The Warrior King (Book 4) by Michael Wallace Read Free Book Online

the morning sun rising over the blasted land, witnessed through the hazy cloud over his eyes. What he’d taken before for the fog of a deep sleep passing had become his permanent vision.
    They were riding through the Desolation of Toth. Roderick had only glimpsed it before from the Tothian Way as the road carved a magical passageway through the ruined, dead kingdom of Aristonia, left so destroyed by the Tothian Wars that it had become a dead land, haunted by mindless, gibbering wights. The Harvester himself couldn’t gather souls in the Desolation.
    Even though the sun itself looked dim in the sky, and the massive, billowy cloud with its castles and windmills seemed gray and faded, like the colors of an old painting that had been rotting in the cellar of a derelict castle, he was surprised by how clearly he could see the features of the Desolation itself. There were people and beasts among the ruins. Peasants tended fields, and soldiers rode horses. A boy drove a herd of goats across a field, and when the goats stopped, they dropped their heads to pull at the grass.
    Except there was no grass, only sand. There were no fields, either, and the women sweeping their houses were only passing invisible brooms over the rubble of gutted cottages. The soldiers rode their horses in straight lines across roads that no longer existed, and hadn’t for hundreds of years. Most curiously, Roderick could only see the people and animals when he stared straight at them. As he turned his head, they faded even before they’d reached his peripheral vision, while other people appeared instead. Whenever he stopped focusing and cast his gaze across the entire landscape, all he could see was dead, dry land and empty ruins.
    Roderick rode in a company of ravagers, with Pradmort next to him, and two more men in front. The captain stared straight ahead without acknowledging that the other man had just awakened. Roderick opened his mouth to speak and was surprised by the words that came out.
    “Master, how do we travel through the Desolation without attracting attention from the wights? Why don’t they attack us?”
    The man glared at him. “Speak when spoken to.”
    A tide of uncontrollable emotions swept over Roderick at the insult, and he found the sword at his waist and drew it. It was a heavy, evil thing with a red sheen like blood. It reminded him of his brother Whelan’s sword, Soultrup, except dark and wicked. He lifted the blade to strike.
    Pradmort lifted a hand. “Enough. Save your emotions for when we train. Put the sword away.”
    A flush of loyalty washed over him, and shame that he would lift his sword against this man who had brought him back to life. A small voice noted this reaction with alarm. Roderick, what are you doing? Have you gone mad?  
    But the voice blinked out as soon as he noted it. He slid the sword into its scabbard. “Yes, my master.”
    One of the other men looked over his shoulder and stared hard at Roderick before saying to the captain, “So you were right. He has kept his mind. I’d have thought he would become one of the mindless ones.”
    “He is a prince, the brother of kings,” Pradmort said, unperturbed that this other man had spoken first, unlike the injunction against Roderick. “His mind is strong.”
    Roderick kept his eyes on the road ahead of him, wondering, but not asking what they were talking about.
    The captain must have felt his question and deemed it worthy of answer. “Many men cannot stand the magic that binds together body and soul. The first test—in your case, the dogs—drives them mad. They become the mindless ones.”
    He nodded over his shoulder, and Roderick looked back to see the bulk of the company, most of whom rode behind, their eyes glazed and staring straight ahead as if not seeing. It reminded him of that horrifying battle where he’d been killed, when the enemy knights had come at him relentlessly, wordlessly, as if ordered by some unseen force, but carrying no more