The older woman glanced at Quentin and Damon on either side of her. “This is a matter for the true rulers of Ildakar, for the remaining duma members—and that is the three of us. We know the punishment that must be meted out. It has been well established.” Elsa raised her hands, curling her fingers. So did Damon and Quentin.
Thora recoiled. “What are you doing?”
“You know the price for treason against Ildakar, against its people and against its leaders. We will impose it, by the law and by the gift vested in us.”
Thora cringed. Her porcelain face grew even more pale. “You must not! I’ll annihilate all of you.” She summoned her own gift, tightened the crawling energy threads around her body.
Elsa continued, “Wizard Commander Maxim was the most adept at the petrification spell, but we three together can release the magic as well.”
Quentin said, “Thora, you will be a statue for all to see. We will never forget the damage you have done to our city.”
“No!” Thora cried. She lashed out with her own magic, but the three united wizards of Ildakar brought up a shield that deflected the hissing bolts of energy.
Nicci and Nathan threw up their own magical shields to protect the crowd behind them as the destructive lashes sprayed everywhere, striking the walls, skittering along the floor. Bannon and the slaves standing behind him gasped, ducking from the attack, but did not run away. All these people were eager to witness the utter defeat of the evil sovrena.
Nicci wanted to destroy Thora, grind her down until she was nothing but greasy smoke and a bad memory, but she respected the will of the duma members. It was true—she, Nathan, and Bannon would leave Ildakar soon, along with Mrra. This justice belonged in the hands of the new rulers of Ildakar. Nicci certainly did not intend to stay and become their new sovrena.
Elsa, Damon, and Quentin stood shoulder-to-shoulder, pouring their gift into the petrification spell.
Thora weakened. She trembled. The yellow lacing of power skirled around her, then vanished like morning mist. She raised her hands in agony, and her skin grew whiter, stiffer. She placed her palms against her cheeks, horrified at what was happening.
“No!” she cried. Her pale blue dress rippled, and she tried to take one last step forward, as if she might find somewhere to run. Her skin became hard and gray, and with a sound like ice crackling on a frozen pond, Thora became entirely petrified, a new statue.
The audience remained silent for a moment, like a held breath, and then they cheered in their victory. The remaining duma members looked at one another, momentarily relieved, but clearly realizing their work had just begun.
Nicci looked at Nathan and then at Bannon. She nodded in satisfaction. “I believe that is what we came to do.”
CHAPTER 80
Maxim ran into the night, leaving the city far behind. The shroud was down, and the whole world awaited him.
Ildakar had been his home for countless centuries, and as the wizard commander, he possessed every power, every treasure, anything he could want. He had loved his city. He had helped build it, raising it up from the plain, moving the river and the earth itself, and he had sacrificed much to protect it.
Ah, he had been so young and naive.
He had also been in love with beautiful Thora. He still recalled how happy he had been when they were first married. Joy had exploded from him, a romance that had nothing to do with the gift or any spell that he released. Thora had worked a different kind of spell on him. He had been infatuated, then deeply in love. The passion was immeasurable. He had felt drunk with the touch of her skin, the curve of her breasts, the feel of her soft, warm thighs wrapped around him as he entered her and she arched her back. It had been so marvelous!
What had he been thinking?
Unlike the ridiculous songs that minstrels sang, there was no such thing as a true love that lasted forever, of bonded soul mates whose every thought was for their partner, for whom each day, each moment apart was torture.
No, even his remarkable delusional love for Thora had lasted no more than a century or so. Even though she didn’t age and her body remained as perfectly formed as ever, Maxim had come to find it less interesting. For a while, he had diverted himself with lovely and pliable silk yaxen, but they quickly proved unsatisfying. So Maxim had his first real illicit lover, then his first ten illicit lovers, managing to keep them secret from his wife, although he suspected she had taken lovers as well, growing just as discontented with him as a husband. Eventually, they expanded the pleasure parties, flaunting their affairs in front of each other, and Maxim soon found that he didn’t even care.
He and Thora were bound together as sovrena and wizard commander, but his great love had turned to boredom, then apathy, and finally, twisted into a long-simmering hatred. He had wanted to destroy her, to make her hurt, to make her suffer.
On a grander scale, his romance with Ildakar was much the same. In the beginning, long before Emperor Kurgan tried to conquer the Old World, before the army of General Utros arrived, Maxim had loved this city. He was the one who had developed the petrification magic as an invincible defense. He had worked the spell that turned all those invading soldiers into stone. He had taught the others how to do it, but he controlled that potent magic.
Bottled up under the shroud, Ildakar became stagnant and remained that way for many intolerable centuries. If one locked even the closest friends or lovers in a confined room, Maxim knew, they would grow to hate each other after enough time had passed.
That was how Maxim had begun to feel about Ildakar. Yes, the city was still as beautiful and unchanged as ever, but to him it was just a colorfully painted corpse. And corpses began to rot and stink. They needed to be burned on a funeral pyre.
As Mirrormask, he had built that funeral pyre, and he had struck the spark to ignite the tinder. Nicci had been his tool, and a very useful one.
Now, as he continued to run beyond the walls, heading across the plain toward the hills to the south, he followed the uplift and the bluffs that rose above the Killraven River. Maxim knew he had to finish the work he had begun.
Ildakar needed to be destroyed. Although the rebellious slaves would prove to be an inconvenience for the rulers, they would do only superficial harm. Maxim wanted to do more, and he had long ago thought of the perfect answer, though he had always been too afraid to try it.
Now he had nothing to lose.
* * *
Word traveled throughout the city of Ildakar of the defeat of Sovrena Thora and the shocking revelation that Mirrormask was Wizard Commander Maxim himself. The duma members, united now, sent out announcements commanding High Captain Stuart and all of the city guard to stop fighting against the rebellious slaves.
The lower classes had risen up and now they looked at the damage they had done, the fires that burned in the poorer sections of the city. Instead of continuing to clash with the guards, the rebels worked together to stop the conflagration from spreading and also to treat the wounded.
Knowing that Mirrormask had escaped, his most vehement followers called for Nicci, and she knew it was her responsibility to help calm the unrest. After leaving the ruling tower, she, Bannon, and Nathan went through the streets, calling out for peace and cooperation, asking the people to help in the name of their homes and of their future.
Rendell and some of the other slaves kept calling out Nicci’s name. In her raspy voice, old Melba even proclaimed that Nicci should become the new sovrena, but the sorceress immediately quashed that idea. She held up her hand. “That is not for me. I came here to help, and I came here for my friends. Ildakar is your city.”