “Captain,” she said to Talon, “I wish to speak with you . . . alone.”

The man raised an eyebrow. “Very well.”

Talon gestured for his young advisors to exit the pavilion, which they did without question. The sellsword captains, however,
hesitated
.

Quester leaned into her. “What are you up to, Rachida?”

“Trust me,” she told him. “Now get out.”

When they were finally alone, Rachida unlaced her cloak and removed it, exposing the Twins on her hips. She felt Talon’s eyes on her as she made her way across the pavilion, tossing the cloak on the captain’s desk. The man was visibly wary. She could use that.

“Tell me, Captain Blackwolfe,” she said, “what do you wish to come of your predicament?”

“I wish to fulfill the will of my god,” he told her, though his fidgeting and tone said otherwise.

“Do not lie to me, Captain,” she said, removing her belt and placing her swords on top of her cloak. She then moved back to the center of the space. “Tell me how you truly feel about this, how your
men
feel. We are here now to help you. You will receive no punishment for the truth.”

Talon leaned back in the chair, rubbing his temples. “You wish to know the truth?”

Rachida nodded.

“The men want . . . they want this conflict over,” Talon said, nearly whispering the words. “Though a few of us have discovered the thrill of conflict, were born for it even, most of the men are cut from softer cloth. They had lives once . . . farmers, merchants, pages, blacksmiths, potters, bakers, miners. They lived and died and loved and lost as free men. Yet they are free no longer. We are all starving and near death. We’ve suffered in a wasteland for so long, and for what? To be told by our god that we are to be abandoned, that our lives are worth nothing because we followed our leader’s instructions? How is that fair?”

“It isn’t,” said Rachida.

Talon seemed taken aback by the statement. “Thank you,
Commander
. So now you know of the men’s wishes. What would you have us do?”

“I said earlier that you had two options, both ending in death. What if I offered you a third?”

“I would kiss you on the mouth, if that option did not also end in death.”

Despite his obvious exhaustion, he smiled, and Rachida decided she liked him.

“I offer you an opportunity to live your lives as free men once more,” she said. “The chance for this siege to end and for you all to walk away, fully supplied for the task ahead. Your men could cross into the Tinderlands and return home, or flee to some remote corner of Paradise. Those who have developed a taste for conflict can join me and my men and wage war against the very god that abandoned you.”

At that, Talon started. In a single sharp motion he took a step back and grasped the handle of his sword, though he hesitated to pull it. His eyes flicked toward the table on which
Rachida’s
blades rested, then back to her. Rachida made no move to c
laim them
.

“Who are you really?” Talon asked, his voice shaking.

“Just who I said I am. Rachida Mori, a child of Karak’s First Families.”

“You speak of treason.”

“I do.”

Talon’s indecision seemed to grow.

“Karak swore he would punish us for the betrayal.”

Rachida forced a smile.

“Did he? Do you think he’ll hunt down each and every one of you? Scour the lands, and for what? Petty revenge? Our beloved creator cares not for such things, and he cares not for
us
, his children. His war against Ashhur is all he loves. You have a choice, Captain Blackwolfe. Remain here in the cold and die, or take your life in your own hands.”

“It’s madness,” Talon said, though his eyes began to show a spark of hope. “How would we even do such a thing? How would the men be fully supplied? Are your wagons fully stocked?”

“They aren’t.”

“Then how?” he asked, frowning.

To that, Rachida smiled. “The spellcasters, Captain. You said they aren’t starving, so I say we find out why that is the case.”

Talon shook his head. “It won’t work. I told you, they’ll kill you the moment you try to attack.”

“Who said anything about attacking? I mean to walk up to their gates and ask.”