Gwen loved him for his words, which as always set her at peace, and she laid an appreciative hand on his wrist, then took it away.
They marched and marched, all of them deeper and deeper into the Great Waste, the suns creeping higher overhead, Gwen already feeling herself covered in sweat. She trembled, shaking as she went, and she no longer knew if it was from the violent change in temperature, the exhaustion, or the lack of food and water. Her mouth was so parched, it was hard to swallow; even speaking was becoming an effort.
Hour after hour passed, deeper into the Great Waste, and Gwen found herself looking down, tracing the lines in the desert floor, losing all sense of space and time. She was beginning to feel dizzy.
“UP AHEAD!” a voice suddenly cried.
Gwendolyn, yanked from her thoughts, stopped and looked up, hearing the frantic tone of the voice and knowing it must be real. As she did, she was shocked by the sight before her.
There, in the distance, something was emerging on the horizon, and at first she wondered if it were a mirage. It looked like a large mound, perhaps a hundred feet tall, with nothing else around it. It was the first object they had encountered in this endlessly empty desert.
They all picked up the pace as they walked faster and faster, encouraged, approaching the mound. They marched as one, with a renewed energy, the bickering finally stopped, Gwen’s heart pounding with excitement as they neared the structure. It rose into the sky, a dark brown color, made of a strange material Gwen could not quite understand. At first she thought it was an immense boulder, but as she got closer realized it was not. It looked as if it were made of clay.
They marched closer, till they were hardly twenty yards away.
“What do you think?” Kendrick asked, just beside her.
Gwen examined it, unsure.
“It is not a rock formation,” Aberthol chimed in. “Nor is it a structure.”
“Sandara?” Gwen asked, as she walked beside her. “This is your homeland. What is this?”
Sandara squinted, and slowly shook her head.
“I wish I knew, my lady. I’ve never been this far into the Great Waste. None of my people have. I have seen or heard nothing of this before. It is nothing I recognize.”
“Food!” one of her people yelled out.
Suddenly, there was a rush of people, all of them stampeding for the huge mound. Led by Aslin, they rushed to the mound and as they got closer, Gwen saw what they were looking at: a sap-like material oozed from it, ran down its sides, collected in a puddle at its base.
“It’s sweet!” Aslin yelled, reaching out and licking the sap with his fingers. “It tastes like honey!”
Gwen salivated at the thought, but something about this did not feel right.
“I don’t know what that mound is!” Gwen cried out, over the din. “It may not be safe! All of you, get back here! Step away until we’ve examined it closely!”
To Gwen’s surprise, though, none of her people, already convened at the mound, listened to her. Only her entourage and the Silver remained behind, obeying her.
“And why should we listen to you?” Aslin called out. “We are done listening to you and your advice!”
The crowd cheered, to Gwen’s dismay, and they continued eating, grabbing the sap hand over fist and stuffing their mouths.
“It is a mountain of honey!” another person yelled out. “We are saved!”
Gwen watched them, looking up into the sun and examining the mound, with a deep sense of foreboding.
“My lady?” Kendrick asked, turning to her. “It seems safe enough. Shall we eat?”
Gwendolyn remained where she was, a good thirty yards away, examining the mound, unsure. It all felt too good to be true. She sensed something was just not right.
Gwen began to feel a slight trembling on the desert floor beneath her feet, and began to hear a soft buzzing noise.
“Do you hear that?” she asked.
“Hear what?” Steffen asked.
“That sound…”
Suddenly, Gwen’s eyes opened wide in fear, as she realized what was happening.
“GET BACK!” she shrieked. “ALL OF YOU!” Back away from the mound NOW!”
Suddenly, before any of her people could react, the walls of the mound exploded, sending its clay everywhere, and inside it there appeared an enormous monster, bursting out of its shell.
Gwendolyn looked up, shocked to see an enormous creature, a hundred feet tall, with aqua skin, rippling muscles, and impossibly long arms. It had a face like an ox, yet with long sharp teeth, and jagged horns all up and down its jaw. Horns protruded all over it, in every direction, like a porcupine. It looked ferocious, enraged—as if awakened from a deep slumber.
It leaned back and let out a roar, and all of Gwendolyn’s people, now standing at its feet, stopped, frozen, honey dripping from their hands, all too terrified to move.
There was no time for them to react anyway. The creature suddenly swiped down with its claws, faster than Gwen imagined, and in one swipe, it killed dozens of her people. They went flying up into the air, shrieking, and fell down with a splat on the desert floor, their necks broken. It then stepped forward and stomped them to death.
“ARROWS!” Gwen commanded.
The soldiers and Silver who had remained behind with her immediately obeyed her command, stepping forward, drawing their bows and releasing their arrows, all firing for the creature’s head, Steffen and Kendrick unleashing more than the others.
Dozens of arrows pierced the creature’s face and head, and it shrieked, then reached up and tore them right out of its skin, as if they were all merely an annoyance. The monster then lunged forward, raised one arm high, made a fist, and brought it straight down like a hammer on a dozen more of Gwen’s people, the spikes on its arms impaling them on the spot.
Kendrick, Brandt, Atme, and Steffen formed a protective circle around Gwen, along with dozens of Silver, all raising their swords, bracing themselves as the creature came close.
Gwendolyn knew she had to take some dramatic action; if she didn’t do something, all of her people, she knew, would be dead within moments. She turned and looked everywhere, desperate for some solution, and she suddenly had an idea: she spotted Argon, still motionless, carried on the shoulders of healers on a stretcher, and desperate, she ran over to him.
“ARGON!” she cried out, shaking him again and again.
She was sure he would rouse, find some way to help her; he had always been there for her in times of crises.
But even he did not respond.
Gwen felt crushed, hopeless, as the beast tore through her people, killing them like ants, their screams filling her ears. This time, she was truly on her own.
“My lady!” came a frantic voice.
Gwen turned and saw Sandara standing beside her, panic in her eyes.
“I know this beast,” she said. “It has attacked my people before. It is a Mound Hatcher. There is only one way it will die: by the blood of a ruler.”
“I will do it,” Gwendolyn said, without hesitating. “I will give up my life to save my people.”
Sandara shook her head.
“You do not understand,” she said. “It does need your life. Just your blood. Give me your hand.”
Gwen reached out and opened her palm, and Sandara sliced it quickly with her dagger. Gwen cried out in pain, the cut fast and sharp, and felt the hot blood rushing from her palm.
Sandara quickly reached down and caught it in an empty vial. She then handed it to Gwen.
“It is for you to do, my lady. You must douse the beast!”
Gwendolyn grabbed the vial of blood, capping it with her thumb, and ran, rushing through all her people, avoiding the monster’s feat and spikes. The ground shook as the beast roared and stamped his foot, crushing people all around her.
“HERE!” Gwen shrieked up to it, waving her arms, trying to get its attention.
The monster finally turned and set its sight on her, lowered its head, looking her in the face as if examining her.
“Take
me
!” Gwendolyn yelled.
The monster snarled, opened its mouth wide, and came rushing down at her, as if to swallow her whole.
Gwen reached back and hurled the vial of blood with all her might; she watched with wonder as it landed inside the creature’s open mouth.
The monster stopped in midair right before it could reach her, and froze. It began to ossify, turning to stone from top to bottom, cracking as it went.
There came an explosion, and the Mound Hatcher shattered, showering down all around her, small fragments of rock and dust.
Suddenly, all was still. Gwen looked around in the chaos, the bloodshed, and saw that some of her people, at least, had survived. One more horror of this desert, at least, was behind them.
CHAPTER TWENTY ONE
Soku, commander of Volusia’s armies, could not believe the twists and turns that fate had taken. But a moon ago, he had been in command of only a few thousand soldiers, guarding the well-fortified city of Volusia, with little for him to do. It was a steady and safe position that had not changed much ever since even the time of her mother.
How much, and how quickly, things changed. Now, since Volusia’s capture of Maltolis, her gaining of two hundred thousand soldiers, the men under his command had grown far beyond what he could have expected. Their missions had grown increasingly bold, their conquests increasingly greater. At every turn Volusia had proven him wrong, had surprised him, had shown more cunning and ruthlessness than any general he had ever known.
And yet, he also was not pleased with the current state of affairs. Volusia was too unpredictable, too reckless, too fearless; he did not know what she would do moment to moment, and he did not like to take orders from people he did not understand. She had won thus far, and yet it may have all been by chance.
Most dangerous of all, she believed too much in herself, was too drunk with her own power. At first he had thought that her claiming herself to be a goddess was merely a plot, a cunning ploy to keep power over the masses. He had admired it.
Yet now, the more time he spent with her, the more he came to see that she really believed it. She really considered herself a goddess. She was growing dangerously out of touch with reality each day.
And now it had come to this: a pact with the Voks, the darkest, nastiest, least trustworthy race of all. It had been, in his view, a terrible and fateful choice. She had gone from being megalomaniacal to being delusional: she really believed that she and her two hundred thousand men could capture the capital and conquer the Empire’s millions.
Soku knew it was only a matter of time until her downfall—and he did not plan on being on the wrong side of it.
“And which path do you advise?” Volusia asked him.
Soku snapped out of it, looked up and saw Volusia staring back at him. He stood there with her large entourage of men around her, Aksan, her personal assassin, and most unnerving, Koolian, her sorcerer, who gaped back at her with his wart-lined face and glowing green eyes. She was also joined by her other commanding generals, all of them going around and around, as they had been for hours, debating the best strategy.
Soku looked down at the crude drawings etched into the desert floor at their feet, three diverging paths, each leading to three different circles, each representing a different Empire division. They’d all been debating which one to attack first. Soku knew that the best approach would be to attack the circle to the far right, the Empire’s second flank. That path led over mountains, would give them the high ground, and give them the advantage of surprise. If they took that route, they might even gain enough momentum to continue on to the capital.
But Soku did not want Volusia to win. He did not want to advise her in her best interests; he wanted this war over. He wanted her out of power. And he wanted power for himself.
Volusia did not know it yet, but Soku had already struck a deal with the Empire. He had sold her out, and he would be given power in her place. He had coordinated exactly where their armies would meet, had coordinated the truce procession that would lead to her death. All he had to do now was to sell her on it—and his path to victory would be complete. She had always trusted him; that had always been her weak point. Just like her mother before her. Volusia would be ambushed, surrounded, and vanquished, and he would be given the position of command of the Empire’s millions.
Soku cleared his throat and put on his most earnest expression.
“Goddess,” he said. “If you wish to win, there is but one path to take. Straight down the middle,” he said, outlining the path in the dirt with a stick as he spoke. “You must strike approach the capitol unashamedly, in the Valley of Skulls.”
“A foolish idea!” Aksan said.
“Suicide!” a general added. “No one else advises such counsel. It is the most obvious route.”
“Let him speak!” Volusia said, authority in her voice.
The others fell silent as she turned to him.
“Why do you counsel this, Soku?” she asked.
“Because it is the path the Empire would least expect,” he lied. “They have greater numbers, and they would never expect us to attack them head on. They will put all their strength on their flanks. You will catch them unaware, and divide their flanks. More importantly, if you approach their city head-on, they will see you coming. They will send messengers. They will send offers for a truce. You must give them a chance for a truce, Goddess. After all, there remains now no Supreme Commander of the Empire. They need a commander. They might voluntarily choose one in you. Why fight for a victory when one might be handed to you?”
Soku was impressed with his performance; he’d said it with such authority, he nearly believed it himself.
“A reckless proposition,” another general countered. “The Valley of Skulls is where the Empire is strongest. It is the very front door of the capital. It would leave us vulnerable to ambush. And the Empire will never negotiate a truce.”
“All the more reason the Empire would not expect it,” Soku replied. “And all the more reason they might offer it. When you approach from a position of strength, Goddess, they will be more inclined to embrace you as their ruler.”