Grim Company 02 - Sword Of The North (38 page)

Beyond the remains of the throne room, a set of stone steps led down into the palace dungeons. The White Lady paused on the very top step and stared down into the blackness below. ‘Marius was a man of many appetites,’ she said. ‘One might view his city from afar and conclude that he embraced an enlightened attitude, but that would be a mistake. At the heart of every man is a beast, no matter the clothes he dons or the words he utters or the ideals he professes to hold. Let us now peer beneath the mask of this particular beast.’

The White Lady descended the steps, her handmaidens trailing her. Sasha and Ambryl brought up the rear, together with the crew of the
Luck.
Though the dungeons had flooded along with the rest of the palace, an outlet somewhere below had allowed the water to escape, leaving only a few shallow puddles and an incessant drip that accompanied the party ever deeper. Blackness soon swallowed them until the White Lady uttered a word and floating globes of light blinked into existence, illuminating the way. Soon an iron door bled into view on the left side of the passage. Upon finding it locked, the Magelord beckoned and her three handmaidens tore it clean off its hinges, forcing it with a brute strength not even the strongest men could hope to match. Not for the first time Sasha wondered about these pale women. She had heard them referred to in hushed whispers as the ‘Unborn’, and that had done little to assuage her unease.

The White Lady stepped through the door into darkness. A moment later her conjured lights danced their way into the room, shedding light on a large and richly decorated cell. Sasha followed, and her gaze lingered on the furnishings for only a moment before finding the naked and emaciated corpses chained to the walls at the rear of the cell.

The dead prisoners were all women, and they were all young. Brutal metal implements rested on a rack nearby, and no few of them had seen use, judging by the obscene wounds the women bore. The floating lights revealed the prisoners to be of assorted ethnicity. There were a pair of pale Highlander women; a red-headed girl of Andarran heritage; a petite dark-haired girl from Tarbonne or possibly Espanda in the Shattered Realms to the south; and even a black-skinned Sumnian.

‘Marius’s sex slaves,’ the White Lady proclaimed. ‘It appears he collected them with the same passion with which he collected exotic flora for his gardens. They died here, chained up like dogs.’

Sasha had to turn away before she vomited again.

They continued through the dungeons, passing similar chambers filled with mutilated corpses, the work of a truly deranged mind. ‘How could anyone do this?’ Sasha whispered.

The look Ambryl gave her seemed almost triumphant.

At the very rear of the dungeons, a long and narrow corridor led to a single iron door painted a dull red colour. The White Lady turned to the captain of
The Lady’s Luck
. ‘You go first,’ she commanded.

The grey-haired captain swallowed and raised a hand in salute. Alone she proceeded down the corridor. She was a third of the way along when a hidden compartment on the left wall suddenly swung open and there was a flicker of steel as a blade trap was sprung. Then the woman was on the floor, clutching what little remained of her legs, hot blood spraying everywhere.

The White Lady nodded in satisfaction. ‘The magical wards once guarding this passage are no more. Even so, whatever lies in the room beyond must be of great value. To employ such crude mechanical traps is an assault on good taste.’

She gestured and her handmaidens sprang into action, the three of them racing down the corridor in a blur. More traps were triggered, all of them evaded by the pale women and their lightning reflexes. A concealed pit opened in the floor and the handmaidens seemed to shift direction in mid-air, running
along
the walls to land safely on the other side. Finally they reached the door and turned to wait for their mistress.

‘Come,’ the White Lady said. She glided down the corridor, stepping neatly around her maimed captain, skirting the edge of the pit where a thin ledge provided just enough room to cross. Sasha and the others followed, though two of the crew stayed behind to help their stricken skipper. There was little they could do except gather up the shredded remains of her legs and try to stem the bleeding.

‘Why didn’t she help her?’ Sasha whispered to Ambryl. Her sister only shrugged in reply.

They joined the White Lady and her handmaidens in the room beyond the corridor. As the floating lights darted into the room, Sasha readied herself for whatever gruesome sight awaited her.

But it was only a pair of naked skeletons. They were sitting in upright positions, thick straps and chains securing them tightly to their seats. Whoever the skeletons once were, they had been dead a long time.

On closer inspection Sasha saw that both skeletons were oddly shaped: they would be extremely tall were they to stand. Their bones were incredibly long and thin and delicate – almost inhuman.

The White Lady stared at the skeletons for a long moment before turning to her handmaidens. ‘Remove the chains and secure the remains. We return to the ship immediately.’ It seemed absurd, but Sasha thought she glimpsed something like disquiet on the Magelord’s face.

As they were leaving the room, one of the crew approached them in the passage and pointed a trembling finger at her whimpering captain. ‘Mistress,’ she said in a shaky voice. ‘She needs healing. Please.’

The White Lady glanced at the stricken woman sprawled in a spreading pool of blood. ‘I have no place for the foolish or the careless. Tell my erstwhile captain that
The Lady’s Luck
no longer favours her.’

‘She will die, mistress.’

In response, the Magelord merely nodded. ‘I trust she will. I have no place for the foolish and the careless. Nor do I have any place for cripples.’

Sasha hid in her tiny cabin aboard
The Lady’s Luck
and brought her finger up to her nose. She inhaled long and hard, feeling the sweet powder fill her world. Soon it would carry her away to a better place – just as the first available ship out of Thelassa’s harbour would carry her back to Dorminia, once she had collected her belongings from the Siren.

The White Lady’s callousness had left her shaking. For weeks she had suspected something was seriously wrong in the City of Towers. Her sense of unease had only increased following the Seeding and the strange events that had taken place that night. The odd behaviour of the Thelassans, Lyressa’s disappearance… even her sister’s rapid conversion to the cult-like worship of the city’s ruler. It was as if Thelassa was under some kind of spell. She remembered the Magelord’s words back at the Palace of a Thousand Pleasures.

Let us now peer beneath the mask of this particular beast.

Marius had indeed been a sadist, but Sasha was beginning to wonder if the White Lady was any better. Now all she needed to do was convince her sister of the Magelord’s true nature.

Lost in the thrill of the hit, she didn’t hear the door creak open. Didn’t realize the object of her thoughts was standing in the cabin behind her until she felt Ambryl’s nails digging painfully into her shoulder.

‘You lying whore.’

Sasha twisted around, spraying moon dust everywhere. ‘A-Ambryl! Wait, I’m sorry—’

‘Not here. When we return to the City of Towers, dear sister, you and I are going to have words.’

‘I’m going home.’

‘What did you just say?

‘I’m going home. Back to Dorminia.’

Ambryl’s hard eyes narrowed dangerously. ‘We already discussed this. There is nothing for us there.’

‘There is nothing for
you
there, Ambryl.’

‘My name is
Cyreena
, damn you. Why return to the Grey City, sister? We have no family. No friends. No reason to care about that place at all.’

‘Cole might still be alive—’

‘Oh, not this absurdity again. I met this boy once, this Davarus Cole. He was a braggart, a charlatan, and a fool. His disappearance was a blessing.’

Sasha stared at her sister in disbelief. ‘You never told me! Why didn’t you tell me?’

‘Why should I?’ Ambryl demanded. ‘You need to start moving on, sister. Moving on from the past.’ Her voice softened a little. ‘Now that we’re in the White Lady’s favour, no one will ever harm us again.’

‘The White Lady’s a monster.’

‘She’s everything we could ever dream to be, you stupid girl! Sandwiched between a wolf to the north and a wolf in sheep’s clothing to the south, two males with their armies and their bluster and their perversions – and yet she won.’

‘I don’t care about winning. I only care about surviving.’

Ambryl grabbed hold of Sasha’s chin and twisted her head painfully. ‘All I’ve ever wanted is to protect you,’ she said softly. ‘I’ll lock you in a cell if I must – until the demons release their hold and the sister I know is returned to me.’ And with those words, her sister turned and stormed out of the cabin.

Sasha slumped back against the wall and buried her head in her hands, letting the
hashka
spill to the floor.

‘Wake up. We have to go.’

Yllandris opened eyes as heavy as sin and stared up at Yorn’s bearded jaw. How long had she been sleeping? An hour?

Time had lost all meaning now. She was beyond exhausted, fever-sick from the wound on her face that refused to heal, her shoulders chafing from the sad burden she carried. The pain didn’t matter any more. She just had to keep moving.

Somehow she climbed to her feet, though they were so numb she could hardly feel them. She knew the foundlings had it worse; their legs were only half as long her hers. A few children wouldn’t stop crying because of their blisters. Though it broke her heart to watch them suffer, they couldn’t afford to slow their pace. Not until they reached the Greenwild.

She stumbled through the shallow valley in which they’d called an all too-brief halt and surveyed the sleeping children spread out across the autumn grass. Most had simply collapsed in the spot they’d been standing, falling into a deep sleep as soon as their small bodies had touched the ground. She hesitated, overcome with guilt by what she was about do. It couldn’t be helped.

She clapped loudly, moving from child to child. Some stirred and managed to rise, rubbing at tired young eyes. Others were oblivious to her efforts, so overcome with exhaustion they could have slept through a thunderstorm.

Fortunately, Corinn rose to lend a hand. The girl’s hair was a dirty mess and her blue eyes had lost a little of their lustre, but she cared for the other children with the dedication of an older sister. Yllandris had been like that, once. Before the day she’d crawled out of bed to find her father sobbing over her mother’s battered body. Before she’d forced herself to become as cold as the winter snow in order to survive.

Corinn made a brief circuit of the campsite, rousing children and offering soothing words. Yorn busied himself portioning out the provisions they’d foraged. The Green Reaching remained neutral in the civil war that had engulfed the rest of the Heartlands, and even the Butcher King understood that the breadbasket of the High Fangs was too important to embroil in the conflict, but it was dangerous to seek refuge so close to the King’s Reaching. Krazka would find them eventually. And if not he, the Herald when it eventually returned. There could be no sanctuary, not until they were out of the High Fangs.

‘Why aren’t they pursuing us?’ Yllandris had asked Yorn, the third day after they’d fled Heartstone. The taciturn warrior had merely shrugged. Whomever Krazka had sent to hunt them down, they appeared content to bide their time.

They were leaving it late. The Greenwild was only a few miles ahead now. Even the best trackers would quickly lose their quarry in the labyrinthine depths of that vast and preternatural forest. For the first time since they’d set out from the capital, Yllandris began to hope they might make it to safety.

But that hope was quickly dashed. An hour after breaking camp, they were cresting a hill when Yorn spotted a small group approaching from the north. ‘Looks like half a dozen,’ the big warrior rumbled. ‘They’re on foot.’

Yllandris shielded her eyes and scanned the horizon. Her vision had deteriorated since Krazka had sliced her face open, but she could see the group Yorn referred to. While they were too distant to make out exact details, one of the figures glittered silver in the bright afternoon sun and it took only a moment before a terrifying realization dawned.

It’s the iron man. It has to be him.

Yllandris turned to Yorn. ‘Sir Meredith is with them,’ she said. Yorn gave a grim nod of his shaggy head. ‘He… he has an abyssium ring. My magic won’t work on him. They’ll chase us down.’ She blinked away tears. She’d known this was a foolish plan. She’d known it all along.

The orphans were watching her curiously, all except Corinn, whose pretty eyes were filled with fear.

‘I just wanted to save them,’ Yllandris whispered. She heard a soft clacking noise and realized she was shaking so badly that the bones in the sack were knocking together.

‘Go.’

Yorn spoke the word slowly and deliberately. His eyes were locked on the approaching group, utter determination carved onto his craggy face. ‘I’ll delay them as much as I can.’

Yllandris took a deep breath and tried to calm her trembling body. ‘You can’t fight that many.’

Yorn drew his broadsword, and his gaze narrowed as if he were seeing events long ago. ‘Rayne ain’t the only Kingsman that survived Red Valley. I was there too. I killed a lot of men that day. I’m not going down without taking a few of them with me. Take the children and flee. Don’t look back.’

Yllandris reached out, placed a trembling hand on Yorn’s broad shoulder. ‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘For everything.’

The big warrior merely nodded. Then he busied himself untying the wooden shield strapped to his back.

Yllandris turned to the orphans. ‘Quickly, children. We must make it to the Greenwild before nightfall.’