by CW Thomas
“Aberdour fell to the Black King many moons ago,” Korah continued, “but there is a rebellion growing. Some say that the children of Kingsley and Lilyanna Falls have escaped, that the rightful heir to the throne of Aberdour is still out there. Someone like him could unit the rebels. There are people here who fear you, Bryn… Emma. If they found out who you really are, they would hurt you very, very badly.”
Korah pressed her hand against Brynlee’s heart again, as if shutting the last bits of Brynlee Falls away for good. “You must keep yourself in there. All right? Promise me you won’t tell anyone who you really are?”
Brynlee nodded, and Korah pulled her in for a hug.
“Mungo wants me to learn to be like you,” Brynlee said.
Korah sighed as if disappointed. “He does, does he?” She pulled away and looked at Brynlee with great sympathy. “When did he tell you that?”
“Just a little while ago. Downstairs. He said he wants me to learn to dress like you and look like you.”
“Then that is what you will do,” she said. “But not tonight. It’s very late, and you should get to bed.”
The echoes of the party downstairs had passed their peak by the time Brynlee left Korah’s bedroom. She walked down the hallway to the balcony that circled the common room below and peeked over the railing. About half the guests had left, some with women and some without, while a few remained behind by the large fireplace to keep drinking and talking.
Brynlee circled around the left side of the balcony and down an adjoining hallway that contained two bedrooms. The door to the first room was closed, but she could hear the bumping and scraping of furniture within along with the muffled sounds of aggressive grunting.
She continued on to the second door that led into a simple bedroom filled with narrow cots where she slept with three other girls—Maidie, Vika, and Murron. All of them had survived the attack on Aberdour and the subsequent journey to the capital city. They were huddled together when Brynlee entered the room with Murron sobbing in Vika’s arms.
“What’s wrong?” Brynlee asked.
Vika looked up, her freckled face pink with grief and glistening with wiped tears. She was eleven years old, the soft-spoken daughter of a tailor and a seamstress, both of whom had been murdered during the high king’s attack.
“Mungo’s going to put her to work after she turns fourteen next month,” Vika said, as she rubbed Murron’s back.
Murron was the oldest among them, hardheaded and strong. It unsettled Brynlee to see her crying so freely.
“Doing what?” Brynlee asked, though, deep down, she knew exactly what.
“Brynlee, you’re so stupid,” said Murron pulling away from Vika, her face a distraught wreck. “What do you think we’re doing here? What do you think this place is? Mungo’s turning us all into whores.” She buried her face into Vika’s dress once more, the back of her auburn head bobbing up and down as she cried.
Murron’s words frightened her, and yet confirmed what she had suspected all along.
There had been fourteen girls taken prisoner from Aberdour. Three had died on the road to Perth. The witch, Demulier Congave, had murdered a fourth on the day a rich prince from Tay purchased Scarlett. Three others had been sold as slaves.
Mungo sent the two oldest girls to work at his other brothels in the various corners of the kingdom, while keeping Brynlee, Maidie, Vika, and Murron at his main house in southern Perth. The four of them spent most of their time serving guests, cleaning the brothel, and learning the trade of prostitution from Mungo’s whores.
Murron pushed away from Vika and jumped to her feet. “I’m leaving,” she said breathlessly. “I can’t do this. I can’t stay here.”
“What?” Vika said, rising to stop her. “No. They’ll kill you if they catch you trying to escape.”
“Close the door!” Murron snapped to Brynlee who immediately obeyed.
Murron grabbed a pillowcase and began stuffing it with a blanket and a few extra clothes that she had been given.
“Where are you going to go, huh?” Vika argued. “At least here you’ve got a place to sleep, warm food—”
“My father told me that a respectable woman always keeps her honor,” Murron said. “I can’t let them take that from me.”
“Remember what Cordelia told us? It’s only our bodies,” Vika said. “If we make it our choice, they have no power over us.”
“And you believe that?”
Murron went to the window where she fought for several moments to crank open the glass panel. Brynlee cringed as she watched the girl flop a leg over the sill.
“It’s a long drop. You’ll break your legs,” Vika said.
“I can climb down,” Murron insisted. “And you’d be smart to come—”
The door to the bedroom opened and Mungo stepped inside. Murron froze, one leg out the window, her eyes locked upon him in terror. Mungo clasped his hands in front of his round belly and smiled. “And where are we running off to at such a late hour?”
Murron stepped back into the room. “N–n–nowhere, my lord. Just… needed to smell the night air.”
He sauntered over to her. “Needed to smell the night air,” he repeated, enunciating each word carefully. “What was your name again?”
“M–Murron, my lord.”
“Yes, that’s right. And are you excited to start working for me, Murron?”
Even from across the room, Brynlee could see the shiver trickle down Murron’s body. She didn’t answer him and kept her eyes locked on the floor.
“I can tell that you are quite nervous,” Mungo said. “But can I tell you a secret?” He leaned down close to the girl’s ear. “They all are at first. But that will not do.” He began to unfasten his belt. “I didn’t make my reputation as the best brothel owner in all of Perth by selling men nervous, unwilling girls. Now turn around.”
Murron was shaking violently now. “P–p–please, m–my lord. I’m sorry. I w–won’t try to run again.”
“I hope not, but you see what you’ve done? You’ve put the very idea of running into the heads of three other girls. I need to beat it out of them by beating it out of you. Now turn around.”
Tears slid down the girl’s cheeks. “My lord, please—”
Mungo lunged at her and flipped her around as she screamed. He bent her over his knee and swatted her bottom with a quick lash of his belt. Murron kicked and flailed, but he continued beating her. Though she slid off his knee and lay flat on the floor he continued beating her. When he finally stopped, he was sweating and panting, and the exposed parts of Murron’s arms and legs were riddled with welts.
Mungo looked at Vika, Maidie, and Brynlee who were standing against the far wall in shocked silence.
“I trust I’ve made myself clear,” Mungo said, refastening his belt.
“Y-y-yes,” stammered Maidie.
Vika nodded, but Brynlee was too afraid to move. Slowly the whore master walked over to her, wiping the sweat from his brow.
“And you?” he said. “You won’t try to run from me, will you?”
Shaking, Brynlee said, “N–no, sir.”
“That’s a beautiful girl.” He caressed her face with gentle fingers and then left the room.
As Brynlee watched him stroll down the hallway, she felt a drafty chill sweep toward her. Then she heard the front door shut. She thought it odd that more guests would be arriving at this time of night.
She looked back into the room at Murron who was being comforted once again by Vika.
Leaving them behind, Brynlee trotted down the hallway to the balcony overlooking the common room and peered over the railing. There were two cloaked figures walking in from the entrance, dark against the shadows of the entry corridor. They stopped midway down the hall and used a key to open a doorway that led far beneath the house.
Brynlee felt her pulse quicken as it dawned on her who the two figures were.
She tiptoed down the stairs, past the few guests left in the common ro
om, and down the entry hall.
The side door that led to the underground chamber was usually locked. Brynlee had been down there once already to watch Neesah vanish in a tub of black water. The idea of returning to the dark crypt made her shiver, but she found her curiosity stronger than her fear.
“Pretend to be someone else,” she whispered to herself. “Someone braver.”
Brynlee tiptoed down the stairs into the darkness of the cavern beneath Mungo’s house. She stopped every so often to listen, but she heard nothing except for her own breathing.
When she neared the bottom she saw light coming from the large black room where she and Neesah had been taken after they had arrived in Perth almost four months ago. A part of her wondered if the poor young girl was still in there, soaking in the cold water of the mysterious tub.
Hundreds of candles illuminated the room, casting a flickering light on the two figures within, Ustus Rapere, servant of the high king, and Demulier Congrave, the smooth-skinned witch with the bright green eyes.
“How many?” Demulier asked. She pulled a wide hood away from her face and laid it across the vibrant copper shoulders of her silk gown. Her face looked deathly pale in the dark shadows, framed by shiny locks of black hair.
“They found just one of the gems on the man,” Ustus said, “but we hear that he may have been given up to four by Merek.”
The witch looked furious. “The ways I will burn him if I ever get my hands on him,” she muttered.
Ustus folded his cloaked arms across the green chest of his patterned tunic. He looked just as he did the last time Brynlee had seen him—treacherous and vile. “He sold the gems to buy back his sister, even though I already told him that I could get her back for him.”
“And could you?”
Ustus shook his head. “I was just telling him what he wanted to hear.”
“Then his decision to splurge the gems on his sister was a wise one.”
“For him,” Ustus said. “How can we complete the ritual without the gems?”
“We cannot,” Demulier said, pacing. “And by now they are scattered into the populace of Efferous.” She walked about the room in deep contemplation. She unbuttoned her cloak and set it on the table, revealing a deep gold brocade neckline and the sides of two impressive breasts.
Ustus seemed distracted for a moment. “Orkrash does not suspect anything, not yet anyway. I am not sure how many more lies I can conjure to convince him to be patient.”
“Tell him the truth, that the wizard was assassinated by a thief who took the gems. Then advocate for sending soldiers throughout the empire of Efferous to hunt down the pieces.”
Ustus looked stunned. “Hunting down six shards would take—”
“We need that gem!” Demulier shouted. She calmed, tapped her fingers together, and added, “I could always use the high king himself as the vessel. That would not be preferable, but it would be possible.”
“Dangerous?”
“That is hard to say. My master has plans for Orkrash that are beyond my sight.”
Ustus became giddy with excitement. “You–you speak to the master often?”
Demulier shot him a look of pure disdain. “No one speaks to him, you fool. He speaks to those he deems worthy.”
Ustus bowed. “Of course, my lady.”
The witch continued pacing, drawing her nails over the surface of the large table that sat in the center of the room.
“Are there no other gems that will serve our purpose?” Ustus asked.
“Another regenstern? Ustus, I thought you were smarter than that. The regenstern is a rare gift. It was not plucked from a mountainside, but forged by a great wizard many centuries ago. It is one of an exceptionally rare few, and likely the last of its kind. No. There is no other.” She flicked her hand through the air. “But that doesn’t matter right now. The dragon’s blood is still collecting and will take many more years before it is even ready for The Red Awakening. Time and patience. That is all we have right now. In the meantime, find the gem!”
When Demulier started moving toward the door, Brynlee sprinted up the stairs. Forgoing silence for speed, she raced to get out of the cavern before anyone discovered she had been there.
In her mind she replayed the pieces of the conversation she remembered, trying to make sense of it. She understood nothing except that Ustus and Demulier were plotting something against the high king—something involving a dragon perhaps.
At the top of the stairs Brynlee bumped into a woman in a silky copper dress. She bounced back from the woman’s hip and would’ve tumbled backward down the stairs had Demulier not reached out and caught her by the arm.
Brynlee’s eyes were wide as saucers as the witch drew her out into the hallway.
“You must be careful,” Demulier cooed, brushing some dirt off of Brynlee’s shoulders. “Always watch your feet, my love. You don’t want to step where you’re not welcome.”
Brynlee was too terrified, too confused, to say anything in response to the woman.
Ustus emerged from the stairway and locked the door behind him. He passed by Brynlee without even looking at her and opened the door to leave the brothel. Demulier followed him, but not before casting one final look over her shoulder at Brynlee who stood quivering in the dark, musky corridor of Mungo’s house.
LIA
Lia Falls sniffed the late evening air of West Galori. It smelled of sea salt and fish. From the alleyway she looked behind her at the ocean, to the distant horizon alive with a brilliant orange sunset. Somewhere beyond sat Aberdour. It would be late autumn there now, the cooler winds from the north bringing in the first frosts of winter.
If Efferous had an autumn, she hadn’t seen it yet. The summer had been plenty hot enough, with one dry day rolling into the next.
Lia missed home, missed the changing seasons. This moon marked her eleventh year. Mother would have baked her something sweet. Father would’ve given her a boyish gift, as he always did, but he would’ve done so discretely, out of sight of Lilyanna. One year ago he had given her a dagger. Though not a gift most girls would jump up and down over, it became Lia’s most prized possession. She had lost the knife after stabbing Sir Komor Raven in the leg.
Her thoughts of home now soured by the memory of that awful day, Lia turned back to face the busy fishing community of West Galori.
She pulled her hood tight around her face, always aware of patrolling black vipers. It was unlikely any of them would ever recognize her, but she figured it wiser to be safe than sorry.
There were two city guards across the road standing watch at the base of a round stone tower. Their cloaks hung almost to the ground, the heavy fabric dyed a dark blue. They hadn’t noticed Lia yet, and she hoped it stayed that way. Just to be sure she slunk back into the alleyway a tad further.
The crowded streets were thinning. Fishermen were headed home for a hot meal. Merchants and traders were packing up and counting their earnings. Lia had spent many days watching them all, learning their routines, studying their behaviors. In recent months she had become intently focused on the way people interacted with each other, knowing that the best way to blend in was to know how to behave. She could now tell a real smile from a fake one that often gave away a liar. She knew the look in a woman’s eye when she was truly in love, and could tell the ones who weren’t by the way they cut short the kisses they gave to their men, and the lonely expressions on their faces as they walked away.
Lia’s attention was currently fixed on the workingmen of West Galori with their sun-bleached hair coming and going from a popular tavern across the street. She had spent several days watching the place, looking for someone—or rather a certain type of someone.
A scuffle broke out among three men who were standing outside the tavern, two fishermen versus a dark skinned traveler in a long leather coat. One of the fishermen had struck the traveler in the jaw, sending him spinning to the dusty earth.
They were shouting in Efferousian. Lia couldn�
�t speak the language very well, but she had picked up enough from Khile, the old man, and the townspeople to understand that the dispute involved money. The traveler owed, and the fishermen were out to collect.
A few townsfolk were gathering to watch the fight.
One of the fishermen rushed in to kick the traveler.
What happened in the next few blazing seconds confirmed for Lia that she had found the man she was looking for.
The traveler caught the fisherman’s leg, broke his ankle with his forearm, and threw him to the ground where he caved in his nose. He deflected a blow from the second man, shattered his nose with his palm and kneed him in the crotch. The fight ended as swiftly as it had begun.
Lia watched the traveler walk away as though he had done nothing but swat at a couple of bugs. After a moment, she emerged from the alleyway and went after him. She followed him for a little while, watching him move, his dark head and black hair low between his broad shoulders, his long coat tussling in the breeze behind him.
When she finally found the nerve to approach him, she sprinted up to him on his ride side and whipped around to face him. “Teach me,” she said.
He stopped, puzzled, and looked her up and down. “Teach you what?” he said with a baritone voice.
“To fight.” She pointed down the street in the direction of the tavern. “Like that. Like you.”
The man smirked. “Go home, little girl.” He pushed past her.
Lia skipped ahead of him. “I can pay you.”
He stopped again, looking annoyed. “Pay me how?”
“I can cook. I can clean. I can shovel barns. I’m good with my hands. Let me be your apprentice. I can—”
“Apprenticing is boys work,” he said. “Get out of my way.”
Lia reached out to stop him. “Please. I want to learn how to fight.”
He stepped back, sighed, and studied her again. “How old are you?” he asked.
“I’m fourteen,” she lied, hoping she wasn’t pushing her luck.
“Women are good for one thing,” the man said. “Are you prepared to pay like that?”