Drogal looked up, some clarity appearing in his eyes, “I heard what was said. I want to know which one of you said what. But I can’t get over how much alike you two sound. What area of the world are you from Footman Hazel?” He was still drunk, but the officer inside Drogal Clock had caught on to something that alerted him.
Malwynn, still smiling from what he’d thought was a drunken question, made the decision that would alter their lives forever, and put them on a collision course with a destiny they could not imagine.
Malwynn brought the haft of the large Amaranth axe upward, sending it powerfully into the jaw of Captain Drogal Clock. The intoxicated officer’s knees gave out with his consciousness, and he hit the stone steps awkwardly, splaying out on his face, then rolling onto his side. A smudge of blood was on the stone where his eyebrow had split.
“Ancestors bless us Malwynn what the hell are you doing!?” Umaryn said, grabbing the officer’s wrists.
“I’m sorry Umaryn, I wasn’t in the mood to fucking kiss him, so I hit him in the face instead. What the hell were you thinking? I saw your tongue for mother’s sake!” Mal said harshly in a whisper as he looked around for witnesses. It appeared clear, and after throwing the axe down the alley, he returned and grabbed Clock’s feet.
A cup of ice cold water poured on his head got the bound Captain back to the world of the awake. The twins had tied the officer up on the large wooden butcher’s block in the cutting room of the shop. Arms above his head, he was bound strongly with multiple strands of baling twine around both wrists and feet. To avoid unwanted attention, they kept the room very dark, with a single candle lit on a distant blood soaked bench. The room smelled of old blood, and dirty meat. Soon it would smell of fear and fresh blood.
Drogal’s face was swollen and red along the jaw where Malwynn’s axe haft had struck him. His eyebrow was equally swollen, and had leaked a stream of now dried blood. His eye would be blackened by morning if they let him survive. Despite his injuries he forced out words, “Where am I?”
Malwynn stepped close to the bench so he could speak quietly. “That’s not important Drogal. What is important, is how you choose to answer the questions we have for you,” Malwynn said matter-of-factly.
Drogal lifted his head off the butcher’s block and looked up to Malwynn. All the alcohol had drained from his blood, leaving only the clarity that fear coupled with adrenaline gives you. “You don’t scare me. I’m protected by the Queen.”
“Well for your sake, I hope the Queen gets here right fucking quick, because if you don’t answer the simple questions we have for you, we’re going to kill you.” Malwynn lifted his dagger in as unthreatening a way as possible.
“I’ll serve my Queen in death,” Drogal said, favoring the pain across his face.
Umaryn slid across the bloody butcher’s floor like the angel of death, leaning over to caress his cheek, very similarly to how she’d done it earlier. “Drogal baby, we’re not going to leave enough of you behind for her death mages to work with if you don’t talk. You simply end right here, no spirit, no undeath, if you don’t tell us what we want to know. No one will ever know what happened to you. There will be no legacy of Captain Drogal Clock.”
Drogal’s Adam’s apple bobbed up and down slowly, allowing the twins to see him swallow the reality of his situation. After blinking a few times and regaining his resolve, he nodded solemnly.
“Remember when you asked where I was from Drogal? And I said near the Varrland border? That was the truth, mostly. We’re from northern Varrland, not southern Amaranth. A different side of the border my friend.”
Drogal’s eyes flared wide with betrayal, “Damn you Isabel I knew it. Your name probably isn’t even Isabel is it? I knew your accent was too strong. Both of you. I can see it now. You’re family aren’t you?”
“No, my name isn’t Isabel, but yes, we’re family. Drogal, meet my brother.” Umaryn motioned to Malwynn but didn’t offer his name. Instead she took a step back to the butcher’s table and hefted her hammer high enough for Drogal to see it. Drogal looked from Malwynn to the clean heavy steel of Chael’s hammer.
“Drogal you said to my sister that you spend time along the border a lot, correct?” Malwynn asked him, dragging the tip of the dagger across the butcher’s block their captive was tied to. The vibrations tore his eyes off the hammer and brought them back.
“Yes. I patrol there frequently.”
Malwynn nodded, “Have you ever been ordered to go across the border into Varrland? Perhaps to raid a village, or steal something?”
Drogal took a minute to answer, clearly debating what to say and how to say it, “I’ve been into Varrland, yes.”
“To kill? To attack towns?” Umaryn asked, stepping forward, her hammer in hand.
“I’ve been ordered to attack a few small villages. Tiny ones, mostly for bodies to bolster the Queen’s forces, and to clear space for a Queen’s Guild necromancer. The Queen likes to give her loyal servants territory, and that’s an easy way to do it.” Drogal said.
Malwynn’s lip twitched, “When was the last time you did this?”
Drogal had to think, “It was in the late spring, many months ago. A small village of perhaps thirty or forty to the east of the rail line.”
Not New Picknell.
Umaryn seemed frustrated, “You didn’t attack a village about two months ago? New Picknell it was called?”
Drogal shook his head, “No you whore. I was deployed here in Graben doing civic patrols. My unit won’t deploy again to the border for a month.”
Malwynn cuffed the man across the jaw line where the axe had hit him, causing Drogal to let out a yelp of pain. When he subsided and was quiet again, Malwynn whispered a threat, “Don’t call my sister a whore.”
Drogal spat blood up at Malwynn, narrowly missing his face, “But she is a whore you moron. She prances around The Salon like a trollop, all of her goods on display like the meat at a butch-“ Drogal trailed off, finally realizing where he was. A strange expression of panic appeared on his face as all his senses came together to confirm what he already knew.
“She is not a whore, and if you say anything about her again, I’ll kill you for the trouble. I’d planned on killing you for who you were before we tied you up tonight Drogal Clock, I’ll do far worse to you if you offend me in the meantime.”
Drogal scowled, but remained silent.
“Who would’ve or could’ve attacked a large village near the rail lines in Varrland about two months ago? Who makes those decisions?” Umaryn asked him, oblivious of the entire whore conversation.
Drogal again had to think. Malwynn wasn’t sure if he was thinking about what to say, or how to say it without calling ‘Isabel’ a whore. “Usually those decisions come down from Inquisitors, or the Lords of Graben. We’re simply given orders to carry out.”
“That sounds like a guilty man’s way of saying something isn’t his fault.” Malwynn said.
“It sounds like the truth Varrlander. We do as we are told. We obey because it is the will of the Purple Throne, and our Queens. You have your way of doing things, this is ours.”
Malwynn fought off the urge to punch the man again, “Have you killed Varrlanders?”
Umaryn leaned in closer to Drogal. This was a question she desperately needed an answer to. It would validate all of what they’d done this night, and the past few weeks. She sought vindication for her thoughts, and intentions. She stifled her emotions and breathed deeply as the Captain answered her brother.
“Yes, and I’d do it again if I could. If you cut me free I’d kill you. Then I’d kill your whore sister, whatever her name is.”
“I’m sure you’d try. Sadly, we’ve no plans to cut you free tonight,” Mal said.
“So be it. I’ll tell you no more. Isabel, or whatever your name is, if you’d been real, I would’ve made you my wife. We could’ve risen to the High City and had good lives, you and I could have-“ Drogal’s skull exploded as Umaryn brought the hammer
down on it as forcefully as she could. Her teeth gritted in anger, eyes flooded with pure hatred, she lifted the hammer again only to bring it back down onto Drogal’s skull. The head of the weapon bounced off the wood under the disaster that Drogal’s head had become. Her eyes were fixed on the pulpy mess she was making as she silently brought the hammer down over and over into the butcher’s block. Malwynn stared at his out of control sister as she ruined the Captain. Finally, he took a wide circle around the hammer, and eventually put his arms around her, stopping her frantic destruction. She struggled against his arms, trying to get free to continue wrecking the man she hated so much.
“Stop. Stop please. He’s dead Umaryn,” Malwynn whispered to her.
By then Umaryn’s emotions were exploding. She dropped her hammer to the floor. The night and all its events had broken her, “I kissed him Mal! I kissed that piece of shit to keep him shut up! I had his tongue in my damn mouth! He’s a murderer. A filthy killer of innocents. I’m dirty brother. Forever tainted!” She was nearly hysterical.
Malwynn seized her shoulders and spun her to face him. He was surprised he had the strength to overpower her. He chalked it up to her being overwhelmed. “Umaryn stop. Stop. You are not tainted one bit. We will wash away his stink and continue forward after this, pure and clean. Tonight, out of his blood we are born again. Born again as the executioners of those who do wrong. We will bring justice to those who escape it, no matter how far they run, and no matter what we need to do, we will destroy evil where we find it because our family cannot seek justice. Because we are the ones who need to do it for them, and for everyone who cannot.”
Something in what Malwynn said appealed to her, and she stopped her shaking. The tears still came, hot and fresh however. “Executioners?”
“Some cannot be allowed to live Umaryn, you know it as well as I do. Whoever killed our family is pure evil, and those who helped them, or support them shall feel our wrath.”
She nodded, her mind clear again, “Whatever it takes.”
“Whatever it takes.”
- Chapter Six -
THE TAX MAN
“What do you mean we need to get someone else? I thought we had enough money?” Malwynn asked. He spun Drogal’s short sword in varying fast circles around his body. What he lacked in skill he made up for in flash.
The two were alone again in their rented room on the second floor of the old couple’s home. Malwynn looked out at the stable in the back of the home where Bramwell and Tinder were stabled. He’d be taking Bramwell for a ride later after dark, when the streets were empty.
“Mal I haven’t worked at The Salon since we killed Drogal. Well, just that one night, and yeah I made good money, but Bram and Tin eat like… well, like a Gvorn and a horse, and we eat too, and we need to pay Maya and Usul for the room here. Drogal had what? Thirty Crowns on him that night? And the three soldiers we’ve done in since then have had a grand total of thirty more. We pay five Crowns a week just to live here Mal.”
“I know, I know. I just… It’s hard to imagine that we’ve become petty thieves. And the bodies Umaryn… I don’t know how many more I can dispose of. It’s got to be fouling up our souls to be doing this.” Mal stopped spinning the sword and looked at the individual snowflakes falling from the sky. The snow would not accumulate tonight, but it was a sign of things to come.
“Petty thieves steal from the innocent. We’re looking for information about who killed our family, and taking the money of those people afterwards. That’s different. As for the bodies… Don’t forget Mal, you said it yourself. Whatever it takes.” Umaryn flopped down on her back in the bed, tired for no reason.
“You’re right, but Umaryn, we need to be cautious about this. Too many missing soldiers will arouse suspicion. Ancestors forbid we get any kind of attention from the Inquisitors. We can fool the general populace, but necromancers that are trained to find and prosecute in the name of their Queen? That scares me sister. It scares me a lot.” Mal sat down on the edge of his bed, skin coated in a thin layer of sweat despite the cool air.
“You have any other ideas? I’m all ears.”
Malwynn thought about it, but knew she was right on many levels, “Maybe we just need to hit someone with a lot of money? One big hit, then lay low for awhile? If we’re smart about it, we hit someone high up that might know about home.”
Umaryn rolled over and faced Mal, “Money-wise, that’s a great idea.”
Mal nodded, “We just need to find someone high up enough that’d have money, as well as knowledge we could squeeze out of them.”
“We’ve already gone after a Captain for ancestor’s sake. Kind of rarified territory. There isn’t a whole lot of room above that for us to hunt,” Umaryn said.
“Very true. What we need to think about now, instead of going after military targets, is going after political figures, and people who aren’t in the chain of military command, but in the civil structure.” Malwynn sounded a bit eager.
Umaryn considered his suggestion. “Well, there’s one thing to consider. Something bad,” Umaryn said, rolling onto her back again.
Mal flopped on his own back, “What’s that?”
“We’re probably talking about a purple robed person right? I mean, those are the folks who have the money, are in the power structure making decisions, as well as have the potential for knowledge about home right?”
“Yeah, I guess.”
Umaryn looked over at her brother, “Aren’t most of the purple robed people necromancers? Are we really ready to go after someone who knows The Way?”
“You know The Way. I’ve seen you use it. If we’re smart about it, and prepare ourselves ahead of time, I think we’ll be fine.”
“You’re an optimist,” Umaryn said.
“No. I’ve just got little to lose. We’ll either be fine, or dead, and honestly for us, there’s little difference between the two right now.”
“Here Maya, sorry it’s a day late,” Umaryn said, handing the elderly lady that was half the pair that hosted them five purple coins.
Maya, the shriveled but sweet lady that owned the home they rented took the coins graciously. “Thank you dear. Are you planning on staying next month as well? We’d love to have you if so.”
Umaryn shuffled her feet uncomfortably, “Yes, it looks like we’ll be staying another month at least. We’re having trouble saving enough money to do what we want to do here.”
“Ohhh. I understand. It’s hard for young men and women to get ahead here. Usul and I only live in this home because it was willed to us. So long as we pay our taxes to the throne, it’s ours. The moment we miss a payment though…” Maya sipped her herbal tea.
Umaryn nodded, “You get a knock at the door.”
“Indeed. The tax collector comes knocking no matter what though. As they say, only three certain things in life; death, The Queen, and her taxes.”
Umaryn’s mind began to work like a machine, the gears turning rapidly, “When does the collector come next Maya?”
“Oh, about a week’s time I’d say. Right when the first snowfall comes. We had spitting flakes the other night. Us old timers say that each of the first few flakes hitting the ground every autumn are louder than the sounds of a Crown falling on the floor.”
“All your money going to the Throne, eh?” Umaryn said with a knowing smile.
Maya nodded, “Don’t tell Usul this, but I’ve never been a fan of the Queens. They’re such hard women. We’re fortunate that this Queen has only been on the Throne a decade. The Queens are much nicer earlier in their reign. They sour like milk.”
“What’s the Queen’s name?” Umaryn asked.
“No one ever knows, and it doesn’t matter. The Princesses are kept sequestered in the royal palace in the High City until the current Queen passes the Throne to her eldest. Once the crown is handed down, the daughter loses whatever identity she had, and simply becomes the Queen. We do not worship each Queen so much as the Purple Throne. Who sits on it doesn
’t matter, pretty one. I would’ve thought you’d have known that. Being from a small village and all.”
Umaryn was blasé, “I suppose I already knew that, but it’s been so long since I heard my mother and father tell such tales of the Queen. In truth, my brother and I are from a very small town, very far from here, and very far from the Queen’s influence. It is only Amaranthine by the thinnest of connections.”
“Mmm. That makes a lot of sense. The Empire is a very big place.” Maya sipped her hot tea.
“Very big, and very empty. Vast expanses of nothing all over the place. Question, when the tax man comes, does he bring an army of the dead with him? Guards too I imagine. He can’t be a very popular man,” Umaryn said with another smile.
“Oh he’s alone. Though not in the strictest sense. He walks with a handful of the dead,” Maya sounded sad.
“Do they come in? I’ve seen you don’t keep dead in the home here.”
“No, he leaves them outside. There’s no room for them in the foyer, or the kitchen. We couldn’t forbid them entry even if we wanted to. He concedes and leaves them outside because they wouldn’t fit. A true Amaranthine gentlemen.” Maya laughed a bit. She was pleased to have at least won a little something off a servant of the Queen.
“Well maybe when the tax man comes, I’ll blow him a kiss, and ask him to lower your taxes on my behalf.”
“Just for the asking eh? If it were only that easy my dear. I’ve half a mind that the man is dead himself.” Maya sipped her tea again, setting the cup down.
“Well, if you’d like me to try. Just tell me a day in advance so I can get all prettied up. Dead or not, he might appreciate a nice dress and done up hair at least. It can’t hurt.” Umaryn put on her best smile, the one she couldn’t possibly appreciate enough herself.
Maya laughed again, a warm laugh that made Umaryn miss home, “Good spirit girl. Good spirit. I’ll be sure to let you know when the tax man comes.”
The Wrath of the Orphans (The Kinless Trilogy Book 1) Page 11