Oathen (26 page)

“I know more than I ever wanted to about you,
that’s for sure.”

“Well, I wouldn’t want my presence to chafe on
your personal space. You’re free to stay behind while Geret and I
sail back across the Empty Ocean,” Rhona replied.

“That sounds like a fabulous idea.” Sanych
envisioned a maddened swarm of Deep Ones devouring Rhona’s
fleet.

A smug chuckle pierced the blackness. “At
least you know a futile cause when you see one.”

“Do I ever.”

Rhona filled the darkness with her voice.
“Being surrounded by all this dirt isn’t my idea of a party,
though. And Ruel, he took a fine beat to the skull when they
grabbed us…” Rhona paused, then spoke again, describing her last
few hours.

She and Ruel had entered Cish through the Fire
Gate. Its gate posts and massive doors were twined with carved
dragons of every hue, each in the act of breathing blue-and-orange
fire. The pirates made their way through the unfamiliar city, not
noticing their tail until they reached a night market. Through the
shadows of the raised market pyres, through the incense and the
jostling, sweaty crowds, Rhona noticed a thin man who always paused
when they did, and never drew too close.

The attack was poorly planned, though, and
might have failed except for a fateful decision. Rhona told Ruel to
hide with her in the next alley. They slipped into the dim, reeking
slot, half-hidden by the flap of a market tent. As the din of the
crowds faded behind them, she began to voice her next plan, only to
realize that they were two paces from the thugs who had been
waiting to intercept them. Ruel took a hard blow to the head right
away, and Rhona was beaten into submission soon after.

“Don’t you pirates have pretty thick skulls?”
Sanych asked, when Rhona had finished her tale.

“Our men do,” Rhona replied. “You dirtwalkers,
though, I’m not sure about. Say you get locked up with someone you
don’t particularly like, but you like who’s captured you even less.
What should you do? Keep antagonizing her? Or find another approach
that gets you what you want?”

Sanych was stung by the logic in Rhona’s
words. “Our options are pretty limited in here.”

“We can fight them off together when they come
to kill us,” Rhona said in a practical tone. “Or you can just stay
out of my way, and I’ll do all the fighting. I’m not
picky.”

“Meena said they wouldn’t kill us.”

“On purpose,” Rhona clarified. “I’m free to be
rescued any time.”

“She won’t come yet,” Sanych said, her body
shivering in the cool dankness.

“What? Why not?”

“There was a second plan. One I didn’t tell
you about.”

“Aboard my ship? That’s twice you’ve kept me
out of the know, wench! If I had a dagger, I’d pin your tongue to
the stone!”

Sanych waited in the silence, glad Rhona
couldn’t see her grinning in the dark.

After a few moments, Rhona calmed herself and
said, “The plan I heard was to have the cult give away the location
of their hideout, then Meena breaks us all out and we kick their
arses so they can’t interfere with her destroying the book. What
else is there?”

What else, indeed?
Even Sanych didn’t
fully understand. “I have…” Sanych gulped reflexively and tried
again. “I have a gift, Meena says. She needs it to crack open, so I
can use it to help her destroy the
Dire Tome
. Magical gifts
can only be forced awake where earth magic is very
powerful.”

“And this is one of them,” Rhona
supplied.

“Yes.” Sanych’s teeth chattered as her
nervousness overcame her.

“You’re near to pissing yourself with fear,
wench,” Rhona said. She scooted across the pit, grinding gravel
under her hands and feet, and laid a hand on Sanych’s shoulder.
“Deep breaths. Now tell me about this gift.”

Sanych told her as much as Meena had
shared.

“Gods’ folly,” Rhona swore, when Sanych was
done speaking. Then, “Folly’s bastards! Won’t Dzur i’Oth kill you
when they realize what you can do?”

Sanych barked an unhappy laugh. “Meena’s been
preparing me for that too. And I have no interest in dying. I have
no interest in my life changing without my permission, either, but
that’s about to happen—”

A grinding sound reverberated in their tiny
cell. The stone plug lifted, and a light shone down through a round
hole in the ceiling. The light turned out to be a single fat yellow
candle in an iron holder, but it seemed gloriously bright after the
total absence of light. A knotted rope fell down the hole, and a
rough voice ordered them to hold onto it and be pulled
up.

Four black-clad guards with serrated blades on
their swords were waiting for them above. Two of them drew heavy
black hoods over the women’s heads, and their world went dark
again.

~~~

Bailik presided over the questioning of the
three male prisoners, pacing behind them as they knelt, chained to
the floor of the large cavern, and applying his pain baton as
encouragement. So far, he hadn’t gotten any answers from them, and
one of the prisoners seemed in a bad way already.
He won’t stay
conscious for much more torture, and killing him in front of the
others may backfire if they don’t care enough about
him.

So Bailik had ordered four of his Enforcers to
fetch his next tactic from the pits.
The Hand of Power will know
the whereabouts of the thief by nightfall. And while he’s pursuing
her, I can make a pursuit of my own.

The broad bronze doors at the side of the
red-stone cavern swung wide, glinting in the light of the braziers
that encircled the chamber. Four of his men led the two women
prisoners into the room, and Bailik immediately started getting
promising results.

The one called Ruel cried, “Rhona!” There was
no fear in his voice. The woman in front turned her head inside her
hood and called Ruel’s name. Bailik flicked a gesture to her
captor, and the man drove his fist into her gut, doubling her
over.

That got the middle prisoner, Geret, angry as
well. Bailik smiled, letting them rant at the Enforcers. His men
walked their prisoners down the ramp to the broad pit at whose
upper edge the male prisoners were shackled. Their view of the
following proceedings was going to be up-close and vivid. And if by
some miracle they still didn’t talk after that, Bailik would
possess the liquid he needed to force the truth from their lips. He
fingered the handle of his dagger in anticipation.

Within the wide sunken circle in the center of
the room, there crouched three low stone mounds, arranged
equidistant from each other. Each mound was ringed by a smooth
stone trough. The Enforcers halted a prisoner by each of two mounds
and whipped off their hoods, letting the women finally see their
three companions.

The shackled men stared down at them, unable
to look away. The women looked around in fear and confusion, until
relief spread across their features at the sight of the others.
Good. There is a bond here. Now, let it feel the press of my
blade.

“We told you,” the third male prisoner said,
his voice cold. “We don’t know this thief you’re looking for.”
Bailik hadn’t yet managed to force the man’s name from him. He
seemed aware of Bailik’s tactics, speaking to his captor while the
other two men talked to the women below.

“Perhaps not,” Bailik replied, sending a dark
tendril of lightning to caress the third man’s back, causing him to
arch in pain though he stifled his cry. “But perhaps these lovely
ladies do. I’m afraid I shall have to question
them…thoroughly.”

The prisoner Geret seemed most agitated by
this prospect, jerking on his chains as he tried to rise. Bailik
casually smacked the back of the man’s head with his baton, letting
a little of its magic loose on his skull. Geret subsided with a few
trembling gasps.

“You may, of course,” he said to all five of
the captives, “tell me where the thief is now, and save yourselves
all that excitement. But I guarantee you, one way or another, I
will know her location. It is merely a matter of how far you wish
to take this. So,” he said, waving the guards to action, “what is
it to be?”

~~~

Sanych felt one of the guards press his short,
serrated sword to her throat. Another drew his dagger and slid it
inside the cuff of her sleeve. He began to slice through the
fabric. Sanych tried futilely to pull her arm away from the man who
held it; he merely laughed at her. A few feet away, Rhona was
standing still and smirking.

I need to get that man to use
magic on me!

She jerked her sleeve free, lurching forward
against the serrated blade, eyes on the cultist behind the kneeling
prisoners. As the guards arrested her movement, she felt the sting
of a cut on her neck.

“Sanych—” Geret began, cutting off in agony as
black lightning played across his chest.

Sanych gritted her teeth. If they were
anywhere else, she’d have enjoyed zapping Geret herself, but this
man truly meant them pain and death. “You’re just a foolish lackey,
aren’t you?” she shouted up at the cultist. “Doing what your master
commands, not caring whether he’s right or not? You know what he’s
going to do to you when you ruin this plan? You
do
know,
don’t you?” she added, seeing his face change. “Does it matter that
your master’s going about this completely wrong? Do you have enough
will left in that bald pate of yours to go against him and do what
needs to be done, or are you totally mindless after all your
decades of service?”

The man bared his teeth at her. “You, girl,
have a hole in your face where one is not required.” He pinched two
fingers shut against his thumb, and Sanych felt her jaw creak shut.
Her lips sealed a moment later, leaving her to suck her breath in
through flared nostrils. The man waved for his guards to continue
their work.

The guards sliced through Sanych’s and Rhona’s
sleeves all the way up to the necklines, and their shirts fell away
on one side of their bodies. The blades switched to the remaining
sleeves.

“We don’t know anything,” Ruel insisted,
pressing a hand against his bloody head. “You have the wrong
people.”

A strange, warm shudder rippled within the
stone beneath Sanych’s feet; she gasped through her nose. The
sensation began climbing up her legs. Her eyes darted to the man
and his baton, but he was focusing on Ruel now, not her.

“Boy, don’t toy with me,” the man said. His
head glistened in the light of the braziers. “We know that all five
of you appeared out of nowhere within hours of each other. We know
that the thief has been hiding herself for weeks with magic
identical to that which placed you around the city. We know you’re
with her. Just tell me where she is, and we’ll call this whole
thing off. It’s not you we’re after.”

“That’s too bad,” Geret muttered.

Sanych blushed and squirmed as the dagger
approached her neckline again. Next to her, Rhona cursed the guards
roundly, promising them death by octopus, piranha and newly-hatched
sea serpents, in that order.

Another ripple flowed up Sanych’s body, more
quickly this time, and she inadvertently pinked herself on the
serrated blade again. Her ears began throbbing with the sound of
her own heartbeat, and it drowned out the angry protests of her
friends. Nausea curled in her stomach, and she hoped her body
wouldn’t try to vomit. Was the magic making her ill?

Then her shirt fell away to her waist, leaving
her torso bare. Cool air caressed her skin, and the floor spun
crazily. She closed her eyes, staggering against the hold of her
captors. Distantly she heard Rhona screeching and fighting; Sanych
could barely contemplate conscious movement. Her body seemed to be
turning to ice.

~~~

Bailik watched as the Enforcers draped the
blonde girl forward across the stone mound, securing her hands and
feet to iron rings set in the floor. The redhead was a handful, but
eventually the two men finished with the blonde and lent a hand
strapping her down as well.

He stepped to the side of his three kneeling
prisoners and slowly drew his dagger from its sheath. He tucked his
baton into its place on his belt and slowly turned its black blade
against his fingertip in the warm light of the braziers.

Keeping his eyes on its gleaming surfaces, he
said, “There is a magic that sleeps in the blood of mortals. Untold
hundreds of villagers have given their lifeblood so that we might
expand our reach and draw the
Great
Tome
’s key to us.
Once we have freed the book from its prison, we can restore magic
to its rightful place in the world.” He looked over at them as he
turned toward the ramp into the pit. “Perhaps you’ll even live to
see that.”

~~~

Sanych figured she should be feeling some sort
of mortal terror, but she wasn’t. Geret was shouting something at
the top of his lungs, and Salvor was arguing with him just as
loudly. Or maybe agreeing with him; it was hard to tell over the
thrumming in her ears. Ruel was shaking his head and staring at
Rhona, who had upped her threats to a series of rampant, if
muffled, shrieks.