Marysvale (42 page)

“
Well, I suppose then this
wasn’t a complete waste of time. After all, we had to be
sure.”

“
Who was right?” I asked
weakly.

“
Why, your aunt Sarah, of
course. She said she did not tell you anything of importance, which
surprises me just a little. Still, it is her
prerogative.”

“
What else didn’t she tell
me?”

He smirked. “Well now, perhaps you
should inquire of her yourself.”

The room of men guffawed
loudly.

Their laughter made me angry and,
losing control of myself, I snapped, “I know about
Naehume.”

Their cackling quickly died and their
faces now wore amused expressions.

“
Ah,” said Lord Wright
slowly. “Now we get to it. Please tell us what it is you know and,
believe me when I say, you have our undivided
attention.”

Suddenly, I regretted mentioning the
name. “All I know is that Naehume is your leader.”

He chuckled cruelly. “Forgive us if we
fail to believe you. Surely, you know more.”

“
I’ve said everything I’m
going to say.”

“
We shall see,” he said with
a sardonic smile. He addressed Lyman, who was still on the floor.
“Are you quite finished licking your wounds?”

Two servants went over to help him to
his feet. He shoved them away and got up.

Then, Lord Wright clapped his hands and
boomed, “Guards.”

A half dozen soldiers instantly poured
in through the door on the right. It would be pointless to resist,
so I glared at the lord while my hands were bound tightly behind my
back.

When that was finished, he said
mockingly, “Very stoic of you, I am sure. But you see, where most
presume death to be the ultimate punishment, I, however, do not. We
have learned, through experimentation, that there are many forms of
torture and many different ways to loosen the tongue. I have no
doubt that you would be able to resist most of them, but not
all.”

He then bellowed, “Bring them
in.”

The same door opened, and Jane and
Hannah were viciously shoved inside. Both had their hands bound in
front of them.

“
What are you doing?” I
demanded.

Upon hearing my voice, Jane looked up
at me, and relief spread across her tear-stained face.

Ignoring me, Lord Wright continued,
“Naehume is most anxious to talk to all of you.” Then he ordered,
“Bring them along—you too, Lyman.”

A smile spread across Lyman’s bloody
mouth.

“
NO!” I cried. “I’ve told
you everything!”

“
Perhaps,” said Lord Wright,
as he strode past. “We shall see.”

Lyman fell in step behind his father.
The soldiers gathered behind us and forcefully prodded us out of
the dining hall and through the wide corridors. A lightning bolt
flashed through a nearby window, its bluish-white light briefly
illuminating the passageway. Occasionally, a soldier gave a hard
push—obviously more to intimidate than to hurry us along. A few
times, they did it so forcefully that one of the girls would
stumble and fall, only to be hauled aggressively to her feet and
again driven ruthlessly forward.

We passed through a door and down a
long, sloping corridor. Soon we broke out into a vast, deep natural
cavern. Torches lined a wide staircase that was roughly chiseled
out of the cave walls. The stairs circled around, in an irregular
pattern, as they spiraled down the abyss. Bats squeaked and flew
about before disappearing somewhere into the blackness.

We descended down and around the
cavern, until we reached the bottom. From there, we followed a
tunnel which finally emerging into a large chamber. A fetid,
rotting odor filled the air. Few torches cast a dim, orange light,
revealing scattered bones lying about. Multiple sets of chains were
nailed into the cave wall, with shackles fastened to the ends. In
one pair, the upper half of a long-dead and decaying body still
hung. Prison cells ran the entire length of the back half of the
chamber. Iron bars were embedded in the stone, extending from the
ceiling to the floor. They were divided every so often by more iron
bars that ran perpendicular to the far wall. In total, there were
five cells. One of them housed more human remains heaped in a
corner; another contained a tattered, bloody nightshirt.

The cave felt damp. A trickle of water
could be heard seeping out of the walls. It moistened parts of the
floor where moss grew in abundance.

“
Put him in a cell,” ordered
Wright.

A soldier snatched up a large key from
a protruding nail on the wall, and opened one of the middle cells.
As soon as the rusty iron bars had swung open with a groan, another
soldier violently shoved me in from behind, so as to ensure I’d
fall; and with my hands tied behind me, there was no way to brace
myself. I hit with a thud and slid a foot or two along the grimy
floor.

The cell door slammed shut with a clank
and was locked.

“
That will be all,” said
Lord Wright. “You may return to your posts.”

With a salute, the soldiers disappeared
back the way we’d come.

Roughly, Lyman grabbed Jane by the arm
and twisted her around. Lord Wright did the same for Hannah. They
led them into another dark tunnel that I hadn’t noticed.

“
You don’t have to do this,”
I pleaded.

In the flickering torchlight, Lord
Wright stopped, turned, and peered back at me, his face contorted
with malevolent loathing.

“
No, no. You are looking at
this incorrectly. Of course we do not have to…we get to,” he said
venomously.

He spun around and they continued their
march down the tunnel.

“
Wait,” I cried.

They ignored me.

A terrible feeling of dread and fear
welled inside me. “Wait, I’ll tell you anything.” I pleaded more
loudly, panic and desperation cracking in my voice.

They stopped, and I thought they would
return; but it was only to open a door in the side of the tunnel.
Dim torchlight streamed out of the opening. The girls were thrown
in, and father and son followed. Instantly, both Jane and Hannah
screamed in heart stopping terror; and the door slammed shut with a
wooden rattle. The wood was apparently thin, because I could hear
the men laughing.

I flung my extra vision open and cast
it towards the girls, desperate to see them, though also afraid of
what it might reveal. But it was pointless. I couldn’t see through
dead material; and rock was certainly no exception. The only way I
could even tell my sight was working was from the moss, as it was
the only living thing in my field of vision. I let it
close.

Awkwardly, I struggled to my feet and
ran, hurtling myself against the cell door. It gave a slight
tremor, then nothing. I careened into it again—not a budge, not
even an inch. Hauling back and frantic, I charged painfully into it
once again. The only sound it made came from the resonating thud
that traveled through me as my body collided with the
bars.

I ran to the back of the cell,
mustering all the speed I could…

“
It won’t work,” said a
quiet, raspy voice. “You will only succeed in hurting
yourself.”

I hesitated, unsure of what I’d just
heard. I peered into the dark tunnel. I could hear muffled voices
coming through the door where the girls had disappeared to moments
earlier.

“
Put your back up to the
bars.”

I looked around. In the dimly lit cave,
it was difficult to see or hear where the soft voice was coming
from.

“
Over here,” came the reply
to my searching.

Squinting behind me, and into the dark
shadows of the cell next to mine, I saw what I had mistaken to be a
dead body move. The wounded, grimy figure half crawled, half drug
himself into the torchlight.

I studied whoever it was for a moment
as he drew near. In horror, I finally recognized the swollen,
bruised face of Sarah.

“
What…but how did you get
here?” I asked.

She wore the same clothes she was
wearing when we’d left, but they were dirty with stained splotches
of dried blood. They were also torn and shredded, some probably
from torture and some to make strips of cloth to bind up her
wounds.

In a croak, she whispered, “The Brean
may not be able to swim or build boats, but men can.”

“
I don’t understand,” I said
confused.

“
I never planned on men,
only Brean. My escape plan was to flee by boat to a small island
where I had built a shack and stocked it with food.” She took a few
breaths. “That’s why you couldn’t come with me; the boat wouldn’t
carry all of us.”

Sarah continued, “They were waiting for
me when I reached the island. I was captured and brought here for
interrogation, even before you arrived. I have been in this dungeon
ever since. I’m sorry John, I should have told you more, but I
didn’t think they would discover the truth about you. I had no
idea...”

“
You don’t have to say any
more,” I reassured her.

She shook her head. “You deserve to
know the truth, at least as much as I know. The only reason I was
allowed to live in peace was to set a trap for you. They thought
you or your father, my brother, would come looking for me. They
want you dead, for some reason. They never expected you to make it
into the town. When you did, they decided to try and get you to
join them.”

“
They told you all this?” I
asked.

She nodded. “They are arrogant and
couldn’t help boasting how they had used me. Regardless, I don’t
think they intend for any of us to live much longer.”

A blood-curdling, prolonged scream of
pain rent the air and echoed throughout the chamber, followed by
sobs and appeals to stop. It was impossible to tell which girl made
what sounds. The door did nothing to stop the heart wrenching
pleas. It tore through my soul, and I would gladly have traded
places with them. It would have been much easier to bear their
agony than to sit here feeling so helpless and responsible. If this
was the kind of torture Lord Wright had in mind for me, it worked.
I would tell them anything to make it stop. Tears poured down my
cheeks as the harrowing screams resumed again and again.

“
Give me your hands,” said
Sarah somberly. Tears were also streaming down her grime-covered
face.

I put my back up against the bars and
her shaking hands fumbled and struggled with the knot before the
cords finally fell loose. I sank to the floor and buried my head in
my hands.

An eternity passed before the torturous
screaming stopped.

Dread fell over me. I lifted my head
and stared hopelessly at the cold stone walls of the cave,
terrified at what was happening in the accursed room. I overheard
the sounds of crying and murmuring voices. There was a harsh laugh,
followed by scuffling and more sobbing.

Suddenly, the door flung open, nearly
rending it off its hinges. A body sailed through the opening,
smashed against the opposing tunnel wall, and crumbled to the
floor. Right behind her, a massive, dark shape filled the entire
passageway. The shape barely had to stoop to snatch up the fallen
girl. Lumbering, hunched over into the dim light, was the ugly,
scarred-face Brean who had tried to attack me in Sarah’s house an
eternity ago. I gasped in shock and terror, stumbling back against
the cell wall.

A rumbling, deep rhythmic sound issued
forth from the monster and its colossal shoulders shook. At first I
couldn’t make out what it was doing, and then I realized it was
laughing at me as I cowered at the back of the cave.

Lord Wright emerged from the room with
the hair of the other girl grasped in his hand. She was bent over
with her head at his waist. Her legs stumbled as she struggled
behind him, trying to keep from falling over and thereby being
dragged completely by her hair. Violently, he hurled her in front
of him where she sprawled across the floor. She rolled over and,
with her bound hands, brushed the hair from her face. Tears
streaked down her lovely cheeks, and she flashed me those deep
green eyes that I loved so much—they were filled with sorrow and
pleading.

Instantly, I jumped into Jane’s mind.
She didn’t keep me out—instead, I could hear her talking. “I’m not
hurt, John; it’s Hannah!” She was unable to hold back the images,
though she tried to, of Hannah strapped to a table and long, thin,
curved blades slicing….

I closed my eyes, unable to bear the
sight.

Hannah, still grasped in the monster’s
hand, seemed like a lifeless ragdoll. It threw her body across the
room with an underhanded toss. She landed and slid nearly six feet
before coming to rest against my cell, face down.

I rushed to the bars and gently turned
her over. Patches of blood grew on her dress where tears in the
fabric had been made, revealing cuts on her body. Her face was
scraped and her lip split open. Through the bars, I cradled her
head in my arms the best I could. I watched her chest rise and
fall. Slowly, her eyes flittered open and I leapt into her soul.
With gratitude, I found that her virtue hadn’t been taken from
her.