Bloodfire (The Sojourns of Rebirth) (35 page)

The Emperor tsked and said “Hush, child, there’s plenty of
time for that. How is it that you’ve survived? How long since you
lost...this?” and she felt his hand wave in front her face once more.
She hesitated. She didn’t wish to tell this man a thing
about her life. This man, who was ultimately responsible for
everything that happened in this horrible place. This man, who
had fostered the kind of cruelty which had led to her parent’s
deaths, who had ordered his man Ortis to kill Silena’s entire
family, who had built a world where a soldier could abandon a
child to a life of hell in the name of an Empire.
And all of it, for what?
she wanted to shout in his face.
She could feel his tension building. He was not used to
being made to wait for answers to his questions, she was sure. She
thought about letting him squirm some more, but finally she
remembered that she wanted to be done with it all.
“I lost my sight six sojourns ago.”
Uriel’s tension transformed into something unusual and
unexpected: awe. He was genuinely radiating admiration.
“Six? So long? But surely you have had help all this time.
Someone to rely on?”
She shook her head, growing weary of this man’s mind
games and unwilling to play any more. He sighed when she chose
not to elaborate on her answer.
“Very well, you wish to keep your secrets, and you shall be
allowed to, for now. They mean nothing to me. Show me the item.
Slowly.” With that, the Emperor set his feet and she could smell
his demeanor change to one of dangerous potential. His scent was
unlike anything she had experienced before, but she couldn’t place
exactly why it was so unique.
Catelyn slowly removed her pack from her shoulder, and
reached a hand inside. The Emperor tensed, anticipating some
kind of trap, but Catelyn simply drew out the small weapon case.
She held it briefly, then extended her hands and passed it to the
Emperor.
He grabbed the case with one hand, and with the other
reached out and grabbed her by the wrist. Catelyn was shocked to
discover exactly how fast and how strong he was as she winced in
pain from his sudden and forceful grip.
“You will tell me everything about how you acquired such
a thing, and you will tell me how you survived for so long before I
string your guts from the top of my tower. You have...secrets. I can
see them written upon your face. Soon, they will be mine.”
The Emperor let go of her wrist, and turned on his heel
with the case in hand. Catelyn reached down to rub her wrist,
when suddenly she heard the Emperor stop, turn back and stride
back toward her until he stood a hand’s width from her. He arched
his head forward, and Catelyn got the sense that he was smelling
her, and she heard him inhale deeply through his nose. She felt her
heart thumping loudly beneath her breast, and she could hear his
breath quicken as he sniffed two more times.
Catelyn felt his rage spring up from nowhere, and then she
was doubled over in pain as he smashed his fist into her stomach,
sending shooting pain through her middle. She felt radiating
waves of pain from the blow, and she heard Silena audibly yelp
from nearby, but Catelyn willed her to remain quiet, to stay hidden
in plain sight for the sake of everyone gathered in the square, and
she did. She felt the Emperor’s hands reach out and grab her head
scarf, and he yanked it free, revealing her dirty hair, and the
winding scars across her face.
Shocked cries could be heard from all around her as the
citizens saw her for who she really was. They saw her ruined face
and eyes, they saw her red hair, a clear defiance of the man
standing before her. She could imagine his face contorting with
rage as he spat venomous words at her.
“I knew it. I could smell your filthy hair through those foul
rags. What...what were...you...
thinking
?” Another powerful blow
landed in her midsection and she collapsed as the wind was
expelled from her and she again felt herself get light headed from
the shock and the pain. She felt his hand on the side of her face,
and he pulled her chin up to face him, and that’s when she heard
the Emperor gasp in surprise.
His free hand moved to her face, and traced the flowing
scars across her face and over her eyes. She shied away from his
touch, wishing that he would just kill her and be done with it
rather than continue to draw this out even further but he gripped
her shirt with his other hand holding her in place for his
inspection. His touch was shockingly intimate, and made Catelyn’s
skin crawl in discomfort.
“We are full of surprises, aren’t we?” he asked breathily,
but only loud enough for her to hear.
Uriel took his hand away and waved it to signal one of his
men over, and then there were three breaths of awkward silence,
as Catelyn waited for the end, anticipating her imminent death.
The soldier that had been called over stopped just behind her, and
snapped to attention.
“See that she is taken to my chambers immediately. She is
to be restrained there until I command otherwise.”
Catelyn felt a wave of panic at the prospect of what the
Emperor had planned for her, and she reached out with her
bubble, but he revealed nothing of his plans to her senses as he
turned and walked away. She sensed him store the case in a
saddle bag before mounting his horse. The soldier he had
commanded grabbed her arm and was leading her away, and she
turned to find Silena with her bubble. The older woman was
watching her being led away by the Imperials, trying to remain
calm but Catelyn could sense that she was completely
overwhelmed by fear. Catelyn wasn’t sure what else to do, but she
silently mouthed “Thank you”, and then she was obscured as the
Imperial soldier shoved her along, his rough hands clamped on her
upper arm, shoving her toward the Imperial Citadel.
Catelyn turned her head toward the east, to the massive
fortress where she knew the Emperor made his home, and tried
not to imagine the pain and torment that was surely going to be in
her future, for the rest of her very short life.

Ortis watched as the thief, as Catelyn, was led away by one
of his former soldiers, and then was joined and flanked by the
remaining men of his unit, until the girl was surrounded by an
entire fist of men. Ortis would not be able to get her away from
them without instigating a full blown massacre. These were his
own men, and at least half of them he had hand-picked for their
ferocity and skill in battle. He was confident that he could prevail
in a conflict with these men, but not without significant collateral
damage.

As so often happened when it came to his thief, despite the
girl’s command and for reasons he didn’t fully understand, he
hadn’t done as she had commanded. He felt a twinge of shame at
having lied to her, but some larger purpose moved in him now,
and he had remained in the marketplace and had most definitely
not forgotten about her forever.

He found himself processing the events of their brief
meeting. Ortis didn’t know what had overtaken him, to have
prostrated himself before her, begging her to command him. Ortis
hadn’t even been that deferential when he had first met Uriel
many sojourns ago. Oh, he had given of himself and his men
completely, but at that time, it had been awe which had prompted
him to make such an offer. This time, with the girl, it was as
though some invisible hand had moved him from within. He
hadn’t known what had so moved him, but he didn’t doubt that it
was the right thing for him to do.

And then she had sent him away. The older woman, the
one named Silena, had known him and had revealed his crimes to
Catelyn, complicating everything. The sense of shame he felt,
having been so exposed before her like that, was nearly
overpowering, and yet he knew that if she hadn’t revealed it, he
would have. He be unable to lie to Catelyn, though he couldn’t
understand why she was so different to her.

He had initially obeyed her command, taking step after
step away from the marketplace, a part of him fully intending to
walk away and never think of her again, and then something
changed. Ortis felt a greater pull within him and stopped. It felt as
though something had been lifted from him, some invisible hand
which had guided him to fall to his knees before Catelyn and her
friend and which no longer pressed upon his heart. It was as if,
having fulfilled this part of his purpose, he could think clearly
again.

With the clouding of his mind gone, he made a decision
and raced back toward the market, blending into the crowd as they
watched the proceedings, and so he witnessed the Emperor’s
encounter with the girl. He felt an overwhelming desire to cut his
way through the Imperial soldiers and kill the man for his crimes,
to run in and grab the girl’s hand and take her far away from all of
these evils.

But Ortis was not a fool, and he knew that such an attempt
would result in many innocent lives put at risk or lost outright, and
Catelyn would never have approved. Indeed, her very sacrifice,
however foolish Ortis thought it was, had been done for the
express purpose of ensuring no further suffering. But that still left
Catelyn in grave peril, and he was compelled to act. He hoped that
the Emperor was intrigued enough by the girl that he would bring
her to the Citadel first, and that would give him an opportunity to
do something about her captivity.

But regardless, her choice had led him to the first clear
conclusion he had come to in spans. He would not abandon the
girl. He could not, despite her demand that he do just that. Not
because it was what she wanted, or because he felt a pull inside to
do so. But because her life was in danger, and she needed help,
and he felt the empowering freedom of being able to choose to
help, or not. And so he chose to offer his, whether she wanted it or
not.

After she was led away, the Imperial soldiers dispersed the
rest of the crowd, and Ortis blended in with them, but made a
point of watching for the older woman Silena. The Emperor had
not seen the two of them together, and so had not identified the
connection between the two women. Ortis knew that Silena would
never speak to him under normal circumstances; there was so
much bad blood between them. But for Catelyn, he would do what
needed to be done, and so as the crowd dispersed and the
marketplace returned to normal, he watched over Silena until she
got to safety, and then he acted.

Although he knew the Imperial Citadel as well as his own
hands, getting Catelyn out could prove to be an almost impossible
task, but he had to try. If it meant his own death, so be it. He
would gladly give it for even the chance of ensuring Catelyn’s
freedom.

Since he had first spotted Catelyn climbing out of the
Dane’s estate as it burned down before him, his life had seemed as
though it had been spinning out of his own control. He had
alternated between feelings of such clarity of purpose, and then
swinging wildly towards feeling like a puppet on strings, being
pulled by forces he could not see or understand.

And now, all of that had changed. Watching Catelyn being
led away, it was as though the fog in his mind had lifted fully, and
he knew with certainty what his purpose, his choice, was. Ortis
moved freely towards it, the cloud within him no longer obscuring
his view and steering him away from what he knew he must do.

Catelyn was roughly pulled through the streets of the Seat,
the twelve soldiers forming a wedge around her and shoving their
way through the crowds of onlookers, and she heard shocked
gasping as the people they passed by saw her eyes, her scarred
face, her matted red hair. She could only imagine what they must
be thinking, as she ranged her bubble back and forth, trying
desperately to find some way that she could escape, but it was
useless. Her escort was comprised entirely of the Emperor’s most
highly trained men. She could tell by the way they breathed, the
way they themselves scanned the crowd, and the way they carried
themselves. These men would never drop their guard long enough
for her to escape.

She sensed the towering Citadel blocks before they
arrived, like a massive wall of numbness from which all the city’s
suffering flowed. She had probably seen it once before of course, as
all newborn children were required to be brought to the Citadel to
be branded with the mark of citizenship, but she would have been
a babe in her mother’s arms.

Catelyn did her best to scan her bubble and memorize the
path into the Citadel, just in case, by some miracle, she managed
to find herself in a position to escape. She was not optimistic that
she would ever see the world outside this fortress again, and that
her death was mere breaths away, but something in her refused to
accept that fate without some amount of defiance. This part of her
filed away every detail she could about her surroundings, and
frantically tried to formulate her exit strategy should an
opportunity make itself known.

Once inside the Citadel’s bailey, the fist of soldiers split up
and six of them remained behind while the others continued
taking her across a vast, open courtyard and into the main
building, a massive structure that literally towered over everything
else around it. Catelyn had never experienced anything so tall
before, and scanning her bubble all the way to the top made her
stomach turn over with dizziness.

The men, one at each shoulder, two in front and two
behind, marched her directly into the well of a spiral staircase,
where the sounds of their heavy footsteps echoed off the walls as
they ascended, drowning out all other sound. Within the stairwell,
with the way that sound bounced in circles, all of her senses grew
confused and she was forced to let her bubble fade as they carried
her roughly up the stairs.

After what felt to Catelyn like countless turning, the men
finally stepped out of the stairwell and down a long hall, their
boots clicking on tiles that felt cold and smooth to her feet, like
some kind of highly polished stone she had never experienced
before. The sensation would have been pleasant under other
circumstances.