Gate to Kandrith (The Kandrith Series)

by Luiken, Nicole

  * * *

  “Footsteps,” Lance said quietly. He moved away from the door and picked up the sack with the Qiph box.

  Sara stood up. An hour had passed, giving her plenty of time to wash up and change. She only wished she’d dared eat some more. She still had no symptoms, though her stomach jumped with nervousness. She tried to calm herself. It’s probably just a cuorelle come to clear the plates. She’d scraped most of the food under the bed so it would look like they’d eaten, but without knowing what drug was in it, she didn’t know what symptoms to feign.

  But it wasn’t a cuorelle. A cuorelle would have knocked. Instead an armed guard opened the door, gave the room a hard-eyed scan, then stepped back.

  Her father swept in, Evina at his heels. Four guards in House Remillus blue and silver livery took up positions in the hall.

  Sara felt off-balance. This was the man who had betrayed her so cruelly, yet her father looked as he’d always looked: handsome in a distinguished way, carrying the mantle of power. She could see no mark of evil upon him.

  “Sarathena, my dear! I’m so glad to see you. I’ve been so worried.” Concern etched his face. If he had expected her to be drugged asleep, he hid it well.

  It was all Sara could do not to recoil, but Lance was depending on her to distract him. She scowled at her father and didn’t take his extended hands. “It’s only Diwo’s luck that I’m still alive. When you invaded, those barbarians wanted to cut off my head.”

  “You didn’t tell me that!” Evina exclaimed.

  Her father had the gall to look shocked. “I had no choice but to invade. I received proof that Slaveland was behind the Favonius massacre. But I gave General Pallax orders to rescue you before he sent in the Legions.”

  He seemed so convincing, and General Pallax was the enemy of their House, but no. There was the blue devil, and Rochelle’s testimony. That could not be explained away. Nor had he said one word about the supposedly inevitable war with the Qiph.

  She pretended to believe him. “Either my rescue party went astray or General Pallax never sent it.”

  “I will find out which,” her father vowed. He sounded ready to rain wrath down on General Pallax’s head; he sounded like the father she’d thought she had. The one who loved her.

  She searched for a crack in the façade and found it in his eyes. The blue orbs were cold with calculation.

  “How did you escape?” Evina asked.

  Sara tossed back her hair. “One of the Slavelanders was infatuated with me. He smuggled me out of the country.” She carefully didn’t look at Lance.

  “That’s my daughter.” Her father beamed and reached for her hands again.

  What exactly was he proud of? Sara wondered. Her beauty? Her ability to besot men with lust?

  Lance had been waiting for her father to get close enough. When her father squeezed Sara’s fingers, Lance pulled the carved Qiph box out of the sack and started to open the lid—

  —and then stopped. Jerkily, he closed the lid and held it shut. Consternation showed on his face.

  The way he moved reminded Sara forcefully of Nir at the feast, when he’d choked down the racha meat. Eyes wide with horror, she swiveled her head toward her father. He was doing this. “No,” she breathed.

  “What’s this?” her father said sharply. He pulled the box closer. Lance’s fingers stayed clamped around it, but he passively allowed the study. “It looks Qiph-made, but you’re not Qiph.”

  “He’s an osseon I picked up once I crossed back into the Republic,” Sara invented. “I thought his price was suspiciously low, but he’s been very docile till now.” Her nerves screamed. Could she get close enough to open the box herself?

  “What’s in it, Aleron?” Evina asked, frowning. She leaned forward, edging Sara out.

  “Let’s find out,” her father said. “Give it to me.” The last was a command directed at Lance.

  Lance’s fingers clenched spasmodically, fighting the command, then released. Sara’s father took possession of the box. Sara held her breath as he opened the lid—

  A brief swirl of green light outlined the carvings, then dimmed. Her father neither cried out nor fell to the floor, though his smile seemed strained.

  “A pretty trinket, nothing more,” he told Evina.

  Despair flooded Sara. They’d failed. Their careful plan had crumbled to ashes.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  “You’re doing to him the same thing you did to Nir, aren’t you?” Sara’s voice sounded odd to her ears, the emotion leached out of it by fear.

  “Yes.” Sweat formed on her father’s forehead. Subjugating Lance seemed to be taking a toll, at least. “Stop breathing.”

  And Lance stopped.

  Sara twitched. Instinct demanded that she act—hit her father over the head with the water basin, stop him somehow—but the guards in the hall would hear her, and she would have given herself away for nothing.

  Evina looked both disturbed and fascinated, but she must have seen her brother-in-law’s powers before because she said nothing.

  Sara bit the inside of her lip where it wouldn’t show and tried desperately to think as Lance’s face turned red. She was back in the Republic. Wildness wouldn’t serve her here. She needed to relearn her lessons. Passion was her enemy.

  Sara cleared her throat and tried to sound amused. “I don’t think he can talk like that. Wouldn’t it be better to find out who sent him before you kill him? I’d like to know if the Qiph are working with K—the King of Slaves.”

  Her father released Lance, who staggered back, gasping.

  A gesture, and the guards from the hallway came inside. Two held Lance’s arms while a third drew his sword.

  “Make him talk,” her father said.

  The fourth guard, a short, heavily muscled man, nodded and began to systematically beat Lance with his fists, battering him to his knees. Periodically, he would ask, “Who sent you?” When Lance said nothing, he would hit him again.

  Sara didn’t know how to save him. Their plan had hinged on the Qiph box, which hadn’t worked. She looked off to the left, unable to watch Lance’s brutal interrogation without betraying herself. Her hands fisted at her side.

  Evina sidled up to Sara. “He’s your lover?” she whispered.

  “Of course not,” Sara said, blinking rapidly.

  Evina patted Sara’s arm. “A woman has a right to be sentimental about her first lover. Don’t worry, Auntie will fix it.”

  The horrible noises continued: slaps and meatier punches, punctuated by grunts from Lance. A flying droplet of blood struck Sara’s cheek. She didn’t wipe it away, but let it brand her. She couldn’t endure this much longer. She would fling herself between—

  “You’re getting blood on my floor, Aleron,” Evina complained.

  “Yes?” her father said, a dangerous light in his eye.

  Evina didn’t quail. “I don’t think he’s going to break very soon, and you said you had important matters to attend to before dawn?”

  Sara’s father nodded reluctantly.

  “Then take Sara—she needs rest—and leave the slave to me. I have just the drug to have him singing in no time,” Evina said confidently.

  This was the bargain Evina offered. She would save Lance’s life, but from Lance’s stories Sara knew exactly what drug she was likely to use. Her aunt meant to forever break the ties binding Sara to her ‘first lover.’

  “Yesss,” her father said. “Sarathena does look tired, doesn’t she? I must take care of her. Blood of my blood.” Something in the way he said the phrase made Sara shiver. He looked…greedy.

  “So you’ll leave him to me?” Evina trailed her finger up Aleron’s arm.

  He chuckled and stooped to kiss her fully on the lips.

  A month ago the fact that her father was Aunt Evina’s lover would have been a dreadful revelation. Now all Sara thought was: So that’s why she had Uncle Paulin murdered, to become the wife of the Primus. Sara was too terrified for Lance’
s welfare to feel anger on her dead mother’s behalf.

  “I know you’re fond of the brawny ones,” her father said to Evina. “Very well, minx, work him over for me.”

  Evina circled Lance where he knelt on the floor, swaying and barely conscious. When Sara looked at Lance, she wanted to cry. One of his eyes was swollen, his lips were smashed to a pulp and more damage had likely been done to his ribs and body. The same sight made her aunt’s eyes shine; her mouth parted as if tempted by some rich feast.

  “He looks like he has plenty of stamina. I’ll definitely need chains.” Evina licked her lips.

  Lance had endured the beating with stoicism, but now his lips pulled back from his teeth in fury. He lunged to his feet, taking the guards by surprise. He broke free from the two men holding him, sending them both staggering back. His fist slammed into the face of the fourth guard—Sara swore she could hear bones splinter. The man collapsed, holding his jaw.

  But there were too many. Before Sara could jump in, the third guard shouted, “Hold!” and put his blade at Lance’s throat. Lance stopped.

  Evina’s fright turned to titillation. “My, he is a strong one. You’ll give me quite a ride, won’t you?”

  “Never,” Lance swore, his face contorted with anger. Then he dropped to the floor, choking and wheezing.

  Was her father doing this? Sara’s hands curved into claws; she almost attacked. But, no, her father looked miffed. “Your reputation seems to have preceded you, my love,” he said to Evina. “It looks like he’s swallowed his tongue to save himself from your tender mercies.”

  “Nonsense,” Evina said stoutly. “He’s having an asthma attack, that’s all. One of the slave’s brats gets them all the time. It’ll pass. Your guard, on the other hand, is going to be useless for months.” She pointed to the man with the broken jaw.

  Sara had eyes only for Lance, and his desperate struggle to breathe. She clenched her teeth on the urge to comfort him and raged inwardly at the Goddess of Mercy. Why couldn’t Loma have given Lance a cold or a rash today? She’d debilitated her own champion.

  “Ottavio?” Evina was at the door. Her steward appeared almost instantly. “Take this one to the dungeons to await my pleasure.” She pointed at Lance.

  The prospect of being taken away panicked Lance. “Don’t…let…her…take…me…” he gasped, speaking to Sara. His gaze went to the downed guard’s sword. He wasn’t asking to be saved—the box had failed, there was no rescue coming. He was asking her to slit his throat.

  Despite Evina’s promises, Sara knew her father wouldn’t let him live. It was death now or death later, after being raped and tortured. If Sara had been about to be handed over to Nir, she would have begged for mercy too.

  “If…you…love…me…” His eyes were full of naked pleading as he fought for breath.

  For an eternal second, Sara teetered on the brink. But she couldn’t pick up the knife and do as he wanted. However small the chance of Lance’s survival, she could not kill him.

  And to have any chance of rescuing him, she needed to keep playing her part and stay—well, not free, but less well-guarded. “Of course, I don’t love you.” The words tore her heart like knives. She turned to her father. “Can we go now? I’m tired.”

  He smiled paternally. “Of course.” He put his arm around her shoulders and led her out of the bedroom.

  “Sara.” A last cry of despair.

  Sara walked faster, trying to outdistance the sound of Lance choking and wheezing. Trying to outwalk the sound of betrayal as she abandoned her lover to his worst nightmare, choosing to prolong his life for a time no matter how short.

  * * *

  Sara struggled to keep her wits about her, to play her part, as she followed Evina and her father. She was grateful not to be included in their conversation.

  Being separated from Lance felt so wrong, it was almost a physical pain. Only the guard behind her kept her from going after him.

  Wait. You have to wait. Don’t give yourself away.

  To Sara’s faint surprise, they went not to the villa’s front door, but down into the wine cellars. Warm, moist air and the scent of earth clogged her nostrils. Row upon row of stoppered clay jugs lined the floor and sturdy shelves.

  Sara watched numbly as the lead guard swung back a section of shelving and revealed the secret door behind. The other two guards drew their swords, but when they opened the door it showed only the mouth of a tunnel. No assassins lurked about. The swords went back into their scabbards.

  Evina took hold of Aleron’s hands. “Will I see you tomorrow, darling?”

  “Of course. It would look odd if I didn’t comfort my sister-in-law in her time of grief,” Aleron said lightly. He bent his head and kissed Evina deeply. His hands caressed her buttocks, and she moaned.

  One of the guards, a beefy man with a cleft chin, openly watched the show. The other two put on at least a pretense of being alert.

  Sara studied the oak barrels on one wall, counting the number of staves, until her aunt and father broke apart.

  Evina walked over and kissed Sara’s cheeks. “I know you’re having trouble with this, duckling, but your father never should have married Serena—he did it for the alliance and knew within months he’d married the wrong sister. Aleron and I are much better suited.”

  Yes. Neither of them thought anything of betrayal.

  “I’ll see you in a week or two when the war’s ended and you’re over your sulks,” Evina said.

  Sara managed a stiff nod. I’ll be dead in a week. The world thought her already dead, assassinated by the treacherous King of Slaves. Alive, she was nothing but an embarrassment to her father.

  But there was no point in telling her aunt so. Evina might be fond of Sara, but her passion was for Sara’s father. She wouldn’t question Sara’s death when the time came.

  One of the guards took a lantern down from a hook, and he and a comrade entered the tunnel. At her father’s silent urging, Sara followed. Her father and the last guard fell in behind.

  The narrow tunnel walls forced them to travel in single file. It was even worse than the Gate to Kandrith, for the ceiling lay only a few inches above her head. There was no sky here.

  But every time the passage’s closeness pressed in on her, Sara castigated herself with the memory of Lance. She deserved this feeling of not being able to breathe—it was nothing compared to what he was going through right now.

  * * *

  Madam Lust began by chaining Lance. Not to a wall, but, far more ominously, flat on his back to an iron-framed bed. Lance tried to fight, but his asthma hindered him. Without air in his lungs, his arms had no strength. His wrists were yanked above his head and manacled together through the bars. They weren’t stretched, but neither were they comfortable.

  His body was too long for the bed. A shorter man would have been spread-eagled by the ankle chains, but Lance had about a foot of play on each side and could bend his knees.

  The links of the chains were thick, far too strong for even a shandy to break. A shandy. Lance cursed under his breath. He should have sacrificed his humanity and turned into a shandy upstairs, before they’d chained him, but all he’d been able to think was that he would rather die than be in Madam Lust’s power.

  It had been a mistake to ask Sara to kill him—he didn’t know if he could have done the same if their positions were reversed. Beheading her even with the intention of healing her immediately after had been hard enough.

  Her disavowal of love had stung a little, but he knew she’d made it for the benefit of her father’s ears. Lance didn’t know how deep her feelings for him went, but he’d seen the anguish in her eyes during his beating.

  Madam Lust put her hand on his knee, making him flinch. She smiled like a cat about to pounce. “There,” she said. “Now we can begin.”

  “No!” a man screamed. Lance turned his head and saw another prisoner chained, naked, to a ring in the stone wall. “Mistress, you promised you’d take care of me as s
oon as you returned. It’s his first time—he won’t be any good to you. Please, Mistress, I’m burning.”

  “Quiet—have some pride,” said another voice, oddly familiar. A second prisoner.

  Lance’s stomach lurched. Both men were chained where they would see the show. Both men had rampant erections. How many hours ago had Madam Lust fed them jazoria and left them to hang in unfulfilled agony?

  Madam Lust sashayed over to the first man. He had brown hair and the scruffy beginning of a beard. He looked to be around twenty and had startlingly red lips. “Did you miss me, Claudius?” She drew a sharp fingernail down his chest, circling his nipples, and down.

  “Yes—yes, I missed you. Mistress, please!”

  Her fingers hovered over his straining rod, but did not touch.

  “It’s only what you deserve,” Madam Lust told him, “giving my poor niece jazoria.”

  “But—but you gave me the jazoria. It was your idea.” Claudius sounded bewildered.

  “Only because you’re such a poor lover you couldn’t get her into bed on your own. You didn’t manage it even with my help.” Her lip curled in disgust. “You deserve your punishment.”

  This was the arrogant lordling who’d been chasing Sara the night they met. Lance’s sympathy vanished.

  “And you,” she turned to the second prisoner. “I trust you’ll remember the right name to cry out in ecstasy next time?”

  “Yes, Mistress.” His reply was subdued. He didn’t plead for release, seeming to realize it wasn’t forthcoming.

  “Now then, where was I? Oh, yes. Knife, Ottavio.”

  Ottavio handed over a wickedly sharp dagger. Madam Lust strolled over to Lance and placed a plump hand on his ankle. Lance twitched.

  She cut off his sandal, then slit her way up the side of his trouser leg from ankle to hip. “That’s right, keep still.” Evil amusement lit her blue eyes. She did the same to his other leg, then started a third cut at an angle down the crease between his hip and thigh. The blade came horribly close to his scrotum. She did both sides then peeled the flap of fabric back. She made a sound of disappointment when Lance’s flaccid state was revealed. “Too bad. Some men like this part. Claudius did.”