The Dark Queen (20 page)

healing chant, for something to soothe and settle the plant. He began slowly, whispering
an old warding from Qualinesti. But a humming sound from the heart of the cactus, unlike
any song or language of plants the druid had ever heard, drowned out the chant before he
had really begun. Alarmed, Vaananen stepped back from the plant, which swelled more and
more rapidly, like a grotesquely inflated waterskin, its shiny yellow surface mottling and
browning. Vaananen realized that the cactus was no longer just a plant, but had been
transformed into some- thing monstrous and menacing. Run! the druid's instincts told him.
He turned to the lectern to gather the last of his belongingshis copying pens and inksas
the cac- tus sizzled and whined, the sound reaching above audibility. Mesmerized, the
druid stayed one second too longand with a shattering boom, the cactus burst open. The
room filled with a hot, swarming rain of something fierce and stinging and relentlessly
hungry and alive. Vaananen felt searing heat course up his legs and run down his back, and
he futilely lifted his arms to shield his face. Tiny black scorpions covered his
shoulders, his neck, the hidden red oak leaf on his wrist. The druid cried out once,
briefly, but the poison that raced through his blood felled him like a cross- cut oak. He
sank to his knees in the midst of the white sand, with a last painful brush of his hand
erasing the final glyphs he had written for Fordus, the message the War Prophet would
never read. I am again surprised, thought Vaananen, sinking into green darkness. How
remarkable. Swarming over the room, their dark mission accomplished, the scorpions turned
upon one another until all of them, stung by their own poison, lay as dead as the druid.
The next day, the stunned acolytes found that the sand from the rena garden covered the
floor, the bed, the lectern, the dead scorpions, and Vaananen, too, in a thin white layer
like a fresh new snowfall. It was pristine, almost beautiful, except for a wide stain of
sand hardened into dark volcanic glass, in the center of the garden between three standing
stones.

The gold and gray plains at the edge of lstar stretched out sandy and rock-litteredlittle
more hospitable than the desert in which Fordus had wandered and prophesied and fought for
most of his life. There was said to be forest somewhere farther northa land of thick and
luxurious green, dripping with soft autumn rain or the hard, thunderous downpours of an
Ansalon spring. Standing in the midst of his ragged army, for a moment Fordus let himself
imagine that northern country. He had never seen a landscape of lush and resplendent
green, never walked beside brooks or looked up into a vault of leaf and evergreen. His
country was brown and red and ochre, its land- marks visible for miles over the level
terrain. Landmarks like the towering city of Istar, carved of marble in the Age of Dreams,
the heart of an empire. Soon to be his. City and empire alike. What did it matter that so
few warriors stood behind him now? What did it matter that his numbers were not the
thousands, the hundreds of thousands, he had dreamed long ago in the Tears of Mishakal and
again, a few nights ago, high up on the Red Plateau? It was not loss, not attrition. It
was a weeding out, a culling. Only the finest fighters remained, their worthiness proved
by their survival. For Northstar was still with him, and Rann and Aeleth. Somehow Gormion
had wrestled down her natural cowardice, and she was beside him as well, as were
threescore of the younger men and women, their sunken eyes alight with adulation, their
thoughts upon the liberation of the Plainsmen enslaved in Istar.

Stormlight is dead, Fordus hallucinated. He is a forerunner, a harbinger, the vanguard of
an invisible legion. For the dead would arise and follow Fordus Fire-soul. So he had read
in the fissures on this cracked and graven plain.

Oh, he had not told the others yet. Not even Northstar knew. At night Fordus found himself
laughing at his little surprise, at the army he knew was coming. For the dead army would
fear nothing ... especially not death. He held back a high and rising laughter as he
crouched among his lieutenants on the stubbled plains. Milling before the city walls, the
Kingpriest's army assembledsoldiers and mercenaries called from all corners of Ansalon.

Because the Kingpriest was afraid now. Fordus's dreams had told him that as well. It was
the time of the Water Prophet, and the War Prophet, and the Prophet King. The Prophet
King's army, bound for Istar, set to marching around the lake, rising to Fordus's demand
yet again, tired beyond belief and helplessy enthralled. Their torches fanned the
shoreline like glowing gems set in the half-circlet of a crown. Fordus would be Istar's
new monarch, and their native prince. They needed no songs, no chanting of bards to
dismantle the walls of Istar. With his gallant following and the huge invisible army at
his back, Fordus would scale the walls himself. Into a city promised him before the
beginning of the world.

*****

Stormlight watched from the encampments, as Fordus organized his few men for the assault.
Just as he had previously seen huge, destructive storms brewing and approaching, he could
see this disaster in the makingless than fourscore rebels marching against the assembled
might of the city. Left behind were the children and grandfathers and pregnant wives,
starved and vulnerable amid smoking campfires and tattered tents. Even if, as a last
resort, he killed Fordus, the others would still attack, propelled by the martyrdom of the
Prophet King and by his final propheciessome delirious foolishness about armies of the
dead. Stormlight had known it would come to this when he bade Larken farewell, told her to
wait with his followers while he set out after Fordus's quick-marched forces. He had
looked over his shoulder once, twice, and she stood as he had left her, silhouetted
against the red light of Lunitari. “Wait here,” he had told her. “I shall return.” Now he
was not so sure. Miles away, on the other side of the lake, Larken stood in the Western
Pass, staring across the water toward the harbors and walls of the marbled city. Vincus
stood at her shoulder; stroking Lucas, who danced back and forth eagerly upon her gloved
hand. The young man believed that Lucas was his closest friend among them, the creature
most worthy of his trust and reliance. Larken's sign language was soothing and familiar,
as well. Through the afternoon he had guided Larken and her hundred followers to the
Western Pass. There they meant to waitfor tidings of the battle, for Stormlight and
returning survivors. All of them sensed the disaster approaching, doom riding the air as
heavily, as corrosively as the wind-driven sand in the southern sterim. Oddly, the bard
had set aside her drum. She held the lyre now, softly fingering its bow as though
reluctant to touch its strings. Lucas hopped to her shoulder, raining amber light into the
moonlit shadows, his soft voice mewling, encouraging. Vincus tugged at Larken's tunic. How
long do we wait? he signaled. The bard blinked, as though awakened from a light sleep.
Three days, she signaled in reply. Longer would be dangerous, but news travels slowly
across the lake. If we had the glyphs ... Vincus offered hopefully. But Larken shook her
head. Those were the old days.

Now we have belief and waiting. Belief in Stormlight, in his skill and resourcefulness.
Larken turned again to her harp, and the young Istarian, cast back into his own thoughts,
stared north over Lake Istar. The distant walled city reflected serenely on the glassy
surface of the water. With a fumbling of weapons, the ranks closed behind the Prophet
King. Solemnly, as though at the beginning of a great and somber ritual, the rebels
marched toward the citytoward Istar, shimmering in refracted light. In the distance, they
saw the Istarian army groupingred banners aloft and fluttering in the rising wind. The
rebels had seen these flags before, had eluded them over a world of high grass and sand,
striking from the flanks and the rear with the swiftness and surprise of swooping birds.
But now, they marched to meet Istar head-on. Seventy, seventy-five warriors arrayed
against ten thousand. It was certain madness. Were it not for the promise of the Prophet
King. For Fordus had sworn their deliverance in the council fires of the night before.
Never trust simple numbers, he had urged them, for I have a magic that no numbers can
quell. Now, as they saw the army assembled against them, the banners and the bright,
approaching stan- dards of four legions, for a moment it crossed their minds that the
magic might fail and the prophecies go dry. Yet each man stood at the shoulder of Kis
cohort, and pride and illusion prevailed. Having come this far, they would not run and
they would not waver. Ahead, dressed in a dirty white robe and a brown kaffiyeh,
indistinguishable from his followers, his golden collar hidden under the loose robes, the
Prophet King shouted and beckoned. Past judgment and past wisdom, they lifted their
shields and followed. The first wave of arrows rained down upon the rebels. The archers
perched in the distance, perhaps two hundred yards away, and their efforts, spent and
inaccurate, clattered against the rebels' uplifted shields and fell harmlessly on the hard
ground. Good. The Istarians were nervous. Too quick to shoot. The pikemen in the forward
ranks lowered their weapons. Men of the Fourth Legionold foes with a score to
settlequickened their pace, breaking into a run, a shouting, shrieking charge across the
level fields where the rebels, woefully outnumbered, braced to face the first assault.
“Now!” Fordus shouted as the lines collided. Rebel weaponry flashed amid the lunging
pikes, and Istarian after Istarian fell to the more mobile rebels. The Fourth Legion's
attack billowed and eddied around Fordus, Northstar, and Rann, then the Istarian lines
broke, the pikemen withdrew, and the distant archers showered arrows once more. Fordus
looked around him. Forty Istarians dead, but twelve of his own, as well. Even more rebels
wounded, though these were rising to their feet, preparing for yet another assault. It did
not matter. Reinforcements were coming soon.

*****

From the Kingpriest's Tower, Tamex looked out across the city, past the walls and onto the
plains, where the skirmish unfolded. There, banners tilted and nodded as Istarian troops
attacked and regrouped, then attacked again, each time suffering grievous losses, it
seemed, but each time whittling away at the rebel numbers.

He could not believe the easy foolishness of this War Prophet, this Prophet King.
Assaulting the Istar-ians with less than a hundred men. He scanned the ranks of the
entrenching rebels. Plainsman and bandit had gathered the shields and armor of the fallen
Istarian pikemen. The desert robes were lost in a swirl of leather cuirasses, of burnished
bronze shields so bright that the glare made the rebels hard to number, their leaders hard
to identify.

Surely not Fordus, Tamex thought. Surely this is a scouting party only, and the War
Prophet waited behind the lines, safe in an encampment from which he could direct the
battle.

With the sight of a god couched in his crystalline eyes, Tamex scanned the horizons, his
gaze reaching as far as a small rebel camp, twenty more miles of plains, and then the
beginning of the forests. Nothing.

No concealed forces. No rebel reinforcements, except for that huddled handful in the
mountain pass, led by the jilted bard. Still, the dark general refused to commit his
troops. Perhaps Fordus had surprises planned, was waiting for the full assault to unleash
a veiled and dangerous tactic.

The woods themselves could be bristling with rebels. Tamex would wait. He would hurl
attack after attack at the entrenching company of Plainsmen, losing ten men, twenty, even
a hundred for each fallen Que-Nara. What difference would it make? The rebels were gravely
outnumbered. Eventually, the numbers would win out. From his balcony, Tamex signaled the
herald. The mounted messenger guided his horse to the foot of the tower. Scrawling a hasty
message on a scroll, Tamex dropped the missive to the young man, who took it and galloped
to the gates of the city, bearing orders for Celeres, the commander of the celebrated
Sixth Legion, whose soldiers waited impatiently, hidden from rebel eyes inside the city
gates. Hold ranks, the message said. Wait until further orders. They would hold until he
found Fordus Firesoul.

*****

Weary and battle-shocked, the Fourth Legion withdrew and regrouped in the milling Istarian
ranks. Again the archers drew and fired, and then for a moment the battlefield stilled, as
if neither side were willing to engage again. Then slowly, not as if they had not been
ordered, but prodded or pushed or cajoled, the spearmen of the Second Legion surged over
the beaten plain, two companies of the finest Istarian swordsmen following.

In a ragged semicircle, their numbers reduced to about fifty, the rebels braced for the
attack. In the center of the line, Aeleth nocked his bow, and a dozen Que-Nara readied
their slings. On each flank the officers waitedRann on the left and Fordus on the right.
It was the old tactic, straight out of the Battle of the Plains. First the rebels salted
the legion with arrows and stones, then Aeleth's troops turned and withdrew, the angry
Istarians charging after. At the right moment, when the Second Legion was spread out and
overextended, Fordus and Rann attacked, and the rebels converged on the hapless Istarians,
who turned, broke ranks, and ran under a withering assault.

Fordus, eyes alight and head high, whirled across the battlefield like a deadly wind. An
arrow passed inches from his head, ripping away his kaffiyeh, and bare-headed, his auburn
hair blowing back and tangling, he urged his men to pursue the fleeing Second Legion. The
enlivened rebels surged around and past him, and the War Prophet whooped ecstatically. He
had turned the Istarian army, and behind his charging forces, he thought he saw wavering
shapes rising out of the bloodied ground. The dead. The army of the dead had arrived. Hear
the word of the Prophet. From his vantage in the Tower, Tamex saw the kaffiyeh fall from
the auburn-haired warrior, saw as well the gold collar at the man's neck. It was all he
needed to see. “Fordus!” he whispered. Then, aloud, “Messenger!” The next courier galloped
to the city gates, where a thousand men stood ready. Celeres and the Sixth Legion got
their order: March. Attack. Take no prisoners.

The gates of Istar opened, issuing forth the Sixth Legion, their strides quickening with
the loose, confident movement of veterans. The other Istarian soldiers parted ranks as the
crack troops moved into the open field. Spears raised, shields glittering, in a matter of
minutes they closed with the remaining rebels.

Twenty of Fordus's troops fell before they could return a single blow. The rebels reeled
back, turned, and routed, their destination the camp, the forest anywhere. High in her
marble perch, masked by the face of Tamex, Takhisis laughed softly. She leaned against the
wall, her masculine, faceted body as hard as the stone against which it rested. And so it
would have been over, were it not for the storm that lifted out of the sandy fields and
bore down upon the armies. For Sargonnas had not waited and brooded and plotted to let
this moment pass. When the Sixth Legion surged through the rebel lines, the landscape
burst with a hundred geysers of fire. Borne on the rising wind, the glowing ash rained
havoc on the Istarian rear guard. The red banners smoldered and caught fire, and the
vaunted troops scattered, screaming and burning, unable to fight what they could not
understand. In the front of the little battle the Sixth Legion slowed, uncertain. The
firestorm rushed at them, passing over them in a deadly wave of fire. The stark hexagonal
standards erupted in flame, and Celeres himself fell in the inferno. On the far flank of
the rebel forces, Fordus and Northstar scrambled clear of the storm. Behind them, Istarian
and rebel burned on the blasted battlefieldRann and Aeleth, the vaunted Sixth Legion fell
quickly, engulfed in smoke and fire. “The Prophet King . . .” Northstar began. He blindly
searched for Fordus in the rolling murk of the smoke-filled sky. “This way,” Fordus
shouted, and began to run. “But, Fordus!” Northstar coughed. “I can't see you...” The
Prophet vanished in a curtain of smoke. Spiraling to the ground, the great young guide of
the Que-Nara crawled the tight circle he had already passed over, then circled it again.
Cries burst from the smoke, and at the edges of his awareness, North-star could catch the
dance of flames, shadows flitting back and forth through the smothering, twilight country.
“Fordus?” he called. “Fordus?” No answer returned from the thickening smoke. Choking,
sneezing, the Plainsman fell flat on his face. Stay low in a fire, someone had told him
when he was a child. So he lay in a flat, barren clearing, clutching his rescued medallion
and praying for the fire to pass, for the smoke to spare him. When three Istarians, swords
drawn, stumbled into the clearing a moment later, they found him facedown on the
groundguttering, gasping, drowning in smoke. And though they, too, were seeking refuge
from the fire-storm, passage through the flame and through the strangling smoke, they were
veterans and merciless, stopping long enough to follow their general's orders: “Take no
prisoners.” Northstar's hand at last relaxed on the medal, and he found his way to death
with no trouble at all.