Unfettered

by Terry Brooks

  The smile vanished. “Back? Certainly. Just as soon as we’re finished here.”

  “It wasn’t a question, Brie. Turn around right—”

  “Touch me and I’ll scream. I swear I will, Kylac. And draw whoever’s down here on top of you, given the echo in this place.”

  “You’re mad, is that it?”

  “No more than you. I wasn’t going to watch you run off and never even know what happened to you. Together, we stand a better chance.” She bent to retrieve the burning brand from the burial niche. “How many of them are there, do you think?”

  Kylac was livid. “Forget it. I’m hauling you straight back to the surface.”

  “You’ll have to truss me up. And that’ll take time I’m guessing we don’t have, given your terrible haste to get down here.”

  She was correct about that much. He might render her unconscious…and then what? Leave her in a burial niche and hope no one found her? Pray she didn’t wake and raise a stir?

  “How long must you stand there gaping?” she asked him. “Master Rohn has to be wondering by now if anyone means to free him.”

  There would be no second chance at this—or at least, none that Kylac could risk. Fool! he wanted to shout. You blind, arrogant fool! Only, he was unsure who deserved it more, Brie or himself.

  Kylac stepped toward her. Brie shied back, looking as if she might actually cry out. He glowered for a moment, then snatched the brand from her hand before she could blink.

  “Stay behind me,” he commanded, “and keep silent.”

  Brie grinned slyly. “I managed it this far.”

  Kylac shouldered past. “Should you get yourself killed, don’t expect me to weep.”

  The acrid smell of smoke betrayed the outer watchman’s position even before the globe of his torch was seen pushing against the darkness. Kylac snuffed his own brand and awaited the soldier’s approach. The dark-bearded corporal drew to within three paces of Kylac’s position before turning heel and marching back down the corridor.

  Brie tugged at Kylac’s arm. Her gesture bespoke confused irritation. Kylac shrugged free, motioning for patience.

  The watchman marched thirty paces, by Kylac’s count, reaching an intersection where he raised his torch to the left in signal. He then turned and repeated his approach.

  Again Kylac restrained himself, holding back his anxious friend in the bargain, observing Darkbeard’s path and cadence.

  “We’ll have to move quickly,” he hissed at Brie when the watchman turned for a third approach. He slipped from his belt a pair of leather thongs. “Bind him ankle and wrist. Cut strips from his tabard to gag him.”

  Brie scowled. “Easier to slit his throat.”

  “As you prefer,” Kylac said, and wondered if she truly had it in her.

  They were silent for the final fifteen paces. As Darkbeard made his turn, Kylac rose behind him, capturing him in a sleeping hold. The startled soldier resisted for two heartbeats before slumping limply. Kylac eased the body to the ground, then stripped the watchman of cloak and helm, donning them himself.

  “He’s a full head taller than you,” Brie observed, when she realized what he intended.

  Kylac just scooped up the fallen torch while nodding toward the body, then hastened down the corridor, falling into the proper rhythm of steps as he neared the intersecting tunnel.

  He kept his head low while hefting his torch in signal, raising his free hand to his chin as if to rub at a beard. He needn’t have bothered. The signal he received in return was another thirty paces distant, the man who held it scarcely visible in the engulfing blackness. Kylac smirked as he made his turn back down the first corridor, pausing to inspect Brie’s work. Darkbeard’s throat was uncut, his bindings tight. She was still working on the gag, but when he knelt to assist, she elbowed him aside, the task in hand.

  He returned to the signal junction. After hefting his torch, he found Brie on his heels. So he passed her his light and padded invisibly down the next corridor, marking the watchman’s patrol path while positioning himself at its near end. When the soldier returned, Kylac disabled him as he had the first, then assumed the man’s route. He left another pair of thongs with the body, and smiled to see them already put to use upon his return. He also found Brie wearing the second man’s cloak and helm, both of which looked ridiculously large on her. Matched with her too-serious expression, he very nearly laughed aloud.

  By the time they reached the fourth watchman, their incursion began to strike Kylac as suspiciously easy. Upon disabling the fifth, the nagging thought had blossomed into a genuine concern. As narrow as the chance might be that anyone could find or would attempt to follow Traeger’s company into this subterranean labyrinth, the captain believed he was dealing with the fabled Seax Lunara. Should he not have tightened his defenses accordingly?

  But they were too far committed to turn back now. If they had wormed their way into a trap, there was naught but to sidestep its trigger, else respond as they could when it was sprung.

  He found the sixth watchman in a stationary post at the top of a descending stair heavily lit by bracketed torches. A voice echoed from deep within, though Kylac could not discern the words. He mimicked the fifth watchman’s signal to the stair sentry, then drew back along the previous route, sharing with Brie what he had seen.

  “Well?” Brie whispered.

  “If there’s another at the base, we’ll not likely be able to take him silently.”

  “Then we do it swiftly. How many are left?”

  Kylac couldn’t be sure. “Three at the least. Not more than six, I should hope.”

  “No more bindings, then.”

  Kylac took a steadying breath, then drew his shortsword. “If it’s the latter, no.”

  “We but tread the course they set,” Brie offered, keen to his hesitation.

  She waited on his confirmation, so Kylac gave her a nod. “We’ll approach slowly, get as close as we can. Keep your head low.”

  He handed her the torch, which she accepted. As they returned to the signal junction, Kylac bolted ahead without her. He was three strides into his sprint—a safe lead on Brie—before the watchman responded.

  “Hathen? Krakken’s blazes…”

  His words afforded Kylac five more strides. Drawing his sword gave Kylac two more. He half-turned to holler a warning down the stairs, but managed only an inarticulate grunt as Kylac closed the remaining distance. His sword came up to block Kylac’s lunging thrust. As it raised, Kylac dove low, driving a shoulder into the man’s thighs and carrying them both into the torchlit stairwell.

  The watchman scraped and thudded headfirst along his back, white-blond beard and colored cheeks giving him the look of a turnip. Kylac perched atop him, coiled to spring. The stair wasn’t long. A gap-toothed watchman stood at its base, fumbling for a blade of his own. As the weapon came free, Kylac leapt into him, tackling him against a chamber wall.

  They struck hard enough to jar the sword from Gaptooth’s hand. Kylac used his blade to dislodge the soldier’s helm, following with a pommel strike to the temple. Gaptooth crumpled beside his weapon, which Kylac kicked clear.

  Turnip moaned senselessly, mouth bleeding, eyes glazed. So Kylac turned focus to the rest of the room. A swift survey revealed a crypt come to serve as a torture chamber, given the bladed instruments set around its torchlit walls. At the far end, his father hung half-naked from a pair of manacles hammered into the ceiling, unconscious if not dead, covered in sweat and filth.

  That was all he had time to discern before Traeger and an attending watchman rounded on him with ready blades, their features flashing alarm, anger, and finally bemusement as Kylac shed his cloak and helm.

  He did not wait to see what their reaction would be when Brie came scampering down the stairs, or for their companions to recover. Instead, he launched toward the attending watchman, forcing the soldier to engage. The watchman responded with a practiced thrust. Kylac deflected it high and to one side with a scissored de
fense, giving a twist that forced the weapon from his opponent’s grasp. As it struck the stony ground, he drew a pair of shallow gashes along the soldier’s wrists—a deterrent against retrieving his blade too quickly.

  He heard Brie enter behind him, but did not have time to turn. Traeger’s sword came at him in a sweeping arc. He ducked low to avoid its cleaving edge, then spun for a pommel strike against the back of the bleeding watchman’s head, who had stubbornly bent to chase his sword despite his wounds.

  I should have taken his thumbs, Kylac thought.

  Thumbs dropped like a sack of grain. Brie stood over the dazed Turnip, pointing her sword at his throat.

  “Eyes up!” she shouted.

  A kind warning, if unnecessary, as Traeger slashed again. Kylac twisted, then ducked a sudden backswing. The next strike aimed low. Kylac sprang from the floor to the wall, somersaulting over Traeger’s head to land at his back. The captain fought to whip his blade around, but Kylac pricked his ribs, causing him to reflexively hunch over that side. Kylac then dropped his own blades to latch on with a sleeping hold.

  “Pleasant dreams, Captain.”

  Traeger sputtered furiously, then fell slack in Kylac’s arms.

  Kylac dropped the captain, then reached for the final handful of thongs tucked in his belt. “Bind them,” he said to Brie, tossing her the leather strips.

  “This one’s waking,” she replied, pricking Turnip’s throat with the tip of her sword.

  “He’d rather be trussed than dead, I’ll wager,” Kylac said, reclaiming his own swords while staring pointedly at the half-dazed watchman. “Have him roll over with his hands behind his waist. If he refuses, I’ll carve the peak from his throat.”

  Turnip cowed to the threat, rolling over as commanded.

  Kylac watched until the man’s hands were tied, then sheathed his weapons and turned to his father. Rohn continued to hang limply from the iron chains hammered into the ceiling, head bowed against his chest. Kylac wasn’t even certain he still lived.

  His heart raced…carrying a warm flood of relief when he found his father’s pulse.

  “Is he…?” Brie asked, as she worked at binding Turnip’s feet.

  Rohn’s face was bruised and swollen, but did not bear any permanent injuries. Traeger had only been softening him, in preparation, mayhap, for Governor Tehric’s arrival. “He lives.” He took his father gently by the jaw. “Come now, Father. I need you to wake.”

  “What now?” Brie asked, as she moved on to Gaptooth. “I mean, where will he go?”

  “We’ll find a safehouse, hold him until the king hears my petition for an honest trial.”

  “Have you a place in mind?”

  He didn’t. Not yet. He needed his father to regain consciousness first.

  He snapped his fingers beside Rohn’s ear, then raised an eyelid, exposing the reddened orb to the light. Still his father did not respond.

  “Check our good captain for a key to these manacles,” he said, before deciding it might be just as quick to pick the locks. “Belay that. I’ll tend to it. Just see that he’s bound like the others.”

  The cuffs hung too high for him to access without difficulty, so Kylac moved farther back to fetch a stool. He had just picked it up when he heard Brie’s startled gasp, followed by the rasp of her blade coming to hand. As he turned, he watched Traeger retrieve his own sword and throw a clumsy swipe. Brie parried it easily, and then another.

  Kylac dropped the stool and reached for his blades.

  Traeger managed a third strike, this one stronger and more focused. Brie deflected it as she had the others, then lunged forward with one of those lighting thrusts she executed so well, catching Traeger in the side.

  “I got him!” she cried, the thrill evident in her voice.

  Guard up, thought Kylac, dashing toward her on legs suddenly made of sand.

  A broad grin raised her puffy cheeks. But as her fiery gaze found his, gleaming with anticipation of his approval, Kylac watched Traeger’s sword slash out in counter.

  She was still grinning when its tip ripped a matching smile across her throat.

  Traeger lurched aside as Kylac flew past, ignoring the captain completely. He dropped his blades to catch Brie as she slid into his arms. She was still smiling when she looked up at him, sword slipping from her nerveless fingers.

  “Brie?”

  “I got him,” she said again, a whisper now as blood pulsed from her throat.

  He put his hand to her neck as if he might wipe the wound clear. But it was the smile on her face that vanished, a choking realization seizing upon her brow. Her eyes turned toward the ceiling, lids fluttering.

  “Kylac…?”

  “I’m here, Brie. Lie still. I’m here.”

  Her gaze found his again, though it seemed to peer through him. She reached a hand toward his face. “You…You’re…”

  A sudden spasm gripped her. She clutched his arm with amazing intensity, nails gouging his flesh. “Breathe. Just breathe. I’m here, Brie. I’m here. Shards, I’m right here.”

  She blinked twice more before her eyes rolled back and her head sagged in the crook of his arm. “Brie? Brie?”

  As her grip on him weakened, he clutched her all the harder, pressing his cheek to hers, where her blood smeared against his tears.

  “Hypocrites,” he heard Traeger say, as though from a great distance. “You sow death amid the shadows, yet weep when the harvest comes home.”

  Kylac opened his eyes to find the captain standing beside Rohn, blade perched against his throat. A fistful of hair kept Rohn’s head upright. His father was awake now, if only barely.

  “Too long has my fair city suffered your plague,” Traeger spat, and there was blood in it. His abdomen glistened darkly where Brie had pierced him. “Tonight, I end it.”

  Kylac lowered Brie softly to the earth, gently closing the lids over her eyes. You…You’re… He folded her palms upon her chest.

  “Doubtless, another will take his place. But Magistrate Aarhus will continue to hunt you. And as each head rises, he will strike it down, until no more dare rise.”

  Guard up, Kylac thought. He noticed Brie’s blade upon the ground, lying near his own.

  “Tehric,” Rohn coughed suddenly. “He’ll not be pleased…should you cheat him of his prize.”

  The words proved a distraction, stealing the captain’s focus, giving him pause. In that moment, a sensation like liquid ice burned up Kylac’s spine, spilling into his shoulders, coursing outward through his limbs. He could not have said how it happened next, only that he willed himself forward, and his body responded. A pair of swords came to hand. His heart beat once, twice, while the physical world stood still around him. When it was done, Traeger’s severed sword arm was falling toward the earth, and Brie’s blade was sliding cleanly through his gaping mouth.

  Too easy.

  A chill ran through him as the captain’s body fell. It convulsed upon the floor, its expression contorting with fury and denial, blood coughing from its ruined face. Its back arched as it flopped to one side, where it finally lay twitching.

  Kylac watched, awaiting a sense of satisfaction, of triumph, of vengeance slaked. He watched until the throes had ceased, yet tasted only raw, writhing emptiness.

  He continued to stand there, unmoving, while blood pooled beneath the mutilated body, spilling outward into the cracks and crevices of the floor, spreading…

  The presence of a shadow drew his gaze toward the chamber stairwell. There stood a man in silken robes trimmed with gold, his impressive height and rigid posture giving him an austere bearing. His head was shorn, his close-cropped chin beard shaped into an arrowhead. The gilded ropes draped about his shoulders proclaimed his office.

  Magistrate Aarhus.

  The magistrate surveyed the scene. He seemed utterly disinterested in the pair of watchmen bound at the base of the stair, Turnip pale with fear, Gaptooth unconscious. His gaze lingered only slightly longer on Thumbs, similarly insensa
te, bleeding at the wrists—whom Brie hadn’t had a chance to bind. He took careful note of Brie’s small form, laid out peacefully, and of Traeger’s, laid out in pieces. Only when his eyes found Kylac’s did they cease to roam, taking hold like a raptor’s talons.

  Then came Xarius, slinking from the stairwell like a stray patch of darkness, rapiers drawn.

  Aarhus advanced—one long, slow stride followed by another—shadowed by Xarius. Kylac found himself stepping protectively in front of his father, hefting his blades.

  Aarhus stopped. Though his gaze burned with enmity, a savage grin split his features. “And you thought the boy a lost cause.”

  Rohn grunted, his chains clanking with movement. “I nearly had Jedrick do the deed. Loose these irons.”

  Kylac blinked, as confused by the strength in his father’s voice as he was by the words. He half turned to find Rohn standing on his own, no longer limp in his shackles.

  “A shame he didn’t take Jedrick, too,” said Aarhus. The magistrate stepped nearer, raking a glance at Thumbs. When Kylac snapped toward him, Aarhus stopped.

  Xarius snorted. “He doesn’t understand. Look at his face. I doubt he could even tell us where he is.”

  “Show him,” said Aarhus.

  Xarius grinned before backing toward the stairs. With a reverse thrust, he put a sword through the chest of the unconscious Gaptooth. That drew a startled shout from the waxen-faced Turnip, trussed upon his belly, now fully alert.

  “M-m-magistrate. My lord, I—”

  A rapier through the back of his neck put an abrupt end to his plea.

  Aarhus produced an iron key from a pocket within his robes. “For the master’s manacles. If I may?”

  Kylac could not seem to think straight. If the magistrate had come not to harm Rohn…

  He felt his arms lowering, sagging beneath the weight of realization. He fell aside a pace, so that he could easily face his father as he did the others. “What scheme is this?”

  “The elimination of a troublesome nuisance,” Aarhus replied, closing the distance between himself and Rohn. A long arm reached skyward, fitting his key into the first cuff. “Captain Traeger had become quite rabid of late. I tired of holding his leash.”