Page 7 of Siege of Stone (Sister of Darkness: The Nicci Chronicles 3)

At first she was confident, but after circling the obvious routes for hours without any sign, she began to feel desperation. She could not fail! She dared not return to Sovrena Thora without the man’s severed head. She ranged wider, stopping to meditate, extending all her senses, looking for any hint of his passage. Maxim was a weak and inexperienced man, and she could not let him best her. She couldn’t.

Adessa’s face was splattered with mud, her short dark hair clumped with perspiration. She pushed her way across a thicket, slashing spiderwebs with her dagger. When she crashed out into an open grassy area, she came upon the swamp dragon.

The fierce armored reptile was low to the ground. It had spiny ridges along its back, an elongated snout filled with fangs that could snap down on prey and crush bones, rip flesh. The swamp dragon’s head was raised, its jaws open, its slitted eyes dull and turned to stone.

The monster had been petrified. The creature must have tried to attack Wizard Commander Maxim, and he had unleashed his stone spell. The swamp dragon stood as a fierce-looking statue in the grass and muck.

Adessa smiled. She was on the right track again. This was a reminder of the creatures she might face in the swamps, but she was not afraid. As a morazeth, she was the most dangerous thing out here.

Adessa extended her senses and picked up the path again. Now she knew where she was going. She continued to hunt.

CHAPTER 6

General Utros had lost all but the most rudimentary tools, but he did have inexhaustible manpower, and his soldiers had complete devotion to serve the needs of their commander. He did not waste any time.

Within a day of their awakening, though the displaced army still reeled in confusion, First Commander Enoch sent teams into the hills to cut trees with sharpened battle-axes, to strip and haul the logs down onto the plain, where they chopped them into structural beams. With furious effort, the men erected a dozen command structures, with the largest headquarters for General Utros and the twin sorceresses. The workers created wooden buildings with sturdy walls, logs cemented with mud, thatched roofs of thin branches lashed with long grasses.

Though the awakened soldiers were oddly numb and impervious to the chill that had set in the night before, Utros insisted on building up the camp, pulling together as many normal trappings as possible. Though it was mainly symbolic, his fighters had nothing else to cling to.

Situated in the center of the plain, his headquarters structure was a rectangular building with a high roof, lit by daylight through open windows, as well as two braziers inside that held low fires. The rudimentary building was not as comfortable as his old lavishly appointed command tent, but after campaigning for Iron Fang across the wilderness, Utros was no stranger to austerity. This would do.

He sat inside the structure now, inhaling the wafting smoke from the braziers, basking in the orange-red glow of embers mixed with pungent herbs. With hewn logs, the soldiers had constructed benches and a long, rough table where Utros could conduct his war councils, but as of yet he had no maps, no paper or ink for messages, not even any fresh clothes. He hoped his scouting teams would soon find outlying towns where they could procure basic supplies.

For now, Utros sat on a sturdy bench at the head of the long table. With regimented thoughts, he contemplated Ildakar, his army, and his war. Ava and Ruva were with him, close and alluring, their skin as smooth as marble. Many times, he had watched the two stand naked inside the dim shelter, using razor-sharp knives to scrape every inch of their skin. The only mark that marred their perfect bodies was the ugly mirror-image scar on the outside of their legs, where their bodies had once been fused together from birth.

The paint that now swirled and colored their skin was faded and flaking, but neither of the two women looked weak. They were patient. They were strong. They counted on Utros to get them what they needed as soon as he could.

And he intended to do so.

The foremost ranks of his soldiers continued to pound on the impregnable walls of Ildakar, showing their might. Given enough time and men, and their hardened fists, they might actually batter their way through the thick stone. A tiny acorn growing in a crack could split apart a boulder.

From atop the walls, the defenders of Ildakar pelted the soldiers, dropping missiles on them: rocks, bricks, chamber pots. They poured down burning oil, which covered the fighters and sent them away screaming. But the projectiles caused little damage to the hardened warriors, and the actual casualties were remarkably few. The flaming oil seared them and their armor, but Utros had seen burn victims before. The fire didn’t have nearly the same effect on the partly solidified flesh. Maybe his vast army was no longer entirely human, but their stiff skin made them more invincible. As a commander, he could make use of that fact.

Hour after hour, lieutenants appeared at his headquarters, delivering reports in an efficient military fashion, as they had been trained to do. The officers described the disposition of the troops, the status of the awakening camp. Utros absorbed the information, memorizing the words because he had no paper on which to write notes. The twin sorceresses also listened intently.

When the vast army had marched across the Old World, crossing over the sheer mountains and covering miles each day at a forced pace, they knew how to set up huge camps along the way.

Now, one of his senior lieutenants stood before him at the far end of the table. Ava and Ruva stared with intense eyes, like two vultures waiting for a dying horse to perish so they could feed. The well-trained lieutenant ignored them and fixed his gaze on the general.

“We spread out the camp, sir. The valley itself shows none of the damage that our army caused on our march to Ildakar and the siege, before we turned to stone. I’ve dispatched a hundred squads for the usual labors, clearing spots for campsites even though we have no blankets or tents, excavating midden trenches. They’re digging enough latrines to serve so many men, thousands of pits.” He looked away, a frown on his pale, hard face.

Utros rested his elbows on the rough surface of his table. “What is the problem, Lieutenant? Report.” Dealing with the bodily functions of hundreds of thousands of soldiers was no laughing matter. Without efficient sanitation, the giant camp would become a cesspit, and diseases such as dysentery and the plague would spread. Utros knew that such debilitating sicknesses killed more soldiers than any enemy’s sword. “You still have spades. You have plent

y of space to dig the pits?”

“The latrines are complete, General, but…”

Ava and Ruva stared at him. Utros grew impatient. “Speak! I’ve faced countless enemies and huge opposing armies. What could possibly be problematic about waste pits?”

“They haven’t been used, sir,” the lieutenant admitted.

Utros drew his broad brows together. “What do you mean, they haven’t been used?”

“No one has so far … needed them, sir. They haven’t…”

“Are they using the bushes?” Utros demanded.

“I’ve asked, sir, but no one claims to have felt the need. I confess, I haven’t myself, not even to … not even, you know, to piss.”

Of all the grand questions Utros had faced, this had never entered his mind. As he was about to growl another question, he realized that he himself had felt no need in the past day and a half.

And that led to another realization. His teams had made makeshift basins, delivered water from the streams across the valley. Utros had plenty of water here in his command structure, but he couldn’t recall whether he had needed to drink. “We’ve been petrified for an unknown time, and we’ve neither eaten nor drunk anything. Our bodies haven’t felt any such call.”

A knock came at the door as someone else arrived. Utros turned to the latrine commander, who backed toward the door. “It was merely an observation, sir. I felt you should know.”

“So noted. Thank you.”

The next visitors sickened Utros. He’d seen bloody violence in his many battles, had witnessed the most appalling injuries and torments, but this was beyond anything he had seen before.

Ava and Ruva lurched to their feet from the side bench. Even the subcommander looked sickened as he led four soldiers into the command structure.

The glow from the braziers and the slanted daylight through the windows lit the horrifically mangled faces of two blind, staggering soldiers. They still wore their armor, but their faces looked like chewed raw meat. Their noses were gone, their eyes gouged out. One man’s ear had been smashed off. Their teeth had been battered, and only jagged stubs protruded from their gums like shards of pottery. Their breath came in wet, sucking sounds through ragged mouth holes.

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