Or, perhaps he was her jailer? She didn't even know his name—or where she was. Here she was, giving him all of this information on a cult she couldn't care less about and yet, she got next to nothing in return.
On her third day trapped in that drafty tower room, she decided to give him her name.
“Katell Maeva.” she nodded, reaching out a hand across the tiny desk. “You never asked my name.” she explained, waiting as he slid a wide eyed gaze towards her waiting hand. “And it is ungracious that I never asked yours.”
His chuckle was strangled, uncertain. “What are you...”
Kat wiggled her fingers, nodding curtly as the man's whispered words trailed off.
He took her hand. Clasped it and shook. “You may call me Elisedd.” he smirked, brushing her hand away. “You understand that you're my captive, correct?” he told her, still smirking. Still twisting up his scarred face. “We aren't friends, no matter how long I'm forced to speak with you. We are not friends, egidul. The powerful men and women commanding your race have already predetermined that.”
“Why have you locked me up here? Why did your people take me? Where am I?” Kat tried, crossing her arms as she leaned back into her wooden chair. “I believe I deserve to know that much.”
Elised brought an elbow to the table, the silky sleeve of his robe trailing downwards as he brought his fist to his chin. “Of course you're right, Katell Maeva.” Elisedd responded, the corners of his lips curving up. “You've proven yourself to be no threat, true. But your kind is tricky, ambitious.” he quickly added, shaking his head. “What would you do if you knew the name of this fortress? If I set you free, what would stop you from providing said information to the Monarchy? To the Sonants?” he smirked again, steepling his fingers upon the thin table top. “No, I think it is in my best interest to keep you blind to what surrounds you, Miss Maeva. I cannot trust you.” he stated matter-of-factly. “But, perhaps this will placate your worries? Once you pass on your knowledge of the Sonants of Liberation, I will release you and my people will take you to the Lady's hideout. Does this sound fair?”
“I have more questions.” Kat said, clapping the feet of her chair to the floor.
“As do I.” Elisedd grinned, the ruinous scars of his face gaping and twisting.
~~~
The days oozed by, night sneaking upon the sun silently until darkness overtook all, and stars glittered like dust upon the horizon. Three days became four. Five, as Kat paced from one end of the large chamber to the other. Hand to her chin, eyes to the windows, thoughts to her shieldbrothers and the Montbereau Sonants. If they neared the Poudurac, would she be able to see them from high up? Would Elisedd free her before they restocked at Labassette and backtracked through the forest to Montbereau?
Would she drop everything to meet her mother? To hold her in her arms one last time?
Did Kat even want to see her? If it was true—that her mother wasn't dead. That somehow after being cut down by that Champion, she survived—why hadn't her mother come to her? Saved her from the grueling life of a wood cutter and brought her home? If her mother truly was still alive—hadn't she abandoned Kat, then? Left her to live with her grandmother and cousins who could barely provide for themselves, let alone welcome another mouth to feed.
Bark soup.
Her skin shivered at the thought as she paced. At the tasteless meal Gran often made during the winter months when wood wasn't selling because everyone owned axes and no one possessed the coin to pay for Gran's logs. Kat shivered again, stopped in the middle of the room and approached the far window. Bringing her eyes to the darkening sky above, she counted six off. Tallying another day gone within her mind as her gaze caught sight of something odd.
Smoke. Dark gray curling from the center of the white wood, reaching up to kiss the sky and wane.
Smoke on the horizon, crowding a sky full of darkening clouds as the gray-white haze climbed the cool air outside her window.
Smoke.
Kat grinned as she planted her palm upon the cold glass.
That had to be a good thing.
SIXTEEN
On the morning of the seventh day, Kat awoke to a stale whisper of air wafting from the back of her tower room. She turned upon her bedroll, stiff as a board, grunting as she brought her gaze towards the back of the room.
The door to her cell—it lay open. Hanging upon rusted hinges, silently beckoning her to freedom.
It's a trap. It must be.
Kat blinked, furiously. Attempting to clear her eyesight of this trickery as her stomach clenched and rolled with her jerky movement. Shoving herself up to standing from the bedroll, Kat crossed her arms and continued trying to clear her vision of this trick.
But as she lowered and lifted her lids one last time, the door remained opened. Beckoning.
She approached it slowly, pressing an open palm out as if to shield herself from whatever may come next.
From the corner of the room, something yellowed caught her eye. A roll of stained parchment lay curled upon the tiny wooden desk to her left. Slowing her approach towards the door, she turned and slowly crept towards the desk.
A flowery hand had mottled the parchment in flowing black script. Placing her palms upon the desk, she bent over in an attempt to trace the curving script with her gaze. Kat had never read cursive before, never seen words drawn so eloquently. She strained to make them out, silently moving her lips as she tried to make sense of the words. Murmuring quietly to herself as the scribbled phrase finally dawned on her. Finally made sense.
“Katell Maeva,” it read, the cursive curved and abrupt, “I have been mislead,” her eyes narrowed as she murmured the words to herself. An echoing crash thundered from somewhere below her. The sound dimmed by thick stone and wood. “we all have been.” a large blank space took her eyes downwards, to a signature enveloped in swirling black ink. “Elisedd.” she read, wanting to chew on her bottom lip. “Do what you will with your precious freedom, human.”
Kat wanted to ball it up. Rip it to bits and spit on it. Stomp it into dust and burn it to ash. Elisedd have given her nothing—she still had questions. Did his agents have Bertrand? Or did they simply leave him in the snow to freeze and die? Why take her? Of all people—why take Kat? She wasn't special—sure, perhaps her mother was the Night Lady, but this only made Kat a witch. Or worse. Whatever her mother was now, prowling Baate Noir as a jaded Queen of Monsters, this didn't make Kat special. Never in her life has she had to outrun the shadow of her mother—a woman Kat had thought to be human, and dead, for months. Years. For her entire adult life, up until now. Elisedd had opened her eyes by making her relive the massacre of Remicourt. He had promised her information, had promised to not only give her the whereabouts of her long lost mother, but to take her there. To help Kat meet the woman one last time, so that she may look upon the woman's face and realize that...
That we are one and the same. Witches. I am a witch.
A monster.
But if her mother truly controlled Baate Noir, why had the hetaera attacked her and Bertrand? Why hadn't the Night Lady stopped it as she had done to that inky creature so long ago? Why had the Night Lady allowed the hetaera to outright maim her and practically kill her?
But I was brought back.
Rebirthed and reformed. Renewed—I was brought back.
Why?
Kat snatched up the parchment and ripped it. Shredded it into skinny yellow pieces as another dimmed crash echoed from down below, the din crawling upon the draft from the corridor outside.
She was free. Free to do what she wanted.
Yet, Kat wanted her questions answered. She wanted to find her jailer, make him answer to her. She had given so much—all of her knowledge on the Sonants of Liberation in exchange for the whereabouts of her mother—and had gotten next to nothing in return. All she knew was that her mother was alive...somewhere. And perhaps, perhaps she was a traitor for happily extending information on the Sonants over to a man who wasn't exa
ctly human. Who couldn't be—he had the eyes of a snake.
Kat had never met a non-human before. Though she knew of their existence, they were as mythical as dragons and vampires to her and to a vast majority of the south. Liches and changelings only existed in tall tales mothers would tell naughty children before bedtime to warn them against sneaking away into the woods with their knuckle-headed friends. The scope of her knowledge was lacking—extremely.
What creature possesses the eyes of a snake and the body of a human? What creatures walked Myrine well before humans? What creature speaks a foreign tongue that's fluid? Like song?
She couldn't put her finger on it. She knew nothing of non-humans, nothing at all.
But a Champion might. She told herself, nodding. The Rose's monster hunters—they ought to be knowledgeable.
But how would she get to the continent's capital from here? Alone and weaponless? Would a Champion even acknowledge her? A bedraggled wood cutter from the Southern Reaches? Besides, didn't she owe it to Horace and Alan to make it to Labassette Chateau so that she might clear their names? They'll hang Alan for insubordination and the death of two comrades—absent rope, they'd burn him. Set him aflame upon a stake drowned in tar and star powder. But what has stopped the remaining guardsmen from doing this already? From murdering Alan for sending Bertrand and Kat to their deaths without Horace's consent? What has stopped them from taking his life already?
And then there was Horace, four of his detail of eight—dead. Roux wouldn't learn of this until Horace returned to Montbereau, but that doesn't stop the last men of his detail from usurping him and supplanting themselves as captain because he has proven himself to be a questionable leader. Learning of Bertrand's demise might throw him into a dark depression. Coupling that with Kat's death—it would surely break him. So much death—Manuel's and Noel's, Kat's and Bertrand's—it would surely break her poor cousin.
She had two choices: enlist the help of a Champion to track down the serpent eyed Elisedd and find her mother, or follow the gray river below to Labassette and save her cousin's reputation—not to mention, Alan's life.
Two choices. One path.
Kat slumped her shoulders. Bringing her gaze over her left shoulder, she turned her body towards the long rectangular window upon the far wall and approached it at a sluggish pace. Shuffling her feet as if they were heavy boulders. Moving her body as if her bones had suddenly become dry wood. She stopped at the window from a distance, about an arm's length. A swarm of angry cotton clouds crowded out the sun, swallowing the blue of the sky in an ostentatious white. From this distance, only the sky could greet her. The sky and a dim projection of her face. Her body.
Kat had no time for mirrors or preening, not like Eva and Maddy had. So many years ago, when the coin from Grand's logging venture became scarce, the family business churning up no more than a few coppers every five days or so; Kat and Horace joined the Montbereau Guard. They were young at the time, Horace no more than fifteen. Kat, around fourteen. Young and bright eyed, they both endured the hardship of a brutal boot-camp. They joined together, yet graduated years apart due to an ankle injury Kat obtained during the earlier phases of training. A hike made her strain it, a hike around the outskirts with fifty pounds of gear weighing down her back. Grappling had sundered it, her opponent taking note of how she babied the ankle during her other tussles and chose to take the low road, slamming her hard in her bum ankle with a bloodied knuckle. So hard—it made her slump to the grass, blacking out as the world around her erupted into a chaotic din of shouted commands and broken phrases.
It took her two years to heal properly. And even then, when she was fit to finish her training and become a full fledged guardswoman, the Guard was reluctant to let her back in. The men in charge of taming recruits dragged their feet about processing her. They made her start all over again—declaring her prior six months of training obsolete because she was forced to back out in the first phase.
Of all the people to come to her aid—the Duke's own son, the man who broke her ankle in the first place, declared that ruling absolute nonsense and pushed for the Guard to fast-track her training with his father's help. The Guard didn't like that—even the Sonants complained that she would be poorly trained. And being a woman, Kat remembered some of the higher ranking guardsmen murmur, she needs all the training she can get.
Robin Bereau-Vanja helped her. Fought for her.
Kat smirked at her reflection, gaze flowing over the sharp arches of her cheekbones. Those high peaks all the Maeva's had. Her full lips.
She still hated him. Robin, the man who made her drop out of training in the first place. But she had been eternally grateful for his help, even if the Guard would stamp her with a weak link stigma for the rest of her enlistment. She was still grateful for the coin the job brought. Grateful that Eva and Maddy wouldn't have to live the harsh life she and Horace had endured at their age. She was grateful—grateful that things had finally started looking up.
And then Roux decided to test her mettle by attaching her to the Chaperon. Finally, he had begun to believe in her—finally. But during Montbereau's couple months of preparation, hundreds of voices vowed to stop her. The most powerful of those voices being Sonant Kaiden, a senior witch hunter among Montbereau's Sonants who possessed the ear and friendship of the demesne's Duke. Of all the people who wanted her spot on the duchy's detail replaced, Sonant Kaiden was the most genuine in his arguments. He wouldn't completely blame her womanhood or supposed weakness; he'd bring up the fact that Baate Noir was too dangerous for someone who has never fought against a real threat before. He'd tell her that she was not ready—not yet. But that someday, she would be. Of all the naysayers, he was the only one she didn't want to beat into a bloody pulp during those long grueling months of preparation. Dare she say it—Kat somewhat admired the man. Hell, he was one of the few Sonants to actually see a griffon. Even lost an eye to it.
Kat watched her smile grow wider in the reflection. Felt the floor beneath her shake with a raucous clash of metal upon wood as something monstrous shattered into splinters beneath her.
It was now or never, she realized. Whoever was barging into this, now derelict, fortress—they might try to detain her too. They might stop her from reaching Labassette...or help her. Maybe give her directions?
She took a chance—stalling. Eyes gazing at her widow's peak, and the gnarled tresses of knotted hair that somehow reached past her shoulders. They were brown, the color of life giving soil after a soft storm of drizzle. Her skin was somewhat pale and pallid, her cheeks sunken from her lack of nourishment. Sharp eyes were lazy in the light, deep purple bags hung low beneath them. And she ignored the hanging skin, moving her gaze over the rest of her face as the corners of her lips dipped into a frown. She wore the clothing of a vagrant, baggy brown cotton that hung from her bony frame like ragged thatch and stuck beneath the thick fabric of her wide belt. Its ends somehow still trailing upon the ground, even though she wrapped it round three times to avoid dirtying the already dust strewn cloth. Kat looked foreign in her own eyes. Like a beggar. A foreign northwoman.
Kat heard a multitude of triumphant screams—wild as they sang. As a thousand mismatched voices rang together joyously.
It's now or never. She reminded herself, stiffening at the noise. Choosing her path as she spun upon her heel and headed for the door.
Only to freeze. Muscles going rigid.
Gaze staring into mordant eyes as green as untamed verdant.
SEVENTEEN
The woman pounced on Kat, pockmarked hands rigid beneath thick iron gauntlets as they gripped her shoulders and slammed her to the floor of the drafty tower room. Kat felt her teeth chatter in her mouth as her cheek hit the floor. Her eyes boggled, widened as the woman heaved above her. Breathing heavily as she caught her breath.
“Damn you—damn you!” the woman hissed between exploding breaths as she wheeled around Kat's flattened body and stabbed an armored knee into her lower back. “Having the guile t
o come back!” she spat as Kat's right cheek flattened to the cold stones of the floor. “Having a mind to stay—to straggle!” calloused fingers gripped both of her wrists, choking them as the woman yanked Kat to her feet. “You're lucky I have a higher to report to, dammit. Lucky I don't slice you open right here!”
Kat panicked, tensed as her tongue became cotton in her mouth. “I've been held prisoner—”
“I won't hear it.” the woman behind her scoffed, shoving Kat forward. Towards the door. Towards freedom. “You'll get the noose for what you've done here,” her voice became low and thick, a mottled growl as Kat lurched into a knock-kneed walk. “and that day will come for all of your kind.” she hawked, spat upon the stones of the ground as Kat trudged forward. Eyebrows fixed, face twisted with burning confusion. “For all of you demented Scyllah.”
~~~
Kat could see everything now. Everything that Elisedd's people had attempted to hide away from her. The stony walls of the fortress seemed to crumble around her, falling to decrepit debris as Kat was led from the tower room, spiraled down a melange of creaking wooden stairs, and yanked into a narrow hallway of chalky stone that seemed to stretch on forever. Bright light crept from the hallway's end, brandishing the long expanse of stone and wood in a trickle of afternoon light as Kat was led down the narrow passageway. At some points in her journey, black smeared the walls. An oily black that reminded her of the torso calling for her in the snow, its lavender intestines trailing as it reached for her. Called out her name and cried for her.
Winterskin: A Dark Fantasy (Kindred Souls Book 1) Page 8