No Reprieve

by Gail Z. Martin

  “Two.” The lash fell twice, once on each of them.

  “Three.” Blood spattered as Prokief raised the thin, merciless leather cord and snapped it once again, spraying them with droplets. Forty lashes would kill most men, Blaine knew. On occasion, the flayed body of a prisoner had been tossed out in the snow of the parade ground until it froze solid, where it remained until the thaw, a warning for the rest of them. Blaine wondered how far Prokief would take their punishment, whether he and Piran would become Prokief’s next cautionary tale.

  “Four.”

  After ten lashes, Blaine’s vision swam. His body cramped from the unnatural positions in which the manacles stretched him, but every twitch and shiver tore at his bonds or pained his bloodied back. Piran stopped cursing, and his face had paled. Blaine’s jaw clenched so tightly against the pain that he feared he might crack a tooth.

  “Fifteen.” Blaine grunted and bit into his lip. The lash fell again and again, each time striking in a new spot. He lost count, slipping in and out of consciousness.

  Blaine gritted his teeth. His silence enraged Prokief, who brought the lash down harder as the guard counted. “Sixteen…Seventeen…Eighteen…Nineteen…Twenty.”

  When the last lash fell, Blaine lay still, lost in pain and shock.

  “Douse them with salt water,” Prokief commanded.

  A guard went to grab a bucket from near the wall. The weight of the water hurt as much as the salt that stung in the fresh, raw wounds, and Blaine barely bit back a cry.

  “Take them to the Holes. No food or water. Three days.” He paused. “Ejnar, come here.”

  Dimly, Blaine heard the swish of the warden-mage’s gray robes as the man’s soft boots stepped around the rivulets of blood on the tile floor. “Commander?”

  “Use your magic to keep him from dying. I want him alive when he leaves here, even if he’s barely breathing.”

  “Done, Commander.”

  Blaine could hear the satisfaction in Prokief’s tone. “Give him something to remember me by while he’s down there. Fever and cramps, eh? It would be pleasant to hear him beg for death.”

  “As you wish, Commander.” Ejnar paused. “And Rowse?”

  “The same.”

  “With pleasure.” Ejnar had no sooner spoken than Blaine felt a wave of fire building inside his body. A moment earlier, soaked to the skin and spread-eagled on the ice-cold floor, Blaine had shivered uncontrollably. Now, he felt sweat breaking out on his temples, only to subside a moment later with the onset of shuddering chills. His gut clenched, and the pain would have doubled him over had the ropes not kept him flat against the floor. Blaine’s breath came in shallow gasps as the pain hit again. He writhed, twisting against the ropes that held him until the skin at his wrists and ankles were raw. After only a few moments, the scream Prokief coveted tore from Blaine’s lips.

  “Make sure he remains conscious.” Prokief turned from Ejnar to the guards. “When his time’s up, drag him out when the prisoners are in the yard. Let them see the price of insolence.

  “Unlock the cuffs,” Prokief ordered. The commander made no effort to hide the gloating tone in his voice. “Get them dressed and give them each a woolen cloak. Then throw them in the Holes.”

  Blaine forced himself onto his knees, refusing to give in to the pain of every movement. Pulling the rough-spun cloth of his shirt over his savaged back hurt enough to make him pale.

  “Three days in the Hole,” Prokief repeated, settling his gaze on Blaine with satisfaction. ”Perhaps you’ll remember who’s in charge.”

  The Hole. Prokief’s oubliette. Blaine felt his hopes, briefly raised from surviving the whipping, plummet. Deep holes cut into Edgeland’s ice held prisoners Prokief wanted to make sure never forgot the ‘lesson’ he wanted them to learn. Usually, the prisoners were beaten first, or whipped, before being dropped into the icy, solitary darkness until Prokief remembered to send someone to get them out. Some survived. Many did not.

  One of the guards shoved Blaine, intentionally placing his hand to press against the fresh wounds that seeped blood through Blaine’s homespun shirt.

  Blaine bit back a curse. He had no desire to go into the Hole with broken bones, something a vengeful guard could easily arrange. Even Piran restrained himself to a murderous glare.

  The snow crunched beneath his feet as the guards dragged Blaine and Piran to the oubliettes. Blaine saw an unbroken expanse of white that stretched into the gray horizon, and more snow falling from slate-colored skies. He shivered as the snow fell on bare skin where his ragged prison uniform did not protect him from the cold.

  A soldier on either side dragged him, one on each arm, with Blaine between them as deadweight, too injured to stand. Blood dripped from Blaine’s mouth into the snow, leaving a crimson path of droplets. Red stains trailed behind him. The gritty ice burned against his raw wounds until his skin grew numb from cold.

  Blaine and Piran exchanged a glance that spoke volumes. Solidarity. Shared suffering. Acknowledgment that it might be the last time they saw freedom. And above all, an unspoken vow that someday, somehow, they would be avenged against Prokief and their attackers.

  One guard removed the lid from the Hole; then the two guards heaved Blaine into the darkness. Blaine tumbled down, deep into the ice, as they replaced the lid and left him in blackness. He landed hard.

  Blaine lay where he had fallen, gasping from the pain, alone in the darkness. Will Ejnar really meddle to keep us from dying down here? It would be like that bastard Prokief to want the chance to torture us longer. Gods know, Piran and I have earned his ire a dozen times over.

  After he caught his breath, Blaine forced himself to his knees, and began to feel around the ice to discover the bounds of his prison. To his relief, Prokief’s sadistic humor had not included tossing in a wolf or some other predator to finish Blaine off.

  Of course not, Blaine thought. That would be too easy. Merciful, by his standards. And if he had intended a blood fight, he would have left the lid off, so the soldiers could watch.

  It would not have surprised Blaine to find the frozen corpse of one of the oubliette’s prior occupants. Then again, Prokief liked to make sure all of Velant’s inmates saw the evidence of his brutality to remind them that their lives and deaths were wholly under his control and subject to his whims.

  Blaine permitted himself a grunt of pain. The fall had winded him. His back hurt badly enough to bring tears to his eyes, but he swallowed down his pain and forced himself to pace the circumference of the oubliette.

  He could stretch out his arms and reach both sides. That meant his prison was barely wide enough for him to lie down. On the other hand, cold as it was deep in the ice, he was out of the wind and snow. Still, freezing to death was a real possibility. Prisoners found it difficult enough not to die from ice sickness in the normal course of their work, when they could retreat to the relative warmth of the barracks and the heat they could coax from the scant rations of firewood.

  The oubliette contained no food, and certainly no means to build a fire, and no draft to vent one. Once again, the dubious mercy of Prokief’s punishment was clear.

  Blaine eased down to sit, tucking his cloak around himself to conserve as much body heat as he could. His gut still clenched spasmodically and he alternated between chills and fever.

  I never really expected to survive Velant, Blaine thought. No matter what Prokief told his mage this time. And none of us will ever return to Donderath. Piran’s right; the chance of living long enough to get out of this damned prison and become a colonist is slim. A sucker’s bet.

  And yet the colony of Skalgerston Bay was populated by the Velant colonists who had survived the hardships of Prokief’s prison. Those who earned their Tickets of Leave received small amounts of acreage and pittances of coin to build cabins for themselves and start over as colonists. Most returned to the kind of work they had done in Donderath, coopers and blacksmiths, whores and tradesmen. The herring boat fleet made fishermen of all a
ble-bodied colonists, and sometimes if the food ran short, some of the convicts as well. Everyone did some farming, since the shipments from back home did not come as often or as regularly as needed to keep people fed.

  How much life can change in just a short period of time, Blaine thought. I managed to trade father’s brutality for Prokief’s. At least back at Glenreith I had a bed to sleep in and hot meals most of the time.

  Still, he knew that given the choice he would not change the course of action that brought him to Velant. Not if it meant that Father continued to beat Carr and abuse Mari. If I hadn’t killed Father, he would have had to kill me. So perhaps death was looking for me either way, though I cheated King Merrill’s noose.

  Three days, Prokief said. Do I believe him? If I fall asleep, I’ll likely die down here in the cold—unless Ejnar can actually keep me alive and torture me at the same time. Freezing to death isn’t that bad of a way to go, considering the options. No more pain, or hunger, no more being the guards’ target. I can fight to stay awake. Maybe I’ll even manage to last that long. But did he mean it? Will he really haul us out then, or did he just say that to raise false hopes? What’s to say he won’t change his mind?

  Cramps bent him over from time to time. Fever raised a sweat; then chills shook him to his core. But after a time, Blaine felt some strength return. He did not trust Prokief’s word or Ejnar’s magic to assure his survival. The cold, not his wounds, was the biggest threat. He resolved to keep moving as long as he could.

  Blaine struggled to his feet and forced himself to pace the oubliette, then reverse course and pace again. He rested, leaning against the icy wall, and traced the path once more. The pit was cold, dark, and silent except for the scrape of his boots against the ice. Blaine felt jumpy, as if energy tingled through the darkness and the ice, catching him in its flow. Just my imagination, he thought. But he had heard whispered rumors, back in the barracks, that magic coursed beneath Edgeland’s snow and rock, out through the bay to Estendall, the volcano that sometimes rumbled and sent plumes of steam into the cold air. Rivers of magic flowed through certain places, some of the hedge witches said, things they called ‘meridians.’ Legends and wives’ tales, Blaine thought. But in the darkness, he wondered.

  Most people in Donderath had at least a flicker of small magic, and they used their talent for everyday tasks—healing a sick cow, making crops grow faster, finding out where to drill a well. Blaine found his own talent of limited usefulness. In a fight, he had a second of forewarning of where his opponent would strike, sensed even earlier than signaled by the movements or expression of the other fighter. It was a secret Blaine had long guarded, since it gave him his only edge against his father. Here, it had enabled him to best other convicts who had tried to put him in his place. But against the ice and cold, it was useless.

  As he remained alone in the darkness, memories returned, vivid and unavoidable. For the first time since the awful days aboard the convict ship, he let himself think about Carensa. The anguish in her eyes when King Merrill passed sentence had been almost too much for Blaine to bear. He remembered the touch of her skin and the scent of her hair, and her last, desperate visit to him when he awaited exile in the dungeon. Despite his pleas, she had been there on the dock when the Cutlass sailed from Castle Reach, a silent witness. We would have married just a few months from now, he thought. If I hadn’t ruined everything.

  To stay awake, and to blunt the pain of his injuries, Blaine counted his steps as he walked. Even so, his mind wandered. He thought about Glenreith, and realized that the only truly happy times he could remember were when Ian McFadden was gone at court, sometimes for months. Only then had Blaine and the rest of the family been certain that they would not bear the brunt of one of Ian’s rages. A few golden moments were crystalized in memory. His mother Liana, before the awful night Ian’s temper had taken her life. Carr, his brother, when he was young enough to escape Ian’s fists, when Blaine had been able to draw off Ian’s anger and protect Carr and their sister, Mari. It had been worth every bruise to see them safe. Then Blaine had grown too tall and strong for Ian to beat, and he had turned his attention to the others. Blaine had not always been able to protect them. Carr turned sullen and angry. Mari grew quiet and hid. When Blaine finally discovered why Mari tried so intently to vanish from her father’s gaze, when the depths of Ian’s debauchery had finally been exposed, Blaine had taken the matter into his own hands and run Ian through.

  Five hundred steps. Walking keeps me warm, but eventually I’ll tire. No food to replenish my energy. Sooner or later, exhaustion and cold will overwhelm even the pain. And then it will be over.

  It was cold enough that the blood on his back froze to his shirt. Every movement ripped his shirt free from the ice-scabbed lacerations. Fever melted the ice, and blood trickled down his back, only to repeat the cycle again and again. For now, Blaine welcomed the pain. It proved he was still alive. When it dulled, his life dimmed with it. He focused on the pain like a beacon.

  Five thousand steps. Only a few candlemarks had passed, but Blaine was growing tired. Before the fight in the mine, and the ordeal in Prokief’s headquarters, Blaine had already been exhausted from the hard labor in the ruby mines and at the edge of starvation from the prison’s scant rations. That left few reserves on which to draw, now that his body began to register the full trauma inflicted on it. Uncontrollable shivering cramped bruised muscles and tensed broken skin, jerking him awake every time the tremors made him shake from head to toe.

  At least I won’t die of thirst, he thought, using the buckle from his belt to scrape off some chips of ice. But even that was folly. Eating ice would lower his body temperature. Sooner or later, whether from cold, hunger, exhaustion, or thirst, he would die in the darkness. Weaponless, he lacked the means to shorten his suffering.

  Twenty thousand steps. Blaine sank to the floor, unable to push his weary body further. He wondered how Piran was doing, whether Piran was shouting curses in the darkness or trying to climb the slick walls of his oubliette, or surrendering to the finality of the situation.

  One hundred thousand. One hundred thousand and one. Blaine kept counting, though he had stopped walking candlemarks before. He was resigned to the numbness in his fingers and toes, the growing stiffness in his bruised body. He huddled in his rough cloak, trying and failing to warm his burning cheeks and ears.

  If I’m still alive when they haul me out of here, what will I lose to the cold? A hand? The tip of my nose? My ears? Toes? Just in the few months Blaine had been in Velant, he had seen his fellow convicts lose a bit of themselves to the awful cold. Frostbite was relentless. Blaine had helped hold a man down as the hedge witch cut off two gangrenous toes, frozen dead by the cold.

  That’s what we have to look forward to, if we survive. Dying by inches.

  Blaine kept on counting, but the pace grew slower. Now and again, he lost his place and had to back up to the last number he remembered. It gave him a focus, but he was tiring. Even something as simple as counting became difficult to maintain. He counted to keep from sleeping, but it didn’t help. He faded in and out of consciousness, and the dreams and nightmares finally claimed him..

  Sunlight warmed his skin. The meadow down the lane from Glenreith was yellow with spring flowers. Mari ran through the blooms, shrieking with glee. She gathered a fistful of blossoms and presented them to Blaine with a wide smile. Her face and dress were grass stained but her eyes were alight. Innocent. Untouched still by the horrors to come. Blaine reached for the flowers, but Mari pulled them away and, with another gale of laughter, turned and ran across the field.

  “Come back!” he shouted, starting after her. It occurred to him that he should be counting his steps. Why? He wasn’t sure. It had been important. He knew that, but not the reason, and so as he ran he kept a silent count with each footfall, as the tall grass sliced at his skin, leaving traces of his blood behind on every razor-sharp blade.

  “Mari!” She only laughed harder and ran faste
r. Surely he could catch her, but she remained far ahead of him. They were leaving the meadow and its brilliant sunlight, heading into the darkness of the forest. Blaine called for Mari to stop, but she ignored him, or perhaps she was too far away to hear his warning. The forest was dark and cold, filled with danger and predators. Wolves. Bandits. Monsters.

  In the shadows of the tall trees, Blaine lost sight of Mari. He could hear her laughter but he could no longer see her. A glimpse of her white shift sent him running in one direction, and the sound of her voice made him veer off. Mari was everywhere and nowhere, and it was growing dark. He had lost count of his steps, and now he would not find his way out of the forest.

  Blaine shouted Mari’s name, but silence answered him. His steps pounded on dry leaves and crunched on the sticks and pinecones that littered the forest floor. Nothing mattered except finding Mari and leaving the woods. He stopped, lost. Her laughter was gone. A wolf howled. He heard her scream, this time in fear.

  “Mari!” he shouted, starting to run again. Shadows gave way to darkness. So dark beneath the tall old trees. Cold, too. Snow began to fall, thick and heavy, blanketing the ground. The wolf howled again. Another scream. The forest melted away, and Blaine ran through knee-deep snow. Up ahead he saw Mari. Her shift was no longer white, but crimson, and she stood over the wolf’s body, holding a bloody sword. Blaine shouted to her, terrified for her safety, angry that she had taken on the wolf herself, but Mari only stared at him as if in a daze, then began to shake her head.

  Blaine lost his footing and crashed down into the snow. The cold blackness swallowed him. Mari and the wolf were gone, and only the dark remained.