Siege of Night (3 page)

There he lay gasping for air as his shoulders burned and throbbed with perfectly placed daggers protruding from each. His shirt began to dampen and turn dark with fresh blood. Corzon slowly walked to the scene and stood over the helpless man while wearing an unreadable expression. He looked neither happy nor angry as he hovered over the cursed man, still gnawing away at a meatless bone that simply had nothing else to give.

“Why?” cried the fat merchant in a weak, pleading voice. “What did I do to deserve—”

“You dare ask me such a stupid question!” Corzon growled as he kicked the man hard in his side. He continued talking right over the man’s wails. “You came groveling to me when you couldn’t pay the set taxes on your sales last month, saying you needed a little more time.”

Corzon seemed rather relaxed all of a sudden, finally dropping the meatless bone to the floor. He locked his fingers behind his head while looking at the other two merchants. One had climbed under the table while the other buried his face deep in his knees, rocking back and forth in complete denial of what was happening. “Don’t worry, you two,” he said to them it a shockingly calm voice. “I didn’t bring you here to kill you. You must bear witness to what you’ve seen. Bear witness to this…this cheat! Tell the other merchants what happens when the fair taxes owed are not produced.”

“And you,” he said as he returned his attention to the fallen man once again, “have been given all the time I’m willing to give.” He raised his eyes slightly, looking to the girls, who had kept their hardly dangerous prey pinned the entire time. “You know what to do,” he commanded in an unnervingly emotionless voice as he turned back toward the table.

Fire shot through the merchant’s shoulders as the girls dragged him by his arms across the thinly carpeted stone floor and straight out the door. Corzon sank back down into his chair and began to stretch hard, as if nothing had even happened. He turned to the other two merchants, gesturing for the first to crawl back up from under the table, then smiled warmly at both of them.

“Eat! Don’t be shy,” he said in a simply cheerful tone. “You see, I like both of you. You two have nothing to worry about, since you paid me on time, of course.” The two merchants rattled their heads up and down in urgent agreement, not daring to speak a word. “The only thing I want you two to do is let our other business associates know what you saw here today.” He slowly turned away from them, seeming to speak into the air rather than to either of the men, “I will not be made a fool of.”

He glanced behind him to get a little reassurance from his daughter, but saw that Grandling was the only presence still leaning against the banner. He might have been a statue, considering it seemed he hadn’t moved at all.
Now where did that girl run off to
?

Chapter 2

The man screamed out as his legs thumped over and over again all the way down the winding wooden stairway. The combination of pure terror mixed with searing pain shooting through his shoulders was more than the soft man had ever been forced to endure. Dragged like a sack of potatoes, he was powerless against the iron grips crushing his wrists. Pulling him along presented all the challenge of towing a mere child across ice. Even without his injuries he would have posed no real threat to these killers.

When his legs bounced off the last step, the ride continued across a dusty, dark, wooden floor. On he traveled through a narrow stone hallway lit by flickering torches instead of the usual oil lamps. Because the floor was poorly sanded and ridged from age, numerous tiny splinters dug into him quickly, as the reckless pace never slowed. Still filled with terror, even though quick panting had now replaced his screams, he never even noticed his legs being jabbed by the tiny wooden slivers.

Stopping briefly before a thick wooden door, the girl in yellow shouldered it open before dragging him inside. “Stop...please!” he begged as they stood him up flat against the white-painted stone wall. Iron cuffs hung from thick, black chains screwed directly into the stone wall. He winced as his arms were raised aggressively, inhaling sharply through his teeth, making a slight whistling. “I’ll pay you anything! I’ll double what he offered you...I swear!” the poor man pleaded as the metal cuffs were snapped tightly onto his wrists. His shirt was torn off in ribbons as his shameless groveling continued.

“If you had the capital or assets to make good on your bribe, you wouldn’t be here right now, would you?” hissed the girl in green as she brought her face within an inch of his. Cold murder flashed in her brilliant blue eyes. She held his terrified gaze a long moment before sidestepping to reveal the girl in blue holding a wooden bucket she seemed to have pulled from thin air.

She tipped it over him with without a moment’s pause. His horrified scream was choked off quickly as the sweet, thick goo filled his open mouth and covered most of his face and body. He coughed and spit while trying to blink, struggling to gain vision through the thick honey.

“Wha-what are you doing? Please,” he stuttered while continuing to spit periodically, shaking his head rapidly as if that would somehow shed the clinging goo. When he had regained some degree of vision he saw the girl in yellow once more. She stood in front of him holding yet another bucket, her expression blank and emotionless. She also showed no hesitation throwing its contents over the doomed merchant.

His renewed scream, filled with terror and anguish, echoed down the stone hall as thousands of aggressive red insects swarmed him. The girls turned to leave as he thrashed and screamed wildly against the searing pain. Flesh was quickly consumed as the tiny invaders gorged on their treat. The job was done, and there was no reason to stay and watch the inevitable. After all, it was just business.

* * *

Athel scurried down the narrow stone hall, paying little attention to the occasional guard pinning his back to the side wall to allow her unabated passage. She wasn’t interested in their feigned politeness or murmured apologies. More pressing matters urged her haste as colored beads clicked angrily against one another like a rattlesnake poised to strike.

When she had seen the three Steel Maidens enter the dining hall, it was clear at least one of the merchants would die this day, but it was also to be viewed as a rare opportunity that needed to be capitalized on. Athel needed to use the precious minutes gifted to her by the death of a lowly merchant.

A bloodcurdling scream echoed off the walls and down the hall behind her—nothing that brought sorrow or pity to her heart cast of stone, but a simple reminder that time was running short. She nearly sprinted the final fifty feet or so, extending her arm out in a knocking pose long before she was in range of the thick, wooden door.

She began pounding the door incessantly the moment it met her fist, not stopping until a small wooden panel toward the top slid open with a
snap
. Surprised-looking dark eyes rolled in circles, searching for the obnoxious intrusion. The impatient throat clearing guided his eyes downward before they seemed to double in size.

“Open this door. Now!” she said firmly, looking up with her arms now crossed impatiently.

“B-b-but my lady,” the man stammered nervously. “Your father has given strict orders to allow entrance to no one. Believe me, my lady...he was very clear on the matter.

Her green eyes narrowed angrily as she hissed, “In the absence of my father I hold full authority over all matters regarding the keep. This includes all residents of the keep, ranking or otherwise.” Her eyes narrowed even farther as her voice grew dangerously low. “I will not ask you again.” It was now clear to him she had never really asked at all.

“One moment, my lady,” he sputtered in a rush as the sliding panel shut sharply with a
snap
. The thick door wavered back and forth as the man nervously fumbled with the wooden bolt on the other side before finally pulling it wide open. She rushed in, paying him no more attention as he leaped out of the way and froze in an awkward salute.

The man she had come to see hung there limply against the wooden wall with his hands shackled in black iron cuffs. With one eye swollen shut and the other not far behind, he lifted his head in a frantic jerk to see who had just entered to bring him even more suffering. “Go,” she barked at the first man, who scampered from the room without needing any additional coaxing.

The lightly muscled man with long, jet-black hair bared his bloodstained teeth in a defiant grimace as Athel casually strolled in closer. The clanging of chains rang out as he lunged as far as they would allow, leaving his scowling face inches from hers. His dark eyes glistened with unshed tears, the tears of desperate man who was at his wit’s end.

She met his scowl casually with a lopsided smile, then drove him back into the wall by his chin with her left hand while crossing his throat with her highly ornamented half- moon blade, which had suddenly appeared in her right. His scowl faded into shock while her expression of amusement remained unchanged.

“I am not here to pursue what others have started,” she said while still holding the blade tightly pressed to his throat. “That is, unless you lie to me. And believe me, I
will
know whether or not you are telling the truth. Lie to me once, and those will be the last words that ever escape your lips!” She finally released his chin with a shove and removed her blade before turning her back to him.

“I swear on my life everything I told the others is true,” he said as a line of bloody drool hanging from his lip bounced off his chin with every word. “I should have lied. It would have been easier to believe than the truth ever would,” he mumbled as his head lowered and his voice tailed off.

“We’ll see about that,” she replied in an even tone as she moved in close to him again, focusing on the eye that still had some remaining function. “Remember, lie to me just once...” She allowed the threat to hang in the air for a moment.

Athel began to slowly pace back and forth in front of him, rotating her head evenly so as to never take her eyes from his. “You were sent to the Dead Forest with five men...five! Yet only
you
return?” Her eyes narrowed suspiciously. “Tell me what happened.”

He took a deep breath and gazed up toward the ceiling. “I get beaten every time I do, as if that will somehow change the reality of what I saw.”

“You will die if you don’t,” she quickly replied, the lopsided smile returning—a smile that all but promised death.

“We were attacked!” he shouted, as if screaming the words would somehow make the story more believable. “The man was hiding behind a thick tree. We never even saw him until it was too late.”

“This would be the man who was gravely injured and covered in his own blood?” she asked mockingly while raising an eyebrow.

“Yes,” he said as he lowered his head in shame. “But he moved...he moved with the speed of a snake! Two of us were struck down before I could even blink. Then he threw that axe of his into the skull of Broden before picking up Argondy like a child and slamming him to the ground. And those eyes, those bright green eyes shone like some kind of beast from the underworld!”

“And I assume you just ran away like a coward,” she said as she placed an accusing finger on his forehead. He merely whimpered while averting his eyes away from her accusing gaze. Athel screwed her finger and pressed into him hard before spinning away in disgust. She began her pacing once again while thinking out loud.

“So a mortally wounded man took out four of our top scouts. No doubt he interrogated the one he captured,” she turned again to face him, “and let the coward go free because one capture was all that was needed to gain information.” The man lowered his head in shame once more.

Her beads rattled as she shook her head. “But what I don’t understand is why he attacked you in the first place. You were only sent to bring back reports of the crytons’ latest voodoo nonsense, more accounts of these
trial
s of witchcraft used to justify children’s stories written by madmen hundreds of years ago.”

The Dronin had known about the crytons’ existence for some time now, regularly gathering reports from the scouts sent to spy on them. Lord Corzon’s paranoia had led to constant suspicion of everyone, no matter their proximity to the city, but he kept an especially close eye on them, given their special abilities and tendencies with magic. Those were the sort of things humans were extremely limited in, much less having the knowledge or ability to defend against.

“If this man was as gravely injured as you say, and still took the risk of confronting you even though he was completely outnumbered, he must have had a dire reason,” Athel said to no one as she rubbed her chin in thought. “You weren’t robbed, and seeing as how he captured one of you alive for questioning, that leaves only one remaining possibility.”

She turned and walked straight up to the man, tenderly placing a hand on his cheek. When he began to lower his head, she gently raised his chin with her other hand, not letting his eyes escape hers. Leaning in close, she whispered in his ear, “You saw something—something you weren’t supposed to see. Now you’re going to tell me what it was.” She backed away slowly, keeping her knowing eyes locked on his.

The man began to tremble as a stream of urine ran down his leg, forming a small puddle around his ankle. Athel’s expression never changed, nor did she look down at it a single time while waiting patiently for the answer to this mystery. “I saw him. We saw him,” the poor man stammered as his uncontrollable shaking became even more apparent.