Blood of the Fold

The arriving men were dressed in their finest robes, coats, or furs. Though some wore ornate swords, Tobias was sure they were only decoration and doubted that a one of them had ever been drawn in fear, much less anger. As an occasional wrap billowed open, he could see that the women were attired in elegant, layered gowns, the setting sun glinting off the jewels at their necks, wrists, and fingers. It would appear they were all so excited to be invited to the Confessors' Palace to meet the new Lord Rahl that they had not elicited a threat from the D'Haran soldiers. By their smiles and chatter, they all seem anxious to ingratiate themselves with the new Lord Rahl.

Tobias ground his teeth. "If you don't stop scratching, I'll tie your hands behind your back."

Lunetta dropped her hands to her sides and stopped with a gasp. Tobias and Galtero looked up to see bodies impaled on poles to each side of the promenade ahead. As the three of them approached, he realized they weren't men, but scaled creatures only the Keeper could have conceived. As they proceeded, a stink enveloped them, as thick as a bog mist, making them fear to draw a breath lest it blacken their lungs.

Some of the poles held only heads, some held whole bodies, and others parts of bodies. All appeared to have been killed in a brutal battle. Some of the beasts had been ripped open, and several were cleaved completely in two, their innards hanging frozen from what was left of them.

It was like stepping through a monument to evil, through the gates to the underworld.

The other guests covered their noses as best they could with whatever they had handy. A few of the finely dressed women sank to the ground in a swoon; attendants rushed to their aid, fanning them with handkerchiefs or rubbing a bit of snow on their foreheads. Some of the people stared in astonishment while others shuddered so violently that Tobias could hear their teeth rattling. By the time they had run the gauntlet of sights and smells, everyone around them was in a state of either high anxiety or open alarm. Tobias, having often walked among evil, regarded his fellow guests with disgust.

When a shaken diplomat asked, one of the D'Harans to the side explained that the creatures had attacked the city, and Lord Rahl had slain them. The mood of the guests brightened. As they moved on, their voices became exuberant as they chatted about the honor of meeting such a man as the new Lord Rahl, the Master of all of D'Hara. Effervescent chuckles drifted on the chilling air.

Galtero leaned close. “While I was out earlier, before all the chanting, and the soldiers around the city were still talkative, they told me to be wary, that there had been attacks by unseen creatures, and a number of their men, as well as people on the streets, had been killed."

Tobias remembered the old woman telling him that scaled creatures, he couldn't recall what she had called them, had begun to appear out of the air to gut anyone in their way. Lunetta had said that the woman's words were true. These must be the creatures.

"How convenient of Lord Rahl to arrive just in time to slay the creatures and save the city."

"Mriswith," Lunetta said. "What?"

"The woman said that the creatures be called mriswith."

Tobias nodded. "Yes, I believe you're right: mriswith."

White columns towered outside the entrance to the palace. The ranks of soldiers to each side funneled them through white, carved doors spread wide, and into a grand hall lit with windows of pale blue glass set between polished white marble columns topped with gold capitals. Tobias Brogan could feel himself being sucked into the belly of evil. The other guests, had a one of them known better, would be shuddering at the living monument to profanity that surrounded them, instead of dead carcasses.

After a journey through elegant halls and chambers with enough granite and marble to build a mountain, they at last passed through tall mahogany doors to enter an enormous chamber capped with a huge dome. Ornate frescoes of men and women Swept across the ceiling overlooking the assembly. Round windows around the lower edge of the dome let in the waning light and revealed clouds gathering in a darkening sky. Across the room, on a semicircular dais, the chairs behind the resplendent, carved desk sat empty.