Terry Goodkind - Phantom - Chainfire Trilogy Part 2

“Soldiers were everywhere, pawing through the residue left behind by yet other soldiers, picking over the dead, looting anything they could carry off, smashing elegant decorations out of sheer contempt, joking as they stood in lines outside rooms waiting their turn at the women captives. As I stumbled in a daze through the wreckage of the palace, I kept expecting to be grabbed and dragged off to one of those rooms. I knew that there was no avoiding my fate.

“I had never seen the likes of these men. These were men who inspired unbridled terror. Great, hulking, unwashed men in scarred and bloodstained leather armor. Most of them were covered in chains and belts and studded straps. Many had their heads shaved, making them look all the more muscled and menacing. Others glared out from beneath mats of long, tangled strands of greasy hair. They all looked savage and hardly human. Their faces were blackened with the grimy soot of fires and streaked through with sweat. Their language was loud, coarse, and boldly vile.

“Seeing such men stalking through the grand pastel pink or blue rooms seemed almost comical, but there was nothing amusing about the bloody axes at their belts, their swords greasy with gore, or the flails, knives, and iron-spiked cudgels hanging at hand around their waists.

“But it was their eyes that stopped you in your tracks. All had the kind of eyes that had not just become comfortable with the messy craft of butchery . . . but had taken a lustful liking to it. All looked upon every living thing they saw with a single evaluation: is this something to be killed? But their eyes had an even crueler cast when they took in any of the women captives being passed from hand to hand. That look was enough to stop a woman’s breath, if not her heart.

“These were men who had abandoned any pretense at civilized manner. They did not bargain or barter the way normal men did. They took whatever they wanted, and even fought each other over the most insignificant plunder. They crushed and destroyed and killed on whim without consequence or conscience. These were men beyond the realm of civilized morality. These were savage brutes turned loose among the innocent.”

“If there were soldiers everywhere, then why didn’t they snatch you and drag you off?” Cara asked with the kind of casual yet pointed directness that only a Mord-Sith could so effortlessly muster, as if the very concept of propriety was beyond her.

The same question had occurred to Richard, but at that moment he had not been able to summon his voice.

“They thought she had been designated as a servant,” Nicci said in a quiet, knowing voice. “Since she was walking around unmolested that long after the onset of the assault, the men would have assumed that there was a good reason, that those in command had reserved her for other duties.”

Jebra nodded. “That’s right. An officer who spotted me right off pulled me into a room with other men who were gathered around maps spread out over tables. The room hadn’t been ruined as had most of the others. They demanded to know where their food was, as if I should know.

“They were just as ferocious-looking as the rest of the men and I would not have known at first that they were the officers except by the deference paid them by the other soldiers who came and went with reports. Some of these officers were a bit older and had an even harder edge to them, a more calculating look in their eyes, than the regular soldiers who always gave them a wide berth. When they looked at me I knew they were men who expected immediate answers.

“I grasped at that glimmer of hope—that I might live if I played along. I bowed with an apology and told them I would see to the food at once. They said that I had better, apparently more interested in eating than dealing out punishment. I rushed off to the kitchens, trying to act with a sense of purpose while being careful not to run for fear that the men would see a woman running and react like wolves to a fawn bolting from cover.

“There were several hundred others in the kitchens, mostly older men and women. Many of them I recognized, as they had long cooked for the palace. There were younger, stronger men there as well who were needed to manage some of the work that was too heavy for the scullions or the elderly, work such as handling the carcasses for butchering or turning the heavy spits. They were all working frantically among the roaring fires and steaming pots as if their lives depended on it, which of course they did.

“When I entered the kitchens people hardly noticed me, as they were all rushing about, preoccupied in various tasks. Seeing everyone was already working at a fever pitch, I grabbed up a large platter of meats and offered to take it back up to the men. The people in the kitchens were only too happy to have someone else who was willing to go out among the soldiers.

“When I returned with the food the officers who had sent me abandoned what they had been doing. They appeared to be ravenously hungry. They sprang up from the couches and chairs and used their bare, filthy hands to snatch the meat off the tray. As I set the heavy tray on one of the large tables, one of the men peered up at me as he chewed a mouthful. He asked why I didn’t have a ring in my lip. I didn’t know what he was talking about.”

“They put rings through the lower lips of slaves,” Nicci said. “It marks them as the property of men of rank and keeps the soldiers from taking them as plunder. It gives those in command servants at their disposal for menial work.”

Jebra nodded. “The officer yelled orders. A man grabbed me and held me while another came forward. He pulled my lower lip out and shoved an iron ring through.”

Nicci stared off into the distance. “They use iron as a reference to iron kettles and such. An iron ring signifies kitchen workers and such.”

Richard saw the glaze of suppressed rage in Nicci’s blue eyes. She, too, had once worn a ring through her lower lip, although hers had been gold to denote that she was the personal property of Emperor Jagang. It was no honor. Nicci had been used for things far worse than menial tasks.

“You’re right about that,” Jebra said. “After they put the ring in my lip I was sent back to the kitchens to get them more food and wine. I realized then that the other people in the kitchen wore iron rings as well. I was in a numb daze as I ran back and forth to get the officers what they demanded. I snuck a gulp of water or a mouthful of food whenever I could. It was enough to save me from collapse.

“I found myself thrown in with other frightened people who worked at the palace who were now taking orders from the officers. I hardly had time to consider how I had by chance managed to escape a worse fate. As much as it throbbed and bled, I was glad to have that iron ring through my lip because when any soldier saw it he changed his mind about his intentions and let me be.

“Before long I was sent out with heavy satchels of food and drink for officers in other areas of the city. Out in the countryside surrounding the city I began to discover the true extent of the horror that had befallen Ebinissia.”

When Jebra sank into a distant daze, Richard asked, “What did you see?”

She looked up at him, as if she had almost forgotten that she was telling her story, but then she swallowed back her anguish and went on. “Outside the city walls there were tens of thousands of dead from the battles. The ground for as far as the eye could see was covered with mangled corpses, many bunched in groups where they had died making their last stand. The sight seemed unreal, but I had already seen it before . . . in my vision.

“The worst of it, though, was that there were a number of Galean soldiers still alive, though grievously wounded. They lay here and there on the field of battle beside their dead brethren, wounded and unable to move. Some moaned softly as they lay near death. Others were more alert, but unable to move for one reason or another. One man was trapped, his legs crushed under the weight of a broken wagon. Another had been pinned to the ground by a spear through his gut. Even though in great pain, he wanted so desperately to live that he dared not pull himself off the shaft and release what it held in place. Others had legs or arms so badly broken that they were unable to crawl over the chaos of dead soldiers, horses, and rubble. With soldiers constantly patrolling, I knew that if I stopped to offer any comfort or aid to these wounded men I would be spotted and killed.