The Traitor's Reliquary

by Chris Moss

  “Yes,” said Gyges, his deep voice rumbling.

  “Answer my question.”

  Gyges remained silent, his eyes glinting in Harpalus’s lamp. The waters around the criminal’s feet rose and fell again, leaving the stripped man shivering.

  “Who are you...to ask?” Despite Gyges’s obvious power, the cold water sapped the bulky man’s strength, managing a reply only through chattering teeth.

  Harpalus leaned down further, so that he could see every scar on the bushy face. “I am the man who might free you or might let you die in this hole. Now answer my question. Why kill those two men?”

  Gyges’s eyes glinted in the darkness. “It’s what...I am.”

  Harpalus rose. “That is the correct answer.”

  “Free me.” Gyges struggled against his chains.

  Harpalus held the lamp close to his own face, waiting for the water to rise and fall over Gyges once more. For a moment, he heard nothing but the dripping of condensation from the walls and the spluttering of the water below.

  “Free me,” said Gyges again.

  Harpalus cocked his head. “Why would I do that?”

  Turning, he blew out his lamp and felt his way back to the stairs, leaving Gyges to the unforgiving ministrations of the sea.

  “Is he ready?”

  “Just about.” Oswin craned his neck to the spyhole in the cell door. “I must say, Brother Reynard, this strikes me as a most foolhardy course of action. Reconsider the use of compulsion.”

  “Your compulsions will only last as long as you continue to maintain them,” said Harpalus. “Have faith, Brother. I can be persuasive when I need to be.”

  Abbeyfort’s warden gave Harpalus a pitying look. “I’ll say a prayer over your corpse when it’s over.”

  Ignoring the black-and-red-robed cleric, Harpalus opened the cell door and wandered into the bare room beyond. Gyges, still naked and shivering, lay slumped over a wooden table. The hulking figure did not respond to the Spymaster’s approach, but Harpalus, nonetheless, set his stool just outside the killer’s reach.

  “Why…leave me?” said Gyges, his head still resting on his elbows.

  “To show you I could,” said Harpalus. “To let you know I can be harsh as well as kind.”

  “Kind?”

  “Yes,” said the Spymaster. “Life has not been very kind to you, has it?”

  “You need to engage with him.” Sister Julia had insisted, her eyes stern and demanding. “Get him to talk about how he came to be Maal’s killer. This will give you all the information you need to help him unlock the chains Maal left in him.”

  “I want to control him, not tuck him in with a lullaby,” said Harpalus.

  “It amounts to the same thing, Pye.”

  “I wonder, when you look back over your life, what do you see?” whispered Harpalus.

  Gyges raised his head—just enough to lock gazes with the cassocked figure.

  “Death.”

  “But where did it begin, Gyges? How?”

  Gyges shivered, his frame trembling. “Long ago. Drunk. Blood. Goddess—beautiful, happy.”

  “Lady Maal made you kill for the first time?” Harpalus tried to sound as sympathetic as he could. “It must have been terrible.”

  “Guard.” Gyges teeth began to chatter again.

  “You were a guard?”

  “No,” said Gyges. “Kill guard. Killed guard.”

  Interesting... “And from there, she made you kill again?”

  “Again.” Gyges nodded. “Again, again.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that. She kept making you kill, even sending you here.”

  Gyges’s trembling became more pronounced. “Yes. Kill the Holy Woman. What she said.”

  “But, then you were caught,” said Harpalus.

  “Failed,” said Gyges. “Failed, now I’m here forever.”

  “Gyges is a man who suffers greatly,” said the Silver Prioress, her old eyes staring out to sea. “From our brief conversation, it seems he thinks of his imprisonment as a natural penalty for failing his duty.”

  This admonition shocked Harpalus. “When did you speak to him?”

  “A few weeks after the incident, during your…changing of the guard.” The Prioress accepted the mulled wine Harpalus handed her and gave the Spymaster a conspiratorial wink. “The chaos allowed me a brief respite from my observers.”

  Despite the seriousness of the situation, Harpalus found himself smiling at the old woman’s mischief. “What should I do?”

  “Tell him I forgive him.”

  “Not killing the Prioress was good thing, Gyges,” said Harpalus. “You don’t have to stay here for the rest of your life. I really can free you—if you come and work for me.”

  Gyges remained quiet, his breath rattling and uneven. “Holy Woman,” he said struggling to find the words. “Won’t allow it. Forever here.”

  “Not forever, Gyges. Whatever failures you think you made are long gone.” The Spymaster leaned forward. “The Silver Prioress wishes you to know she forgives you, and tha—”

  Lashing out with surprising speed, Gyges gripped the Spymaster’s cassock and pulled.

  Shouldn’t have leaned forward…

  Angry with himself, Harpalus twisted like a snake under the meaty arm, looking toward the door. “Oswin!”

  “If you can’t control him, Reynard, you can’t hope to take him with you,” said the warden, his tone imperious.

  Pox! So much for the empathetic crap.

  Harpalus freed his daggers and slipped out of the cassock. He feinted right, ducking past the grasping hands, and dove under the table. Gyges snatched the Spymaster’s foot, but Harpalus’s savage kick caused the brawny figure to fumble. Straightening, Harpalus turned just in time to catch Gyges’s outstretched foot in his chest. Hitting the stone wall, Harpalus let his instincts take over. He sprang off the flat surface and slashed Gyges’s exposed skin.

  The giant figure groaned, trying to back away. Harpalus used the dagger clenched in his right fist to slice through the meaty palm of one of Gyges’s anvil-like hands, pinning it to the wooden table.

  Gyges gasped, though his eyes still lacked any emotion. He brought his free hand up to punch Harpalus’s exposed throat. Harpalus expected the move. He twisted away from the clumsy attack, throwing his weight into Gyges’s arm and pinning the thick hand next to its fellow with his remaining dagger.

  This time Gyges howled with pain but retained enough control not to struggle. Harpalus reached down and gripped the killer’s bottom lip, digging his thumb in and twisting until he drew blood.

  “Listen to me!” the Spymaster said. Gyges continued in vain to break free of his grasp.

  “You listen to me, you dung-eating son of a whore!” Harpalus yelled.

  Gyges stopped shaking his head, his dark eyes boring into his opponent.

  “We both know what you are, Gyges. You’re a killer. But from now on, you’re my killer. Mine. Do you understand?”

  Gyges tried to snarl, but Harpalus gave the man a savage punch and reached down to tear off the pin fastening his cassock. Gyges ducked, trying to protect his eyes, but, rather than sticking the pin into a soulless orb, the Spymasters’s aim went higher, cutting deep into skin above the eyebrow. Before the prisoner could respond, Harpalus cut three deep lines into the skin, punctuating them with four smaller cuts to form a jagged design on the man’s brow.

  Gyges, realized what was happening and opened his eyes in shock. Something flashed behind the killer’s eyes—not fear, or even anger—but something that made the hair on Harpalus’s neck prickle. Gyges went limp, and Harpalus let go of his lip and leaned away.

  Some marks for indentured servants, some for criminals, and some for slaves.

  Drawing himself up, he raised his voice to a commanding tone. “You are mine. Say it!”

  Gyges’s bloodstained lips trembled.

  “Yes.”

  Harpalus curled his lip. “Swear it!”

  “I…
swear.”

  The Spymaster walked around the table and leaned within a finger’s breadth from the criminal’s face. “I could leave you here to die, slave. Never forget that.”

  With a resigned nod from Gyges, the Spymaster set his boot against the table and pulled his daggers free. He used his cassock to wipe the blades clean. Tearing the brown cloth into strips, Harpalus turned back to the barrel-chested figure. “Hands out.”

  Gyges exposed his bloody arms, and Harpalus bandaged up the wounds in a brisk fashion. “I’ll stitch you up on the ship.”

  Silent as the grave, Gyges nodded and fell in behind Harpalus, heading for the cell’s entrance.

  “Warden Oswin!” Harpalus called out. “Open the damn door!”

  There were muffled whispers from the other side, but finally the portal eased open. On the other side, Oswin stood, an astonished look on his face.

  “Brother… Reynard?” he said. “Did you, that is…is he safe?”

  “On the contrary,” said Harpalus, his tone cold. Turning to Gyges, he nodded toward Abbeyfort’s Warden. “Show him.”

  Without a word, Gyges staggered forward—still bleeding and unsteady on his feet but nonetheless more than a match for the warden. His enormous hand covered the cleric’s mouth before he could invoke his powers. He placed his other hand on the side of Oswin’s head.

  “Stop there!” Harpalus stepped forward. The criminal gave him a disappointed look and turned back to his victim.

  “Gyges…” the Spymaster warned in his deadliest tone.

  With a great shuddering sigh, Gyges released the black and crimson figure who slumped, pale and shaking, against the wall.

  Harpalus leaned over and whispered, “Was that controlled enough for you, Warden?”

  Oswin nodded and tried to hide the growing stain on his robe.

  “Excellent,” said Harpalus. “Then I shall take your leave. Gyges—come!”

  “Don’t think you can control him forever,” said Oswin, shying away as they passed.

  The cleric’s words rang in his head, bringing up memories ten years old. Shaking his head free from the uncomfortable thoughts, Harpalus smiled at the warden.

  “Only for as long as I need him.” He left, taking his charge back to the docks.

  15

  Maal’s troops have discarded their northern offensive against the Baavghir, and new groups have been reported near Farkirk and Colmain. We believe that a harsh winter has forced Maal’s troops to focus on Eldeway as a staging point for raids against the southern farmlands of Caedon.

  ~from a report to Spymaster Theron, dated 61st year of the Exile~

  “Ready, lad?” whispered Arbalis.

  Kestel nodded in the evening gloom and resisted the urge to peer over the cracked, wooden balcony. This is folly. There are far too many.

  Kill the first one you see, and there’ll be one less to worry about, said Creven, the silvered reliquary, bumping against Kestel’s hip.

  “Shut up,” whispered Kestel, shrugging his shoulders at the uncomfortable chainmail he wore over his leathers.

  “What?” said one of the soldiers next to him.

  “Nothing.”

  The chainmail-clad soldier gave Kestel an odd look, before turning away to peer through a crack in the splintered wood. The light from the small fires flickering below made an odd pattern on his face, like an old wickerwork basket with one too many holes. Eldeway shuddered under renewed siege, with more Sacred Realm forces pouring into the dilapidated city daily.

  I could just ditch the uniform and run. Kestel weighed the option. But the first Sacred Realm warrior who saw this tattoo would attack on sight. Perhaps if I covered it, I can—

  “They come!” Mollis said, his voice booming out over the cacophony below, breaking Kestel’s thoughts. “Seventy yards behind!”

  The long line of Exsilium soldiers positioned in the rubble along the side of the street readied themselves, their leather boots slapping on the uneven cobbles, a nervous mutter amongst them.

  Kestel’s mind flashed to speeches by Commander Philotus, explaining that while the common soldiers of the Citadel were better equipped, the warriors of the Sacred Realm outnumbered them more than six to one.

  “Surround them,” Philotus had said, then took a deep gulp of Bloodwyne before throwing the cup into the corner. “Bottle the bastards up and keep piling on until they’re corpses.”

  However, Kestel observed that Arbalis resorted to quick strikes and traps rather than risk an all-out battle.

  “More than one hundred and fifty,” Mollis said to Arbalis.

  The old soldier nodded his head. “We’re already committed. We’ll have to risk it.”

  Rising, the former commander of the Praetoria drew his sword. “For the Exiles! For revenge!”

  A wordless cry rose up in response. Kestel drew his sword and sprang over the remains of the balcony. Before him was a broken panorama of half-demolished buildings and rubble. The pockmarked street was visible only from the haphazard bonfires burning around its edges. A mass of scabies soldiers, warriors of the Sacred Realm, took up most of the view. Kestel recognized a few, small details—a wild scruffy beard, leather armor, and an assorted collection of knives, cudgels, and pikes that passed for weapons—before he stood in the midst of the battle.

  Long weeks of training took over, but they fought against the far older instincts Kestel had acquired growing up on the streets of the Old Capital. Batting away a blunt cleaver, Kestel shoved his sword through a man’s ribs. He pulled it out just in time to swipe at the unprotected back of another, running past. Around him rose the dreamlike sounds of a real battle—sharp animal grunts, moans and visceral thumps, the filth and blood of the skirmish splattering over the combatant’s faces.

  Kestel turned, facing a burly warrior almost twice his weight. He hammered away at the man’s defenses, treating him like an anvil rather than using the quick, focused strikes Arbalis had taught him. Before he regained control, another figure shoved him aside, screaming as the blood poured from his belly.

  He kicked the dying man away and scrambled to his feet, but every hair on his body stood up. As a former member of the Divine Guard, he had experienced this tingling sensation of power, like the buzzing of blowflies just above the skin.

  “Arbalis!” he yelled at the top of his voice. “Immortal!”

  The old soldier emerged from the fray, waving at the assembled soldiers. “Back! Back, all of you.”

  The Exsilium forces clambered back toward the dubious safety of the ruins, but before the street could clear, a wall of black liquid exploded from a nearby alleyway. The men closest to the opening scrambled to get away, but fell screaming into the enveloping, steaming poison, their skin and flesh bubbling off their bodies. Looking for a place to hide, Kestel heard Arbalis’s voice cry out.

  “Kestel! Keep it busy!”

  “Are you crazy?” yelled Kestel. “What can I do against that?”

  “Think of something!”

  At the end of the ruined street more black poison exploded into the dusk. Kestel swore under his breath. Now what?

  Hit it over the head with a rock.

  Kestel snarled and edged closer toward the smoldering ruins of the alleyway. This is no time for poxy jokes, Creven!

  I’m not. You’ll never get close enough to stab him—you just need to distract him.

  Keeping an eye on the end of the street, Kestel bent down and picked up a piece of rubble, weighing it in his hands.

  An Immortal rounded the corner. Unlike the drab robes of the Citadel’s clerics, a bright red-and-gold-tunic adorned the Maal’s Immortal. Kestel recognized the uniform from the dozens of ceremonies he attended over the years. The elite warrior walked up the street, putting himself in full view of the soldiers standing amongst the rubble. Black liquid dripped from his hands into steaming puddles.

  “Oi you!” shouted Kestel.

  Oi you? Creven mocked. That’s the best you could come up with?

>   The Immortal turned toward Kestel. An arrow from one of the Exsilium soldiers hit the red and gold figure, sinking into the Immortal’s chest. A stream of amber blood gushed from the wound, but the warrior yanked the offending arrow out. The Immortal laughed with wild abandon, the skin around the wound knitting itself closed in an instant.

  “Is that the best you can do, ironsides?” he shouted. “To hide behind your metal skins? Let me enlighten you.”

  Kestel threw the rock at the arrogant smile. The Immortal brought up his arm, another sheet of liquid death erupting from his hand. The rock sailed right through the poison to strike the Immortal on the chin. The warrior yelped in surprise and looked for his assailant, smiling grimly as the dripping blood slowed and the gash healed over. The Immortal spotted Kestel and moved toward him. Poisonous bile erupted once more from his hands, coating the ruins around him.

  “You unworthy maggot. How dare you—” The Immortal stopped, peering at the ugly mark on Kestel’s forehead. “You? How—”

  The Immortal’s head snapped sideways with a grisly crack, the robed figure crumpling like a rag doll. Kestel bent over and examined the foot-long wooden bolt, burning hot where it protruded from the Immortal’s temple.

  Arbalis wandered over and joined the young soldier, followed by Mollis and Calla.

  “Good shot,” said Mollis. “You did well too, Kestel.”

  Kestel looked down at the bodies of the Sacred Realm warriors around him, listening to the ghosts of his past.

  Arbalis eyed him, his expression turning wary. “You alright, boy? They’re not your comrades—they’re the ones who tried to feed you to the hydra, remember that.”

  Kestel pushed the emotions away to hold onto his stone-like expression. Screw them. They shouldn’t have betrayed me. I owe the Sacred Realm nothing.

  “Boy?”

  “It’s nothing.”

  Kestel looked at Calla, expecting some sour epithet. However, the scarred face remained blank, though something dark swam behind her eyes.

  Arbalis called over to the captain of the remaining soldiers. “It’s alright, he’s dead. Get your men back to the docks.”