Bannon rapped the blade of his sword against the shoulder of one petrified warrior. Sturdy’s steel sent a bright chiming note into the silence. “A thousand years … three thousand years—and they’re still intact? Will they ever awaken?” He looked at Nicci, his face suddenly struck with remembered grief. “We revived the statue people in Lockridge when Nathan defeated the Adjudicator. All those statues trapped with their guilt.”
“That was a much smaller thing, my boy. The Adjudicator used his corrupt magic only on those he found guilty, one at a time.” Nathan shook his head again. “The scope of this effort is … breathtaking. So many thousands of men!”
Mrra sniffed at the stone boots, but found nothing of interest in the marble figures. Restless, she glided off into the spreading oak forest, picking her way among windfall branches and thick mats of brown leaves.
With curiosity replacing his tension, Nathan walked around the tableau of petrified soldiers, inspecting them like an art patron reviewing a new statue garden placed in a king’s courtyard. “I studied ancient war chronicles back at the Palace of the Prophets. The armor is familiar to me. This badge here, see the sylized flame design?” He tapped the breastplate on one of the guards. “Such a symbol appears in the tales of Iron Fang.” He stepped back, put his hands on his hips. “If only these men could talk, think of the stories they would tell us.”
“I’d rather they remain silent,” Nicci said. “Because if they could talk, then the entire army could talk. And I doubt their first priority would be talking.”
Bannon remained mystified. “But if they came to conquer that great city, there’s nothing to keep them here. The city is gone.”
“Except for the fact that they may all be statues, my boy,” Nathan pointed out. “They’re not going anywhere.”
“That’s a good point.”
Nathan’s voice grew more erudite. “On the bright side, if those countless soldiers are stone, then that vast army is no threat to us or to anyone. We should be able to walk among them and find clues to where the city has gone. No more skulking about. It should be perfectly easy.”
The moment he uttered his ill-advised comment, a crashing sound broke through the trees at the far side of the glen. Branches snapped asunder, and a huge, hairy creature appeared, uprooting spindly scrub oaks and casting them aside.
Nicci spun into a crouch, cupping her hands to touch her gift and pull forth magic. Nathan raised his ornate sword, with Bannon right at his shoulder. Mrra bounded out of the trees from the opposite side of the glen, racing toward her companions.
The monster paused to snuffle the air, assessing the intruders. The beast was the size of an ogre, but shaped like a nightmare-distorted bear. It let out a deep bellow, spreading its jaws wide to release ropes of saliva that drooled onto the ground. It reared up and extended paws filled with hooked claws like the tines of a rake.
The thing charged toward them, like a bestial thunderstorm.
CHAPTER 3
The beast was too enormous for the thickets of scrub oak to contain it. The thing slashed with a battering-ram arm, catching some meddlesome branches with long hooked claws. With a heave and a louder roar, it shredded the wood, leaving only strips of splintered oak, like ribbon frayed by a seamstress into a decorative tassel. With a backward yank, it uprooted the spindly trees and hurled them sideways. The creature crashed toward them, grunting and snorting like the bellows in a blacksmith shop.
Bannon ducked among the statue warriors, as if they could protect him. “What is that thing?”
“We learn something new every day.” Nathan planted his black boots in a widespread stance, bracing himself. He grasped the ornate hilt of his sword with both hands for a stronger grip. “But I suppose we fight it in the usual way.”
Nicci stepped in front of the two men and curled her fingers, felt her skin tingle as she awakened the gift inside her. “Stand back.”
The monster reminded her of an enormous rabid bear—or it had once been a bear. Its body was covered with matted cinnamon fur clumped with drying pus and blood that leaked from oozing sores. Its blazing eyes were wide set in the blocky skull. One side of its face looked melted, like candle wax left too near a flame. The eye drooped in its socket, sliding down its face. The cheek had peeled away to reveal a horror of fangs in its elongated snout. Thick saliva dripped out, mixed with blood from its cracked gums.
The furry body was armored in places with smooth, curved plates, like the shells of lobsters that fishermen sometimes delivered to Grafan Harbor. The hard plates were grafted onto the bear monster’s body, and in many places its hide was marred with branded symbols and geometric spell designs, much like the scarred runes that covered Mrra.
The creature came on wildly, intent on attacking them, hurting them, killing them. Nicci saw that the beast wasn’t just a ravening predator in search of food: it was in indescribable agony. Judging from the mutilation of its body, especially the festering brand marks on its hide, she knew that some human—some evil human—had shaped this creature.
No wonder the beast wanted to kill anyone it encountered.
Even though Nicci understood its reflexive attack, she did not intend to let the monster harm her companions. With barely a thought, she called a sizzling, turbulent sphere of wizard’s fire into each hand. The molten substance would engulf the bear monster and turn its repulsive form into purified ash.
She hurled the fireballs, one after the other, as the monster crashed closer, knocking lichen-covered trees out of the way. The first blazing sphere struck the beast—and merely curled around the furry body like hot fog, before spilling into the shattered trees on either side. The wizard’s fire ignited the dense scrub oak, but did no harm to the creature.
The second fireball slammed into the bear monster, only to roll off like water from oiled skin. The beast kept coming.
“It’s immune to wizard’s fire!” Nathan cried.
Nicci didn’t wait. She had an arsenal of other spells. She reached out with her gift to stop the bear’s heart, which would drop it in its tracks. Often, under extreme circumstances, she had wrapped a living heart with her magic and clenched to still its beating … but now her gift slid away again. She couldn’t touch the heart, couldn’t reach inside at all.
The beast stormed closer, undeterred. Just as the bear was upon her, she thrust both of her hands forward, palms out, and pulled the air together, thickening the wind to create an invisible battering ram that slammed into the oncoming monster. It staggered, paused only a moment, and lumbered forward again. The runes branded on its hide glowed faintly.
Nicci knew what was happening. Mrra was impervious to magic as well, thanks to the scar markings on her tawny hide. This bear had been branded with the same protective runes.
Then it was upon her, slamming a huge paw down. As she tried to duck to the side, the blow clipped her shoulder, and the force numbed her as she rolled.
Nathan dove into the fray. “Leave it to us, Sorceress. Come, my boy, you haven’t used your sword in days.”
Yelling, Bannon came toward the beast, as Nathan darted in, stabbed with the sword, and cut a long gash in the creature’s forearm. The bear snapped its misshapen jaws and swiped at the old wizard with its uninjured paw, but Nathan darted out of the way. He spun on one foot with unexpected grace and stabbed again, but his sword did little more than provoke the creature.
Bannon attacked from the other side, swinging Sturdy in a horizontal arc that caught the tip of the bear’s massive paw, clipping off four knifelike claws.
Nathan swung his blade down hard. The steel struck one of the armor shells and glanced off. Everything happened in a few seconds.