Escana

by J. R. Karlsson

  'Now, fill your pitcher and then we'll depart, the ladies here don't take kindly to any man shoving their way through.'

  She heard outraged voices and jostling from far behind her and swiftly filled her jar with water as was asked. Hanging on to her arm, the old woman steered her away with something approaching haste. They made their way through a series of confusing alleyways and to Ella's surprise ended up outside the small room she had departed earlier.

  The woman chuckled at her face and tapped the small key Ella had hidden on her person. 'You've been watched, I have to admit that Hermit one led us on a merry chase. He will know who I am, no doubt you will tell him of our encounter anyway.'

  That same smile seemed to flash across the crone's face briefly as she peered at her through rheumy eyes, Ella was entirely lost for words.

  'You had best go inside now dear, we know of your plight at the House of Falarus and all shall be explained to you in time. Just know that you are not alone, we will speak again later if I have time.'

  The old woman turned abruptly and hobbled off as if nothing had happened.

  43

  Gadtor

  There was a period of time that Gadtor always spent letting his eyes adjust to the light when he was underground in the sewers, it wouldn't do any good to grope around half-blind to his death. It was when he saw no improvement that he knew he was encased in true darkness.

  He kept track of the time by listening to the rattling chest and hoarse wheezes of his aged friend. He had tried waking him to no avail, whatever had been done to him after they had separated had left his friend completely immobilised. Occasionally the old man would cough and splutter as his lungs sought for the next breath, much to Gadtor's alarm. He was completely powerless should Falarus stop breathing, yet as that knowledge truly dawned his panic subsided into idle fear.

  He was strung up on the back wall, his arms and legs spread-eagled and clasped by manacles. He had tested them initially but they had remained surprisingly firm considering how deep into the bowels of the dungeon they were.

  Of course he had heard tales of the explicit cruelty and the vast corridors of the lower levels under the Urian tower but he had always taken them with a pinch of salt. The idea that such a labyrinth would exist entirely unknown to he who spent most of his time dwelling in the lower regions of the city seemed highly unlikely and the result of rather exaggerated tales.

  He had no doubt that they had planned a public execution for both of them, that this was where the most wanted criminals were held. The reason he had never heard of such a place seemed clear now, anyone that left this chamber walked to their death.

  With his sight gone and his hearing straining into silence, his sense of smell took over and he quickly identified the dried blood and faeces that spelt danger. There was something gangrenous about the air cloying in his throat, he couldn't help but be unsettled by it whether it had been planted or not.

  A racking cough from Falarus caused him to instinctively try to turn his head toward the old man, momentarily forgetting entirely how futile the act was only for the sense of captivity to wash over him once more.

  'Gadtor, am I blind?' he heard the familiar cracked voice say.

  He shook his manacles slightly with his stiff arms, they echoed loudly at his heightened senses. 'I don't know, everything is darkness here.'

  There was a sigh then, which seemed to sum up all the futility he had felt. 'I feel I must warn you, my most trusted of friends. They are going to try and divide us in spirit, don't listen to them whatever they may say to you.'

  Not for the first time, Gadtor didn't understand the cryptic words, was that fear he heard in them?

  'As if I'd listen to a word of my jailers, those that would see me dead. Why would they divide us when they have us entirely at their mercy?'

  This elicited another sigh. 'They want you to give your information freely, they don't know how few are left, they don't know that all resistance has been crushed and most of all what they do know is that they must fight an idea with an idea in order to kill it. You will be the focal point for that new idea.'

  Gadtor shook his head at that. He didn't buy into the political manoeuvring Falarus knew so much about. Honest words and a sword were all he needed to make people talk or follow.

  'What will they say? What will they do?'

  He heard a wincing sound as the Falarus drew another breath. 'I do not know. It is inevitable that they will try. It is Kelgrimm's way.'

  Another fit of racking coughs took the man, causing him to recoil into the wall and thrash about in his chains, Gadtor decided not to ask any other questions.

  Time ground to a halt waiting in the small chamber he knew as their cell. After a time, the sound of feet approaching from a great distance intruded into his mind. He braced himself as best as he could in preparation of whoever was coming.

  There was a series of clicking sounds and the door swung outward into the dazzling light of a torch held aloft by a dark figure. He heard Falarus groan, as if the light itself were a new pain inflicted upon him. He was followed by a presence Gadtor had felt before.

  All hope in his heart died.

  'Judge, jury and executioner of innumerable mundane acts for the powers that be. Ah to live in times where I could waltz to and fro between countless couples of dignitaries and men of worth and be known by name! A shame that I must deal with such offal as your like, yet this unwanted piece is of an altogether larger puzzle.'

  Gadtor snarled at him. 'Oh fuck off whorespawn. The torture of your company is enough, I submit!'

  He was completely blinded by the light and entirely powerless, yet if anything his hopeless situation seemed to make him bolder in the face of something he wouldn't have a chance against even if unshackled.

  To his disappointment once again, El-Vador chuckled. 'Not a man of many words. Your uncouth dialect allows a more direct approach perhaps. Let us then dispense with my lexicon and arrive at a suitable conclusion. Lord Kelgrimm desires your assistance and feels you've bought a lie that has long been told.'

  Gadtor tried his best to shrug. 'What lie?'

  The creature paused for thought, as if direct speech didn't seem to come to it easily. 'Your decrepit friend beside you isn't who you think he is.'

  Falarus rattled in his chains, hissing at El-Vador in a peculiar fashion.

  'That's right,' El-Vador continued. 'I read his mind at the shanty warehouse and found the contents most distasteful. Would you like me to divulge any?'

  Falarus barked out a denial that seemed to be cut off from its source. A sound emanated from his throat as if it seemed to tighten, constricted from the air around he so desperately required.

  'I hear no firm denials on the part of Falarus. I can only assume he wants us to continue.'

  The silent figure holding the torch opened the door again and ushered in a smaller one with his arm.

  'This is Elizabeth, your eyes are no doubt beginning to see her more clearly.' El-Vador motioned to the silent torch-bearer. 'Have Elizabeth approach our friend here, let him see that I am true to my word.'

  As the little girl grew closer Gadtor peered out into the haze. It was indeed her, El-Vador had not been lying to tug at his heart, instead he felt an unease at what this thing might do to her to make him talk.

  'Ah but we are only getting started. Gadtor is it? Yes, Gadtor. We have only just begun, the true story of your friend's identity shall be revealed to you now.'

  El-Vador turned to Falarus, a genuine look of contempt playing on its odd features. 'You are very aware of who this is and why she has been spared and brought here. She wasn't one of the orphans that were so crudely butchered. Tell me, what was her mother's name again?'

  He almost felt Falarus stiffen at the question, the words seemingly rung from his lips by force. 'Mrs Newbury is her mother.'

  El-Vador nodded. 'Yes, quite accurate. Is this the case Elizabeth?'

  Elizabeth nodded wordlessly. It was only then that Gadtor sp
otted the small platter she carried in her hands, had she been brought here with food? Somehow he didn't think so.

  'Now withered one, answer me this.' El-Vador's hand motioned upward and Elizabeth removed the lid of the platter. 'Who fathered Mrs Newbury?'

  A shriek ripped out of Falarus as his chains thundered against the wall. The severed head of Mrs Newbury stared unblinkingly at him. Elizabeth held the platter dispassionately without a sound. He retched but nothing but a trickle of bile met his lips.

  'You monster!' Falarus wailed at him brokenly, tears running down his weathered face.

  El-Vador laughed. 'I? I am the monster? Oh no my contemptible fiend, you are keenly mistaken.'

  Turning back to Gadtor the creature's face appeared solemn. 'No, I am not the monster at all.' He waved his hand at the platter and Elizabeth set the lid back down. The stony-faced torch-bearer appeared unmoved by what had transpired.

  'You see, if Elizabeth's mother is the recently deceased Mrs Newbury, then that would make Falarus her kindly old grandfather would it not?'

  There seemed to be anger there for the first time, genuine anger towards the end of that question.

  'Yes, it would,' Gadtor said, seeing that nobody else was going to answer.

  'Tell me, monster. Who is the father of Elizabeth?'

  Gadtor's gut wrenched. He knew where this would end.

  Falarus' feeble head shook violently with the chains, as if trying to hold back the answer, all the while watching El-Vador with a look Gadtor couldn't describe.

  'I am her father.'

  As soon as Gadtor heard those words he knew he must act. Incestuous relations to such a degree may be a common occurrence in Urial because of the importance placed in pure bloodlines but he still couldn't shake his feelings of utter revulsion and disgust. The man who had been a father to him, the man that had brought him back to life, was no better than the pompous nobles and their despicable acts back home. He felt a great coldness steal over his heart. A small voice of warning tried to shout out at him but it was silenced as if smothered by a large blanket.

  Gone were the smiles, the jibes, the lengthy insults. In its place was a decisive interrogation that Gadtor found himself willing forward.

  He had never known Mrs Newbury as the child of Falarus. Nobody had known. It seemed like he had never known Falarus at all. It wasn't the frail cracking voice he knew either, his words had been delivered with clear anger and defiance.

  There was a ringing silence throughout the dungeon. El-Vador finally cut through the reticence with his usual sardonic glee. 'I feel as you do, Gadtor. Such misguided torture of a small child over the mistaken belief of the power of a bloodline is despicable to the core. I feel that it would be dishonourable to let you enact justice without knowing the full extent of the truth. There is yet more.'

  He motioned to the torch-bearer, who placed it in a sconce on the wall and produced a small key from his hooded robes.

  'I know you cannot harm me, you know that as well. I also believe that you will not try.' The torch-bearer unlocked Gadtor's manacles as El-Vador spoke.

  'There is one more atrocity that this creature has committed and it must be brought to light before you act.' He motioned at Elizabeth, who watched the hooded man without emotion. 'Young Elizabeth is with child.' He looked at Falarus as he uttered the final words. 'We both know who the father is, don't we?'

  Gadtor shook free the final manacle and was confronted with the pommel of El-Vador's sword.

  'I don't understand,' he said. 'Elizabeth is but a child herself.'

  El-Vador shook his head. 'Elizabeth has seen a few more summers than you suspect and thus has entered into womanhood.' The look he gave Falarus should have killed the man. 'A woman can be kept a child only so long by the herbs laced in her every meal.'

  The man with the key flung back his hood and stood beside El-Vador.

  'This gentleman that freed you met Elizabeth two score summers past. As she nursed him back to health, their friendship flourished and blossomed into something entirely different. He cared not that she was mute as he was deaf and endeavoured to teach her letters as she cared for him. Falarus prevented Elizabeth's departure from the warehouse and made Gershon the villain, outcasting him. He has been waiting to avenge Falarus' atrocities, to be reunited with Elizabeth. Yet he is not a violent man and he begs that your hand end it.'

  The pommel rested in his hand. He gazed up at the bald man, tears were brimming in his eyes and a pleading look was on his face as he spoke a single word. 'Please.'

  He turned to Falarus, the sword drawing him over toward the man. 'How? How did you do this?'

  Time seemed to stand still as he watched the man gather his final breath. There was a look in his eyes of resignation now, as if he knew that there was no getting out of this any more now that his lies had been uncovered.

  'Gadtor my friend, I forgive you.'

  44

  Re'tak

  Re'tak's eyes had adjusted to the near-perpetual darkness he had been encased in.

  It was an enclosed space of stone and a solid structure as his initial enraged thrashings had determined. The surroundings were unfamiliar in composition but not in their regularity. The stones were stacked as the pink skins were prone to do and that seemed the only feature, much like the desert's perpetual sprawling dunes yet drawn uncomfortably close. His people were used to being buried under such rock, yet the knowledge of the stone being a foreign construct filled him with wariness.

  Occasionally he would be blinded by a small shaft of light and his back would be littered with rancid meat and the occasional corpse, hardly appetising fare but enough to keep him alive.

  He soon learned to judge the passing of time with his digestion, which in itself was an alarming factor in his captivity. The steadily increasing squalor of his conditions would attract the attentions of insects he would rather avoid.

  Mid-way between feeding sessions he heard a distant clicking and a closer grinding sound of stone meeting stone. He had grown wise to the blinding light and flicked his first set of lids in anticipation. A small chink of white light spread out from the far side of the wall as it slid agonisingly to reveal sand and more light yet again.

  He eased himself stiffly into a ready stance, his captors no doubt had sinister plans and wouldn't release him willingly after having captured him without a fight to the death.

  The crack had widened into a space large enough to fit his head through, but he was wise to the folly of such curiosity, there was no sense in getting his head lopped off for his troubles.

  When the wall had finally slid open enough to let him out, his eyes had fully adjusted to the harsh sunlight beaming into his cell. There also seemed no attempt to rouse him from his current position so he crept forward, sniffing the air for signs of life.

  There were at least four of them standing a good distance from the entrance, all of them breathing much harder than necessary. He could feel the fear coursing through them as they stood their ground, they clearly hadn't unleashed him of their own volition.

  He sucked in a deep breath and tested their resolve with a roar that bounced off the rocks and out into the open space. Their fear multiplied, clearly they were also unwilling prey to the pinks that had ensnared him.

  He knew much of terror, of how it may paralyse any creature on a primal level. He may not relish inflicting it as often as others of his tribe but it was an effective tool in the right place. Given that he had been bested by two pinks alone, he wasn't going to take multiple ones lightly any more.

  Now that their fears were peaking he chose to unveil himself, at first he stuck his snout out and let a crooked grin display the curling of the teeth across his jaw. Apparently whatever ghoul their imagination had conjured up had not prepared them for the fear of reality.

  His eyes came next, flicking this way and that between each of them men, assuring them quietly of their demise. Their fear was no act, these men were terrified of him, not like his captors at
all.

  He took a moment to survey the surroundings that remained entirely alien to him. It was a wide clearing of sand shaped in an ovular fashion with a small hole cut at one end of the large wall enclosing them. Larger skins swooped downward over a series of strange objects with two additional pinks sat amongst them. He tried digging at the nearby wall with his claws but found no purchase, clearly he wasn't going to climb his way out.

  A shrieking sound emitted from one of the pinks under the skins safe from harm, his waving arms were clear even to Re'tak. Slowly the four figures ahead of him closed the distance.

  Their skins were no different than any he had seen before, nor were the objects they would try to stick him or club him with. There was a primal confusion at such a foolish attack that Re'tak's inner wariness silenced. Granted they didn't look much of a threat but their aggressive and irrational behaviour even when laden with fear and doubt was worth pausing to consider.

  The first man with a lengthened stick let out a yell and charged him, Re'tak braced himself and leapt into the air to avoid his initial thrust. He came down hard on the puzzled man's neck with a resounding snap as his weight crushed it. Perhaps their assault was folly after all.

  It was only after more shrieking from the pink under the skin that the others charged him at once. He swept his tail in a quick slash and decapitated two of them, the third being thrown across the oval against the wall. He did not rise.

  45

  Dyson

  Corporal Dyson clapped his hands together in admiration of the slaughter, turning to the troubled looking man beside him. 'Well Praetor, I hope that was an adequate demonstration. Now you know what those poor bastards in the front line are truly up against.'

  The Praetor clearly coughed in distaste at the mirth Dyson was showing. 'Your demonstration was most... enlightening, Corporal. I am somewhat hesitant to acknowledge this beast as a genuine competitor in the forthcoming tournament.'