The noise of the spectators rose to a new pitch. If their words could not be understood, their insatiable appetites were clear. Blood! Give us blood!
The elf held his arrows ready, like short knives, thumbs braced against the shafts. His breathing came fast as a frightened bird’s. Shock and fear stained his aura. He defied it with his eyes, fought it with his soul.
Sherakai had seen similar expressions before, but something about this one touched him. The elf—No, half elf, he decided. Less angular and sharp-featured than an elf, and more attractive. He had a face other men would envy, yet too graceful and fine-boned to call handsome. Ebony hair and brows played a perfect foil to intense thunderstorm gray eyes. What eyes he had beneath brows black as a raven’s wings! His mouth, open to catch a breath, promised the most beautiful of smiles.
Look at me, waxing poetic. Was the aro at work here? A comely appearance was irrelevant to survival in the arena. Another quality drew Sherakai’s interest. An indecipherable impression of music and promise. Steadfastness. A shimmering brightness like the sun on water.
Sherakai’s grip on his weapon tightened. He could not allow the slightest intimacy or softening. He brought his focus back to reality.
“Yoro nin mima ness kumoi?” he asked. Why have you no sword? What was he to make of this archer who so clearly did not belong in this arena?
The archer relaxed his shoulders a fraction and waved the arrows. His brows pinched in incomprehension, though a certain light in his eyes suggested that he almost understood. Wanted to. “You’re very fine, young falcon,” he said in the trader’s tongue Sherakai knew, but with an unfamiliar accent. “But I can’t understand you.”
Another puzzle. He replied in the same language. “You are an excellent shot with your bow.”
“Most kind.” The half elf lowered his arms, letting the arrows dip. “You are incredibly fast,” he returned, inclining his head a fraction. Care shaped his words, as if to be understood, not to disparage.
“Why are you here?” Sherakai’s voice sliced through the demanding roar of the crowd.
The gray eyes flickered toward a dark box opposite Bairith’s own. Shadows spilled out of it and down the high wall. “I was forced by another’s hatred to fight here, to slay a man I do not know so that I might save my brother’s life. Without him, I am an empty hand, a quiver without arrows, a heart without hope.” Worry shaded him.
Sherakai studied him for a long moment. “I cannot allow you to do that. There is a debt I must collect. I am sorry.”
“I am sorry, too. I don’t want to kill you. I’m glad I didn’t. We have given them too much pleasure already.” He glanced behind Sherakai again, then back, a calm acceptance in his marvelous eyes.
Sherakai remained where he was. One blow, maybe two, and the halfer would give his lifeblood to the sand. It would be so easy… What had he become, that he dealt death without question? That he should come to heel like a well-schooled dog? He told himself every day that he was waiting for Bairith to slip up, to offer a single sliver of opportunity—but had he already surrendered his humanity? Was he any less a monster than the mage who chained him? If he meant to be more, then he must choose to be more and act on it.
He slid his weapons into their sheaths and retreated a step, then unfastened his helm. Slipping it off, he dangled it by its strap. Pain shaded his green eyes and his jaw knotted. “I will not be the one to end your life.” He turned a little away, bringing Bairith’s box into his line of sight. “I will not fight this man!” he called out.
What is this? What did he say? Surprise and consternation rippled through the wavering crowd. Here and there a quiet fell. In sharp counterpoint, a faction or two pitched their protests to screams.
Bairith shot to his feet, absolute fury radiating from him. “Do it,” he hissed. He did not need to shout to send his Voice across the sand, across the suddenly silent rows of watchers.
Sherakai flinched as though from a physical blow, then straightened. “I will not. I deny contest between us.”
Bairith’s perfect mouth curled in a snarl. “You will do as you are commanded.”
Beside him, the archer dropped his arrows and stood on trembling limbs. Blood dripped from his face. “Don’t suffer for me. What do you expect to gain?”
“My life,” he said, the passion in the word making it more than the simple act of living. He resisted the compulsion of magic, tension in every muscle, every line of his warrior’s body.
“By the gods, how you shine,” the archer marveled, wonder in his voice and his face.
With an effort, Sherakai turned to him. From a shadowed box kathraul’en flowed over the sand and parted around him. They closed on the archer just as he reached out to Sherakai’s arm, sweeping him off his feet, swarming over him, pricking, clawing, biting.
“No!” Sherakai cried. It did no good, but the blade singing in his hand sliced into the shadow creatures, tearing them to ribbons. The crowd gasped and screamed and barked in a frenzy of uncertainty. Bairith threw out an arm, his face blazing with anger, and Sherakai went down hard on one knee. It didn’t stop him from swinging; it didn’t stop him from struggling forward, chasing twisted shadows. The sword had little impact on them, but his Gift did. Left and right, the kathraul’en disintegrated, hissing and shrieking.
The archer stretched his hand out toward him, even after the kathraul’en overwhelmed and obscured him. They dragged him toward the exit, doing the cleaners’ jobs for them.
The wrongness of it screamed against Sherakai’s senses. It drove his efforts to a formidable pitch that severed Bairith’s spell and ripped shadows to tatters. For a moment the space around him cleared. It was not enough. The unearthly army fled with the archer. In their wake, Bairith restored the compulsion, slamming Sherakai to his knees in the sand. He held him there for long, painful minutes. Minutes in which the spectators worked themselves into a frenzy. What kept them from breaching the wall and tearing him apart he did not know.
Chapter 31
A vicious tug drew Sherakai upright. His nose bled, and he licked where it dripped down to his lip. Grit on his tongue. The crunch of sand between his teeth… The mage beckoned him forward. On unwilling feet he went. He would pay for his rebelliousness. Pay for the victory that brought a smile to spite the dread welling up inside. Whatever the price, it was one his heart could not afford to withhold: the price of his soul.
Bairith took that smile. He tore it from him in a single casual motion. Tore his entire face off to leave eyes burning and sagging from their sockets.
Shock stole his breath. Breathe, Tanoshi, breathe or you die! Whether or not the mage used illusion, Sherakai could ram the pain into submission. Bairith himself had taught him how to accept hurt and mold it into something useful. He could keep standing, keep breathing, take his punishment. He trembled as he gathered up the throbbing threads of agony, fumbling as he worked to bind them together. Inhaling through his mouth only emphasized the dryness of his teeth and tongue. How exposed… Easier to think about that than to tolerate the searing, bleeding chaos Bairith wreaked.
Pain is mine. I am pain.
What if Bairith really had stripped his skin away? What if temper drove him to kill his champion? The knowledge that he had nothing at all to lose brought a strangled laugh.
“Pain. Is. Mine.”
He repeated the mantra over and over until it was his truth. It steadied him, but the longer it took to gather and hold those threads he needed, the more his body shook with strain. Pain. Is. Mine. Seconds or minutes? Bairith was so very angry! Pain created its own kind of energy, the strands at once black as pitch and blindingly bright. The promise of death and the hope of life. They lashed like wild things, difficult to capture, but Bairith had taught him well. Patience and acceptance were the keys. Pain. Is. Mine. When he succeeded at last, he lifted his gaze to the mage who presumed to own him. The movement sent burning tongues of flame down his neck and torso as more skin peeled away. He crushed a groan, gritt
ed his teeth, and maintained his grip with stubborn determination. A single step forward brought him another victory.
Pain. Is. Mine.
It also increased the mage’s fury. Energy hurtled toward Sherakai, hammering at him mercilessly. A violent whirlwind billowed up around him, picking up the sand and scouring his ruined face. It clawed into his armor with grasping, tearing fingers to assault tender skin.
“No. NO!” Sherakai cried out, not denying the power that battered him, but the yearning to surrender. The howl of the wind swept his voice away. He buried his head in his arms and strove to push out of the storm.
He waded into frigid cold. It seeped into his boots and crept up his legs. It brought him to a standstill.
Burning on the top, freezing on the bottom. How long until it killed him?
Pain is mine. I am pain.
This was the gift Bairith had given him and he would use it. He had not mastered it, but it gave him strength even so. Inch by awful inch, he straightened. He drew the heat from his head and shoulders downward, downward… where it melted the ice. The thirsty sand drank the water and Sherakai reserved a spoonful or two to bathe his burning eyes. The storm threatened to siphon it away, so he focused on trickling it up his body, beneath his armor. He lost some of it to his clothes, then painstakingly wicked it out again. All the while, the whirling sand ate at his skin, his senses, his concentration. Absolute fury battered at him. Stubborn as an ox, he kept at that one small thing.
Tepid liquid on his eyes nearly brought him to his knees again. He wrestled strands of wild energy to bind the moisture in place. Felt his control slipping. Felt the water slide down one cheek.
How far to the edge of the storm? He could go that distance, couldn’t he? One step. Two. A violent shudder made him stagger. He choked out a sob and sucked dust into his lungs. Coughing, gagging, he stumbled forward. Without warning, the tempest stopped. He found himself within a circle of sand upon sand, swaying, dizzy.
“I. Am. Pain.” Aro laced his voice, not to compel, but to affirm truth. Each word quivered in the air, reverberating with an uncanny quality.
Shivery, wondering cold touched his cheek here, seeped through his armor to brush his elbow there. A whisper caressed his ear. Awe. Relief. Expectation.
They did not belong to Bairith Mindar.
“You dare to mock me?” the jansu asked, his voice muffled as if through a wall of cotton.
Sherakai tried to lick his lips. An electric giddiness coursed through him. He couldn’t decipher the details of what he’d done beyond the obvious, but it mattered.
The mage crossed the arena, his costly robes spurning the sand and dust. Anger strengthened his features, made him beautiful and terrible. He lifted a hand toward Sherakai, palm up. As he closed his fingers, he drew the air away from his willful student.
If he didn’t apologize Bairith would kill him. He wouldn’t stay dead. The mage never allowed that. An instinctive attempt to breathe yielded exactly nothing. His lungs burned. Did they match his face? Gathering himself, he pushed into the pain—all the way in. Bairith’s mouth opened in a shout he could not hear. Darkness deafened him.
The Hole cradled Sherakai in strong, cool arms. The stone sang to him as it always did, deep as could be, constant and true. Kathraul’en waited on him, keeping to the furthest edges of the cell. He would rather be alone. When they sensed he had awakened, they launched into their litany of his flaws and failures. They whispered tales of the disaster he’d made, and the dark magic he’d leveled at the master.
“It was no such thing,” he countered, voice hoarse. He hadn’t screamed that much, had he? “I protected myself as I’ve been taught to do.”
Dark, do you see? You say it is not so and you are not our brother, but one little taste leads to another, and you like the flavor. It could make you powerful indeed. Take it. Take it and see…
They teased and taunted and tempted him until the thoughts found places to cling, put down roots, and began to grow.
What had he thought to achieve by rebelling against Bairith?
Saving myself, he reminded himself. My heart and my soul. Those are worth something.
Even the archer tried to dissuade him. The archer hadn’t known him.
“What was his name? The archer.” It took so much strength just to whisper.
No one. Nothing. Did you think him real? A test only. What did you expect to gain? Cruel and biting laughter scraped his eardrums. His nerves. So high and mighty on the sands, still too blinded with pride to keep from falling into the trap. Make your own traps, reap your own tragedies. Every time, you come a little closer to surrender.
“He was real.” He had to be. No illusion could have eyes like those, but he’d never been able to shake the notion that the creatures he faced in the Twixt were nothing more than the products of a warped and twisted imagination. Figments of nightmare forced on him by magic or drugs.
He is gone. Don’t worry about him. So easy to forget, the shadow things wheedled.
“Gone or never was?”
A long, low rumble went through the stone cell. Agony. Despair. It carried a depth of anguish that far out-stripped Sherakai’s own. He cringed against it. Lifted a hand against the falling dust.
“What was that?” he asked, heart pounding.
The kathraul’en murmured among themselves until a second tremor shook the walls. Silence fell. When they resumed their badgering, it was as if nothing unusual had happened.
You focus on the wrong part of the exercise.
“And what would the right part be?”
You won. Wasn’t it easy? Oh, so very easy…
He grunted and levered himself up onto an elbow. No armor. When did that go? He felt guilty making Fesh and Teth take the stuff off him when he was unconscious. How close to death had he been? Did keeping him alive strain Tylond Corlyr and Bairith’s secret flock of mages to breaking? Or Bairith himself? He could only hope. At the least, he wanted the jansu exhausted and weak, suffering the most shattering headache in the history of the world. If wishes were fishes…
The kathraul’en continued their harassment. Your victory was easy as hitting a bullseye with a knife. Easy as cracking open a nut and eating the meat.
Sherakai frowned. “What are you getting at?”
Why pit the champion against a mere archer? What kind of challenge was that? The voices became sly. Or did the real test lie elsewhere?
He mustered a sneer. “You mean like killing a few gecking kathraul’en? Stay here and I’ll do it again.”
They fled.
Their absence made the silence brighter. He leaned against the wall and gingerly lifted one hand to explore his face. Tender, but normal. Eyelids and eyebrows remained intact, yes, so he had not been stripped of his skin nor burned to a crisp. His shirt hung open, torn down the front. Had the healers done it? Further examination revealed that he still wore his pants and the wrapping Fesh and Teth had done.
He rubbed his thumb back and forth across his chapped lower lip and tasted blood. Could Bairith foster in him some contrary sort of compassion for his adversary? No, he’d have noticed the use of magic, of coercion, wouldn’t he? Maybe not; Bairith was powerful and skilled, and it wouldn’t be the first time the mage had subtly influenced him. But to what end would he have employed such a scheme?
Sherakai could take nothing for granted, trust no emotion. He nursed indifference to the point of obsession. Sometimes, though, during the dark, quiet hours in the Hole, he loosened his death grip on his heart and let it beat for a little while to the rhythm of his carefully hidden hopes.
The kathraul’en were right. Every day whittled away his ability to resist. Every fight eroded his sensitivity. Every confrontation with Bairith tempted him to do things, say things, be things he hated. Worse, those things became more difficult to hate.
Had his attempt to save the elf’s life been a mistake? A small smile tugged at his mouth. Bairith had been wroth beyond control. It proved Bairith was a m
ortal creature, with mortal weaknesses. He must discover a flaw he could make use of. It had to be soon or there would be nothing left of him…
Chapter 32
He sensed the soldiers before they arrived. Four of them this time rather than two. Secluded as the Hole was, he had no difficulty keeping track of the rare comings and goings, or how many passed by. He’d even learned to judge how long it would take them to reach the door, counting his own heartbeats. They never surprised him.
The meals he’d received were always drearily the same. They arrived twice each day, making it simple to figure he’d been locked up for about three days. He hadn’t expected such a light sentence, considering the temper he’d provoked. Even so, three days of missed training would cost him. Recovery from his wounds, too, would exact a price. About midway through that time, he’d come to the realization that something was missing. Repeated inventory proved that he had all his limbs, all his physical senses, and all his magical abilities. What, then, could it be?
And there were still the mysterious sounds like moans. Why would the earth moan unless it preceded a quake? Didn’t Bairith’s magics prevent such a thing?
When the guards opened the door, Sherakai edged out slowly, aware of unusual tension. He squinted against the light of two torches set into iron brackets on the wall. Rough hands grabbed him and clapped a collar around his neck. The instant it met his skin he lost contact with the energy of magic.
Surprise made him lash out, but they’d come prepared. The guard holding the band jerked on it, choking him and setting him off balance. Another knocked his feet out from under him with a staff. Then, to his astonishment, they backed away. Flat on his back, he instinctively measured the distance to the nearest. Calculated how easily he could seize either the staff or a torch, how he could set the men against each other.
“Sorry we had to do that, lad. Orders. We don’t want no trouble.” None but the staff-wielder held weapons. Hands out to their sides, they tried to appear as unthreatening as possible.
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