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Though she could barely breathe, her entire body caught in a strangling vise, she called upon her gift, unleashed fire that threw lightning around her skin. The blast singed and curled her hair, burning it away, but it grew back in seconds and wrapped around her again.
Nicci could barely move her arms. Concentrating hard, she could feel the power of the magic attacking her, and the lightning strike left a tracery in her own aura, like an intrusive vine growing throughout her Han. The magic was centered on her hair, attacking her hair. She could feel it.
There must be some vulnerability, a window through her defenses that she had not detected. But, no … it wasn’t all her hair, it was just one strand of hair! Yes, that was the focal point, the link that her attacker was using, one hair, out of countless strands.
The locks wound tighter, crushing her ribs, squeezing her waist, cutting off all circulation in her legs. She collapsed to the ground, like a fly wrapped up in a spider’s web. She had stopped struggling, stopped cutting, in order to concentrate. It was her only chance.
Dimly, she heard Nathan yelling at her, demanding that she not give up, but Nicci would never give up.
She sent her thoughts out, tracing her Han just as the Sisters had taught her. At last she found the single connection that tied the evil magic to her like a fisherman’s hook and line. That was what connected the spell to her!
She had to find it, break it. She followed her thoughts, closed her eyes, paying no attention to the fact that she couldn’t breathe, that her bones creaked, about to crush inward. Fighting to move her trapped fingers, she stirred through the wild, combative strands, working upward, trying to reach her scalp. She followed the bright line inside her mind, the key single strand, a broken hair. The other half of that blond strand was somewhere else, in the hands of her enemy, an evil wizard or sorceress.
Twin sorceresses!
Nicci found the hair, just a short strand that had not grown fantastically like all the others. This was the strand that bound the spell to her, half still connected to her head, the other half in the hands of her enemies. She couldn’t separate that single hair from the thicker strands all around it, but she twisted the clump of hair with her fingers and gave a sharp yank, ripping out a bloody swatch—which included the single broken strand.
Once she pulled that strand out by the root, the spell connection was broken. The evil magic recoiled like a taut rope suddenly cut. Her ravening hair curled, then fell limp. The bindings sagged around her body, giving her a chance to heave a huge breath, filling her lungs. Her ribs ached and several were likely cracked. Her throat was bruised from the strangling locks.
Yelling her name, Nathan and Bannon cut at her hair, tearing the severed strands away from her face and her mouth, freeing her.
She breathed heavily and blinked her blue eyes up at her two companions. “Thank you.”
Bannon clawed the dead ropes of hair from himself, untangled his legs, kicked the mass away. He looked around warily and tugged his hair back, as if afraid his own ginger locks might also spring into deadly life. “What caused that, Sorceress? Was it some wild magic still left in the pyramid?”
“No.” Nicci turned her cold gaze toward Nathan.
The wizard looked exhausted and battered, confused. “Dear spirits, then what—”
“You know what it was. General Utros doesn’t want to negotiate. His two pet sorceresses attacked me, tried to murder me. There will be no honorable solution.” She brushed strands from her black dress as she stood in a pile of curled, blond hair. “And now, I am angry.”
CHAPTER 21
After being attacked by the sorceresses’ twisted spell, Nicci spent the following day with Nathan and the duma members, deep in angry discussions about how to respond to the threat of General Utros.
Bannon was not part of that debate, and instead he went into the city the next morning, accompanied by Lila. Even with an ancient army camped outside the walls, he knew that Ildakar had more than one enemy, and the city’s populace would have to fight together. The revolt was over, but not settled, and when the duma called upon them to make extreme sacrifices, the lower classes would not forget their generations of oppression under the gifted nobles. He himself had been held prisoner in the combat pits, and his friend Ian had been transformed from an idealistic boy into a killing machine.
As he headed down into the lower levels of the city, he didn’t invite Lila along, but she accompanied him nevertheless. Her skin was marked with countless protective runes, but she had an animal sensuality that was as terrifying as it was attractive.
She fell into place beside him. “Where are we going today, boy?” She sized up his loose shirt, the sword he carried at his side. “Are we going out to fight?”
“My name is Bannon,” he reminded her. “I’m going to the old slave market.” He glanced over at her, narrowing his hazel eyes. “You’re a morazeth. The former slaves there won’t look kindly upon you.”
Her step didn’t falter. “I’m not expecting hugs or smiles, but you’ve proved that you need protection. I go with you.”
Bannon sniffed and kept walking. “I can take care of myself.”
“I can take care of you, too. It’s the best way to be sure. I would consider it my own failing if I let you get killed by some thug in an alley.”
Knowing he couldn’t convince her otherwise, Bannon headed to the open market. He thought back to the day the three Norukai serpent ships had arrived on the Killraven River, carrying more than a hundred and fifty captives for the slave market. Walking meat, the Norukai called them. Bannon had watched the sickening spectacle as the nobles bid on slaves like silk merchants haggling over bolts of cloth, and then the sovrena and the wizard commander had preempted the bids to buy the entire lot for their grand bloodworking.
Even though the slaves had freed themselves, they were not in a forgiving mood. They were bottled up inside the walls of Ildakar, forced to defend their city alongside the nobles who had oppressed them.
Bannon and Lila passed under an arched gate into the open square with stepped stone seats on the outer perimeter, where noble bidders had once sat to inspect the captives for sale. He had expected the slave market to be mostly empty after the uprising, but instead the place was a bustling bazaar, with tents and awnings, colorful Ildakaran silk stretched across wooden frames. Intricate tapestries were spread on the flagstones like rugs, likely torn from the walls of noble villas. Bannon saw chattering families around cook fires, grim-looking people in ragged tunics or drab brown robes, while others flaunted expensive finery looted from their masters’ dwellings.
After Mirrormask’s revolt, many of the freed lower classes abandoned their former domiciles and formed a community of their own, scorning the old order and old duties. But everyone needed to work in some capacity to keep the city functioning, to harvest the food they required in order to withstand the siege. Some citizens understood their duty, while others seemed reluctant to help any of the upper classes they still resented. Several more nobles had been surreptitiously murdered in the past few days.
As Bannon entered the square, hundreds of eyes turned toward him. He felt like a trespasser, but many of the slaves knew him on s
ight. He had fought at their side during the uprising, and he had been with them on the top of the plateau, freeing the sacrificial victims.
But mixed in with the general hubbub of conversation, he heard a grumble directed at Lila, though she seemed deaf to it. She walked ahead of Bannon as if clearing the way for him. She looked around and frowned. “Is this what you wanted to see, boy?” She raised her voice, scolding the former slaves who had occupied the slave market. “This is not your home. This is a public square. You shouldn’t be living here.”
“We don’t listen to any morazeth,” grumbled one man, his hand clenching a sturdy wooden pole that supported a stolen tapestry. “This is our home now. We no longer serve the nobles in their villas.”
“This is our city, too,” said an older woman who washed clothes in a fountain, and then spread them on the sunlit flagstones to dry.
Two laughing boys ran past, chasing each other, but they stopped to stare at Lila. When she stared back at them, they fled in terror.
“Yes, this is your city,” Lila repeated, “and you have responsibilities, too. You must help defend Ildakar against enemies.”
“Against all enemies,” said the man gripping the wooden pole.
Bannon came forward, trying to make peace. “We know that your society has to change. Nicci and Nathan will help when they talk to the duma members.”
“We have no one to speak for us,” grumbled the woman as she slopped a wet, soapy rag onto the flagstones.
Bannon searched for words. He was just a former cabbage farmer, not a politician, and he didn’t know how to fix social injustices. More people began to gather around them like a mob closing in. There were enough potential opponents here to tear Lila apart, but the morazeth would probably kill half of them before they took her down. She stood as still as a stone warrior.
