Denna laughed. “You have spirit. I love breaking a man with spirit. Do you know why Master Rahl picked me?”
“No, Mistress Denna.”
“Because I am relentless. I may not be as cruel as some of the others, but I enjoy breaking a man more than any of them. I love hurting my pets more than anything else in life. I live to do it.” She arched an eyebrow and smiled. “I don’t give up, I don’t tire of it, and I don’t ease up. Ever.”
“I am honored, Mistress Denna, to be in the hands of the best.”
She put the Agiel against the cut on his lip and held it there until he was on his knees and tears ran from his eyes. “That is the last flippant thing I ever want to hear from you.” She took the Agiel away and kneed him in his mouth, knocking him sprawling on his back. She pressed the Agiel against his stomach. Before he passed out, she pulled it away. “What do you have to say?”
“Please, Mistress Denna,” he managed with the greatest of effort, “forgive me.”
“All right, get up. It’s time to begin your training.”
She went to the table and retrieved something. She pointed to a spot on the floor. “Stand there. Now!”
Richard moved as fast as he could. He couldn’t straighten himself; the pain wouldn’t allow it. He stood on the spot, breathing hard, sweating. She handed him something with a thin chain attached. It was a collar made of leather, the same color as she wore.
Her voice lost its pleasant quality. “Put it on.”
Richard was in no condition to ask questions. He realized that he was starting to believe he would do anything to avoid the touch of the Agiel. He buckled the collar around his neck. Denna picked up the chain. The end of it had a loop of metal, which she slipped over the post on the back of the wooden chair.
“The magic will punish you for going against my wishes. When I place this chain somewhere, it is my wish for it to stay there until I remove it. I want you to learn that you are helpless to remove it.” She pointed at the door, which stood open. “For the next hour, I want you to try your best to make it to that doorway. If you don’t try your hardest, this is what I will do for the rest of the hour.” She put the Agiel to the side of his neck until he was on his knees, screaming in agony, and begging for her to stop. She took it away and told him to begin, then went to lean, arms folded, against a wall.
The first thing he did was simply to try to walk to the door. The pain buckled his legs before he was able to put even a little tension on the chain, and stopped only when he scooted backward toward the chair.
Richard reached for the ring. The pain of the magic cramped his arms until he was shaking with the strain of reaching for it. Sweat ran off his face. He tried backing to the chair, then turning, but before his fingers could touch the chain, the pain took him to the ground again. He pushed against the pain, straining to reach the chair, but couldn’t get there past the pain, the effort causing him to fall to the ground, vomiting blood. When it ended, he held himself up with one hand, tears dripping from his face as he held his stomach with his other hand and shook. From the corner of his eye, he saw Denna unfold her arms and stand up straight. He started moving again.
What he was doing was clearly not going to work. He had to think of something else. He drew the sword, thinking to lift the chain. For a brief instant, and with the greatest effort, he managed to touch the chain with the blade. The pain made him drop the sword. He was able to stop the hurt only by putting the sword back in its scabbard.
A thought came to him. He lay down on the ground, and in a quick movement, kicked the chair out from under the chain before the pain could paralyze him. The chair skidded across the floor, hit the table, and fell over. The chain fell from the post.
The victory lasted only the briefest of moments. With the chain off the chair, the pain elevated to a new height. He choked and gasped against the floor. With all his effort, he clawed his way across the stone. Each inch he moved only increased the pain until he was blinded by it. His eyes felt as if they would explode from his head. He had managed to move only about two feet. He didn’t know what to do; the pain wouldn’t let him move, and it was keeping him from thinking.
“Please, Mistress Denna,” he whispered with all his strength, “help me. Please help me.” He realized he was crying, but didn’t care. He only wanted the chain back on the chair so the pain would stop.
He heard her boots walking toward him. She bent and picked up the chair, righted it, and replaced the loop. His pain lifted, but he couldn’t stop crying as he rolled onto his back.
She stood over him with her hands on her hips. “That was only fifteen minutes, but since I had to come help you, the hour starts over. The next time I have to come help you, it will be two hours.” She bent and pushed the Agiel against his stomach, making pain bloom inside him. “Understand?”
“Yes, Mistress Denna,” he cried. He was afraid there was a way to escape, and afraid of what would happen to him if he found it, and afraid of not trying. If there was a way, by the end of the hour, he had not found it.
She came and stood over him as he rested on his hands and knees. “Do you think you understand now? Do you understand what will happen if you try to escape?”
“Yes, Mistress Denna.” And he really did. There was no way for him to ever get away. Hopelessness closed around him, feeling as if it would suffocate him. He wanted to die. He thought about the knife at his belt.
“Stand up.” As if reading his mind, she spoke softly. “If you should think you would end your service as my pet, think again. The magic will prevent it, the same as it prevents you from moving the chain from where I put it.”
Richard blinked numbly at her. “There is no way for you to escape me, not even through death. You will be mine as long as I choose to let you live.”
“That won’t be long, Mistress Denna. Darken Rahl is going to kill me.”
“Perhaps. But even if he does, it will only be after you tell him what he wants to know. What I want is for you to answer his questions, and you are going to do what I want without hesitation.” Her brown eyes had the hardness of steel. “You may not believe that right now, but you have no idea how good I am at training people. I have never failed to break a man. You may think you will be the first, but you will soon be begging to please me.”
The first day with her wasn’t over, and already Richard knew he would do almost anything she said. She had weeks left to train him. If he could have willed himself to die on the spot, he would have done it. The worst thing was knowing she was right; there was nothing he could do to stop her. He was at her mercy, and he didn’t think she had a shred of it.
“I understand, Mistress Denna. I believe you.” Her pleasant smile made him need to think of how pretty her braid was.
“Good. Now, take off your shirt.” Her smile widened at the puzzled look on his face, and the way he started unbuttoning his shirt nonetheless. She held the Agiel in front of his eyes. “It’s time to teach you all the things the Agiel can do. If you leave your shirt on, it will be covered in blood, and I won’t be able to find a fresh spot on you. You are going to see why the outfit I wear is this color.”
He pulled his shirttail out. He was breathing hard, in a near panic. “But Mistress Denna, what have I done wrong?”
She cupped a hand to the side of his face with mock concern. “Why, don’t you know?” He shook his head, swallowing back the lump in his throat. “You have let yourself be captured by a Mord-Sith. You should have killed all my men with your sword. I think you could have done it. You were very impressive, as far as you went. Then you should have used your knife or your bare hands to kill me, while I was vulnerable, before I had control of your magic. You should have never given me the chance to take control of the magic from you. You should have never tried to use it against me.”
“But why must you use the Agiel on me, now.”
She laughed. “Because I want you to learn. Learn that I can do whatever I want, and there is no way for you to stop me
. You must learn that you are totally helpless, and that if you enjoy any time without pain, it is only because I choose it. Not you.” The smile left her face. She went to the table, returned with manacles held with a length of chain. “Now. You have a problem that annoys me. You keep falling down. We are going to fix that. Put these on.”
She threw them at him. He struggled to control his breathing as he latched each iron band to a shaking wrist. Denna dragged the chair over to a beam, made him stand under it. She stood on the chair to hook the chain to an iron peg.
“Stretch up. It doesn’t reach yet.” He had to stand on his toes and stretch before she could get it hooked. “There.” She smiled. “Now we won’t have any more problems with you falling down.”
Richard hung from the chain, trying to control his terror, the iron bands digging into his wrists because of his own weight. He knew there was nothing he could do to stop her before, but this was different. It amplified his helplessness, made him all the more aware that there was no way for him to fight back. Denna pulled on her gloves, walked around him several times, tapping the Agiel against her hand, prolonging his anxiety.
If only he had been killed trying to stop Darken Rahl—that was a price he had been prepared to pay. This was different. This was death without dying. Living death. He was not even to be allowed the dignity of fighting back. He knew what the Agiel felt like; he didn’t need her to show him anymore. She was only doing this to take away his pride, his self-respect. To break him.
Denna tapped the Agiel against his chest and back as she continued walking around him. Each touch of it was like a dagger knifing into him. Each touch made him cry out in pain and twist on the chain; and he knew she hadn’t even really begun yet. The first day was still not over, and there would be many more to come. He cried at his helplessness.
Richard imagined his sense of self, his dignity, as a living thing, saw it in his mind. He imagined a room. A room that was impervious to anything, to any harm. He put his dignity, his self-respect, into that room, and locked the door. No one would have a key to that door. Not Denna, not Darken Rahl. Only him. He would endure what was to come, for as long as it was to come, without his dignity. He would do what he had to, and someday he would unlock the door, and be himself again, even if it was only in death. But for now, he would be her slave. For now. But not always. Someday, it would end.
Denna took his face in both her hands and kissed him, hard. Hard enough to make his cut lip throb and sting. She seemed to enjoy the kiss more when she was sure it hurt him. She took her face from his, her eyes wide with delight. “Shall we begin, my pet?” she whispered.
“Please, Mistress Denna,” he whispered, “don’t do this.”
Her smile widened. “That’s what I wanted to hear.”
Denna began showing him what the Agiel would do, how if she dragged it lightly across his flesh, it raised fluid-filled welts, and how if she pressed a little harder, they filled with blood. When she bore down, he could feel warm wetness on his sweaty skin. She could also make the exact same pain without leaving a mark. His teeth hurt from gritting them so hard. Sometimes she would stand behind him, waiting until he was off guard before she touched it to him. When she tired of that she made him close his eyes and keep them closed while she walked around him, pressing it against him or dragging it around his chest.
She would laugh when she succeeded in making him think it was coming, and he would brace for it, and it didn’t. One particularly sharp jab brought his eyes open wide, giving her an excuse to use the glove. She made him beg for forgiveness for opening his eyes without being told to do so. His wrists bled from the manacles cutting into them. It was impossible to keep his weight off them.
His anger only got away from him once, when she pressed the Agiel into his armpit. She stood with a smirk, watching, while he twisted, trying to think of her hair. Since putting the Agiel there caused him to lose control of the anger, she concentrated on that area for a long time, but he didn’t make the same mistake twice. Since he didn’t bring on the pain of the magic again, she did it for him, only when she did it he couldn’t turn it off, no matter how hard he tried. He had to beg her to do it for him. Sometimes she would stand in front of him, watching him catch his breath. A few times, she pressed herself against him, hugging his chest, squeezing, the hardness of the leather making every wound it pressed against flare anew in pain.
Richard had no idea how long this torture lasted. Much of the time, he wasn’t aware of anything but the pain, as if it were a living thing, there with him. He was only aware that at some point, he knew he would do anything she said, no matter what it was, if only she would stop hurting him. He looked away from the Agiel. The mere glimpse of it made tears well up in his eyes. Denna was right about herself; she never tired or became bored with what she did. It seemed to constantly fascinate her, keep her amused, satisfied. The only thing that seemed to make her happier than hurting him was when he begged her to stop. He would have begged more, to make her happy, but most of the time he was incapable of talking. Simply breathing was almost more than he could handle.
He no longer tried to keep the pressure off his wrists, and hung limp, delirious. He thought she stopped for a while, but he hurt so much from what she had already done that he wasn’t sure. The sweat in his eyes was blinding him; the sweat running into the wounds caused them to burn.
When his head cleared somewhat, she returned, walking behind him. He braced for what he knew was coming. Instead, she grabbed a fistful of hair and jerked his head back.
“Now, my pet, I’m going to show you something new. I’m going to show you how kind a mistress I really am.” She pulled his head back, hard, until the pain made him tense the muscles in his neck to resist the pressure. She put the Agiel against his throat. “Stop fighting me, or I won’t take it away.”
Blood was running into his mouth; he relaxed his neck muscles, allowing her to pull as hard as she wanted.
“Now, my pet, listen very carefully. I’m going to put the Agiel in your right ear.” Richard almost choked with fear. She jerked his head back to make him stop it. “It’s different from putting it anywhere else. It hurts a lot more. But you must do exactly as I say.” Her mouth was right by his ear; she whispered to him like a lover. “In the past, when I have had a sister Mord-Sith with me, we would both put our Agiel in the man’s ears at the same time. He would make a scream unlike any other. The sound of it is intoxicating. I get chills just thinking about it.”
“But, it would also kill him. We were never successful at using two Agiel at the same time in that particular way without killing him. We kept trying, but they always died. Be thankful I am your mistress; there are others who still try.”
“Thank you, Mistress Denna.” He wasn’t sure what he was thanking her for, but he didn’t want her to do whatever it was she had planned.
“Pay attention,” she whispered harshly. Her voice softened again. “When I do this, you must not move. If you move, it will damage things inside you. It won’t kill you, but it will cause irrevocable disability. Some men who move go blind, some are no longer able to move anything on one side of their body, some can’t talk anymore, or walk. But in all who move, something is spoiled. I want you fully functional. Mord-Sith who are more cruel than I don’t tell their pets not to move, they just do it without warning them. So you see? I am not so cruel as you thought. Still, only a few of the men I do it to are able to hold still. Even though I warn them, they still jerk, and then they are left impaired.”
Richard couldn’t hold back from crying. “Please, Mistress Denna, please don’t do it, please.”
He could feel the breath of her smile. She ran her wet tongue into his ear, kissed it. “But I want to, my pet. Don’t forget, hold still, don’t move.”
Richard clenched his teeth, but nothing could have prepared him for it. His head felt as if it had been turned to glass and shattered into a thousand pieces. His fingernails cut into his palms. All sense of time shattered apar
t with everything else. He was in a wasteland of agony with no beginning, no end. Every nerve in his body seared with razor-sharp, burning misery. He had no idea how long she held the Agiel there, but when she took it away, his screams echoed from the stone walls.
When he finally went limp, she kissed his ear and whispered breathlessly in it. “That was a simply delightful scream, my pet. I’ve never heard one better. Except a scream in death, of course. You did very well, my pet, you never moved an inch.” She kissed his neck tenderly, then his ear again. “Shall we try the other side?”
Richard sagged in the shackles. He couldn’t even cry. She pulled his head back harder as she moved to the other side of him.
When she was finally finished with him, and unhooked the chain, he collapsed to the floor. He didn’t think himself capable of moving, but when she motioned him up with the Agiel, the mere sight of it made him do as she wanted.
“That’s all for today, my pet.” Richard thought he might die of joy. “I’m going to go get some sleep. Today was only a part day; tomorrow we will get in a full day of training. You will find a full day more painful.”
Richard was too exhausted to care about tomorrow. He wanted only to lie down. Even the stone floor would feel like the best bed he had ever slept in. He looked at it longingly.
Denna brought the chair over, took the chain that hung from his collar, and hooked it over the iron peg in the beam. He watched in confusion, too weary to try to figure out her intent. When finished, she walked toward the door. Richard realized there wasn’t enough slack to allow him to lie down.
“Mistress Denna, how am I to sleep?”
She turned, gave him a condescending smile. “Sleep? I don’t recall telling you that you were allowed to sleep. Sleep is a privilege you earn. You have not earned it. Don’t you remember this morning, when you had that nasty vision of killing me with your sword? Don’t you remember I told you that you would be sorry you did it? Good night, my pet.”
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