He knew the army of the dead had come to help him. They had come at last, just as he prophesied. They had invaded Istar at his orders, and were wait shy;ing for him.

Heartened, the raving Prophet wound his way through the intricate streets, past tavern and booth and vendors' wagons, always moving toward the center of the city where, through the fretted purple smoke, the looming spires of the Kingpriest's Tower dodged in and out of view.

His city. His Tower. He would meet this usurping Kingpriest face-to-face. As equals, who spoke to the gods, who commanded innumerable legions.

Into the Marketplace Fordus rushed. A passing squadron of Istarian soldiers startled, dropped their weapons, and dispersed as the haunted, robed man rushed at them silently, like some dangerous wind from the desert.

It lay directly before him now: the great Tower with its ancient marble foundations, low surround shy;ing wall… and bolted iron gates.

Muttering distractedly, Fordus rattled the bars across the archway. Then, like a spider, he scrambled over the wall.

And found himself in yet another maze-this time of thick foliage and lush, overgrown garden rows of evergreen and climbing vine.

Drawing his throwing axe, Fordus cut his way through the Kingpriest's private wilderness, slash shy;ing and hacking, his anger rising until his hand touched cold marble, his axe splintering with a blind, furious blow against the strong foundation of the Tower itself.

For a moment the Prophet rested his head against the cold stone, choking and gasping for air.

Had the smoke come this far?

He looked up the Tower. Faint murky tendrils encircled the spire, and its looming top was lost in a higher haze, but directly above was the dark of a window. Instantly, resolutely, using only his fingers and toes, Fordus began to climb.

Through the smoke and the damaged landscape, Stormlight followed.

Wading through the burning fields, he traced a long, looping path around the flames, the massacred rebels, the ignited Sixth Legion, and found his way to the damaged gates of Istar-to the same portal through which the Prophet had passed.

Istar loomed inside them, unreal and dark. Trac shy;ing a roundabout path through the concentric pen shy;tagonal walls of the inner city, he approached its epicenter, its heart: the marble tower that housed the Kingpriest.

For that was Fordus's destination. Stormlight was sure of it. And sure, from the years of affinity between Prophet and interpreter, in which their minds had virtually melded in the search for water, for victory, for hidden dangers, that his old compan shy;ion was still alive.

Alive, and bound for the end of his journey.

At the very window toward which Fordus climbed, Takhisis waited, breathing cold life into the crystalline form of Tamex. Her hours as a warrior of salt and sand were dwindling. Already Tamex crumbled at the edges, two of his fingers broken off in the mere act of opening the door to this sparely appointed guest chamber.

Yes, the both of them waited there-the translu shy;cent warrior and his animating spirit.

But there was another as well. A blue-eyed, bald shy;ing man who cowered in the corner of the chamber, nervously fraying the lace on his high priest's robes.

Tamex had wakened him from his unsettling mid-morning slumber, where he dreamt trees as things with daggers, brooks and streams thickening and darkening in the red moon. He had almost been grateful to awaken, until he saw his visitor, translu shy;cent and eroding, at the foot of his bed.

He whimpered once, most unroyally. Fumbling for the broadsword in which the druid had instructed him all these years, he clutched the pommel desperately, but it was as though his arms had failed him-the sword was heavy and his hands trembled.

Tamex had dragged the Kingpriest from his sump shy;tuous quarters, imprisoning him in this room to wait out the last of the night, the sunrise, the first blood of the battle. Then, coming down from the walls, the crystal warrior had joined his captive in a meeting he knew would be brief.

Now Fordus climbed the last few feet toward the window. Tamex glanced once at the Kingpriest, whose sea-blue eyes widened at the sound of some shy;thing scraping beneath the sill.

Good, the goddess thought, swirling slowly in her body of salt.

Good. It is time for them to meet.

* * * * *

Fordus climbed through the window.

Moving quickly, his eyes adjusting to the shadows of the room, the Prophet saw two figures at the far door. One was Tamex, the man in the salt flats-the dark and menacing warrior who had trifled with Larken in the battle's aftermath.

Fordus crouched, prepared for battle. But then he noticed the other.

The older man-the balding, robed dignitary-he had seen somewhere, he was certain. The face lay half-shadowed, but the curious sunlight in the room illumined the man's eyes.

Sea-blue. The color of Fordus's own.

Cautiously, the Prophet approached them, draw shy;ing his dagger.

"At last," Tamex said, with a voice that resonated out of Fordus's memory-a voice he recalled from a vision, a dream.

He shrank from its sound.

"At last," Tamex repeated, raising a cracked and crumbling hand. "I have brought us all together."

With astonishment, Fordus saw that the warrior- the creature-before him was a thing of rock and crystal, a breathing stone with a stone's heart.

The thing gestured toward its white-robed com shy;panion. "Bow before the Kingpriest of Istar, Fordus Firesoul."

"The Prophet bows to no man," Fordus replied coldly, knuckles whitening as his grip on the dagger tightened.

"But honor is due the Kingpriest," Tamex insisted melodiously. "A natural honor that rises . . . from a forgotten time."

"You talk in riddles, false warrior," Fordus replied.

"Who is this man, Tamex?" asked the Kingpriest nervously, and the pale man turned his faceted face to the cowering ruler.

"This is the one who would have your throne, such as it is," Tamex announced. "This is Fordus, the Desert Prophet."

"Wh-What do you want of me?" the Kingpriest stammered, backing hard against the wall and the nearby door. "I intend you no harm, no slight. Stay away from my throne!" His fingers fumbled vaguely for the latch.

"You will remain!" ordered Tamex, a new, cold authority in his voice. It delighted and amused the goddess within him to humiliate the ruler of a vast empire, but the cravenness of the Kingpriest was sometimes . . . inconvenient.

In disgust and contempt, Fordus watched the robed man grovel. Why, the Kingpriest, his chosen enemy, was nothing but a coward! A thing of robes and her shy;aldry and high renown-no more than a figurehead, an elegant glove for his general's iron hand.

"And are you any better, false Prophet?" asked Tamex, his glittering amber eyes turned toward For shy;dus. "You accuse me of speaking in riddles . . . you! The mirage of the desert, the mockery of a Prophet!"

"You dare call me a mockery?" Fordus asked men shy;acingly, taking a long, aggressive stride toward the warrior.

"Oh, yes, Fordus Firesoul. You are a mockery. And many other foolish things."

With a brittle arm, Tamex seized the Kingpriest by the nape and dragged him into full light. Now For shy;dus and his adversary looked at one another face-to-face, and the slow light of recognition dawned in each man's eyes.

"That is correct, Your Eminence," Tamex sneered. "The son of a slave girl you wished so … devoutly to forget. And when the time came, you took the child-no, you had the child taken-to the desert, and there, in a lonely place where predators stalked and the sun was nigh and merciless . .."

"No!" the Kingpriest cried, covering his ears.

In astonishment, Fordus dropped his dagger. The world seemed to rock and, tumble around him, as though once again, huge cracks opened in the earth-molten crevasses, threatening to engulf and swallow him. He staggered, fell against the far wall.