The Empty Warrior (76 page)

She placed the sole of her right boot on the top of O’Keefe’s head, grinding his forehead into the dusty stone. “You stay right where you are, Earthman,” she said softly. Then louder she commanded the others. “The rest of you get back to your bunks. And don’t move once you get there. If I see one of you so much as breathe, you’ll be joining your friend here in the arena tomorrow.”

The men rose to their feet skeptically, still unused to being free to stand in her presence, and began to slowly make their way en masse toward their beds.

“By all the gods…,” Elorak muttered through clenched teeth. She grabbed the blaster from her boot and fired another random volley through the crowd, miraculously missing everyone this time, but hot splinters of rock exploded into the now scrambling throng as the blast impacted the wall, the ricocheting shards opening deep cuts on several of the men.

“Get in those bunks, damn you,” Elorak screamed. The Akadeans burst into frenetic movement, clambering pell-mell over and around each other, some diving into their beds while those who slept higher on the tiers fought each other for places on the rough and rickety ladders that were nailed up against the stacks of bunks. When all had found their places they lay motionless, petrified by fear.

O’Keefe felt the pressure on the top of his head release as Elorak removed her boot. There was utter silence in the room for nearly a minute. Finally the Vazilek spoke. “Well, my would-be stonliata,” she said. “I have hardly begun to treat you well, and already you reward my generosity with theft.”

As she spoke, she flipped up the pick handle and allowed it to rotate between her fingers in a long arc. At the bottom of its circular path it struck O’Keefe squarely in the temple. Blinding pain shot through his cranium. He winced as the back of his clamped-shut eyelids turned bright red. His teeth ground with the effort required to refrain from crying out. The fibers of his every muscle tensed as a near uncontrollable desire to rise up in attack radiated from the deepest primal pits of his brain. Tears leaked from his eyes as he fought the instinctive impulse.

“Why, why, why,” Elorak continued. “I liked you, Earthman. Why did you feel the need to steal from me?”

“I intended to kill a man,” O’Keefe croaked into the stone. “He pissed me off. I was going to sharpen the spoon and use it to kill the bastard.” He paused, and then added in as insolent a tone as he could muster, “your worship.”

In return Elorak swung the pick handle so hard it elicited an inadvertent grunt from her throat. It caught O’Keefe on his left side, just above the kidney. The blow knocked him over onto his right hip where he writhed in agony. As he rolled he thought he could see the dogs around Elorak almost imperceptibly tauten. They seemed ready to strike.

“You insolent pile of excrement,” Elorak spat. “Despite the fact that it may be of some little cost to me personally, I will enjoy watching you die. Bring him!” The dogs relaxed as she stalked from the barracks, her lackeys wrestling O’Keefe to his feet and dragging him from the chamber.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX:

A Time to Kill, or Die Trying

O’Keefe awoke with his hands tied behind his back, his legs bound at the ankles. He tested the ropes and found them to be knotted securely. He lay on his side, on the floor, in the same position he had worked himself into the previous evening, the only position he had found that was not so uncomfortable as to deny him the respite of any sleep. The stone against his skin was cold and gritty to the touch, and grimy in spots with his blood. Elorak’s lackeys had not been gentle when they had pushed him into what had then been a pitch black chamber. Their shoves had keeled him over onto the unforgiving floor like a tree chopped from its roots. And there was also still the pain from the blows inflicted by the goddess herself. He struggled to move into a seated position, but, with his hands bound, he found he was unable to easily do so. At length, and with more than a little expenditure of effort, he managed to roll his body over an elbow so that he lay on his back.

The elbow throbbed from the weight of his flank grinding it into the unyielding floor while his hands hurt from being momentarily crushed beneath him, but at last he was able to sit up and look around. His cell was roughly twenty feet square. The walls, floor, and ceiling all had the rough appearance of gray bedrock. It had no distinguishing features save the door, and it was merely a flat, solid rectangle of steel with a small, barred window cut into it. The light that now shone through that window was the only source of illumination. It was apparently morning in Ashawzut.

He could feel the hard shape of the pistol pressing against his inner thigh, but had no way to remove it, and no place to hide it if he could have. He was in dire need of assistance. Pulling his knees up as closely to his chest as he was able, he pushed off with his feet and alternately used each cheek of his buttocks to crawl slowly across the floor until his back was up against the wall. Then with the wall there to support him, he was able to push himself to his feet and then hop, in an ungainly and unbalanced fashion, over to the door.

There was a plentitude of activity beyond it. He could see little of what was transpiring, but he could hear the clank of many lizards moving about mixed with the sounds of different arena equipment being dragged across the floor. There was also, as he had hoped, one of the dogs present. She looked much like Regulus, only smaller and with grayish-white markings on her legs, chest, and face. She lay in the hallway against the far wall, her eyes riveted to the window of the cell door.

As soon as O’Keefe’s face appeared through the bars, the dog’s ears stood upright as if she lived only to hear his voice. “Bring Regulus,” O’Keefe whispered, in a voice that even he could hardly hear. But the dog heard, and she immediately rose to trot away down the corridor.

O’Keefe turned, hopped away from the door, put his back to the far wall and slid down until he was once again seated. He waited, each minute seeming like hours, while his bindings became more painful with every throbbing heartbeat. But at last he began to feel the tenuous but now familiar touch of Regulus’ mind floating at the edge of his consciousness, becoming more potent and concrete with each passing moment. Soon the dog was within range to communicate.

We’ve got a problem,
O’Keefe thought.

So tell me,
came the immediate reply, so brimming with confidence that O’Keefe felt instantly buoyed.

I have the gun, but I’m tied hand and foot. And there is no place here to hide it. They’re going to find it when they come to take my clothing.

Do not worry, my friend,
Regulus answered.
The pack will protect you. See the door. It is small is it not, small enough that no dragon may enter. Some of your own, servants of the Slayer, will come to ready you for the arena. Once they are with you, it matters not what they find, because we will also be in attendance. It is normal procedure for members of the pack to be present when an inmate is readied for punishment; the dragons will see nothing amiss in that. After all, guards will be needed to watch such a dangerous prisoner as yourself.
O’Keefe felt the laughter in Regulus’ thoughts.
We will see to it that you keep the weapon, and we will make certain that those who see you with it will tell no one what they have seen.

Regulus felt a lot more confident than O’Keefe did.
You know,
the Earther thought,
there is a better than even chance that I will fail here rather than succeed. What happens when I’m dead out on the arena floor and Elorak still runs this place? Any of her lackeys that see this gun will implicate you in the plot; you know they will. How will you keep that from happening, kill them all before they can talk?

Regulus’ thoughts exuded calm.
There will be no need,
he stated.
What will they say? That we mere canines were colluding with the prisoners? Ha! The bitch of Ashawzut will never believe that. She will instead kill her own servants for allowing you to bring the weapon onto the floor undetected. We are but dumb animals, fit only to serve those who would feed us. We will look at her with cocked heads and puzzled eyes as if we understand nothing, and she will laugh at our accusers’ stories even as she butchers them. But that is irrelevant, as you will not die. The Creator will not allow such as her to rule in arrogance forever. Have faith, Achilles, and together we shall triumph.

Yeah,
thought O’Keefe, without conviction.

Regulus took the spot the other dog had vacated outside the door while several other members of the pack loitered about at various points up and down the passageway. The lizards, oblivious to any danger in the dogs’ presence, repeatedly rolled past them in the hallway, each of the guards assuming they were there only to protect the area. Regulus kept his thoughts to himself, yet O’Keefe could sense that the dog was still quite comfortable with the way events were unfolding. The sensation bolstered his own sagging morale appreciably.

Suddenly there was an end to the long silence, as Regulus’ thoughts erupted into O’Keefe’s mind.
They will be coming for you soon. The arena is nearly full.

As always, the shared percipience of the dogs gave Regulus the insight to correctly judge the situation. Within minutes three toadies, escorted by a lizard and two dogs, arrived at the cell door. The lizard punched a code into a key pad to the release the lock, and then pushed the door open. “Prepare him,” it said to the toadies, its sibilant lizard speech leaking from its mouth between flicks of its forked tongue. “I return later.”

It turned to the dogs. “Guard!” it commanded them, and then rolled away, apparently sure of its safety and superiority.

Addlepated beast,
Regulus thought disparagingly.
This is going to be even easier than I had at first assumed.

The men entered the cell, followed by the dogs, with Regulus slipping across the corridor and through the closing door as soon as the lizard guard had rolled out of his path. The Akadeans pulled O’Keefe roughly to his feet, loosed his bonds, and began to undress him until he pushed them forcefully away. They looked to the dogs as if expecting support, but the animals simply stood stolidly shoulder to shoulder, the two escorts on either side of Regulus, blocking the door and making no move to intimidate O’Keefe into submission. Their bodies filled half the chamber.

The most assertive of the toadies finally found the wherewithal to speak. “Subdue!” he said in a commanding tone directed at the dogs, all the while pointing at O’Keefe.

O’Keefe grabbed the finger the man had stuck out in his direction and twisted it backward until the Akadean cried out in pain. “Shut up!” O’Keefe ordered. “I hate to disappoint you, you little shit, but they don’t work for you. They’re on my side. Now you three sit your narrow asses down in the corner over here and be quiet, or I’ll have them rip your damn throats out. Okay?” The three men looked at O’Keefe in disbelief until the dogs stepped forward menacingly, baring their teeth. Suddenly the toadies could not find the corner fast enough, falling over each other and landing in a heap, whimpering.

O’Keefe shook his head disdainfully at their sudden, complete enfeeblement before quickly beginning to shed the rest of his clothing. After pulling down his trousers, he wrestled the pistol away from his leg and laid it carefully on the same side of the cell as the door and the lackeys, where no curious lizard guard could see. Soon he stood naked before his would be preparers.

“Hand over the diaper,” he commanded, and one of the three men reached into the small bag he carried and offered up the small white garment.

To O’Keefe’s surprise and relief, it was made of much stronger material than its appearance had suggested. And after donning it, he also found that it could be fastened tightly with Velcro-like strips, tightly enough that it was not going to fall off even with the weight of the Colt inside. He reached for the gun, removed it from its holster, and checked the clip one last time before pushing it back up into the stock. He then pulled the slide back sharply and released it. The recoil spring pulled it back with an ominous metallic click, pushing the top round in the magazine into the firing chamber as it did so. O’Keefe engaged the thumb safety before carefully placing the weapon inside the swaddling cloth, directly in front of his crotch.

That arrangement simply did not work. Although strong, the fabric was also elastic and tight. The outline of the gun was plainly visible beneath it. O’Keefe thought for a moment before pushing the stock of the weapon between his legs so that only the narrow, top edge of the barrel pushed out the fabric in front. Then he reached down to pick up his discarded shirt, and ripped it into two pieces. He folded the larger piece into a rough square, and stuffed it down into the front of his garment. The effect was to soften the sharp outline of the barrel that was pushed into the fabric of the breechclout. “Well, how do I look,” he asked Regulus.

Rather well endowed,
the dog thought to him.
But much less obvious than before. The imbecile dragons will not sense anything amiss from the bulge, but the Slayer may. Being human, she is well acquainted with your physiology, and she has repeatedly shown that she can be a capable observer. You are an aberrant though; mayhap she will think the protuberance a peculiarity of your kind. That is far from certain however.

O’Keefe sensed Regulus’ anxiety but did not share it. “It won’t matter,” he said.
From what Bart tells me, her shield is nearly as blurring to her eyes looking out as it is to ours looking in. She won’t be able to see anything wrong as long as it is functioning and she is any more than a few paces away. And when she gets in close enough, it will be too late. I’m more concerned about staying in a condition to shoot straight until she comes out onto the floor. After I hang from the noose and then have to fight the lizards, I’m not going to be in very good shape. I plan on taking a dive as soon as I can, but I’ll have to make it look good, or she will definitely be suspicious, which is the last thing I need. I’m certain she will come out on the floor to finish me off after all the gall I laid on her in the barracks last night; I’ve no doubt about that, but I want her to be sure of herself and absolutely confident that I can do nothing to harm her. I want her ready to drop that shield and spit in my face.