“This gives us a good place we can watch from,” Richard said as he stood in his saddle, checking in every direction, gazing down on the expanse of forest spreading out below. “It’s getting dark fast. Let’s stop here on the road and set up camp for the night.” He pointed behind. “There is a lot of grass for the horses growing to the sides, right there.”
“You think it best to stop out in the open where half people could spot us?” Cassia asked.
“I’d rather be in a place where we can see them coming from a long way off. They can’t get to us going cross-country through the woods, and if they use the road they can only come from ahead or behind. There is no other way to get to us, here. That makes this spot which might seem like it’s out in the open actually much easier for us to defend.” He gestured to the rock wall at the apex of the curve around the prominence in the side of the mountain. “We can put some tarps there and be protected against the weather if it starts to rain.”
“It looks like it will be a damp and miserable night,” Commander Fister said. “What about fires to keep warm?”
Richard’s mouth twisted. “I’m not liking the idea of starting fires that could be seen or smelled for miles. It wouldn’t attract anything good and might tip off anyone searching for us.”
“I can use my gift to heat rocks,” Nicci offered. “At least they will keep us all warm.”
Richard nodded as he swung down out of his saddle. “Post watches in both directions.” He held the reins up close to the bit. “No man stands watch alone. Double the men and keep watches short. We have enough men for us all to get some sleep.”
“You heard the man,” Commander Fister said as he swung down out of his saddle.
Everyone else dismounted and set about the task of stringing up some small tarps to shelter them from the rain and gathering material to keep them up off the wet ground as they slept.
Kahlan smiled to herself. She was finally going to get to cuddle up to Richard for at least a few hours’ rest. As good a rest as she could expect, anyway, with the Twilight Count marking the time until the end of the world while the half people hunted for souls.
Richard circled his big arm around her waist and smiled at her. “What do you say we get something to eat?”
CHAPTER
34
Richard gently drew back on the reins, slowing his horse to a stop. It was an unexpectedly compliant animal that wanted to please and had willingly taken to his directions, but now its nostrils flared as it tossed its head, snorted, and stepped about nervously. The other horses were just as unsettled.
Richard patted the animal’s shoulder. “I smell it too,” he murmured in a comforting voice. “I don’t like it any better than you.”
Everyone had come to a halt all around him. The three Mord-Sith had closed in to get as close to him and Kahlan as they could get. Mord-Sith always wanted to be the closest layer of protection. Richard had long ago learned not only that they were capable and worthy of being in such a position, but it was a lot less trouble if he let them protect him in the way they thought best. The soldiers formed an outer ring surrounding the three women in red leather. They wanted to be the first to encounter any attacking enemy and stop them. So, the Mord-Sith and the soldiers of the First File were both content that they had their way.
Before one of the horses could panic and bolt or throw their riders, Richard signaled everyone to dismount.
“What do you think?” Nicci asked as she leaned closer to him after she was down on the ground.
Richard’s gaze moved across the shadows back in the woods among the trees and rock outcroppings, checking for any sign of threat.
“Well, there is no mistaking that something is dead up ahead,” he finally told her. “The only question is what, or who.”
“And who did the killing,” the sorceress added.
Richard glanced over at her. “There is that.”
Even at the distance they were from whatever it was that was dead, the smell was repulsive. He supposed it could be dead animals, but the hair standing on end at the back of his neck told him otherwise.
Commander Fister held on to the reins to his horse as he stepped closer so he could whisper. “Are we close to the village?”
Richard nodded. He was on familiar ground, now. From the protection of the forested foothills, they all gazed across the open fields toward the cliff face in the distance. The mountain, thick with clinging vegetation, towered over the rough, raw rock face of the cliff.
“I don’t hear anything,” Richard said in an equally quiet voice as he leaned toward Nicci. “Can you sense anything? You should be able to sense all the people from here, shouldn’t you? You should at least to be able to sense the livestock, right?”
Nicci’s blue eyes turned from staring into the distance to look up at him. “If there were any people or animals still alive, I would be able to sense it.” She gestured to the thick trees towering over them to each side. “I can sense small animals here–some birds, a squirrel just out of sight over there, things like that. There are mice hiding down in holes under the leaf litter where we can’t see them.” She flicked a finger, gesturing out toward the fields. “There are small living things like that in the fields, but on the other side, toward the village, I don’t sense anything.”
Richard wasn’t at all surprised. That was what his intuition was telling him. Nicci’s words were all the confirmation he needed.
He drew his sword.
In the dead silence the ring of steel echoed out across the fields, announcing the arrival of the Sword of Truth in the damp late-day air.
“All right, we’re going to have to go have a look. Horses don’t like the smell of death. If we take them any closer they may panic and bolt.” He gestured with his sword. “Let’s picket them back here. Tie the leads so they can get away if they have to.”
One of the men stepped in and took the reins from Richard as he peered out across the field, scanning for any movement, any sign of life. One of the other men took Kahlan’s horse. Nicci and the three Mord-Sith handed over the reins to their horses when another man came to get them.
The rest of the men drew their weapons.
Kahlan stroked the neck of her bay mare. “Take good care of her,” she said with a smile to the soldier. “She has given me an easy ride.”
He smiled back with a nod before leading the horse back to a small open area in the woods.
Richard was already in the grip of the anger from the sword. The smell of death only served to make that rage flooding into him from the sword more urgent, joining with his own anger. Together, those twin storms of rage spiraled through him, filling him with fury to prepare him for the fight. With the power of the sword in his hand, there was no mistaking the threat that hung in the air along with the stench of death. The magic of the sword wanted to meet that threat.
Even though he didn’t really know how to command his gift, it was always there, and it always responded to his rage. He was left with a strange emptiness when his gift was out of reach. The sword served to fill that void and more.
With the sword and its power flooding through him, he felt alive with purpose.
He shared a meaningful look with Kahlan, a look they had shared before when facing unknown dangers. He wanted to see her beautiful green eyes one last time before he began the dance with death. She touched his arm in silent answer.
“If you sense anything I need to know about, speak up,” he said in a low voice as he leaned toward Nicci before starting down the path between the green fields. She hurried to step in behind him. Kahlan took up a position beside her, both knowing enough to stay out of the way of his sword. Cassia and the other two Mord-Sith followed them. The soldiers guarded the rear, protecting them from anything that might swoop out of the woods.
Richard wasn’t sure exactly what Nicci was able to sense with her gift, but he was sure that had his own gift been working he would have been able to see the aura of power crackling around
her. Even without being able to see it, it was not at all difficult for him to tell that she was on alert and would respond in a blink with withering force if need be. Kahlan was no less ready for trouble. The three Mord-Sith always expected trouble and were only surprised when there wasn’t any.
So far, though, nothing was emerging out beyond the fields–no people, no animals, and no threat.
In the distance, across the slightly rolling ground spread out before them, in the face of the rock wall rising up from the far side of the fields, Richard could make out the dark opening into the cave village of Stroyza. He didn’t see anyone standing in that opening.
When he’d left Stroyza the last time he had told the men to post a watch at all times so that no half people or walking dead could sneak up on them again. The people of the village were humble farmers who raised some livestock. They were not warriors. Even so, from up on the face of that sheer cliff, it would have been easy to repel any attackers climbing up the treacherous trail. All it would take was throwing some rocks down at any threat trying to come up to attack the village.
He should have been able to see those lookouts standing watch and also looking out for their livestock below, but he saw no one up in the cavern opening.
On the way toward the cliff, the foot trail passed between large fields, some planted with grain, some with hay, and others with vegetables and fruit trees. Some of those vegetables were mature and ready but remained unpicked. Some were past ripe. Apples, pears, and plums were turning dark, as they were past their prime. More lay rotting on the ground.
Now that they had left the protection of the forest and were out in the open among the fields, Richard felt exposed and vulnerable. The reality was that they would have been nearly as vulnerable back in the woods, but he always felt better when he was in the forests. Even though these woods were different from his Hartland woods, they were still comfortingly familiar. He knew how to live in woods, how to fight among the trees, and how to evade an enemy there.
Bugs flitted and buzzed above the grass, with orange butterflies feeding on small blue wildflowers growing among the grape vines. Swarms of bees fed on both the ripe fruit still on the trees and the rotting fruit on the ground. Other than those bugs, he saw nothing alive and no movement.
In the dead-still air thick with the stench of death, not a leaf, not a branch, not a blade of grass moved. He did hear a low hum, though. He couldn’t quite place the vaguely familiar sound.
The last time he had been in Stroyza, there had been animals in the buildings and pens at the foot of the cliff. If they were still there he didn’t hear them.
As they made their way past the fields to the split-rail fences, he found out why. Hogs lay dead in their pens. Two milk cows, their legs sticking stiffly out from their bloated bodies, lay in dirty runnels of muddy water. Bloodstained sheep were piled in a tight cluster in the corner of where a fence met a building. Dead chickens lay scattered here and there around the yards. The feathers settled everywhere atop the mud and manure reminded him a little of snow.
“What could have done this?” Kahlan whispered on their way past the dead hogs. She put her hand back over her nose. All the rest of them held up a hand or an arm, trying to block the putrid stench.
The small group made their way through a sprawling boulder field of broken rock that had built up over time as the weather had cleaved rock from the cliff face to accumulate below. In some places they had to walk single-file among the boulders, and in a few spots had to duck in turn under massive slabs of stone that over the millennia had fallen from the face of the mountain to now rest atop the jumble of boulders.
As they came around and through the clutter of boulders, Richard stopped in his tracks when he at last spotted the people of Stroyza. The buzzing noise he had heard had been clouds of flies.
The corpses lay piled in massive heaps atop one another, on top of and down between the rocks at the bottom of the cliff. They all rested wherever they had landed. Arms and legs sprawled at crazy angles. Maggots wriggled in places where flesh had split open.
The all held their noses, wincing, gagging on the putrefying stench. The air was so thick with the powerful smell he could taste it.
As he got closer, holding the crook of his arm over his nose and mouth to try to at least partially block the smell, he recognized some of the individuals. He peered out from just over his arm. These were the people who had rescued him and Kahlan. Many of them had protected and helped them. He had fought with these men to stop the animated dead that invaded their cave village.
He saw Ester, the woman who had helped him and Kahlan when they had first been brought to the village. Now, flies walked across her dead eyes staring up at the sky. Richard waved his sword over her body, chasing the flies away.
“Dear spirits, please protect these dear souls,” Kahlan whispered from right beside him. She put her hand back, pinching her nose and covering her mouth.
Richard signaled with his sword for the men to check around the piles of bodies for any who might be alive. He knew there couldn’t be anyone alive, but he had to check. From the way they were piled together and the broken bones stuck out through clothes, it looked to him that these people had all fallen from the cave opening high up on the cliff.
Commander Fister shook his head from the far side of the corpses. “Poor souls. All dead. Terrible way to die.”
“There are much worse ways,” Cassia said. “At least it looks to have been quick for these people. They didn’t suffer.”
Richard knew she was right, but that didn’t make it any easier to see all of these dead people, the entire village, all lying tangled in death below their village.
He had seen a lot of death, but this was making him feel sick.
“Do you see any wounds from a fight?” Richard asked the commander as the man made his way back around, stepping over the odd legs or arms sticking out from the bottom of the piles.
Commander Fister, looking all business now, shook his head. “It doesn’t appear to have been any kind of fight, but it’s a little hard to say for sure. If I had to hazard a guess, I’d say they all fell to their death.” He scratched the side of his neck. “Strange, though…”
“What’s strange?” Richard asked.
The commander cocked his head as he looked in at the tangled mass of corpses. “There are some dead cats in among the people.”
“Cats?” Nicci asked with a frown.
The commander nodded. “I can see eight or ten, at least.”
“There were a lot of cats living up there in the village,” Kahlan said. “They must have fallen or jumped along with the people.”
Commander Fister was frowning at the dead. “Some of the cats look like their fur has been singed off.”
“Probably decomposition,” Cassia said. “They’ve all been here for a while since they all fell from up there.”
Nicci looked up at the cave opening high above. “What I would like to know is what would make all these people jump from up there?”
“Good question,” Richard said. “Let’s go have a look.”
CHAPTER
35
Richard led the five women and twelve men to the point where the narrow path started up along the face of the rock wall. Set back behind a tangle of scrubs and small, scraggly maple trees behind the boulders, it would have been easy to miss had he not known where it was. He looked back, taking a count to make sure everyone was with him.
“Lord Rahl,” the commander said in a quiet voice, “we don’t know what sort of trouble might be up top. Why don’t you let me take the men and go up first, ahead of you?”
Richard lifted his sword along with an eyebrow to make his point that there was more safety behind the sword he carried than the soldiers.
Knowing that arguing would be useless, and realizing that Richard was probably right, the commander only sighed. “Would you like me to post any men down here to make sure no one sneaks up behind us?”
“No
. I want us to all to stay together.” Richard gestured up the cliff with his sword. “I’ve used the trail before. It would be safer if I go first, then it will be easier for you to follow after seeing the best place to step. If anyone slips and falls, it could take the rest down, so watch where I put my feet and where I use handholds. It’s really not a terribly difficult trail as long as you’re careful.”
After Commander Fister nodded, Richard began the climb upward. Kahlan followed close behind him, then the three Mord-Sith, then Nicci, then the soldiers.
There was no back door, no secondary entrance, no other way up to the cliff village of Stroyza except the path that followed along natural crags and ledges of the rock face. Where there were no natural footholds, the rock had been laboriously chipped away to create them. In places softer rock underfoot had been smoothed by the feet of people, who for thousands of years climbed and descended the cliff wall on a daily basis.
“Be careful,” Richard called back over his shoulder to those following behind. “The rock in this section is smooth and the drizzle makes it slippery along here. The people who lived here were familiar with the trail, but we aren’t. Pay attention to where you step and use these natural handholds along here, like I’m doing.”
In some places, where there were natural lifts of ledge, the path was wide enough to walk comfortably along. Even so, the path was still only wide enough for them to climb in single file. Some places were dangerously narrow and, even without the drizzle, quite treacherous. Fortunately, in those places there were iron bars pinned into the face of the rock so that particularly narrow spots didn’t feel so dangerous.
It might have been easier for Richard to climb the trail without having to hold his sword, but he didn’t want to put it away. Besides, he felt that he knew the trail well enough by now to manage with his sword out. Most of the men kept their swords out as well, so he kept an eye on them to make sure they were being careful. Some of them were as agile as mountain goats and had no difficulty. The people of Stroyza, using the trail all their lives, had been familiar enough with it to carry supplies up and down without much of a problem.