As her captors swerved out into the desert to come abreast of Varis’s army, the full, terrible scope of his power came into view. Many of the arrayed forces were indeed soldiers, but most were made up of common men, women, and even children. They had not camped, but simply halted and stood fast, faces coated in thick layers of dirt, their glazed eyes fixed on some point in front of their noses. They did not look around, they did not talk, nor eat or drink, they just stood still, fixated on some collective vision. To the last, the leagues of running had worn the shoes and boots and sandals off their feet. But, other than dirt, their feet showed no sign of injury from racing over roadways of sand and sharp stone.
Ellonlef’s horse abruptly slowed behind Swordsman Naa’il’s mount. He led her away from the army and toward a gathering of men some distance away. As they came closer, she noted Magus Uzzret’s skinny frame, but he ceased to exist in her mind when she caught sight of the pale, white-eyed man sitting astride a tall dark horse. Though the mounted man looked different, what with his full mane of pale hair pulled into a top-lock and his slightly fuller cheeks, she recognized him all the same. Prince Varis Kilvar, the Life Giver.
Her heart began pounding. When she had first seen Varis as he was now, Krevar had been in ruins and people were seemingly dying from a mysterious plague. His appearance had been more shocking then, but now she saw him through a veil of ruddy smoke and thin daylight, and she could not help but think he looked like a malevolent specter. His pale eyes seemed to glow as they took her in, ablaze with an inner light made all the brighter by the sickly red and brown hues of the smoky air hanging over a landscape of jutting stone spires. His mount seemed possessed of that same inner light, as its eyes glowed as well. Though it was an illusion born of dread and weariness, for a brief moment she had been sure smoke curled from the beast’s flaring nostrils. More astonishing, Varis held a sphere of flame in one hand. It flickered and danced over his palm. He paid it no more mind than he would have an apple, and showed no sign that the flames scorched his flesh.
Naa’il and Caulir reined in and dismounted. They were none too gentle unlashing Ellonlef and hauling her out of the saddle, then dragging her to Varis, where they threw her before his mount. Using her bound hands, she pushed herself up into a kneeling position.
The prince did not look at her, but rather gazed at the ball of fire in his palm. Then, abruptly, the flames winked out, and he looked to Uzzret.
“If you please, Magus Uzzret,” Varis said, his tone just short of mocking, “make sure the sister does not attempt to flee. I do not wish to waste more time chasing her, yet again, across the desert.” With that, he dismounted and gestured for her three captors to follow him a few paces away.
Ellonlef scanned the men around her. They were doubtless alive, but they looked like exquisitely formed waxen figures, unmoving, unblinking, as if waiting for someone to give them leave to think and act. Magus Uzzret, on the other hand, was fully in control of himself. He stomped up to her, glaring.
“You should not have sought to betray the Life Giver,” he spat at her, his vehement zeal making her lean away; his black eyes fairly shone with mad devotion. She had never cared overmuch for the man, but whatever scant decency had been in him was fled.
“You will suffer mightily for your crimes,” he snarled, and struck her with a bony hand.
Cheek flaming more in shame than from the force of the blow, she shifted out of reach, tasting blood on her tongue. No man, especially such a wretched excuse for one such as Uzzret, had ever raised a hand against her. If one had, she would have made him suffer for such presumption. Presently, however, she could do nothing to resist.
The magus was not done. He kicked her in the belly. When she doubled over, he struck her back and shoulders with his thin wooden staff. While each strike pained her, they also stoked the fires of her humiliation, and in turn those rising flames burned away her weariness and fear.
A ringing blow cracked against the side of her head. Before the staff could fall again, her bound hands flashed out, catching the wood against her palms with a loud, stinging smack. Magus Uzzret tugged at the staff, his leathery brown features twisted into a picture of shock and outrage. Still kneeling, Ellonlef wrenched the staff free of his grasp and hurled it aside.
“You filthy whore,” he snarled, downturned lips trembling in fury.
Ellonlef answered with a bitter laugh. “I’ve always pitied you, Uzzret … much as I pity all men who lay with boys and sheep to satisfy their lusts.” Resorting to such crude insults was not her way, but it did her heart good to see the outcome. Her grim pleasure was short-lived.
A string of curses and spittle flew from Uzzret’s tongue as he set upon her. He was old, but anger made him strong. Ellonlef warded off the attack as best she could, but when the crazed flurry proved too much, she ducked her head and leaned into him. Reaching out, she caught hold of his testicles through his robes and squeezed, hard. The magus howled in pain and fell atop her. Ellonlef did not release him. Instead, she wrenched at his genitals, as he battered her with flying fists and shrieked curses.
Abruptly, though no order was given, the watching demon-men stepped forward and forced her to let go. They dragged her off a little way and dropped her, as if she held no more interest for them than a bag of beans. A sobbing Uzzret crawled away, jittering in every limb like a crippled beetle.
Ellonlef felt the weight of a stare upon her, and turned to find Varis intently studying her with his corpse eyes.
“You must forgive Uzzret,” he said. “At times he is … overzealous.”
Ellonlef raised her bound hands and wiped the blood from her split lips. “I cannot forgive a man who would have killed me, bound or not. As to his zeal, I say his devotion has become madness.”
Varis shrugged. “Fanaticism is, at times, useful. There will be others who share it, many more, and I will harness that power for myself to make the changes I desire. And, after I take the Ivory Throne, zealots such as Uzzret will ensure I rule a harmonious empire.”
Ellonlef shook her head in disgust. “You speak of men as though they are mindless devices.”
Varis stared at her, his empty gaze unreadable. “Men are tools to be used. Before I became more than a man, I myself was a tool of men and gods. I did not reject this notion, nor feel lessened by it. Rather, I embraced such service as a blessing. Admittedly, now I stand in the place of gods, I cannot say that I am displeased by the prospect of being the craftsman, instead of the utensil in the craftsman’s hands.”
“You are as mad as Uzzret,” Ellonlef snarled.
One moment Varis was placidly gazing down on her, the next he had squatted next to her and thrust his face against hers, forcing her to look away. She could not meet that horrid stare.
“I am the picture of sanity,” he grated. “It is you who are blinded by your narrow interpretation of existence. We must all serve a purpose to justify the drawing of each breath. If a man can offer no justification for living, then he should submit himself to death, in order that those with true usefulness might serve some benefit to all of existence.”
“And who decides that usefulness, or lack thereof?”
Varis smiled and sat back on his heels. “In this new age, I will. Be not troubled, Sister, for I have deemed that you have a very special and specific use.”
“I will never serve you,” Ellonlef said.
Varis abruptly stood up and moved away. “If you will not serve me of your own volition, then you will serve of mine.”
A strange sensation washed over Ellonlef as she watched Varis’s back. Here and now, he did not use a charlatan’s trick of raising his hands and closing his eyes, as he had in Krevar. He merely stood still, looking out into the smoke-hazed desert. Yet he was doing something, she could feel it, like a fast moving sickness surging through her limbs. Breathing became difficult, and a deepening weakness made her slump. When her heart began to flutter erratically, she folded in on herself. She felt herself growing weaker, dying, and her thoughts began to lose clarity. She felt as if she were drifting in fog, and in that moment, she saw Kian in her mind’s eye. Though she scarcely knew the man, she admitted to herself that she wanted to know him better. To do so, she had to survive. Using the last of her strength, she focused on him, seemingly drawing strength from his image, and using that strength to resist the oppressive weight of Varis’s power.