I raised an eyebrow. “You have a head interrogator? Wow. How many interrogators does a place like this need, anyway? Do they work in shifts?”
Apparently, I didn’t rate direct princely acknowledgement, because he ignored me.
“Do enjoy yourself, my flower,” he told Lesimba, stroking his knuckles down her cheek in a proprietary manner.
Ugh.
Once again, I wished I could wake up from this, and find myself sandwiched between Aristede, Eldris, and Nyx. Or, y’know, wake up and find myself pretty much anyplace other than here, really. The guard approached and kicked the sole of my boot. This time, I kicked back with a snarl, but the combination of the heavy shackle around my ankle and the fact that he’d apparently been expecting something of the sort made it completely unproductive.
“On your feet, girl,” he said, more businesslike than angry. “You’ll do better to save your strength—trust me.”
I gave him a flat stare and didn’t move. He shook his head ruefully and grabbed me by the hair, yanking me upright. I yelped and scrambled to my feet as his grip tore at the same parts of my scalp that were still scabbed and sore from my capture. Lesimba laughed gaily, and rage bubbled up in my chest.
“Let go!” I yelled, reaching for the guard’s hand with both of mine.
He caught my nearest arm and wrenched it up, releasing his grip on my hair in favor of forcing my wrist toward the wall. An instant later, it was caught in place. I craned around, only to find the chain attached to the wrist shackle hooked over a piece of curved metal recessed in the stone. I jerked at it, but there was no give. It was also too high up for me to lift it and free the chain from the hook.
I growled and fought as the guard grabbed my other wrist and fastened it to a second hook above my head. Moments later, he’d repeated the actions with the chains shackled to my ankles, leaving me spread-eagled against the wall, helpless. My chest rose and fell rapidly as panic tried to rise.
No. Stop. It was just Lesimba. She might be a vicious bitch, but the really bad stuff wasn’t going to happen until this evening. Anger, not fear, I reminded myself. That shouldn’t be too hard with Lesimba laughing her fool head off at my ineffectual struggles against the guard.
The vicious bitch in question got her glee under control and sauntered over to get a closer look. I leveled my best death glare at her.
“Careful, my lady,” the guard warned. “She might spit.”
What a good idea. I wished I’d thought of it myself. I smiled sweetly at Lesimba and let fly, only to be disappointed when the glob of saliva landed on the shoulder of her fine linen tunic-dress rather than on her face. She hauled off and slapped me with one of her twig-arms. My cheek stung, and my recent head injury didn’t appreciate the jolt, but I only grinned at her, showing teeth.
“Whoa,” I said, feigning awe. “So original. You’ll have that head interrogator out of a job in no time, sweetie.”
Rather than losing her temper, Lesimba smiled back. We glared at each other, sizing each other up across the short distance separating us.
Lesimba was still beautiful, in a sort of vengeful-evil-goddess way. Her dusky skin was smooth and unblemished, her features haughty and sharply defined. She was a few inches taller than I was—but let’s be honest, most people were a few inches taller than I was. Or a lot of inches taller, in many cases. Her hair was styled differently than the first time I’d met her, but still braided just as intricately.
She reminded me of a lifelike statue, carved into marble with nothing out of place, nothing imperfect. Real people simply didn’t maintain that level of put-togetherness once they’d stepped out of their doors in the morning. Hell, most people didn’t aspire to that level of put-togetherness in the first place.
“Bring me a stout cane and a blade,” she told the guard, without breaking eye contact with me.
“Sure,” I said. “And, hey, if you’re making a supply run, bring me a change of clothes and a bucket to wash in while you’re at it. Something to eat besides bread wouldn’t go amiss, either.”
From the corner of my eye, I thought I saw the guard shake his head in resignation. Lesimba huffed a dismissive breath through her nose. The man left, though I didn’t hold out much hope for the bucket and washrag.
“So,” I said conversationally, “how’s harem life treating you? Hurled any good insults at innocent servants, lately? Backstabbed any of your creepy husband’s other wives?”
She slapped me again.
“You’ll hurt your hand, dear,” I told her in a solicitous tone, ignoring the taste of blood and the tender place inside my cheek where one of my teeth had caught on the flesh.
Her answering smile was reptilian. “You really are a common little creature, aren’t you?”
I blinked at her. “Uh… have you seen this hair? Or these blue eyes? Because even if you haven’t noticed, I can assure you that your husband has.”
Lesimba’s disturbing smile hardened into a rictus. Even though the last thing I really wanted right now was a reminder of the men I’d left behind, I couldn’t help comparing Lesimba’s obvious hatred and contempt for Oblisii’s other wives and concubines with the love and care Eldris and Aristede held for each other, or their growing fondness for Nyx. Hell, even Rayth was part of that brotherhood, and was slowly making strides in healing the rift with his estranged former steward.
Didn’t the world have enough fucking strife in it as it was?
Gods, how I longed to be with them, safe and sound and preferably someplace far away from here. The door creaked open and the guard returned, holding a length of cut cane perhaps half the diameter of my wrist in one hand, and a sheathed dagger in the other.
“My lady,” he said, offering both items with the air of someone who’d been in this job long enough to grow bored of it.
Lesimba gave me a final, cruel grin and took the cane.
I’ll still be in one piece for the head interrogator in a few hours, I reminded myself. Oblisii might be the type to indulge his evil wife, but she was obviously too scared of him to risk pissing him off by damaging me irreparably.
She held one end of the woody length in both hands, cocking it like someone preparing to fell a tree with an axe. A moment later, the other end smashed into my abused stomach muscles, driving a heavy grunt from my lungs.
Chapter 10: Interrogation
Frella
“AREN’T YOU SUPPOSED to ask me a damned question first?” I wheezed, once the pain in my gut had subsided to manageable levels.
Lesimba only bared her teeth and slammed the cane into my stomach again. I tightened my abdominal muscles as much as I could to absorb the blow. It was hard to say if the fact that my stomach already felt like it had been trampled by stampeding cattle made things better or worse. I had no doubt that if Lesimba had been physically stronger, it would have been unbearable—and as it was, I still ended up vomiting the bread and water I’d eaten after the dozenth blow.
“Filthy whore,” Lesimba hissed, as I choked on bile and tried to work up enough saliva to spit. “How did you escape the palace? No one turns down my prince!”
I shot her a ‘what the fuck?’ look, wondering for the first time if Lesimba might be mentally unstable as well as a raging cow. If she was so convinced I didn’t deserve to lick her husband’s polished leather boots, why the hell be upset about the fact that I’d escaped his harem and fled?
I would have asked her aloud, but it was pretty clear any words I tried to form were just going to emerge as unintelligible croaking, with my throat still scraped raw from stomach acid. So I shrugged. As much as this sucked donkey balls, it was better than if she were asking me about the dragons, or my companions in the mountains.
That would come later, it seemed. Probably tonight, when they unleashed the professional on me.
Lesimba’s blows gradually lost strength, her stupid, twiggy arms unused to real labor. Mind you, that didn’t mean I wouldn’t be doubled over with pain if it weren’t for the shackle
s holding me spread-eagled.
“Maybe now, you won’t be able to squeeze out any low-bred whore sons, you piece of gutter trash,” Lesimba snarled, giving me a final smack in the stomach for good measure.
My first thought was, ‘my womb is located nearly a hand-span lower than where you’ve been pummeling me, you fool,’ and my second thought was, ‘holy fuck, this woman’s got some serious issues.’ As before, it seemed unlikely that I’d be able to get the words out in any sort of understandable way, so I mostly just focused on breathing and trying not to puke again.
Lesimba was breathing hard, too. She threw the cane aside, pacing around the cell while the guard continued to stand around looking bored. I couldn’t help wondering if this was a regular thing… if the prince’s crazy First Wife often came down to the dungeons to release her frustrations on random prisoners.
“Give me the blade,” she demanded, holding out an imperious hand.
The guard proffered it hilt first, and she slid the dagger from its sheath, running a finger along the flat edge of the metal. My skin prickled despite the sheen of sweat that had broken out across my body as I strained against the shackles.
“Remember what your husband told you, sweetie,” I rasped, when it became clear that the guard wasn’t going to offer any kind of censure to his royal charge. “Wouldn’t want to piss him off, right?”
She stepped right up and sliced open the front of my dirt- and vomit-stained tunic, flicking the cut edges apart as though having to touch it disgusted her. And… great. I was back to flashing my boobs again. What the hell was it with Utrea and my tits hanging out for everyone to see?
I gave them a little jiggle, even though it hurt my stomach. “Pretty awesome, aren’t they?” I croaked. “If you wanted a peek, you just had to ask.”
I’ll still be in one piece for the head interrogator, I repeated over and over in my head, like a mantra. She was just going to threaten me, or—
“I’m going to carve a reminder into you of just whose property you are,” Lesimba whispered, caressing each word as she spoke it. “Now tell me how you got out, whore.”
I stared at her face, its cold beauty twisted up with rage. Punishing me seemed so… personal to her. Gods, was this some deep-buried need of hers to learn how someone else—some other woman—had managed to get out, while she’d been stuck here in her gilded cage, impotent?
“I climbed out a window, onto the roof, and snuck out through the kitchen,” I said, glaring at her. “Then I stowed away in a wagon to get past the gates. Why does it matter, really? Do you want to get away from here, too? Good plan, if so. You should probably leave right now.”
It was an amalgam of truth and lies. I wasn’t about to even mention Nyx; I had no idea if his disappearance had been linked with mine. I also wasn’t in a hurry to mention the drainage tunnel with the broken grate. Who knew when someone might need it again?
“You’re a fool as well as a slut,” Lesimba said with a sneer. Her eyes strayed down to my chest, taking on a strange, almost obsessive gleam.
Something about that look made my body decide that flattening itself right into the rough stone of the wall at my back would probably be a good plan, but there really was nowhere to go.
“Lesimba,” I warned, trying to inject a firm tone.
The tip of the knife lifted, and I held my breath. It was a sharp blade. That much was obvious from the fact that I barely felt my skin parting. It was only the heat of blood spilling from the shallow cut and the burn left behind when she moved the blade in an intricate pattern that let me know she’d actually marked me.
I panted shallowly through my nose, clenching my teeth so tightly that I was in danger of grinding them to powder. She was completely focused on her task. I was frozen in place, my stomach dipping and rolling unpleasantly, afraid to move, lest she stab that razor-edged point—intentionally or unintentionally—past my ribs. My heart fluttered and thrummed like a panicked bird trying to escape a cage.
“There,” she said with clear satisfaction, after an eternity had passed. “Now you’ll wear my prince’s triskelion mark for all time. It will remind you of who you belong to for the rest of your short life, and decorate your corpse until the worms eat your flesh from your bones in the grave.”
Her eyes glowed with a strange, fanatical light. Meanwhile, I was afraid I might faint in my shackles. Only when the sense of her words finally penetrated did fury rear its head, chasing away some of my weakness. I tried to look down at my chest, only for my vision to swim at the way the edges of the cuts pulled when I moved.
“You carved a triskelion into me?” I hissed. “You’re fucking mad, you deranged bitch.”
I jerked against my wrist shackles as though I could somehow magically get at Princess Bitch-Face and claw her eyes out, the sudden movement waking shock-deadened nerves into screaming awareness. My vision tunneled in from the sides right before my body slumped in its bonds, insensible.
* * *
When I regained awareness, torchlight had replaced the daylight filtering through my barred window. It flickered warm and unsteady against the flat surface in front of me. I licked my dry lips, trying to make sense of the fact that my face was now pressed against the warm stone rather than facing outward toward the cell.
“Whu…?” I croaked, hearing sounds of rustling and clanking behind me.
As my wits slowly reassembled, it occurred to me that someone must have unfastened my shackles from the hooks and turned me around to face the wall before refastening me in place. I shifted, only to be reminded in short order of both the pain in my stomach and the pattern of cuts decorating my chest. A grunt of pain escaped my lips.
It seemed highly unlikely that I’d been left to hang unconscious from my wrists for hours since I passed out. My arms and shoulders hurt, it was true—but if I’d been strung up for that long, I suspected that I’d either be in unbearable agony, or I would have lost use of the limbs altogether. After a moment of concentration, I managed to get my legs to hold me up… more or less.
Dark. Evening. People moving around in my cell, out of sight. And… my situation was about to go from bad to oh, shit, wasn’t it?
No one had come to rescue me.
“Give me the bucket,” said a hateful female voice.
My eyes narrowed at the wall. “Wait. You’re letting Bitch-Face stay and watch this?” I asked in disbelief, my voice slurring a bit around the edges.
The only answer was a wave of frigid water slamming into my back. I shrieked in surprise, waking up fast. A heavy tread approached behind me, and I tried to crane around to look, but I couldn’t see. Water dripped over my shoulders, stinging as it reached the fresh scabs on my chest.
A rough hand moved my tangle of hair out of the way, and something snagged at the top of my tunic, pulling downward with a ripping noise. The ruined garment gaped, exposing my upper back.
“How many dragons are you hiding in the mountains?”
The voice came from across the cell. I recognized it as belonging to the same guard who’d been babysitting Lesimba that morning.
“Hundreds,” I grated. “There’s an entire dragon army poised to raze Safaad to the ground. You’d better go tell the king. Maybe if you hurry, you can evacuate everyone in time.”
A hissing noise preceded a heavy thud of impact along my naked back. I yelped in surprise, confused about what had happened for only a moment before the pain from the whip’s lashes exploded across my skin, shocking in its intensity.
“How many dragons?” the guard asked again.
“Hundreds!” I gasped, and shrieked when more lines of pain burst across the first like fire.
“How many dragons?” No emotion, the tone almost sounding bored.
I pressed my lips together. The silence stretched for the space of a few heartbeats. I tensed as the lashes hissed, and grunted loudly as the whip hit home like flames licking me. Dizziness threatened to make me sag against the shackles, and the taste of blood proved th
at I’d bitten my cheek.
“How many dragons?”
Panic thrummed at my senses as I tried to think of some way to get out of this.
“Hundreds,” I whimpered, and braced for the pain.
Bracing didn’t help, and another cry was wrenched from my throat as every muscle in my back went into spasm under the fresh explosion of burning torment.
At first, I thought I’d imagined the noise of boot steps approaching from outside the cell, barely audible beneath the loud thud-thudding of my heart in my ears. But rather than ask me about the dragons again, the guard said, “What?” in an irritated tone.
“Message from the prince,” replied a new voice.
I blinked, trying to get my mind to work. Something about that voice…
“Well?” snapped the guard. “Don’t just stand there. Tell me what the message is.”
Something impacted with a wet thunk behind me, and the heretofore silent whip-master let out a strange gurgling noise.
The guard gasped in shock. A heartbeat later, I heard the unmistakable sound of a body hitting the floor.
“You!” Lesimba hissed, the word laced with utter hatred.
The twin sounds of steel being drawn reached my ears as both the guard and the newcomer went for their swords.
“Your prince’s message is a simple one,” said that oh-so-familiar voice. Rayth’s tone grew as cold as the mountain glaciers on Eburos as he growled, “Give me back my hellion.”
Chapter 11: Bad Blood
Rayth
I’D WALKED INTO hell, and if I stopped to think about any of it for even an instant, all would be lost. I knew my eyes must be dragon-obsidian as they raked over the scene, taking in the guard drawing his sword, Frella shackled to the wall, her bare back crisscrossed with sluggishly bleeding welts… and Lesimba. That bloody millstone around my neck. That serpent in the shape of a woman.
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