Page 26 of Siege of Stone (Sister of Darkness: The Nicci Chronicles 3)

Bannon hadn’t at first recognized Brock, because the young man’s face was smeared with blood, his short, dark hair crusty, his hands covered with red up to his elbows. “I always did what I could,” Brock said in a whining tone.

Bannon finally saw what they were actually doing and stumbled backward in shock. The skinners would open one of the cages, reach in, and grasp the ruff of a squealing animal. The unnatural creatures had broad, squat bodies with stubby heads and stumplike, useless legs that flailed as the workers dragged them out. The animals looked like swollen, living pillows made of fur. Their heads were small, like a turtle’s, and the entire body was covered with a rich, thick pelt, some spotted, others streaked with ash gray. These were not normal animals, Bannon realized, but creatures shaped by fleshmancers, made for a terrible painful purpose.

No one noticed Bannon as he stood speechless inside the door. He watched as another reticent young man—Jed, he realized—grabbed an animal with rusty fur. He dropped the flailing, squeaking creature on the skinning table in front of him. He had a short, razor-sharp knife.

“We’re doing what we can, sir,” Jed said defensively. He pushed the struggling creature down and held it by the back of the neck as he jabbed with the point of the knife, slicing its shoulder. He cut across its short forelegs and all the way around its body. The creature mewled and screeched in pain. Jed dug with the knife, grabbed the edge of the pelt, and ripped it up. He pulled off a wide swatch of fur and set it aside for scraping while the whimpering creature twitched and bled. Though skinned alive, it was not dead, but naked, its pelt torn off.

“How long until this grows back?” Jed asked as he tossed the skinned animal back into the cage.

Oron said, “The ones that survive will have a fresh new pelt in three weeks, ready for harvesting again.”

The skinners worked one cage at a time, grabbing the animals, stripping them of their pelts, and returning them to their cages.

Bannon’s stomach clenched with nausea. There were hundreds of trapped animals. “This is horrible. You’re all horrible!” The others looked up, startled by his arrival. The young man shook his head, trembling. “This whole city is horrible.”

Oron barked at him, “Good, we could use more help. There’s a lot of work to do and too many lazy people refusing to do it.”

“You’re torturing those poor things,” Bannon groaned. He had always loved animals.

Oron let out an impatient snort. “Where do you think fur comes from? There’s always a dark underside to what society needs. Do you eat meat? You can’t have a yaxen steak without killing the yaxen. Or maybe you’d rather live naked and eat plants.”

Fighting back the urge to vomit, he gathered his courage and strode to where Jed and Brock were working shoulder-to-shoulder, covered in blood. Seeing him, Jed quirked his lips in a sarcastic smile. “We wondered what had happened to you. Did you enjoy playing with Adessa in the training pits?”

“I survived. I learned a lot about myself and I learned the truth about you.”

Brock grabbed another animal out of a cage, a gray-speckled one this time, and slammed it on the table in the smear of blood left behind from the previous creature he had skinned. “If you’re our friend, help out with some of the work here.”

“You weren’t my friends,” Bannon said. “You only wanted to laugh at me. But I’m stronger now. I know who you are.”

“It wasn’t us,” Jed said. “It was Amos. We just followed him.”

“That still makes you participants. You could have told Nicci or Nathan what happened to me after I was captured, but you wanted me down there in the pits.” His hand drifted toward his sword, though he had no intention of killing them. Still, Jed and Brock flinched as if afraid of what the young man would do. It was a strange sensation to see them fear him, but Bannon didn’t back down. “Amos beat and abused poor Melody, and she killed him. You two were lucky on the night of the revolt.”

“We hid for our own protection,” Brock said. “It was the right thing to do.”

Jed somehow managed to sound indignant. “Amos is dead. He was the son of the wizard commander and the sovrena.”

“And they’ll be the only two who mourn him,” Bannon retorted. “But the sovrena is locked in a dungeon, and the wizard commander fled the city.” Anger and disgust welled up within him. It wasn’t the same thing as the blood rage he often encountered. He felt strong. He needed to say these things aloud.

Still working, Brock sliced into the fur animal, peeled up the pelt. Bannon nearly retched.

Oron interrupted, looking at his son with scorn rather than pride. “Brock has lived with his pampered delusions for centuries. That’s my own fault as his father. He needs to live up to his name as the son of a duma member. He needs to work and make himself worthy.”

Insulted, Brock continued his bloody task. The mewling animal lay raw and skinned on the table, twitching but unable to escape. Brock growled, “We fought for the city. How many times did we go outside and smash the stone warriors? No one else in Ildakar did so. If the rest of the people in this city had done as much to damage the stone army, we wouldn’t be under siege right now. They would all be destroyed already.”

“Yes, you were very brave, vandalizing statues,” Bannon said. “You said you wanted to fight against General Utros for what he had done in the past. Well, now you can truly fight. The city is under real siege, and the army is alive again. If we have to go to battle for Ildakar, will you be on the front lines?” He lifted his chin in challenge, though he nearly gagged from the stench inside the outbuilding.

Jed and Brock muttered, looking away. “We’ve already done our part.”

Oron spoke in a firm tone. “You need to make something of yourself, son. I worked for centuries to build my power and influence, and now I’m finally a member of the duma. You need to prove yourself worthy, too. Jed’s mother feels the same. Lady Olgya said as much to me.” He looked up, hardening his gaze. “I’ll expect you to meet your obligations when the time comes. General Utros isn’t bound to agree to peace anytime soon.”

“We … we won’t need to go to battle,” Brock insisted. “The wizards’ duma will find a way to end the siege.”

Oron opened a cage and brought out a bla

ck-furred animal, which squirmed and twisted in the air. “We’ll try, but if it comes to a real fight, you will need to help save Ildakar, too.” He pressed the creature down on the stained table in front of him. He glanced at Bannon and snapped an order. “You, boy, put on a smock. Take up a knife. We could use your help.”

Instead, Bannon walked away. “No. I’ll leave you to the work you were born to do.”

CHAPTER 20

As darkness settled again over Ildakar, Nicci pondered the unsatisfying meeting with General Utros as well as how she might use the sliph whose well Nathan and Elsa had discovered in the ruins. One way or another, she was determined to save Ildakar.

The ancient army had made no move in two days, but their mere presence was intimidating. Utros had too much to digest, too much to accept about what had happened, but she hoped he would understand the truth of the situation, realize that his effort was not only unnecessary but pointless. Ildakar had the resources to withstand a siege for years, decades, centuries.

Nicci thought it would be most beneficial to wait, for now, but she doubted the legendary general would abandon the goal of overthrowing Ildakar. His duty remained as unyielding as stone. Nicci understood his obsession, because she felt the same way about her own promise to Richard. If some courier had told her that Lord Rahl was gone, or if she awoke from a spell sleep to find that centuries had passed, would she abandon her duty to the D’Haran Empire?

Never.

She and Nathan had certainly planted questions and doubts in the general’s mind, but he was a man who followed orders, and his loyalty was legendary. He had conquered the continent on the basis of Iron Fang’s command, but he would not be reckless either. She hoped he would ask for another parley with them, soon.

From the high vantage near the ruling tower, Nicci looked out at the night-shadowed streets of Ildakar after dark, the tense people in their homes waiting for resolution. At least the pounding on the walls had stopped, but the silence did not give the city any peace.

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