by Cale Madison
The echoing sound drowned my heartbeat and pounded against my eardrums; sweat trickled across my forehead, falling past my trembling hands. One of my greatest fears in this life included this feeling of utter helplessness; the realization that there are miles of fathomless water beneath me with much larger, more terrifying creatures with the utmost advantage. I possessed no way to defend myself in case of an attack. Once I felt as if the sound had finally died, an unexpected, black and red fin broke the surface, merely the size of a small castle’s tower. It glided through the water for a moment before disappearing again. I was not alone.
CHAPTER SEVEN
FIRE OF A HUNDRED SUNS
No time to react. The monster launched itself into the air, stretching its long, muscular neck at an impressive height with the scaly head of a water dragon. It almost resembled a snake; albeit a very large snake. As it breathed, a gurgling sound vibrated its throat in a chain reaction to its massive jaws which opened and closed like that of a river crocodile. There seemed to be nothing that I could do but attempt another risky escape underwater as it turned toward my direction, scanning the driftwood with its lifeless, black eyes.
The cool water rushed over my body as I tempted certain fate by propelling myself behind destroyed ships, out of the beast’s sight. A bone-chilling roar belted from the heavens as it dove beneath the surface. I scrambled aboard the deck of an aged bireme to catch my breath and slow my increasing heartbeat for a moment. I peered behind the ship’s hull, trying to locate the titanous creature but saw nothing but an abandoned graveyard of war ships. Instantaneously, the sea monster then broke through my mistaken haven, catapulting me through the sky, several yards away.
“Shit, shit, shit.” I muttered under my breath as it realized its prey had escaped. The dragon scanned the empty ships for signs of movement but it found nothing. I held my breath, patiently waiting for the monster to abandon its quest; I had not calculated the difference between my weight and the rotting planks beneath my feet, resulting in myself falling through the wood. With one leg caught within two boards in the old ship’s deck, I watched helplessly as the dragon reared its head back and then latched its gaping mouth onto the bireme. I breathed a sigh of relief when I realized that it had missed me entirely and now choked on the surrounding ship instead.
The sea monster struggled with its latest meal, sinking its teeth into the decomposing craft one fang at a time as I fought to break free. When at last, my leg released, I searched for a final efforted escape from this wretched fate. After retrieving a sharp plank of wood from the deck, I threw myself against the wall of the monster’s mouth and began stabbing with all of my strength. Blood poured from each wound I inflicted but I would not stop until it retreated.
WIth an agonizing roar, it withdrew from the attack to tend to its wounds. I used this moment of clarity to break away and attempt the long-distance swim to safety, never once considering the possibilities of other, more foul beasts in the water. It vanished into the abyss below, allowing me time to catch my breath on the carcass of another unfortunate ship. A pool of dark, red blood began to spread in the last area I saw the creature; I remained still and waited for any sign of movement from beneath.
“Hah! What the hell!?” I yelled to nobody, only myself in a burst of relief and boasting pride. I survived a fucking water dragon!
A sudden noise broke through the silence: a ship’s ringing bell and loud voices rumbling. “What’ve we got here, boys?” a man called out from a black warship, approaching from the distant fog. I watched in astonishment as they neared my driftwood and dropped several ladders into the water. Dozens of crewmen climbed down to pull me from the wreckage and carry me aboard the haunting vessel. Their apparent captain kneeled beside me on their deck, whispering, “You’re in deep, deep shite now.”
“What laws have I broken this time?” I asked, spitting water onto the floor.
The man laughed, knowing something I did not.
“The Baron will need to speak with you.” he replied.
“Well, that worked out perfectly,” I said, “I needed to see him, too.”
The captain’s eyes met mine as he responded, coldly, “It won’t be a cordial visit either. Seems that you just bloodied his favorite pet.”
* * * * * *
Yet again, I found myself beaten, exhausted and being carried onto foreign land against my will. One of the crewmen mentioned the “Badlands”, so I assumed we had just arrived. After docking at the port, the men brought me through a large village, decorated and structured rather strangely: each home was equipped with fortified shields and crawlspaces, revealing that each civilian prepared themselves for an enemy invasion at any time. Arrows sticking out of the shingles of homes reminded me of past, hardly forgotten days as my heavy eyes fought to stay open.
There were several differences between Mercia and the Isles, I must say: families bathed in dirty streams that flowed down the hill and at every shop in their market square, an armored guard stood as a protectful watchman. I also took notice that on every home’s door, an ‘X’ had been drawn in blood. Windows were also reinforced with wooden planks, as if families feared something breaking inside. Lines of wet salt and garlic covered the front steps of houses, leading me to understand what these people were afraid of.
“Vampires?” I faintly asked the group carrying me up the hill towards a dark fortress. It looked as if the entire village rested on an incline with a palace overlooking everything.
“Just one vampire. A scourge of our land. People feel inclined to take extra
precautions...not that it concerns you, anyway.” someone answered me from behind.
I allowed my eyes to close from the overbearing weight of immense exhaustion. I could finally see vague memories of my wife again.
* * * * * *
Aketa steadied herself, leaning against the bulk of an oak tree with her sights trained on the target ahead. A few moments of tension passed before she allowed her arrow to fly, watching as it glided effortlessly through the air and shatter the apple into dozens of small pieces. We both stood in an awkward silence, realizing that she had just conquered my record.
“That makes...seventeen…” she said through breaths of relief, fighting to keep a smile from creeping across her face, “one more than you.”
“You want to gloat. Go on. You earned it today.”
Beneath the tree across the field lay apple fragments and broken arrows. We then sat together with our backs resting against the oak behind us.
“I believe I’ve made progress,” she said, “at least I’m hitting the apples, right?” Knowing she only intended to make me smile after breaking my record, I still resisted the urge to argue and locked her fingers with mine.
“You’ve always been good at buttering me up after winning.” I laughed.
“And I always will.”
We rested in tranquility for a minute before she asked me, “I’m hearing the Black Death has reached Kerko. If it’s spreading, it could be months before it finds us.”
I ran the fingers of my free hand through her blonde hair, whispering, “It isn’t going to cross the sea, Aketa. We’ll be perfectly fine here.”
She looked up at me, her eyes meeting mine in the same beautiful way as the night we first crossed paths. To love someone this deeply, to put them before yourself in any circumstance without a moment’s hesitation, is something more spectacular than anything in this world. In this moment, I did not know what was to come in the following months. I did not know to what extent my love for her would take me; I only knew that I had to keep her safe.
* * * * * *
“On your feet!” a voice shouted, waking me from my sleep.
In a daze, I scanned the chamber that I had been carried into. Red tapestries hung from the walls and golden statues of women lined the walls beneath glorious paintings. Suits of battle-worn armor stood almost lifelike, staring back at me in still anticipation for what was to come. Six or seven knights stood behind
me, their postures upright, as if expecting orders from a commanding officer. A red and black throne rested before me, hosting a muscular man with tattoos covering his arms. He wore a soot-black helmet that only covered half of his face. He held a large rusted chain in his hands, scowling with disdain as he looked at me.
“You,” he pointed to the knight holding me up, “do not carry this whoreson.”
The knight released me and I fell to the cobblestone floor, landing hard. Pain shot through my body as the bruises and cuts collided against the solid ground. The man on the throne rose to his feet, carrying the chain as he walked towards me. The visible side of his face was covered in scars while the concealed half remained an enigmatic mystery. An unkempt, black goatee jetted out from beneath his helmet.
“Do you know where you are?” he asked, leaning down to my eye-level.
“A hunch.” I answered.
“Do you know who I am?”
“Another hunch. I’m guessing you’re the big, bad Baron everyone has been warning me about.” I replied. A swift backhand clashed against my jaw, knocking me to the ground as blood spewed from my mouth - a powerful blow.
“You fucking ingrate,” rasped the Baron who then rose above me, gripping the heavy, iron chain in his hands, “you come to my doorstep and speak to me with dishonor.”
“Hardly a welcome mat at your front door.” I replied, spitting dark blood onto the ground. At this point, I had reached my limit with these unpleasant people.
“I will gut you like a fucking fish!” the Baron shouted, his voice booming through the chamber. He was a man of choice words. Scrawled across his forearms were tally-marks and corresponding dates beside them; I always notice the smallest details in tense situations.
“When I found her, she was so little,” he said in a new pace of calm, staring at the chain in his hands, “barely the size of a grown bear. I won her in a card game in Era’Kul. Did you kill her?”
“No.”
“My men say that you killed her.”
“Your precious pet tried to eat me so I broke free and cut her mouth while I got away. She’s still out there, I’m guessing. Our ship was taken down by sirens and I abandoned ship. Then, came the monst-”
Interrupted by another swift backhand.
“Not a monster,” Skalige warned, “Benny. Her name is Benny.”
I stared up at the tyrant in a bewildered state. This man appeared to be deranged and ecstatic at the same time, switching between moods at a fast rate. He wore solid gold and pure silver rings on every finger, each bearing a ruby or an emerald.
“So you say my men are liars. You say they came to me with news that my baby was slaughtered by one man. Yet, here you are, looking like you could neither plough a rabbit nor dare to oppose a matured water dragon. You’re not a knight or a monster-slayer. This is a very unpleasant circumstance, I fear,” said Skalige as he turned towards the knight who released me, “what’s your name, son?”
“Solomon, sir.”
“Well, Solomon. First, you will explain to me what exactly happened out there. Tell me the truth, as you saw it. I won’t tolerate dishonesty in my house.” Skalige ordered. Solomon appeared intimidated, watching his words carefully.
“We heard Benny on our daily rounds. We followed her cries to Shipwreck’s Gate and found this man in a pool of her blood, sir. I apologize. We assumed this rat had slain her, being that she was gone when we arrived.” he answered.
To his defense, that seemed to be the most honest truth to his knowledge. Baron Skalige nodded before departing from us to the wall opposite of his glorious, yet uncomfortable-looking throne. He retrieved a blood-covered mace from a case hanging on the wall and returned to us as he recited, “The virtue of tolerance makes a man bite his tongue so he can then tear out his hair.”
Solomon now seemed at ease as I panicked, shaking as I prepared to break free and attempt to flee from this unfolding dilemma. Skalige paused for a moment, looking me over while he tapped the blunt weapon against the temple of my head. Multiple iron spikes jetted out from the base of his tool of execution, each caked in dried blood and splattered chunks of brain.
“Such tolerance is not learned without tribulation. I don’t believe in spiritual nonsense or the fear of death itself but I do believe in the sincerity of men, clinging to their last few seconds of life,” he said while looking at my trembling face, “you bring this scared dog into my house and tell me that he murdered my Benny out of malice.”
Solomon appeared startled. Then, Skalige softly whispered to himself, “With the fire of a hundred suns, I condemn you.”
Before I could understand what was happening, the Baron swung his mace above me, cracking it’s blunt end down hard against Solomon’s skull. The knight collapsed onto his back, scrambling frantically to escape the madman wielding the bloody instrument of his demise. Skalige wrapped Solomon’s wriggling body in the rusted chain and dragged him to the center of the chamber, where he proceeded to bash his head in with the mace until nothing remained but a spurting pool of blood. Once the unfortunate knight’s corpse stopped moving, the Baron withdrew and returned to where we stood.
“Let this be a lesson to any fucker stupid enough to bring me such dire news in my time of grief! Remember this the next time you come to me with filthy lies. As for the prisoner,” he dictated, glancing at me, “lucky for him, our sixth contender croaked last night so now, we have a vacant spot in the Eye. Let him try his hand at tomorrow morning’s show. A little welcoming to our wonderful country.”
The knights surrounding me nodded and saluted after being given this order. Skalige left us and disappeared through one of the dark corridors as I was then carried away once again. Through the windows of the Baron’s castle, I could see the moon and ominous, dark clouds looming over. We must have been dawning upon the fifth day. Following multiple flights of downward, spiraling stairs and damp chambers, they proceeded to carry me into a cell resting beside dozens of others, each containing a prisoner. One of the knights locked my cell before leaving me in the dark.
I broke down, punching against the planks of wood separating me from the world beyond; I had grown immeasurably fed up with the prisons, brutal slaughters and all of the psychotic individuals outside of our small home on the hill. Once my strength had entirely been exhausted, I fell to my knees and prayed for the Djinn to come to my rescue again.
“Might want to consider reserving the energy for tomorrow,” a prisoner called out from a cell across from mine, “you’re going to need all of it.”
“Fuck off.” I snapped, kicking against the cell bars and wood.
“No need to be hostile. Tonight, we are gentlemen but tomorrow we are killers. We should revel in the peace we have now.” he said.
“What is the Eye?” I asked him.
The prisoner stood and walked to the edge of his corner cell, revealing his face in the light. Deep scars, embedded into his face and throat and faded, unreadable tattoos lining his body. He was a tough man by appearance.
“If you’re here, you’re to compete in an age-old tradition. Nobody escapes this. The Bloody Eye is the Baron’s prized arena just south of this castle. Twelve potential candidates fight to the death for a spot among his Elites, the charming men who brought you here.” he answered.
I sat and pondered this news for a moment.
“You must have found yourself on the wrong ship, too.” said the prisoner.
“You were stranded?”
“We all were,” he explained, “merchants ferrying us across the sea lost their way or simple, moronic adventure-seekers. Either way, we ended up nose-deep in this shit pile.”
I only wanted this nightmare to be over. Tonight would be my fifth since I left Aketa, giving me only a handful of hours to complete the third task. I knew that if I could not escape, I would have to survive the arena to come face to face with Skalige again. The rest of my plan could be strategized at a later time.
“What’s your name?” I asked the p
risoner.
“Don’t.”
“Don’t what?”
“It doesn’t matter who we are. Tomorrow, my blade will be at your throat and I don’t need any shred of sympathy. The fire of a hundred suns is starving - it means to consume each and every last one of us.” the prisoner replied.
“That’s the second time I’ve heard that phrase tonight. What does it mean?”
“The Bloody Eye was established over a hundred suns ago. Each year, unlucky fuckers like us are thrown into the pit to survive and fight our way out. A hundred moons and a hundred suns, the Eye has been open.” he recited to me.
“Everyone here has a taste for theatrics,” I smirked, “and how did the Baron’s men catch you?”
“We were delivering spices to Fortaare when they intercepted our cargo ship. We were offered a choice: die by their sword, then and there or volunteer to fight in the Eye. Few days later, here I am, talking to you. Funny how the world works, huh?”
“Quite funny.” I replied as I rested my head against the cobblestone. I find it so strange how detainment within a prison cell can open your eyes, help you to see the error in your ways. Here I was, surrounded by other less fortunate voyagers on some conquest that brought us all together on the same night with identical outcomes but separate purposes.
“This isn’t right,” I said, “not at all.”
“Morally fucked, yes, but to these people, it’s an escape from their shitty, shitty lives. Miserable whoresons who’d rather watch grown men slay each other for a spectacle than work harder to improve themselves.”
I remained silent as I processed it all.
“Lighten up,” he said to me, “tomorrow you get your chance at sweet redemption. We’re putting on a show for those sons of bitches in the morning, so let’s really give them one to remember.”