Hero Cast Trilogy Omnibus

by Adam Carter

  “Not here you’re not,” the man interrupted. “And if I were you I wouldn’t bandy that title about too much. These folk have no love for your baroness and if they think for one moment they have one of her officers in here, it’s not going to end well for you.”

  Wren said nothing. She waited for the man on her other side to finish urinating and move off. There did not appear to be anyone else in earshot, but she lowered her voice regardless. “Who are you?”

  “That’s a naïve question, considering how long you’ve been chasing me.”

  “Crenshaw? Jobek Crenshaw?”

  “Not too loud with that, either, if you don’t mind. In here I go by the name of Joe.”

  “You don’t want them to know who you are?”

  “I may be a hero of the people, but that doesn’t count for anything amongst desperate souls.”

  Wren did not know what was going on, but she began to at last feel a little more in control. “What’s to stop me handing you over right now?”

  “Nothing. But if you did, I’d have to let slip who you were, too. They get one of us, they get the other. We’re a package deal, Serita.”

  It irked her to hear him use her forename with such familiarity, but what he said made sense. Or at least some sense anyway. “If you’ve captured me,” she said, “why are you here as well? You want me to think this isn’t an interrogation?”

  “I haven’t captured you, Serita. I’m a prisoner just as much as you are.”

  “I was taken by Moya. Did your lover lock you away here with me, then? That’s what you want me to believe?”

  “Karina?” He smiled. “I was wondering how you’d got here. You see that?”

  Wren followed his pointing finger. In the centre of the ceiling was a hole about a metre wide. “What about it?”

  “That’s how all the prisoners get in here,” Crenshaw said. You fell down that chute about four hours ago. Me? I’ve been here slightly longer. If Karina pushed you down that chute, she wanted you to suffer as you died.”

  “Died? There’s a way out, surely.”

  “Take a look at the iron bars.”

  Wren did so, but only briefly. “What about them?”

  “There’s no door. And even if there was, it wouldn’t lead anywhere. This is part of an old castle, long ago destroyed by the baroness. The corridors either side are blocked in with several tonnes of rock. There’s no way out of this cell, other than through the hole in the ceiling; and that has a handy cover in place at the top. I think it’s an old well, but why a well leads into a cell with no doors, I have no idea. You’d have to ask the former castle’s owners, but your baroness had them all killed.”

  Wren shuddered as she looked about the oubliette. Crenshaw was right: they were going to die down there.

  “No,” she said. “This isn’t real. Moya’s inside my head. None of this is real.”

  Crenshaw sighed, motioned with his finger. “Come here.”

  Wren crawled over to him and he grabbed her nose with thumb and forefinger, giving it a sharp wrench. Wren cried out in pain as she heard bones creak. Falling back, she held her throbbing nose and released a string of curses at her enemy.

  “It’s real all right,” Crenshaw said.

  “Then where does the light come from?” she asked, certain her nose was bleeding.

  “Low-level magic users, probably. I don’t like to ask because it doesn’t much matter. We can see a bit, and there’s no sense in questioning it in case it goes away.”

  “This is ridiculous,” Wren said, her brain becoming frantic. She tried to force herself to relax, but knew it was all too real. She tried to think of a contradiction in Crenshaw’s words but could find none. “Gaolers,” she said excitedly. “This is a cell, there must be gaolers.”

  “Serita, you’ve been chasing me for ten years now. Ever since we met in that village and Karina blew the face of that teenage kid.”

  “I remember that day all too well.”

  “Well, after all that time, we’ve finally sat down for a conversation. Isn’t there anything you want to ask me other than inane questions about lighting and gaolers?”

  Wren was not accustomed to being spoken to in such a manner, but the old soldier was right. She had dreamed of this moment – quite literally – for many years. Now that she was at last faced with it, she found all her questions, all her crass comments, were burning away like fat in a fire.

  “If you want a question,” she said, “try this: why should I believe any answer you give me?”

  “My life is a lie.”

  It was not the answer she had been expecting and she tried to assimilate it, but was unsuccessful. “Where’s Moya now?”

  “I don’t keep track of her, Serita. Karina is a free spirit. We haven’t been together for some time. You’ve been tracking us for years, surely you knew that?”

  He spoke playfully, but Wren could detect an undercurrent of anger. Something had happened to break up the partnership, although there was little chance of him just coming out and saying it.

  “We’re in this together,” she said, focusing on the problem at hand. “Since neither of us wants to die down here, we have to work together to get out. You do agree with that much, don’t you?”

  “You’re assuming I don’t want to die down here.”

  “Like you say, I’ve been chasing you for years. I know something of how you think, Joe. Besides, if Karina’s wronged you somehow, you can’t get revenge from inside of this cell.”

  “I didn’t say Karina had wronged me, or that I wanted revenge.”

  Wren did not want to get back to that. “How about forming a human chain to reach through the shaft and up to the lid? Can it be prised loose?”

  “It’s too tight. We actually did try that.”

  “Then we need to keep the chain there until someone opens it from the other side. If they’re still throwing prisoners down here, someone must open it eventually.”

  “That’s what I suggested, but it takes a lot of strength to maintain something like that, and we survive on rats and dirt, so no one down here has the strength for it.”

  “Magic users, then.”

  “If we had any powerful magic users we’d have been out long ago.”

  Wren fought down her exasperation. She had always been good with ideas, but Crenshaw was shooting them down faster than she could think of them. “We could always sit here and die,” she suggested.

  “Cute.”

  “Where’s my armour? And my weapons.”

  “I’ve no idea. Karina must have removed them prior to tossing you down here. She probably knew you’d be ripped apart the instant anyone realises who you were so wanted you to live in fear for the rest of your life.”

  Again Crenshaw was making sense; again Wren did not like it.

  “Why did you attack the castle?”

  “Who says I attacked the castle?”

  “You, actually.”

  Crenshaw’s smile was tight. “That was such a long time ago, Serita. All I know for certain is that Baroness Thade is a wicked woman and anyone who tries to kill her can only be seen as a hero.”

  “No matter how many they murder in the process?”

  Crenshaw’s eyes took on a faraway look, as though he was enjoying an old memory.

  “Why do you hate the baroness so much anyway?” Wren asked. “She offers her people stability, protection. Do you know, in the past fifty years there have only ever been six incursions into her territory, and three of those were destroyed without a single loss of civilian life?”

  “The people hate her.”

  “The people should love her.”

  “Even those you burn alive because we happen to have passed through their village?”

  “If you’ve been in this oubliette for so long,” Wren said excitedly, “how could you possibly know that?”

  Crenshaw looked sympathetic. “You mean you’ve been doing it again?”

  Wren’s face fell and she turn
ed her eyes aside. She did not like to remember the atrocities she committed in the name of justice, but Crenshaw was right: burning those people at the village had hardly been the first of such instances.

  “Let’s leave politics to one side for the moment,” Crenshaw suggested. “I have an idea on getting out of here, if you’re up for a little challenge.”

  “I’m not going to like this, am I?”

  Crenshaw laughed.

  “A few years ago I made a friend. Her name’s Sooty.”

  “How wonderful for you.”

  “I was on my way to see her when I was thrown in here. By now she’ll have realised something’s happened and she’ll be looking for me. I reckon she’ll be here sometime today, maybe tomorrow.”

  Wren had no idea what he was talking about but assumed he wasn’t just rambling. “What happened to you, anyway? How did you get down here?”

  “I’d like to say I was set upon by a hundred trained assassins, but there’s only so much room in a man’s life for lies.”

  “You going to tell me sometime before we die of old age?”

  “I was a little inebriated and I met a girl who took me to the ruins of this old fortress.”

  “I take it you fell into a honey trap.”

  “The funny thing is the group of men she led me to actually thought I might have some money. I haven’t had any money for a long time.”

  “So they stole your armour, your sword, your dignity, and threw you down here?”

  “Something like that.”

  It was difficult for Wren to get her head around everything he was telling her. She had spent so long chasing Crenshaw and his allies, and now she had found him he was destroying all her preconceptions. She had encountered her quarry on occasion over the years, but only in passing and usually amidst great violence. This was the first time she had managed to sit and talk with Crenshaw, and she could not believe his group had split up. It would make tracking them so much more difficult, but a part of Wren was excited by the thought: if they were indeed split apart her soldiers stood a much greater chance of picking them off one by one. If she could find a sword she could run Crenshaw through here and now and regain at least some of her lost honour.

  Even if she could kill him, she had no way of alerting Canlin to the fact. Having Crenshaw dead was not as important as having people know he was dead. If Crenshaw died in some long forgotten hole her soldiers would continue to search fruitlessly. It was something to which she had never given any thought. After so long it was likely at least one of her quarry would die through other means, and if that happened her mission could never be fulfilled.

  It meant she would have to complete her mission as soon as possible. First she needed to get Crenshaw out of the pit; then she could kill him. If she could reach her army before Crenshaw located his own reinforcements, there was even a chance Wren might be able to take the man in alive.

  Something heavy clamped upon her shoulder and Wren glanced down to see it was a hand with fingers as thick as her forearm. She had been in fights before – a great many in fact – but she recognised the fingers and her heart froze at the possibility of having to tackle the creature to which they belonged.

  Wren slowly turned, pulling back from the hand as she took in the sheer enormity of her foe. The being was around four metres tall, with broad hips and thin chest tapering off to a small head. It gave the creature an almost triangular appearance. Its legs were short, thick stumpy tree-trunks, while its arms were long and thin until they reached the elbows, at which point they became thick and incredibly well-muscled all the way down to its fingers. The creature stared at her from a large low brow, revealing a display of blackened, broken teeth as it sneered.

  The name of the creature’s race was unknown to most folk, and the creatures themselves seldom spoke with other species so there was not enough interaction for people to ever learn. Contact with these brutes was usually fatal, so any intelligence people managed to gather on them generally did not make it to anyone else. For want of calling them something, most people referred to them as trolls, and indeed they encapsulated the image well enough. Wren had no idea whether the creature would find the term offensive, so refrained from using it to its face. She also knew if the troll was trying to intimidate her, she could not afford to back down.

  “What?” she asked. “I’m busy here.”

  The troll grunted; then smacked her across the face with the back of its hand.

  Wren slammed into the wall with such force that her vision turned black and her brain screamed at her that she was dead. Faeries danced before her eyes and she tried to focus as those lights faded and her vision began to clear. As the troll lumbered towards her she almost wished the blow had killed her.

  Without giving the matter any thought, Wren propelled herself forward, slamming her shoulder into the belly of the troll and trying to wrap her hands about its waist. The impact was harder than striking the wall and Wren gritted her teeth to stop herself from screaming.

  Meaty hands grasped her shoulders and Wren found herself being tossed once more. As she landed, her fellow prisoners scattered. Her ears were filled with a cacophony of jeers and roars and it took her a few moments to process that the crowd was enjoying the show. As she scrambled back to her feet, Wren tried to think what any of this could logically mean. Perhaps they were betting on the outcome, perhaps they had set the troll on other newcomers in the past. Perhaps they had simply all gone mad from the knowledge that they were eventually going to die in the oubliette.

  The troll came for her again and Wren realised it did not much matter what was happening.

  Diving to evade the powerful hands, Wren punched out at the troll’s belly, but it was like striking iron. A few members of the crowd jeered but she ignored them as she danced about the troll. It was strong, and if it decided to punch her she had no doubt it would take her head clean off, but it was also slow. Its legs were too short for it to run, while its brain was too small for it to be able to predict her movements.

  The troll swung its arms and Wren ducked before throwing herself forward. She landed on the thing’s back, reached up and dragged herself up by its flabby flesh. The creature twirled, tried to dislodge her, but the nature of its arms meant they had little muscle in their upper extremities so it could not gain a good enough angle. She had no idea how such a creature could physically exist, but was not about to begin asking such questions now.

  Within the span of a minute she had managed to clamber up to the creature’s shoulders, although she had only the barest hint of a plan in her head. The troll’s strength lay in its lower body, which made sense considering this was where it was likely to be attacked, and as Wren found herself clasping its head – her arms this time making it around the creature – she saw this as her opportunity for victory. The crowd was going wild at her moves, indicating no one had ever got this far before. She cared nothing about what these other prisoners thought about her and wanted only to survive. However, she lacked any form of weapon and without one there was nothing she could do to stop the troll.

  With a bellow, the troll attempted to toss her. It was angry, angrier than it had ever been, and Wren held on tightly; if the troll managed to toss her she was under no illusions that she would survive it. The tighter she squeezed, the more frantic the troll became, and it took her panicked mind several moments to realise there was a correlation.

  Encouraged, Wren clutched tighter and the troll reacted in panic. A wide grin spread itself across her face as Wren at last saw an opportunity. Putting as much pressure as she could on the troll’s throat, she felt her muscles strain at what she was putting them through. She could still hear the shouts of the crowd, could feel the blood pumping fiercely through the troll’s arteries as it tried in vain to catch its breath. She remembered what Moya had done to Canlin, at how she had cut off his oxygen in an attempt to kill him. It had been horrible to watch, but she gave it no thought as she perpetrated the same attack upon the troll. />
  The creature staggered, almost fell, and Wren could feel its movements become sluggish. She knew at any moment it would topple and readied herself for the leap she would have to make. It staggered again, this time barely keeping its footing, and stumbled backwards. Wren’s back slammed into a wall and she gasped, but held her grip firm. Slowly, very slowly, the troll sank to the floor until finally its torso pitched over and its head smacked into the ground.

  By this time Wren had already released her hold and was shakily picking herself up. The troll was not dead, but it was certainly unconscious, and Wren did not want to be around when it awoke.

  “That was plucky,” Crenshaw said, making Wren jump.

  “Thanks for the assist, Joe.”

  “You had it well in hand. Besides, if the troll killed you I wasn’t going to be that bothered.”

  “Has Sooty turned up yet?”

  “No.”

  A hand landed upon her shoulder and Wren almost collapsed in terror. Then another grabbed her, and another. She saw they all belonged to cheering people who wanted to shake her hand. Before she could stop them, Wren was hoisted into the air and displayed as a trophy for the crowd. She caught Crenshaw’s surprised expression and could not help but smile. This was at least something he had not predicted; and something she could use against him if she so chose.

  Crenshaw’s face paled as he realised this also.

  Wren decided to say nothing about him to her newfound fans. Perhaps she would, but for the moment she would enjoy watching Crenshaw stew.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Wren had been treated to a banquet, but since it had consisted of little more than the choice parts of cooked rat it was something she could have done without. She ate it anyway, for she needed to keep up her strength for the escape. Who this Sooty character was she had no idea, or even whether she even existed. She only had Crenshaw’s word that he had been in the oubliette for a relatively short period of time, and there was a very real possibility he had been there for years. She had been chasing him and the others with such a single-minded thrust that they could well have split apart years ago and she never would have noticed. She had always believed her dogged determination to be a good thing, although was beginning to see it had held her back all this time. If she had been able to look at the hunt objectively, perhaps she might have been able to bring it to an end a long time earlier.