“So what is your plan?” Darric asked Hweilan.
“My plan? I plan to kill Rhan, get my things back, and go to Highwatch.”
“And what of Mandan?”
“I have other concerns.”
“Other concerns?” Darric screamed. He stood to his feet so quickly that he rapped his head against the stone ceiling. He noted that his outburst had caught the attention of the warriors at nearby fires, but none of them had made a move to intervene. They were just watching the show. “What’s the matter with you, Hweilan? We can’t just leave him!”
Hweilan kept her voice low, but there was no less heat in it. “If you have an army on the way that you neglected to tell me about, now would be the time. I tried to bargain for Mandan, but even the warchief refused to intervene. Me beating the Razor Heart champion gets the four of us out of here. I can do nothing more.”
“They’re going to torture him. To death!”
For a moment, he thought he had her. Something in her expression, some crack in the mask … but then it was gone, and she said, “I know. There’s nothing I can do.”
“I …” Darric stopped. He didn’t know what. She refused to help and he didn’t know what to say.
“I fight, Rhan,” said Hweilan, “I leave. If you choose to stay … you’re on your own.”
“You won’t help us?”
“I can’t help you!” she shouted. All the hobgoblin warriors were watching now, intent on every word. “Not against the entire Razor Heart in their own fortress! And even if I could, I wouldn’t. I have more important—”
“More important? More—” Darric found himself completely at a loss for words. But then he found the one question that summed it all up. “What kind of monster are you?”
Her eyes narrowed, and for a moment Darric was reminded of the night he first saw her on the mountain, that predator’s gaze staring out from the bone mask. He had thought her a monster then, too. It saddened and enraged him that he’d been right.
“I’m no monster, Darric,” she said. “But I’m not a child anymore, either. The world isn’t a court bard’s tale. Honor may help you sleep at night, but it won’t keep the dark at bay.”
“I forbid it,” said Darric, and as soon as he’d said it he felt an utter fool.
“Forbid?” Hweilan snorted. “You’re in no position to forbid anything.”
“Mandan is my brother,” said Darric. “If they won’t let you fight for him, I will.”
Hweilan studied him a moment, and for the life of him Darric could not guess her thoughts. But damned if she didn’t look … hungry. He felt the blood rising to his cheeks but forced himself not to look away. Perhaps the fire and smoke would hide his blush.
“They won’t allow it,” said Hweilan. “Your lives belong to the Razor Heart. If I defeat the champion, your lives are returned. Mandan’s life belongs to this … Ruuket. Besides, you wouldn’t make it through the crowd’s first cheer. Not against Rhan.”
“Oh, and you will?”
“You’re not a killer, Darric.”
“I’m a knight! I’ve killed more p—”
“Did you enjoy it?”
“What?” Darric looked to Valsun for support, but the old knight was watching Hweilan.
“You’re a knight,” said Hweilan. “You kill to defend yourself or others. But you don’t like killing.”
“And you do?”
The smile she gave him had no humor or good will in it. It was the bared-teeth look of a wolf warning a lesser member of the pack to step away and wait its turn. If there was anything left of the girl he had known years ago, he couldn’t see it. Not anymore. And he thought, Oh, gods, Hweilan, what have they done to you?
CHAPTER NINE
PART OF HWEILAN—A VERY SMALL PART, SHE admitted—regretted being so hard on Darric. It was not her intention to shame him. But in their current situation, his sense of honor was only going to get him and all his companions killed. She didn’t doubt his courage, but neither did she doubt Rhan might spend a while toying with Darric for the pleasure of the crowd, then put a quick and bloody end to him.
Kaad completed his ministrations of Jaden and Valsun, confirming that Darric was suffering from nothing more than a few bruises and lack of sleep.
“Now,” Kaad said to Hweilan, “I’ll look at that arm.”
“It’s fine.”
Kaad glanced quickly over each shoulder, then said, “Drakthna is nothing to take lightly. Can’t let that fester.”
Hweilan caught his meaning. She stood still and presented her bare arm to Kaad. He bent close, seeming to examine the tattoo and new skin—and pressed a small bundle into her hand. It was soft, like lamb’s skin, but she could feel the contents. She shoved the whole thing into her pocket.
“Drakthna,” he whispered. “And three roots of white iruil. Hm?”
“Thank you,” she said, just as quietly. “I will not forget Gluured.”
Kaad nodded and stepped back. “Your arm is healing nicely. Try not to plant any more arrows in it.”
He turned away, but Hweilan caught his sleeve and said, “Kaad, Maaqua said my mother’s body had been ‘taken care of.’ I want to see her.”
Kaad looked away. “If you survive tomorrow, it will be done. If not …”
Then it won’t matter, Hweilan knew. No need to say it.
The healer packed up his things and left. The sky outside the cave mouth had turned black. After finishing their meal in an uneasy silence, the Damarans stoked the fire, huddled into their blankets, and lay down.
Hweilan waited until she thought they were asleep, then walked over to one of the other fires. The hobgoblins seated around it were passing around a skin of spirits so pungent that its reek was already leaking out of their pores.
“One of the warriors who brought us here,” Hweilan said in Goblin, “Kaad said his name is Hratt. Where is he?”
“Near the entrance,” one of them replied. He stood up. He wobbled on his feet and put a hand on his companion’s shoulder for support. “I’ll take you.”
“I can find him.” Hweilan walked away, not bothering to see if he followed.
With the coming of night, the air had gone from chill to cold, but Hweilan still felt the effect of the healing concoction, and even her naked right arm wasn’t bothered.
She found Hratt huddled close to a fire near the edge of the cave entrance. Three others were with him, all wrapped in blankets but still wearing their armor. This close to the entrance, the night breeze found its way into the cave and made the meager flames of their fire dance. All four warriors looked up at her approach, but none stood.
“You always sleep in drafty caverns?” Hweilan asked Hratt.
Hratt grinned around the bit of dried flesh he was eating. His companions raised their eyebrows at one another, seemingly impressed that she spoke their language so well.
“Maaqua said to feed and free your friends,” said Hratt. “She didn’t say to make them comfortable.”
“Are you my keeper?” she asked.
“Eh?”
“The one commanded to guard me?”
Hratt finished chewing and swallowed before he responded. “Buureg says you are oathbound. He says he thinks you will keep it. You may go as you please. Until dawn. Then you face Rhan. I am to take you.”
“And until then …?”
He shrugged. “As you please.”
“Good. Then it would please me to have my belongings returned to me.”
Hratt shook his head. “You haven’t won the Blood Price yet. You have no belongings.”
“Rhan chooses his weapon for the Blood Slake, does he not?”
One of the other hobgoblins said, “If Rhan fights with anything but the Greatsword of Impiltur, I’m a gnoll.”
His companions laughed louder than the comment warranted, which told Hweilan they’d started drinking long before she and the Damarans arrived.
“You know he does,” said Hratt. “Buureg warned me—”
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“I have agreed to the Blood Slake. I will choose my own weapon.”
“—about you,” continued Hratt. “Said you were no typical Damaran. Said you knew our ways too well.”
“Too well for his liking, I’m sure. Will you take me or not?”
“You wish to prepare your weapon for the morning?”
“Yes.”
“You don’t wish to rest?”
Hweilan shrugged and gave them what she hoped was her most wicked smile. “Gunhin.”
The warriors laughed, slapping their knees in approval.
Hratt stood and let his blanket fall. “Come with me.”
Hweilan looked down at the remains of the warrior’s meal. “Is that mountain hare?” she asked.
Hratt followed her gaze. “Did the slaves not feed you?”
“Goat. And just the meat. It’s been a long time since I had a mountain hare, and I have a desire to gnaw a bone.”
The hobgoblins exchanged an amused look, then one of them handed Hweilan the remains of a backbone with a few other bones and bits of flesh dangling from it.
“No leg?” she said.
“A wise beggar makes no demands,” one of them said.
“Ah, give her a leg, Gunt. She’ll be dead tomorrow morning.”
The one called Gunt dropped his first offer back into the communal pile, then handed her a leg. All the flesh and most of the cartilage had been stripped away. She took it with a nod of thanks, then followed Hratt out of the cave.
Hweilan waited until they had left the light of the fires behind and were making their way along a trail that snaked along a cliffside before she said, “I would say my farewells to my other companion. Mandan. The big one.”
Hratt stopped and turned. “He belongs to Ruuket. Buureg said nothing ab—”
“Did Buureg command you not to allow me to see to the welfare of my companion?”
“Uh … no. Bu—”
“I’ll be dead tomorrow, if you’re right. Mandan not long after. Yes?”
“You said nothing about that. You said you wished to claim your weapons for the Blood Slake. You never said—”
“I’m saying it now. There is no harm in seeing him one last time. Am I not oathbound to keep the peace?”
“Yes, bu—”
Hweilan took a step forward, looking up at the larger warrior but very obviously invading his personal space.
“And do you question my honor?”
Hratt scowled but he did not back away. “No.”
“Then lead on, Hratt.”
He stood there a while, wrestling with his own thoughts, but at last he did as she told him. Behind them, Hweilan’s ears caught the sound of footsteps. Furtive and keeping their distance. But no matter how many twists or turns they took, they did not lose the footsteps.
It seemed that Hratt might not trust her too much after all.
Under the light of the waxing moon, they walked on cliffside paths and climbed shelves of rock. Hweilan suspected that, though there were surely other ways from inside the fortress, Hratt was taking her by the most uncomfortable way possible out of pure spite. But Kaad’s healing concoction was still coursing through her, and she actually found the biting cold refreshing.
While they walked, she stripped away the last of the cartilage from the leg bone with her teeth. When the bone was as smooth as she could make it, she cracked it against the rock. It broke just as she hoped it would, with a sharp shard on one end. She pried off the knobby end, not caring about the jagged edge—glad for it, in fact—and then began to suck out the marrow. She watched the path as they walked, hoping for a twig or even a bit of stiff grass she could use to clean out the marrow, but she saw nothing but rocks and dirt.
Hweilan heard the footsteps behind them several more times on their way down the mountain, but she never caught sight of a shadow, and if Hratt heard the steps, he gave no sign.
After cresting an offshoot of the mountain, Hratt led her down a path that hugged the cliff wall to the left and dropped to the canyon floor on the right. They turned into a fissure that split the cliff and remained open to the sky, then emerged into a little valley, no more than a stone’s throw across. On the far side was a small cave. An iron door swung open on its hinges, and firelight bled out of the cave. She could hear harsh voices coming from inside.
Hratt stopped.
“In there?” Hweilan asked.
He nodded, then let her go first.
She jogged across the small valley but slowed before entering to allow her eyes to become used to the bright light.
After the night cold, it felt like walking into an oven. Beyond the door was a wide chamber that had probably once been a natural cave but had since been considerably expanded. Two closed iron doors faced her on the opposite wall. Most of the light and heat came from a fire pit in the middle of the floor, heaped high with glowing coals. But torches also burned in sconces on the walls, their inky smoke staining the stone before escaping through vents in the low ceiling.
Two hobgoblins, dressed only in loincloths and boots, stood near the wall to her right. One held a whip, and by the way it dangled from his hand, Hweilan knew it was studded with iron or stone. They had their backs to the door and so did not see Hweilan enter. All their attention was focused on the bloody thing strung up in front of them.
A thick chain hung from the ceiling, holding an iron bar longer than Hweilan was tall. Mandan’s arms had been bound to the crossbar with many links of jagged chain, and his legs, bound at ankle and knees with more chain, dangled less than a foot from the floor. At first Hweilan thought his clothes were hanging from him in bloody rags, but then she saw that he was completely naked, and the ragged bits hanging off him were skin. His chest and the front of his legs had been flayed, then the wounds cauterized so that he wouldn’t bleed to death. Instinctively, she reached for her knife, only to realize it wasn’t there. No matter. Bare hands would be better for this anyway.
The hobgoblin with the whip drew his arm back for a strike.
“Stop!” Hweilan shouted as she advanced on them.
They turned, their eyes widening in surprise, and the whipless one called out, “Up, you slaggers! Bring your blades!”
But then the one with the whip pointed at her. “You!”
She stopped three paces in front of him, ready to catch the whip should it come at her.
One of the iron doors slammed open, and four more hobgoblins rushed into the chamber, all of them bearing swords.
“Stop!” said the one with the whip. “This is the blood-bound! The one who fights Rhan at dawn. She touches either of us and her life is forfeit. Isn’t that right, girl?”
The hobgoblin laughed, his fellows joining in. It was all Hweilan could do not to slam her foot into his gut and throw them both into the fire pit. But his words were true.
But then a shape moved passed her with a clank of armor. Hratt smashed his gauntleted fist into the whip-holder’s face and he went down like a wet sack. His companion tried to back away, but not quickly enough. The same gauntlet backhanded him, and when he had the stupidity not to go down, Hratt brought his other fist full force into his gut. The four newcomers stood dumbstruck.
“I am not bound!” said Hratt. He yanked the whip out of the first hobgoblin’s hand and proceeded to lash them both. “You … were told … to guard him … and keep … him … alive. Nothing more!” He emphasized each word with a snap of the whip.
“You presume to stand in the place of Ruuket and her children? If this man’s blood is to be run, it is theirs to run. Not yours! Or yours! Or—yours!” Every time one of them tried to scramble away, he kicked them down again. Hweilan heard bones crack from the last kick.
One of the hobgoblins who’d come out of the door dropped his sword and grabbed Hratt’s arm. “Stop, Hratt! You’ll kill them!”
“I will! I’ll have their flea-infested heads nailed to my door!”
“Hratt, stop! Stop this!”
It took a s
econd hobgoblin to hold Hratt and two more to drag their bleeding fellows out of his reach. The wide, frightened eyes of the warriors and the bleeding backs of the first two seemed to bring him back to his senses.
“Get them out of my sight,” he said.
The one who’d been holding the whip had to be carried out, but his companion managed to limp against one of his fellows.
The two holding Hratt released him and quickly stepped away. Hratt looked at Mandan, then turned his scowl on the remaining guards. “You two, go get Kaad. Now. And be quick, or you’ll need him, too.”
Hweilan waited for them to leave before relaxing. She gave Hratt a small but very sincere bow of her head. “Thank you.”
The fury had still not left Hratt’s visage. “Not all the Razor Heart are honorless curs. To see a warrior treated this way … it is a shame to me.”
“But weren’t you going to torture him to death anyway?”
“Your friend killed Ruuket’s mate, leaving her children without a father. His blood is theirs. It does not belong to those two cowardly bastards. They are no better than thieves. To steal from children …”
Hweilan returned her attention to Mandan. He was still breathing, but his eyes were closed and his jaw hung open. If he was even aware of her presence—
“No!”
By the time Hweilan turned, Darric was already through the door and running straight for Hratt. He held a rock in one hand, raised to strike.
Hweilan leaped between them. A look of helpless fury crossed Darric’s face as he tried to swerve around her. But Hweilan stepped in, grabbed his raised arm with one hand and planted her other in his stomach, using Darric’s own momentum to turn him up and over. When he landed on his back, she twisted the arm she still held, turning him. She came down, one knee in the middle of his back and her free hand holding down the back of his head.
“Get off me!” he shrieked.
“Drop the rock,” she told him, keeping her voice calm.
He screamed wordlessly and tried to buck her off, but she put her weight onto the back of his head and twisted his arm further. He screeched louder and tried to bat her away with his free hand, but she was well out of his reach.
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