A Thirst for Vengeance (The Ashes Saga, Volume 1) (21 page)

“If you have control over such functions of your body, you can easily abuse them. Do you want to feign death? Enter the Flame of Souls and stop your heart while an enemy checks your pulse. Want to hold your breath under water? Enter the Flame of Souls and delay your need to breathe.

“But it is only a mental thing, Dagan. Your brain still needs blood. Your lungs still need air. Through the Flame of Souls, you control the
process
of achieving those things, but you cannot change your
physical need
for them.

“Do you understand what I’m saying? You must be very careful. The Flame of Souls allows you unparalleled control over your body. You can dull the senses in your arm and dip it into boiling oil. Will you feel pain? No. Will you hand be ruined?
Yes
.”

I understood the dangers. They were the same ones I suspected when Blackstone started to speak. “Are you saying I shouldn’t use it, then?” I asked. “Ever?”

Blackstone shook his head. “No. It is a gift. To deny it would be madness. Just be aware that while the Flame of Souls might make you feel invincible, you are still as human as the rest of us.”

“I will,” I nodded.

“Good,” Blackstone replied. He flashed a grin. “But with this new revelation, I am confident that we can achieve everything we want tonight.”

Chapter Thirty

Blackstone told me the rest of the plan on our way there.

The Arena was divided into three levels. The spectator suites were on the upper ring. The richest and most revered patrons had the privilege of watching from there. Three-Grin, along with the other slavers, would be the guests of honor tonight.

The second level was comprised of all the benches I had seen circling the fighting ground. There, some twenty-odd-thousand people would sit and cheer.

The third and final level made up the pens where the fighters were kept. Blackstone and I had planted explosives there earlier.

Hours before the fight, bets would start to pour in. The odds of each fighter were posted on a board outside. It was organized by the less-than-reputable bankers of the city.

You would think that an event of this size would draw the attention of Hallengard’s rulers at some point. You’d be right. It had. However, the organizers of the Arena had established a kind of uneasy allegiance with the ruling class that let the Arena function.

The fights satisfied the people’s thirst for blood. They prevented the lower and middle class from growing bored and stirring up real trouble. The children who served as fighters were nobodies. They had no homes, no families, no mothers or fathers to care for them. They were raised only to fight.

In return for turning a blind eye, the city’s rulers received very generous donations after each fight—sometimes, as much as half of total earnings. Enough money poured in for the organizers to afford such a hefty tax.

The bets closed half an hour before the first fight. All the money collected would be transported to a secure storage room on the highest level. It would be tallied, and a portion of it would be divvied up in anticipation of the night’s winners. The rest of it filled the pockets of all those involved in the fighting ring.

Blackstone had his sights on that storage room.

The plan was simple: Start a fire in the upper levels that would spread through the rest of the Arena. Break into the storage room in the ensuing commotion. Get out before the barrels beneath the Arena blew.

I would serve as a decoy. The slavers were allowed a special place, separate from the rest of the crowd. Anybody could claim to be a slaver if they provided a child as sacrifice. Three-Grin and the other three simply had a special position because they were the best.

Blackstone would enter me into the fights. I was a little old, but he said if I acted meek and kept my head down, we shouldn’t have any trouble overcoming that. It would grant him access to the slaver’s spectator platform. He would sneak to the highest level from there.

My job was to light the barrels we’d planted at the proper time. The fire Blackstone would start should reach the lower levels and cause the barrels to blow eventually, but we didn’t want to leave that to chance.

Blackstone outfitted a crude rope around my neck to serve as a leash. He held the other end. That is how we made our way through the streets that night.

As we got closer to the Hells, the crowds thickened. Anybody could tell there was something special going on tonight.

We passed the building where I saw the cart deliver the children, then turned down a side alley. I looked over my shoulder and saw the stream of people passing the entrance on the main street. The crowd was loud and lively. The smell of alcohol permeated the air.

“Remember,” Blackstone reminded me under his breath, “you’re deaf, mute, and dumb.”

I nodded in reply, starting the act early.

“And keep your head down like I said.”

I lowered my eyes until I could see nothing but the dirt on my boots.

Blackstone banged his fist against a decrepit wooden door. After a few seconds, a sliding eyehole came open. A man regarded us from inside.

“What do you want?” he asked in a strangely squeaky voice.

Blackstone tugged on my leash, and I stumbled forward. “This pissling’s been nothin’ but trouble for me,” he said, in another of his peasant accents. “He’s lazy. He don’t work. He can’t speak, and he’s dumb as rocks.” Blackstone hit me upside the head to demonstrate. I feigned a whimper. “Meek, too. Won’t life a finger against a soul.”

The man behind the door chuckled. “And you want me to take him off your hands. That what you’re saying?”

“He’s not the best fighter,” Blackstone conceded, “but he can be one of the early sacrifices t’get the crowd goin’. What d’ya say?”

“Let me take a look at him,” the man answered. The viewer slid closed. I heard a scraping sound from inside. After a few seconds, the door opened.

The man who emerged stood halfway to Blackstone’s chest.

He was an imp. I had to smooth my features forcibly lest I be caught staring. I’d never seen a little person before.

He waddled up to me and took my chin in his hand. I shied away, remembering Blackstone’s reminder about
meekness
. His grip tightened, and he forced my eyes to his.

I tried to look frightened.

“How old is he?” the imp ask.

“Don’t know,” Blackstone said. “I found ‘im when he was halfway grown, and had ‘im for three years.”

“Hmph.” The imp stuck his finger in my mouth. He peered at my teeth.

“Still got some of his baby molars,” he said.

“I reckon he’d be about seven, maybe eight,” Blackstone pointed out.

“Nah.” The imp shook his head. “Look at his face. His features are maturing.” He took hold of my chin again and turned it toward Blackstone. “He’s got to be at least ten. Maybe as old as twelve.”

My heart sank in my chest. If I was too old, they wouldn’t allow me in.

“I don’t expect a premium for ‘im,” Blackstone said. “Jus’ a few dimes would be enough.”

The imp barked a laugh. “You want
dimes
for this runt? He better shit gold to be worth that much.”

Blackstone tugged on the leash and yanked me toward him. “Too bad. I’d heard the Arena was lookin’ for extra fighters tonight.” He pulled me after him as he started to walk away. “I can still sell him as a galley slave and get more than that,” he muttered under his breath.

“Wait, wait, hold on, get back here,” the imp said. “I didn’t say I don’t want him. Just that your price is too high.”

Blackstone crossed his arms. “And what would you offer?”

“One dime,” the imp said.

Blackstone turned and began down the alley.

“Okay, okay, wait! I’ll give you two,” the imp corrected. “Two dimes for the brat. You’ve got the look of an educated man about you. Y’know the kid’s over age. I’ll give you two dimes, and no more.”

“Two and a third,” Blackstone said.

The imp grumbled. “Two dimes and a silver penny. I won’t go higher than that.”

Blackstone stuck his hand out. “My friend,” he said, “you’ve got yourself a deal.”

***

The imp yanked on my leash and I stumbled and fell. He turned around to kick at me.

“Get up, you useless sack of rotting bones,” he cursed. He tugged the leash. “I said, get up!”

I staggered to my feet, doing my best to appear beaten. We were in a narrow corridor a few levels beneath the earth. Torches along the walls provided light.

“Good,” he said. He turned away and continued on, pulling me after him.

He was shorter than me, fat, and stubby. My finger felt the hilts of the knives hidden in my clothes. I could kill him before he even turned around.

Instead, I kept my head down and trailed after him.

He led me through a series of doors, all of which were unlocked. The final one brought us to a dark, horrific place.

There were cages all around us. Each one had a child inside. Some bawled, some stared, and others appeared to be already dead.

The stink of human decay clung heavy to the air. The cages were stacked upon each other three-high.

The imp led me to an unoccupied one at the end of the room. He kicked the door open and shoved me in. I fell. My hands and knees splashed in urine.

He knelt down to work on the lock. Every once in a while the ceiling shook as a distant cheer sounded in the air.

“You hear that?” The imp grinned. “That’s the crowd calling for your blood. I wouldn’t get too comfortable. It’ll be your turn up there, soon.”

He didn’t know I had no intention of dying that night.

He clamped the lock shut and walked away. I waited until he was out of the room to reach for my knives.

I sawed through the rope snug around my throat. When it fell, I felt like I could take my first deep breath in hours. So, I did.

That was a mistake. The putrid stench around me filled my nostrils and burned my tongue. I gagged and almost retched.

Steadying myself against the bars, I waited a few seconds to get used to the smells. Then, I turned around and extracted the long metal wire that was embedded inside the rope. There was not much light in the room, but even so, it didn’t take me longer than a minute to pick the lock and free myself.

Blackstone had taught me well.

Next, I waited. The fighters for the first round had already been selected. There would be six matches before the intermission. That break would give Blackstone the opportunity to sneak up to the highest levels. It would also be when the imp returned to wheel out the next group. They would go right before the championship fight—the one Three-Grin was here to watch.

As I waited, I tried not to see all the human faces around me. Blackstone told me the slaves could not be saved. Leaving them to their fate dug at me. I tried to push those feelings down, the same way I kept the pain in my leg at bay. But, I couldn’t. Not fully. Getting rid of the sense of injustice was, for some reason, a lot harder than ignoring the screaming agony of my wound.

When the cheers stopped coming, I knew the intermission had begun. I scrambled out of the cage and ducked behind it, hiding in the shadows.

The imp returned minutes later. I cursed when I saw he wasn’t alone. Two large, bulky men with skin the color of
kaf
trailed him. They had a trolley between them with wheels on the bottom.

The imp went around the room, pointing out different cages. “This one, this one, and this one,” he said, jabbing a fat finger out each time. The two men picked those cages up and deposited them onto the cart.

I tensed as they neared mine. The imp hadn’t noticed I was gone. “This one, this one, that one,” he continued. The two men ran to do his bidding.

I gripped the hilts of my knives tightly. I judged the newcomers to be the greater threats. I edged sideways, positioning myself so I was right in front of them…

“HEY!” the imp cried out. “Hey, this cage’s empty!”

That was my cue. One knife flew from my hand. It flashed through the air and found one of the big man’s throats. He fell to the ground, dead.

His friend snarled and whipped around. “There!” he cried, pointing at me. I did not have the right angle to throw at him, so I shoved my shoulder in the stack of cages separating us and pushed. They toppled forward and crashed to the ground.

I heard moans erupt from the children around me, but no cries. I didn’t have time to consider the significance of that as I leapt out and threw my next knife.

The large man was moving toward me. He saw the blade in the air, and twisted sideways just in time to avoid it. It skimmed his arm and lodged itself into the wooden bars of another cage.

But I was prepared for that. No sooner had the first knives left my hands than two more were there. I rolled to the side as the large man smashed through the cages to try to get to me, and threw.

One knife landed in his ribs. He roared, but the sound only lasted the half-second it took for the next one to sink into his throat.

His hands clutched at his neck. But, he was already forgotten to me. I leapt over the upturned cages, my eyes focusing on the imp.

He had a cudgel in one hand. It wouldn’t do much good against an enemy with a real weapon, but as it were, I was unarmed. Blackstone had only managed to hide four throwing knives on me before we left.

I landed on the floor next to the first body. My wounded leg gave out. Pain tore at the surface of that faraway knot, trying to break free. I fell. The imp saw his chance and rushed me.

He did not get far. I’d aimed my jump so that if I fell, I’d be within arm’s reach of the first blade. I pulled it out of the dead man’s throat and threw.

It spun over itself in the air before stopping with a dull
thud
right between the imp’s eyes. The short man crumpled down, dead on the spot.

I sagged back. My heart thundered in my chest and I was panting. Forcibly, I slowed my breathing and my heartbeat. I was just about to get up when a crash from the side made my head whip around.