Everyone looked to Quinneria, who stirred at the sudden attention. “It’s all right. I find you amusing, Vaste.”
“Oh, what a relief,” the troll deadpanned, “the sorceress finds the troll entertaining.”
“I don’t find any of this amusing,” Terian said, “least of all the fact that we’re still working without a plan other than ‘Possibly find a gift that was maybe handed down by a god none of us can confirm actually exists and then hit Bellarum with it somehow.’ I mean, it’s not exactly the bridges of Termina when it comes to a strategic plan, is it?”
“It seems unlikely we’ll be able to face Bellarum where we want to,” Cyrus said. “He’s more powerful than us, we’ll be attacking him on his home ground …” He sighed. “The ark … I hoped it could level the odds.” He gave it a moment’s thought. “I mean, what else is there? If he truly did break through and kill the God of Evil—”
“He’s something of a liar,” Vaste said, “and a manipulator. It’s possible he didn’t do that at all, and he merely wants you to think he did.”
“He moved so fast,” Cyrus said, shaking his head, “and hit so hard. I don’t know much about the powers of the gods, but … this was beyond the speed of anything I’ve seen from the deities.” He looked down at the wooden table, setting his fingertips upon its surface and making a dull clacking noise as he did so. “Perhaps Terrgenden or Vidara can tell us if … if he did what he says he did … and if there’s an ark at all.”
“Wonderful,” Terian said dryly. “How do we contact them again? Because last we spoke, they were planning to lock the doors to their realms and not come out until we were ready to assail the Realm of War. And I know you were unconscious for that planned date, but they didn’t show up, which suggests to me—”
“They’re either dead or hunkered down,” Cyrus said, looking down at the table. “And either way of no use to us.” He rammed his hand into the table, and cringed, the pain rolling through his body at the exertion. He hissed, trying to expel the pain through his breathing, and failed. When he opened his eyes again, the three of them stood before him, his mother closer than she’d been a moment earlier, as though ready to catch him if he fell. “I’m fine,” he said, waving her off before he paused. “No … I’m not fine, actually. None of us are.” He squinted his eyes shut. “Because once again, we’re back to having no way to beat this bastard.”
70.
Alaric
The weeks passed, Jena the only thing keeping me from slipping into boredom and madness, along with the occasional luncheon with her father, who drove me to near catatonia by his insipid interest in prosaic things such as art.
The walls of the cavern palace seemed to be closing in around me, more oppressive by the day. My instinct to fight came forth in a desire to smash my hands against them, to destroy what was keeping me penned in and cut off from the world outside.
My thoughts often drifted to Rin, wandering through the wilderness swamps on the edge of the empire, attacking slavers and saving trolls. No other Protanian I had met would have undertaken such a mad cause, and yet this was what he had done, who he had been at heart. Twisted up, broken inside, yet still yearning to do good works even when out of sight of everyone.
The other target of my thoughts was Stepan. I wondered how his journey was going, how far he had traveled in his quest to return home. Losing count of the days, I could not be sure, but sometimes I thought he must certainly be back in Enrant Monge by now, and on others I couldn’t muster the confidence to believe he’d even left yet.
Jena’s quiet approaches in my moments of thought, her ability to soften the tension when I grew wracked with frustration, were invaluable. She led her own life out of my sight, and it was a credit to my selfishness that I never asked her where she went when she departed. She wore a wan smile now, worried, when before it had been brighter. I felt cold all the time, and it was as though she began to dress accordingly, making me wonder if winter was permeating its way into the earth because of her heavier robes, draped across her, wrapping her in their bulky softness. We had gradually drifted into a habit of less and less intimacy, my mind preoccupied with other thoughts, and her time occupied by other activities.
What a fool I was, to have missed the signs.
One day, a knock sounded at the door and once more, a guard stuck his head in. I had been dwelling on thoughts of Stepan and Rin all the day, and when the guard said, “Visitor,” I felt a surge of hot excitement, a thrill that had been lost as long as I could remember.
I stood as the door opened wider to admit my visitor, holding my breath, as the man who had come to see me walked into my chambers. I stood staring at him in shock, certain that there had to be a mistake.
“I don’t believe this,” I said, my mouth suddenly terribly dry.
“You may believe or disbelieve as you care to,” Curatio the Butcher said, wearing long robes that draped over and covered his muscled physique. He examined the chambers around me with distaste, as though he had never seen such appalling conditions in his life, even though they were beautifully appointed. “I still stand here in front of you nonetheless.”
“How did you get here?” I asked, watching him. “There’s no love lost between you and the Yartraak, is there?”
“I doubt he knows I’m here,” Curatio said with the hint of a smile. “I had to pay a significant bribe to someone who used to work in this palace in order to receive the spell for the portal the Yartraak secreted into his back chambers. The guards there took me to be someone invited, the fools, and though it took some wandering, I now find myself here, with you—exactly where I wished to be.”
I looked around for a weapon, but there was none at hand, for why would there be? Arming a human in a slave mining camp was the height of foolishness. “If I call out—”
“Don’t be a fool,” Curatio scoffed. “I don’t wish you dead.” His expression changed, his usual outward confidence and prickliness evaporating. “I came here to beg your assistance.”
I stared at him in silence for over a full minute, then looked around my chambers with exaggerated amusement, as if to suggest my resources were contained herein and were nothing to be impressed with. “My assistance?”
“Am I speaking your language with obvious error?” he asked impatiently. “Yes, your assistance. You need not be an arse about it.”
“You once tried to kill me. You cursed me and took my eye.”
He flushed across his tanned skin. “And you took my pride and defeated me in front of the entire Coliseum. I would hardly call us even, but there is no remedy for the wrong I’ve done you.”
“But you come to me now, at my lowest point, and seek favor,” I said, watching him shrewdly. “Very well, I am starved for entertainments in this place, so my curiosity begs the question—how can I help you?”
If he had looked like he’d lost confidence when he’d initially asked my help, it was nothing compared to the helplessness I saw in him now; hesitation, pain, and embarrassment flashed across his face in an instant. “I come to offer—my sword and spell to your cause, whatever it may be.”
“My cause?” My eyebrows rocketed toward my hairline far above. “You just said you need my assistance, and yet you have come to pledge yourself to my cause?” I left aside the fact that as of that moment, I had no cause.
“Yes, I wish to aid you,” he said stiffly, “and in doing so, I will aid myself. That is the bargain I offer.”
“That’s kind of you,” I said, dripping with sarcasm, “but I’m afraid I’m going to have to decline.”
His face darkened. “Why? You know I have strength—”
“Oh, your strength is not in question,” I said, wondering at what game he was playing at. “Your motives are. I have commanded many men,” I said, exaggerating slightly, “and I know where their loyalties lie, what cleaves them to me. Whether it be home or gold or love of brother, men are no mystery when they pledge to my army. You, on the other hand … have power surp
assing mine, have a land of your own to presumably defend, and yet you come to swear your sword to me?” I shook my head. “I’m afraid that’s simply not good enough, no. I will have to decline.”
Curatio’s teeth clenched as he bared them to me, though I doubted he was aware of it. He had just swallowed his pride and done something unthinkable, swearing service to someone who was all but a slave. It was akin to me pledging my fealty to a dog, I knew. “I come here,” he began, plainly trying to control himself, “in good faith—”
“I would have to take your word for that,” I said, “and unfortunately, given the bad blood betwixt us and your lack of explanation, I simply cannot do that.” I folded my arms in front of me, daring him to challenge any part of that statement.
He ground his teeth together, making a horrendous noise. “You wish me elucidate my motives? So that you can feel certain I am not preparing to betray you?”
“It would hardly be the least plausible thing for you to do, especially to one who, as you mentioned, humiliated you in the Coliseum.”
He stared at me evenly, the anger burning in his eyes, and I wondered for a moment if he would simply write this idea off as a bad job and strike me down. He took a breath and regained control of himself, then began to speak. “I have long loved a … certain someone—”
“Caraleen,” I said, and the fury flared in his eyes as he looked up at me as though I’d stripped him naked in front of a crowd.
He breathed quickly for a moment or two, trying to catch his breath. “So it was obvious all along.”
“Yes,” I said simply, wishing to provide neither succor nor a further kick to the balls when he was already so exposed.
“She has persistently rejected my advances,” he said, once he had settled himself, the simmering heat still present in his near-glare. “She is deft at this sport, turning me aside without insult and leaving me with enough hope not to break off pursuit. Her skill …” He stared off past my shoulder, clearly picturing something. “… it is prodigious, like my own ability in the Coliseum.”
“Alas, if only she had your humility.”
He pursed his lips in annoyance. “I spoke to her just yesterday, and found her in … perhaps the worst state I have ever seen her. Tearful, pained, worried … I tried my utmost to console her, but in her wounded condition, honesty shone through like a sunspear through a cloud.” His lips grew tight before the answer burst out like a charging horse breaking out of a line. “I am an angry, bitter, furious person, my rage seeping out in all directions—at her people, at my lessers—you slaves, I think she meant—and in due course she came around to the fact that I am not a solution to her problems of the moment, her peoples’, her father’s problems. I am, in fact, a cause.” He grew very still. “Another weight on the scales of her mind at a point when they need no further encumbrance.”
“She did not spare the honesty, then,” I said, as delicately as I could.
“Indeed not,” Curatio said. “I suppose I need not describe for you the nature of my feelings upon hearing this. The idea that I stood in front of her, the opposite of what she needed and the fact now made obvious, I was left with two choices—to either give up on my … affection for her,” and here I heard disappointment, and knew he was understating the depth of his feelings for Caraleen, “or else become the sort of man she would count as what she wanted.”
I stood in silence at this point. I was no sage when it came to matters of love, having never truly felt the feeling myself, save for in my mild affection for Jena. My mind raced with considerations; this elf who despised me now wanted to swear allegiance to me for some reason I couldn’t quite understand. “How does this lead you to my door?” I asked.
“Because when pressed for example of what she was looking for,” he said, and here I saw a flash of hatred and envy all mixed up in a thick stew of resentment, “yours was the name she brought forth as example.” His face strained at its bounds like a hungry dog chained just out of reach of a slab of beef. “Imagine my surprise. All along I’ve thought you were merely the slave help, and yet she paints you the hope of the Protanian Empire. Not a servant, but a rising master, doing your best to bring honor to your house and preserve the crumbling pieces of this hollow, rotting tree of a nation.” He showed no joy in his assessment of the Protanians, but hearing his words gave rise to new questions in me.
“What are you talking about?” I asked. “When you call the empire hollow, I mean?”
He made a pfft! sound, scoffing. “Have you not heard? Half the council sends bands of masked humans in the night to kill slaveholders to make example.” He barely held in a smirk, though it peeked through at the corners of his mouth. “Sennshann is alight with fear, tension in the markets making slaveholders afraid they’ll be cursed and skinned to death in the night. Their response is slow to come, but a few of these human bands have been caught by mutual defense and made example of, though their masters remain in the shadows untouched.”
I stared at him, grim horror trickling over me. If that was true, that the right side of the council table was using slaves to execute masters in the night to make a terrifying example of them, and slaves were being caught and punished in reprisal … things were out of hand, indeed. My mind shot to Chavoron, considering his place in all this, wondering at the pressures he was presently under. “I don’t see why you—or Caraleen—think I could be of help in any of this.”
“I don’t know why she thinks you worthy,” he said shortly, now more in control of himself, “but she sees virtues in you that I wish were my own.” He lowered his gaze in silent shame as he finished speaking. “I cannot possess what I do not see, and I am blind to most of my own faults.” He looked up at me again, and his eyes burned once more. “I know not what you have planned, nor indeed if you have any plans at all. But if you are the man she thinks you are, I would join you in your fight, aid you in your need if indeed you seek to hold this rotten carcass of an empire together before it rips asunder.” He looked down again. “Not for the sake of it, but for hers.” He looked up once more. “And for mine,” he said more quietly.
“I will consider what you’ve said,” I said, my mind once more spinning along so fast I could scarcely keep up with it. “You are right to wonder at my plans, for I see little I can do here, in the depths of this place, to aid the empire. My mere appearance is unlikely to sooth the situation, either, seeing as half the empire considers me the spark that set this blaze alight.” I took a deep breath. “My appearance in their cities, even, would likely be seen as—”
“Aye,” Curatio said. “An invitation to act in ways you would not find salubrious for yourself or the empire.” He bowed his head. “Yet my aid remains offered, should you need it.”
“And the aid of your people?” I asked carefully.
He shook his head. “Mine alone,” he said. “My people have no interest in this squabble, save to see the Protanians fall upon their arrogant faces. Something I no longer wish.” He swallowed heavily as he said it.
“That puts you at odds with your people, then,” I said, and in this strange commonality I found a slight thread of respect for the elf. I had known discord with my own. “Perhaps we might find common cause, but …” I paused, seeking a direction for my words. “You know I am loyal to Chavoron.”
He watched me carefully. “Indeed.”
“He has exiled me here,” I said, trying to encompass the subterranean chamber with a wide sweep of my arm. “I cannot leave to pursue my own ends without consulting him. There was much left unsaid when last we spoke, and I need to go to him now,” my words grew stronger as I grew more certain in my course, “and see if … if there is anything I can do to help make this mess right.”
Curatio raised an eyebrow at me. “I could take you to Sennshann, and perhaps even shield you against being seen for who you are. Should we walk the skies to the top of the tower, we should evade most inquiry and be able to speak to Chavoron, if he is in residence there. Say but the word and w
e will begin.”
I drew a long breath, and began to speak. “Let us—”
I was interrupted by the opening of the door. Curatio and I both turned, the elf apparently as caught by surprise as I was. He blocked my view of the entering party, his head turned, his shoulders squared so that I could not see the visitor. He nodded his head once, quickly, and then bowed himself out of the way to reveal Jena, clad in a dark cloak.
“Hello,” I said, once I came back into possession of my wits. She was looking from Curatio to me with suspicious eyes, clearly trying to work out what was transpiring before her, to see the two of us speaking in such a strange situation. “Curatio and I were just … talking,” I finished lamely.
“I heard as I entered,” she said, the accusation light but present in her voice, her gaze pointed as she watched me. “And I heard you about to give command to him. You. Give command to him.” She turned to look at Curatio. “And he looks as though he were about to obey.” She took a slow breath. “Peculiar times we are in, indeed, to see you two in some conspiracy.” Her sense of betrayal was obvious on her face as she stood there, cloak pulled tightly against her, staring at me as though I had just stabbed her in the back.
71.
Cyrus
The chamber was dark and cold, and Cyrus did not care. The embers of the fire that had once spread warmth from the hearth had long since faded, but he’d ignored the knocking of the chambermaids wanting to warm the coals. Others had knocked, too, and he’d turned them away as well. Vaste had accused of him mopeyness through the door in an effort to get him to open it.
It had not worked.
He had seethed, vacillating between furious anger and an inescapable sense of loss. His mother had knocked at that point and he’d yelled at her to go away, not caring that he was lashing out. The emotions within him were like a bottled storm, the Torrid Sea poured into a container and unable to find their full expression.
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