by S J Hartland
She sneered as she retreated with a drag of her gown over carpet. “Fool. Your companions are dead. All of them. You are alone, child.”
Alone. Behind the door.
Panic whipped him into a frenzied bucking, twisting and writhing. Kaell screamed at the walls, drummed his heels, yelled until he was hoarse and exhausted. At last he slumped, the ropes all that held him up, his uneasy gaze flickering about his prison.
An ornate prison. His toes curled into a thick rug. The stone beneath his palms marble. Candles in tall holders glowed upon intricately carved tables, high-backed, padded chairs, dark-wood chests and patterned screens. Tapestries and woven carpets covered walls.
Small-leafed vines embraced fluted columns spilling upon a vaulted ceiling. He smelt clotted soil in ceramic pots, mixed with a creamy scent like peaches or figs.
More rugs of spun gold, purple and green and pillows of every shape and size sprayed upon a divan near doors opened onto a balcony. A moon-washed sky, awash with blinking stars, cruelly whispered of freedom beyond this room, impossible freedom.
“Are you done with struggle, then?”
Kaell jerked in alarm. The silky, male voice drifted from the balcony. Someone leaned against the balustrade, arms folded as they watched him.
No, gods help him. He knew that voice from the hall. Archanin’s voice.
Terror ignited new strength. Kaell strained against the ropes until blood trickled down his arms and the cords welted his thighs and chest.
“So—not done.”
“No, not done,” he hissed. “Never done.”
Archanin sighed. He stepped inside the door, stooping to light a candle. Its flame glinted on golden hair, his face hidden. “How sad. Do you believe in fate?”
Back hard against the pillar, every breath chipped with fear, Kaell managed a scornful laugh. What did it matter? Nothing mattered except how quickly this god killed him.
“No.”
“Except your struggle is against just that, Kaell. Fate. The moment this lord you call Vraymorg walked through the Enarae and brought you back as a child of what? Three? four? Your path led to this room.”
“What?” Kaell’s heart skidded. The newly lit candle spilled incense laced with a dizzying, sickly sweet fragrance. He coughed. “The Enarae? I don’t understand.”
“The Enarae’s perfume clings to you. It had to be, to explain who you are.”
Kaell fisted a hand against the pillar. His core wanted to twist away, not just from Archanin and his words but from the desperate, shameful need in him to know the truth. Dry mouthed, he whispered, “Who am I?”
“You don’t know?” Archanin’s laugh was mirthless. “You really don’t know?”
Every muscle in Kaell’s back clenched. The room closed in, the cloying incense, the marble hard against his thighs, the narrowing yellow glow of torches on walls.
“What would you give me to tell you, I wonder? Oh, your lord kept this close, but I tasted your blood and I know the truth. So we come back to it—fate.”
Kaell recoiled as far as his bonds allowed. The candle’s smoke suffocated; it was on his tongue, in his lungs, in his throat. Archanin’s velvet voice, its rhythm, washed his rage into a listless docility. He should fight it, but he couldn’t seem to care.
So we come back to it. Fate.
Didn’t he always know he’d die young? But death in battle. Not this. Bound. Defeated. Alone. That most of all. Alone. Unshed tears burned his eyes. Ashamed, he forced them back.
“There is a Venivan rhyme about fate.” Archanin’s voice possessed an ethereal whimsy. “It starts like this: A warrior’s death they say is set…”
“By lords and gods and fate … and yet.” Kaell took up the second line. The words seemed apart from him, the verse recited by someone else, somewhere else.
“My blade answers to my song,
My life is mine, my will too strong.”
“You surprise me,” Archanin said with a gentle laugh. “Few know this poem.”
“I like words.” Kaell struggled to shake off his sluggishness, that cloud dulling his mind.
Archanin leaned a shoulder against the wall. “Words hold power. Songs. Poetry. They all weave magic of one sort or another. My favourite poems are Venivan.”
“Like King Cerall’s odes to his queen, Eleanor.”
“His poems are little known—in these vicious times.” Archanin released a wistful sigh. “You are different. No wonder fate brought you to me, Kaell. You belong here.”
A spell’s rhythm throbbed beneath the words. Unheard before.
Kaell scraped his nails into his palms to clear his apathy. “Stop it,” he hissed. “Whatever you’re doing. Stop it.”
Archanin’s laugh pealed as chillingly silver and dark as midnight. He pushed off the wall and came out of the shadows.
“I will not look at you.” Kaell screwed his eyes shut. “I won’t let you bewitch me.”
“You will do exactly as I say, Kaell. You’ll look at me, obey me and even love me.”
Footsteps. Cloth whispered over rugs. Archanin stood close. Kaell knew it. His own breath dragged, too loud. Cold sweat beaded on his brow.
“I am your true god. You must learn to obey. Look at me.”
The command tore into him like an arrow. Unbidden, Kaell looked, a startled look that became a stare.
He wasn’t sure what a god should be like. Perhaps like this; as untamed and dangerously beautiful as a lashing storm. Golden hair cascaded onto broad shoulders. Flowing red silk, woven with silver thread, draped lean muscles.
Yet for all his beauty, Archanin possessed a warrior’s contained menace, a formidable, alarming power.
Kaell mouthed a protection prayer to Khir. It tasted ashen. Desperately he heaved against the ropes again until blood riveted along his arms from new cuts.
No one warned him of Archanin’s grim strength. He could not be here, must not be here. More hot tears welled, tears of helplessness.
His captor watched his useless struggle with pitiless, heavy-lidded eyes of an inhuman shade of blue. Translucent, almost silver at the edges but dark about the pupil.
“Why thrash about again? Only struggle hurts, Kaell.”
Kaell had to fight. Only pain lay ahead. He couldn’t just accept that.
“I won’t obey you, so just get on with it.” He etched each word with scorn.
“With what exactly?” Archanin’s tone rippled with amusement. “You think I intend to tear and slash at you in some dark, dank prison?”
Kaell lifted his chin. “I am not afraid.”
“Liar. I smell your fear. It almost makes me want to torture you. Your screams might please me for a time, but I can’t risk killing you. You’re too valuable.”
“Valuable?” An irrational hope stirred. “Do you mean to ransom me?”
Archanin chuckled. “Cruel to tease one so young and naive. Do you see that steel ring?” He gestured. “That’s where I chained the last bonded warrior your gods let me take alive.”
Dry-mouthed, Kaell swallowed. He tried in vain not to look at the ring. “What did you do to him?”
“That one was of no use to me. I did not treat him as kindly as you.”
“Kind?”
“You’re uncomfortable. Weary, afraid, as I want you to be. But that’s all. I allowed you time to heal after I took your blood. I do not even intend to break you, Kaell. At least, not through pain.”
“I should be grateful?” Kaell jeered.
“Oh you’ll be grateful. But let me be clear so you don’t cling to futile hope. You won’t leave here, Kaell. I meant what I said in the hall. It will take patience, but I will make you a thing men hunt.”
“You can’t,” Kaell whispered. “Even the bite of a ghoul kills—”
He broke off with a shudder. Archanin drank his blood. He should be dead. “No. No.” A madness leapt upon him. He slammed his head against the pillar. And again.
“I prefer you don’t hurt yourself,” A
rchanin said dispassionately. “Stop or I’ll tie you so you cannot even twitch. That’s better. Now, shall we get to know each other?”
Back taut, his fists knuckling stone, Kaell said, “I want only to kill you.”
Archanin’s smile unnerved him. It was so confident, so unafraid. “Then you should try. So you learn you can never hurt me, Kaell. Only obey.”
The ghoul god waved a hand. The ropes dropped. For a heartbeat Kaell froze. Then he sprang at his captor.
Archanin spat a word. His palm carved air. Pain flooded Kaell’s body, battered him down to the rug. Moaning, he balled his knees to his chest.
“That won’t do.” Archanin frowned. “Why can I hurt you so easily?”
The pain disappeared fast. Shaken, Kaell pushed to his knees. What just happened?
“Your bond to my brother Khir should protect you from Seithin magic. Didn’t the priests, didn’t your lord, prepare you?”
Stung, Kaell lifted his head to glare. “My lord taught me enough.”
Archanin’s clear, blue eyes dwelt for a long moment. A smile flitted; a knowing smile. “You’re very loyal. But loyal to a man who can never accept you, Kaell.”
Kaell barely hid a flinch. “You’re wrong.”
“Am I? I think I touched a wound. I think you long for that man’s love. Yet with your blood, men and women will always fear you. Never love you.”
“You don’t know me. Stop pretending you do.”
“I know I can give you all you’ve yearned for, Kaell. Everything your lord withheld. Poor child. Raised by a cold, distant man, never the father you sought. But you need never feel alone or different again. Not here. Not with me.”
“You’re wrong,” Kaell answered fast, refusing to let the words sink into him. “I don’t feel alone or a freak. If he knew where to look, my lord would come for me.”
“Is that what you think?” Archanin heaved an exaggerated sigh. “Beneath your defiance, I hear doubt. You don’t know if you’re loved or where you really belong. Forget that other life. It meant nothing. Your real life begins here, with me.”
“No.”
“So easy to break you,” Archanin said. “Easier than the others. Every other bonded warrior could withstand Seithin magic. But not you.” He stared over Kaell’s head, frowning.
“Was the ceremony binding you to Khir flawed? Or did someone, unwittingly or deliberately, break the bond? Blood magic might do that.” He sighed. “I must be gentle, it seems, or I may unintentionally kill you.”
“Then kill me,” Kaell shot back hotly. He could stand the pain. He must. “That’s all you can do to me.”
The ghoul god arched finely shaped dark brows. “Even you don’t believe that.”
Archanin left him curled on the floor, too weary to crawl. Head on hands, he collapsed into sleep.
“Kaell.”
Reluctantly he stirred. From a tall-backed chair, Archanin watched him, his expression masked behind otherworldly eyes.
Kaell struggled to his knees. Sleep weighted his body and wits, a thankfully dreamless but too-short sleep. Darkness still hulked beyond the balcony.
Archanin leaned towards him. “Why did you make me hurt you, Kaell?”
“Wh—what?” He shook his head to clear it.
“That isn’t why I had you bathed and dressed and brought to my chambers. I don’t want to hurt you. I want you to accept me as your lord, to love me.”
“You’re deluded,” Kaell jeered. “I have a lord. A god.”
“A god who abandoned you. A lord who cannot love you.”
“You don’t know me or my lord.”
Archanin sighed. He sat back. “Did you ever wonder at your name?”
“I’m your prisoner and you want to talk about my name?”
A smile curved Archanin’s perfect lips. “Kaell is a common name among my people. Caolin in its female form. My queen’s name. A beautiful, graceful creature. I miss her, though she died many centuries ago.”
“Should I care?”
A shrug. “I tell you this because I want no secrets between us. You belong here, Kaell. With me. No one will judge you for the colour of your hair, condemn you as different. That’s what you want, isn’t it? Acceptance. Love.”
“Don’t do that,” said Kaell.
“Do what?”
“Think you know me. Think you know what I want. You don’t.”
Archanin pressed a finger to his lips, thoughtful. “This lord, this man—Vraymorg.”
“What about him?” Kaell’s voice cracked with unease.
“He’ll never be what you want. Never give you what you want.”
“Shut up,” Kaell said.
“He can’t accept you, because he knows what you are. Knows—and never told you. Did you ever glimpse fear flicker behind his eyes when he glanced at you? Did he stiffen when you hugged him as a child?”
“No. You’re wrong.”
“This man will never love you, Kaell.”
Kaell clamped his hands over his ears. He swayed on his knees. Thoughts strummed with a despairing rhythm.
Candlelight straightened then flared as Archanin stood over him. “Think about my words, about why you owe this flawed man your loyalty.”
He stooped to snap a metal cuff about Kaell’s wrist, then fastened the chain to the floor ring. Kaell did not resist. No point to it.
“When I return, we’ll test just how open you are to my magic.”
Archanin left him with disturbed thoughts.
He remembered writhing torchlight, smoke stinging his eyes, the wind’s icy breath pawing his moist skin. He remembered faceless, hooded priests lifting him onto a slab. A sheer slope of walls closed.
Wet rock, sweat, incense; these scents always threw him back to the terror of that night.
“My lord?” Kaell whispered.
Forbidden to speak, Vraymorg briefly squeezed his hand as the priests bound Kaell’s wrists and ankles. Rough stone indented his thighs, his naked back.
When the priests picked up their knives, Kaell’s breath stalled. He followed the knives with wide eyes, determined to show no fear. Make his lord proud.
“With your blood,” a hooded figure demanded, “with your life, will you serve Khir, god of battles, ancient lord of men and of this land, protector.”
“Yes.” Beneath his terror, Kaell’s voice crumpled.
“Do you accept his protection?”
“Yes.”
“And will you in return surrender your will to the ancient one?”
“Yes.”
The priest cut him. Kaell did not scream. Not then, nor at the next cut, or the next. He no longer heard their chants, aware only of his pooling blood, sticky beneath him, of its slow drip to the floor.
Tears streamed like that blood. Silent tears of pain. He clenched his teeth until his jaw ached. It would end. Everything ended.
“You did well.” His lord rubbed balm into his wounds. They were alone in the sept, the priests gone. “You pleased the gods.”
Kaell accepted the praise with a weary nod. Eyes closed, he let Vraymorg’s hands soothe, summoning strength for the rest of the ritual. He did not—would not—look at the shadows. But a presence, as intangible as a reflection in a polished shield, waited.
His lord left him.
Alone, feeble from blood loss, Kaell struggled to sit up. His body throbbed. Fevered sweat matted his hair. The smoke reeked of sickly incense. Rising on shaking legs, he took the sword stained with his blood and sank to his knees before the statue of Khir.
Near dawn, the vigil ending, he fell into an exhausted sleep. For the first time he dreamt of the girl. For the first time he dreamt of his death.
Kaell was fourteen and knew he would not reach twenty-four.
“Tell me of the dream.” Archanin brushed hair from his brow.
Kaell jolted. There was no rock-walled sept. No priests. No praise from his lord as he rubbed balm into his wounds. This was Archanin’s chamber with all its luxurious t
apestries and carved tables, its rich fabrics and rich perfumes.
He lay on a rug, his head in Archanin’s lap. With a yelp of disgust, Kaell scrambled up in a clatter of chains. How did he end up there? He had no memory of what came before.
Archanin smiled. “The spell lasted longer that time. But again that lovely haze cleared from your eyes. What did that? Memories of your lord, perhaps?”
He stretched. Yawned. “A curious man, this Vraymorg. He teaches you Venivan poetry and the song of swords but shares nothing of himself.”
Kaell hunched. “You know nothing about him or me.”
“I know you desire this man’s love. I could give you what he cannot.”
“You know nothing of love.”
Silence. But only between them. Beneath it crept a rumbling of sounds; distant voices distorted to an echo by caging walls; a breath of wind through broken stone. A bird’s caw. A pitiful beat of wings.
“I’ve loved, Kaell,” Archanin said softly. “I’ve lost.”
“What? Your freedom? Your kingdom. You think that is loss?”
“That, yes,” Archanin’s gaze passed over Kaell to the shadows behind. “And my queen.” He leaned against a chair leg. Even relaxed, arms hugging drawn-up knees, he looked elegant and beautiful.
Kaell swallowed. “How?”
“How,” the ghoul god echoed. His stare fell on nothing.
“Do you know why I’m trapped in this ruin? Because of a spell cast by a long-dead king. If I could summon Roaran Caelan from death to pay for his vicious deeds, I would. His curse killed my queen, killed hundreds of my people, imprisoned me.”
Unlikely compassion stirred. Kaell did not know what to say.
Archanin pressed his lips into a sad smile. “When she died, I knew only despair. It consumed me. Like the words of the Venivan song, the Sorrowful Night. You know it?”
“I know it.”
Kaell remembered a Mountains night when mist lingered and warriors huddled around a fire. A creeping night when men heard a dark song in the wind and shivered for no reason.
He could see Olier, flame light hollowing his cheeks, hands clasped about his knees, his eyes hazy as he sang the words his Venivan grandmother taught him.