Faith of the Fallen (17 page)

He noted that Adie had managed to keep her simple clothes along the way. Yellow and red beads around the neck of her robes, sewn in the shapes of the ancient symbols of her profession of sorceress, were the only ornamentation she wore.

“I’ve been busy,” he said, flicking his hand, hoping to dismiss the matter, “or I would have replaced the hat.”

“Bah,” she scoffed. “You be up to mischief.”

“Why, I’ve been—”

“Hush, now,” Adie said. Holding his arm in a tight grip, she held out the long thin fingers of her other hand. “Zedd, this be Verna: Prelate of the Sisters of the Light.”

The woman looked to be in her late thirties, perhaps early forties; Zedd knew her to be much older. Ann, Verna’s predecessor, had told him Verna’s age, and while he couldn’t recall the exact number, it was somewhere close to one hundred and sixty years—young for a Sister of the Light. She had simple, attractive features and brown hair with just enough curl and body to add a hint of sophistication. Her intent, brown-eyed gaze looked as if it could scour lichen off granite. By the lines of a resolute expression enduringly fixed on her face, she appeared to be a woman with a shell as tight as a beetle’s and just as hard.

Zedd bowed his head. “Prelate. First Wizard Zeddicus Zu’l Zorander, at your service.” He let her know, by his tone, that it was merely a figure of speech.

This was the woman who had taken Richard away to the Old World. Even if she believed it was to save his life, Zedd, as First Wizard, viewed such an act as abhorrent. The Sisters—sorceresses all—believed they could train gifted young men to be wizards. They were wrong; such a task could only be adequately accomplished by another wizard.

She offered her hand with the sunburst-patterned gold ring of office. He bent forward and kissed it, out of what he thought must be their custom. She pulled his hand close when he had finished, and kissed it in return.

“I am humbled to meet the man who helped raise our Richard. You would have to be as rare a person as I found him to be when we helped begin his training.” She forced a chuckle. “We found it a formidable labor, trying to teach that grandson of yours.”

Zedd slightly altered his opinion of the woman, treating her with greater caution. The air in the tent was stuffy and uncomfortable.

“That is because you are all oxen trying to teach a horse to run. You Sisters should stick to work more befitting your nature.”

“Yes, yes, you be a brilliant man, Zedd,” Adie scoffed. “Simply brilliant. One of these days even I may come to believe you.” She tugged his sleeve, turning him from Verna’s scarlet face. “And this be Warren,” Adie said.

Zedd inclined his head toward Warren, but the boy was already falling to his knees and bowing his blond head.

“Wizard Zorander! This is quite an honor.” He popped back up and seized Zedd’s hand in both of his, pumping it until Zedd thought his arm might come undone at the shoulder. “I’m so pleased to meet you. Richard told me all about you. I’m so pleased to meet a wizard of your standing and talent. I would be so happy to learn from you!”

The happier he looked, the more Verna scowled.

“Well, I’m pleased to meet you, too, my boy.” Zedd didn’t tell Warren that Richard had never mentioned him. But that was not out of disrespect or neglect; Richard had never had a chance to tell Zedd a great number of very important things. Zedd thought he could sense through Warren’s grip that the young man was a wizard of unusual talents.

A bear of a man with a curly rust-colored beard, a white scar from his left temple to his jaw, and heavy eyebrows stepped forward. His grayish green eyes fixed on Zedd with fierce intensity, but he had a grin like a soldier on a long march who had spotted a lonely cask of ale.

“General Reibisch, commander of the D’Haran forces here in the south,” the man said, taking Zedd’s hand when Warren at last surrendered it and stepped back beside Verna. “Lord Rahl’s grandfather! What good fortune to see you, sir.” His grip was firm, but not painful. It got tighter. “What very good fortune.”

“Yes, indeed,” Zedd muttered. “Unfortunate as the circumstances are, General Reibisch.”

“Unfortunate…?”

“Well, never mind, for the moment,” Zedd said, waving off the question. He asked another, instead. “Tell me, General, have you begun to dig all the mass graves, yet? Or do you intend the few who are left alive to simply abandon all the bodies.”

“Bodies?”

“Why…yes, the bodies of all your troops who are going to die.”

“I hope you like eggs,” Sister Philippa sang out as she swept into the tent, holding out a steaming plate.

Zedd rubbed his hands together. “Delightful!”

Everyone else was still standing in stiff, stunned silence. Sister Philippa didn’t seem to notice all the hanging jaws.

“I had the cook add some ham and a few other things he had about.” She glanced down at Zedd’s form. “I thought you could use some substance.”

“Marvelous!” Zedd grinned as he relieved her of the plate mounded high with scrambled eggs and ham.

“Ah…” the general began, seemingly befuddled as to how to frame his question, “might you kindly explain…what you mean by that, Wizard Zorander?”

“Zedd will do.” Zedd looked up from inhaling the intoxicating aroma of the dish. “Dead.” He drew the fork across his throat. “You know, dead. Nearly all of them. Dead.” He turned back to Sister Philippa. “This smells delightful.” He again inhaled the steam lifting from the plate of eggs. “Simply delightful. You are a woman of a kind heart and a skillful mind, to think to have the cook add such a splendid complement of ingredients. Simply delightful.”

The Sister beamed.

The general lifted a hand. “Wizard Zorander, if I may—”

Adie hushed the burly general. “You be poor competition to food. Be patient.”

Zedd took a forkful, humming his pleasure at the flavor he encountered. As he took a second forkful, Adie guided him to a simple bench at the side of the tent. A table in the middle held a few mugs and a lamp that lent the cozy tent not only its light but its oily odor as well.

Despite Adie’s advice to be patient, everyone began talking at once, asking questions and offering objections. Zedd ignored them as he shoveled in the scrambled eggs. The large chunks of ham were delicious. He waved a particular juicy piece of meat to the confounded spectators to indicate his pleasure with it. The spices, the onions, the peppers, and the warm lumps of cheese were delightful. He rolled his eyes and moaned in bliss.

It was the best food he’d had in days. His traveling rations were simple and had long ago become boring. He had often grumbled that Spider ate better than he did. Spider seemed smug about it, too, which he had always found annoying. It wasn’t good for a horse to be smug with you.

“Philippa,” Verna growled, “must you be so pleased about a plate of eggs?”

“Well the poor man is practically starving.” Puzzled by Verna’s scowl, she waggled her hand at Zedd. “Just look at him. I’m simply happy to see him enjoy his meal, and pleased I could help one of the Creator’s gifted.”

Zedd slowed when he all too soon approached the end of his meal, putting off the last few bites. He could have eaten another plate the same size. General Reibisch, sitting on a bench on the opposite side of the small tent, had been furiously twisting a strand of beard. Now, he leaned forward, his intent gaze fixed on Zedd.

“Wizard Zorander, I need—”

“Zedd. Remember?”

“Yes, Zedd. Zedd, the lives of these soldiers are my responsibility. Could you please tell me if you think they are in danger?”

Zedd spoke around a mouthful. “I already did.”

“But…what is the nature of the danger?”

“The gifted. You know, magic.”

The general straightened with a sober expression. His fingers dug into his muscular thighs. “The gifted?”

“Yes. The enemy has gifted among them. I thought you knew.”

He blinked a few times as he seemed to run it through his mind again, trying to discover the nugget of invisible danger in Zedd’s simple statement.

“Of course we know that.”

“Ah. Then why haven’t you dug some mass graves?”

Verna shot to her feet. “In the name of Creation! What do you think we are, serving wenches? Here to bring you dinner? We are gifted Sisters, here to defend the army from Jagang’s captive Sisters!”

Adie stealthily signaled Verna to sit down and keep quiet. Her voice came out like gravel in honey. “Why don’t you tell us what you have found, Zedd? I be sure the general and the Prelate would like to hear how to improve our defenses.”

Zedd scraped the small yellow lumps across the plate, collecting them into a final, pitifully small forkful. “Prelate, I didn’t mean to imply a deliberate inadequacy on your part.”

“Well you certainly—”

“You are all too good, that’s all.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Too good. You and your Sisters have spent your lives trying to help people.”

“Well… I, we—why, of course we help people. That’s our calling.”

“Killing is not. Jagang will be intent on killing you all.”

“We know that, Zedd.” The general scratched his beard, his gaze darting back and forth between Verna and Zedd. “The Prelate and her Sisters have helped us with detecting a number of enemy scouts and such. Just the same as Sister Philippa, here, found you when you approached our camp, they’ve found others intent on harm. They’ve done their part, Zedd, and without complaint. Every soldier in this camp is glad to have them here.”

“All well and good, but when the army of the Imperial Order attacks, it will be different. They will use the gifted to lay waste to your forces.”

“They will try,” Verna insisted, trying to be convincing without shouting, which she was clearly itching to do, “but we are prepared to prevent such a thing,”

“That’s right,” Warren said, nodding his confidence. “We have gifted at the ready at all times.”

“That’s good, that’s good,” Zedd drawled, as if he might be reconsidering. “Then you have dealt with the simple threats. The albino mosquitoes and such.”

General Reibisch’s bushy eyebrows wrinkled together. “The what?”

Zedd waved his fork. “So, tell me, then—just to satisfy my curiosity—what are the gifted planning to do when the enemy charges our forces? Say, with a line of cavalry?”

“Lay down a line of fire before their cavalry,” Warren said without hesitation. “As they charge in, we’ll incinerate them before they can so much as launch a spear.”

“Ah,” Zedd said. “Fire.” He put the last forkful in his mouth. Everyone silently watched him chew. He paused in his chewing and looked up. “Big fire, I presume? Colossal gouts of flame, and all?”

“What mosquitoes is he talking about,” General Reibisch muttered under his breath toward Verna and Warren beside him on his bench opposite Zedd and Adie.

“That’s right,” Verna said, ignoring the general. He sighed and folded his arms across his barrel chest. “A proper line of fire.” Verna waited until Zedd swallowed. “Do you find something unsatisfactory about that, First Wizard?”

Zedd shrugged. “Well…” He paused, then frowned. He leaned toward the general, peering more closely. Zedd wagged a bony finger at the man’s folded arms.

“There’s one now. A mosquito is about to suck your blood, General.”

“What? Oh.” He swatted it. “They’ve been thick this summer. I think the season for them is drawing to an end, though. We’ll be happy to be rid of the little pests, I can tell you.”

Zedd waggled his finger again. “And were they all like that one?”

General Reibisch lifted his forearm and glanced down at the squashed bug. “Yes, the bloodthirsty little…” His voice trailed off. He peered more closely. With a finger and thumb he gingerly lifted the tiny insect by a wing, holding it up to have a better look.

“Well I’ll be…this thing is”—his face lost a shade of color—“white.” His grayish-green eyes turned up toward Zedd. “What was that you were saying about…?”

“Albino mosquitoes,” Zedd confirmed as he set his empty plate on the ground. He gestured with a sticklike finger at the general’s flat assailant. “Have you ever seen the albino fever, General? Have any of you? Terrible thing, albino fever.”

“What’s albino fever?” Warren asked. “I never heard of it. I’ve never read anything about it, either, I’m sure.”

“Really? Must be just a Midlands thing.”

The general peered more closely at the tiny white insect he was holding up. “What does this albino fever do to a person?”

“Oh, your flesh turns the most ghastly white.” Zedd waved his fork. “Do you know,” he said, frowning in thought as if distracted by something as he looking up at the ceiling of the tent, “that I once saw a wizard lay down a simply prodigious font of flame before a line of charging cavalry?”

“Well, there you go,” Verna said. “You know its value, then. You’ve seen it in action.”

“Yes…” Zedd drawled. “Problem was, the enemy had been prepared for such a simpleminded trick.”

“Simpleminded!” Verna shot to her feet. “I don’t see how you could possibly consider—”

“The enemy had conjured curved shields just for such an eventuality.”

“Curved shields?” Warren swiped back a curly lock of his blond hair. “I’ve never heard of such a thing. What are curved—”

“The wizard who laid down the fire had been expecting shields, of course, and so he made his fire resistant to such an expected defense. These shields, though, weren’t conjured to stop the fire”—Zedd’s gaze shifted from Warren’s wide eyes to Verna’s scowl—“but to roll it.”

“Albino fever?” The general waved his bug. “If you might, could you explain—”

“Roll the fire?” Warren asked as he leaned forward.

“Yes,” Zedd said. “Roll the fire before the cavalry charge—so that instead of a simple cavalry assault, the defenders now had deadly fire rolling back at them.”

“Dear Creator…” Warren whispered. “That’s ingenious—but surely the shield would extinguish the fire.”

Zedd twirled his fork as he spoke, as if to demonstrate the shield rolling the flames. “Conjured by their own wizard for the expected defense, the fire had been hardened against shields, so instead of fizzling, it stayed viable. That, of course, enabled the curved shield to roll the fire back without it extinguishing. And, of course, being hardened to shields, the wizard’s own quickly thrown up defensive shields couldn’t stop his own fire’s return.”

“But he could just cut it off!” Warren was becoming panicked, as if seeing his own wizard’s fire coming back at him. “The wizard who created it could call it and cut it off.”

“Could he?” Zedd smiled. “He thought so, too, but he hadn’t been prepared for the peculiar nature of the enemy’s shield. Don’t you see? It not only rolled the fire back, but in so doing rolled around the fire as it went, protecting it from any alteration by magic.”

“Of course…” Warren whispered to himself.

“The shield was also sprinkled with a provenance-seeking spell, so it rolled the fire back toward the wizard who conjured it. He died by his own fire—after it had seared through hundreds of his own men on its way to him.”

Silence settled into the tent. Even the general, still holding out the albino mosquito, sat transfixed.

“You see,” Zedd finally went on, tossing his fork down onto his plate, “using the gift in war is not simply an act of exercising your power, but an act of using your wits.”

Zedd pointed. “For example, consider that albino mosquito General Reibisch is holding. Under cover of darkness, just like right now, tens of thousands of them, conjured by the enemy, could be sneaking into this camp to infect your men with fever, and no one would even realize they were under attack. Then, in the morning, the enemy strikes a camp of weak and sick soldiers and slaughters the lot of you.”

Sister Philippa, over on the other side of Adie, swished her hand in alarm at a tiny buzzing mosquito. “But, the gifted we have could counter such a thing.” It was more a plea than an argument.

“Really? It’s difficult to detect such an infinitesimal bit of magic. None of you detected these minuscule invaders, did you?”

“Well, no, but…”

Zedd fixed a fierce glare on Sister Philippa. “It’s night. In the night, they simply seem to be ordinary mosquitoes, pesky, but no different from any other. Why, the general here didn’t notice them. Neither did any of you gifted people. You can’t detect the fever they carry, either, because it, too, is such a tiny speck of magic you aren’t watching for it—you’re looking for something huge and powerful and fearsome.

“Most of the gifted Sisters will be bitten in their sleep, without ever knowing it happened, until they awake in the pitch blackness with the shivering chills of a frightful fever, only to discover the first truly debilitating symptom of this particular fever: blindness. You see, it isn’t the blackness of night they awake to—dawn has already broken—but blindness. Then they find that their legs won’t obey their wishes. Their ears are ringing with what sounds like an endless, tingling scream.”

The general’s gaze darted about, testing his eyesight as Zedd went on. He twisted a big finger in an ear as if to clean it out.

“By now, anyone bitten is too weak to stand. They lose control of their bodily functions and lie helpless in their own filth. They are within hours of death…but those last hours will seem like a year.”

“How do we counter it?” On the edge of his seat, Warren licked his lips. “What’s the cure?”

“Cure? There is no cure! Now a fog is beginning to creep toward the camp. This time, the few gifted left can sense that the wide mass of seething murk is foul with dark, suffocating magic. They warn everyone. Those too sick to stand wail in terror. They can’t see, but they can hear the distant battle cries of the advancing enemy. In a panic not to be touched by the deadly fog, anyone able to rise from their bedrolls does so. Too delirious to stand, a few manage to crawl. The rest run for their lives before the advancing fog.

“It’s the last mistake they ever make,” Zedd whispered. He swept a hand out before their white faces. “They run headlong into the horror of a waiting death trap.”

Everyone was wide-eyed and slack-jawed by now, sitting on the edge of their benches.

“So, General,” Zedd said in a bright, cheery tone as he sat back, “what about those mass graves? Or are you planning on any of you left alive just abandoning the sick for dead and leaving the bodies to rot? Probably not a bad idea. There will be enough to worry about without the burdensome task of trying to care for the dying and burying all the dead—especially since the very act of touching their white flesh will contaminate the living with a completely unexpected sickness, and then—”