‘It’s not a legal requirement,’ Constance explained in a low voice as the party moved through the streets, ‘but it’s customary. Rich owners might give their slaves silver collars. Or silver plate anyway. Some owners like to lead their more attractive slaves around on leashes. “Look what I have.” That kind of thing. There are laws about the treatment of slaves, but they aren’t well enforced.’
‘What about these gladiator games?’ Kana asked.
‘There are two main arenas. One in the north of the city and one in the south. The northern one is a little more… seedy. The rich folks frequent the southern one and it’s a bit more upscale. I’m guessing, but I’d say we’re more likely to find Rain in the southern one. Well, I hope so. Some of the stuff they get up to in the northern arena turns my stomach. It turned my stomach when I was evil.’
‘Huh. Well, if we can find somewhere to stay, I can try the finding spell again. Maybe we can locate her without resorting to anything we could get into trouble over.’
‘That won’t make much difference. We’ll be in trouble for breaking her out anyway. But we may as well try the easy route before we go the tough one.’
~~~
Chains now held Rain in a magic circle carved into the stone floor of a chamber somewhere underneath the city. She had worked out she was in Sintar from the accents she was hearing more than anything else. She had been captured by Sintari slavers – though she was not aware of any other variety, so maybe that was a given
– and now she was chained, naked, to the floor of what looked a lot like a magical ritual room.
Getting free was just not going to happen. A short chain connected to her collar, meaning that she was pretty much forced to kneel in the centre of the circle. Her arms were pulled out to rings in the floor outside the circle, so she could barely move.
Whatever they had planned for her, it was pretty unlikely that she was going to be able to avoid it. Rain had heard various stories about the Sintari slavers; none of them had mentioned magical rituals in underground rooms.
‘Let’s get this started,’ one of the group of mages who would be doing whatever to her said. She recognised the voice from earlier. ‘We’re going to be at this for a while, and I have an appointment this afternoon. She’s blonde and I’m not missing out on her for anything.’
There was a rumble of laughter from the others. They were good-natured evil mages which was sort of a plus. There were six of them in total, five men and a woman. Rain had learned a little about circles like this from Constance; there was one principal mage and five assistants who basically supplied power for the spell rather than actively working magic. This kind of circle was often used in certain kinds of enchantment spells. And some of those certain kinds of enchantments were curses.
The chanting began. At some signal from the leader, the six participants all began to chant at once. They all seemed to be saying something different, the sounds clashing and making it hard to work out what any one of them was actually saying. It had to be really hard to keep up your part of the chant, but the weird thing was that the overall sound was strangely melodious.
Whatever they were doing, it was working, because the carved circle in the floor began to glow with a vaguely disturbing, yellow light and Rain felt herself getting warm.
The heat began to build and sweat beaded on her forehead. After a couple of minutes it was uncomfortable, like she had a fever. Her throat was dry and the bones in her legs were aching. She felt as though she was coming down with the worst case of a cold she had ever had.
And then the pain started…
~~~
‘Nothing,’ Kana said. ‘I’m still getting nothing, but it felt kind of different.’
‘How?’ Constance asked. Everyone was gathered in the room Kana and Aneshti were sharing. Constance had decided on a fairly upscale inn for the lodgings because they had the money after Arabar, lower-cost guesthouses in Sintar tended to have more
residents with four or more legs than with two, and it was fairly unlikely that anyone at this inn would recognise her since she had never been near it in her past life. The rooms were bigger than Kana had grown used to occupying, easily big enough to hold a small meeting in.
‘Last time I tried, it kind of felt like the spell found what I was looking for, Rain, but couldn’t… lock on or something. This time it felt like it couldn’t find her. I don’t know. It’s a really vague difference.’
‘The slave pens probably have better warding over a wider area,’
Constance said. ‘Your spell could get close last time, but this time it’s more difficult. I’m guessing.’
‘Um, it would find her if she was dead, right?’ Mimi asked.
‘Dead Rain is still Rain,’ Aneshti replied. ‘The spell is searching for her body, not her soul.’
‘And they probably wouldn’t hold a corpse in warded space,’
Constance said. ‘We can’t find her, but we can be reasonably certain she’s alive.’
‘Okay,’ Mimi said, ‘so what now?’
‘Now, we wait until it gets dark, and then we go find some slavers and politely ask them where she might be.’
‘Politely?’
‘Okay, not very politely.’
~~~
Once again, the woman’s back arched and she strained against the ropes tying her to the chair she had been secured in. That she was not in pain was apparent from the panting and moaning which accompanied the movements. For ten seconds, she was writhing in utter ecstasy, and then she was collapsing back into her seat.
The sweat running down between her breasts was obvious thanks to the low-cut dress she was wearing; she had been off for a night on the town when Constance and Kana had captured her. She was being ‘tortured’ in her own home.
‘That’s twice, Hepshiba,’ Constance said. ‘You know the spell.
You’ve used it to addict enough slaves. The more I use it, the more you’ll want it. You’ll do anything for a fix and you know what the price is likely to be from the kind of people who know how to cast it.’
Kana watched from as much of a distance as she could manage.
Constance was handling the interrogation and Kana was just there to check the truth of any information they might get. And in case they needed to fight their way out of something, but that was
looking unlikely in this case. She was not entirely comfortable with what was going on, but they needed to find out where Rain was and the slavers were unlikely to give up the information without a good reason, so…
‘I told you, I don’t know anything,’ Hepshiba said. She was an attractive woman dressed like a sex worker. Her sweat-coated breasts were almost hanging out of her dress. The skirt had a split in it all the way up the front to her crotch. Kana was painfully aware that Hepshiba was not wearing anything under the garment; all the thrashing had seen to that. Hepshiba had a dark seductress thing going and, in Kana’s opinion, was messing up a good thing by coating her face in too much dark make-up.
‘And I don’t believe you,’ Constance replied. ‘You’ve got your finger in all the rings supplying the games. You’d have heard if there was a new influx of gladiators from outside the city.’
Constance turned and looked at Kana. ‘Hepshiba here is famous for supplying sex-addicted slaves to rich people, no questions asked about where they came from, and for her taste in gladiators. She likes them taller than her with lots of muscle and huge …
attributes.’ Constance turned back to her victim. ‘Speak or start worrying.’
‘I heard Radekar had a new girl starting in his harem. I’ve no idea if it’s the one you’re looking for.’
Kana gestured and then nodded to Constance. For what it was worth, the statement was true. It did not sound especially worthwhile, however, given that Rain was not physically female and a ‘harem’ did not sound like it had anything to do with gladiators.
‘Radekar?’ Constance asked. Hepshiba nodded. ‘Go to sleep, Hepshiba.’ The slave
r opened her mouth to respond, and then her head sagged forward as the spell took hold. ‘She’ll probably be out until morning.
‘But she said Radekar’s harem ,’ Kana said. ‘Harems aren’t–’
‘It’s vernacular for a roster of gladiators where the owner only keeps women. Well, some people use it for female owners keeping only male fighters, but that’s not as common. There’s an implicit assumption regarding what they get up to when they’re not fighting.’
‘Oh. Figures. But wouldn’t this Radekar have noticed the obvious problem with Rain in those circumstances?’
‘You’d think so. Tricking Radekar with an illusion or something…
Might actually work. He’d be a little annoyed, but he’d want to be careful about how he responded. If it got around that he’d been sold a colt instead of a filly and hadn’t spotted the difference…’
‘Everyone would be trying it. His reputation would be ruined.’
‘Yup. Not that his reputation is anything to write home about.
There’s one other possibility… But that’s more of a rumour than anything else. Ignore me, I’m rambling.’
‘Okay.’ Kana took one more look at Hepshiba who was now drooling onto her boobs. At least she was not snoring. Yet. ‘What’s next?’
‘We go see whether Aneshti and Mimi have managed to track down Guthman.’ Constance heaved a sigh. ‘Watching him writhe is not going to be as pretty. Unless he’s lost weight. A girl can hope.’
~~~
Guthman had not lost weight. He also knew nothing useful and the same had been true of the next couple of slavers Constance had worked on. And now they had a young man named Pashi tied to his bed and awaiting Constance’s ministrations. There was, however, a problem. Two problems, in fact.
‘Pashi’s a cultist as well as a slaver,’ Constance said to the others, keeping her voice low so that her impending victim could not hear. Well, not hear much. There was value in making him nervous. ‘If he gets free, he’s going to tell everyone I’m in the city. He’s also a hedonist of the first order and I don’t think the ecstasy spell is going to give him much pause.’
‘So, what do we do?’ Kana asked.
‘We… I handle this one alone. You can wait outside and… and I’ll deal with it.’ Pashi did not have the money Hepshiba had and his home was nowhere near as large, but it came with a lounge, bedroom, kitchen, and bathroom. They could wait in the lounge and try not to hear anything while Constance did her stuff.
‘How are you going to know if he’s telling you the truth?’ Kana asked. She did not really want to see whatever Constance was going to do, but she felt like it was her duty. ‘What if he gets free or something?’
‘Once I get started, he won’t be getting free. I also think he’s going to tell me anything he knows before I really have to do anything to him. The threat should be enough. Also… Kana, I’m going to use a spell I wish I didn’t know existed . I don’t… I don’t want any of you seeing me using it.’
‘Uh, oh. Well, if you feel you have to…’
‘The other alternative is beating him up.’ Constance watched as her compatriots filed out of the room and then she turned to Pashi.
‘You’re not getting anything out of me, traitor,’ Pashi said before Constance could get started.
‘You say that now… Have you heard of the Curse of Unlife, Pashi?’
He had. You could tell he had because the colour drained out of his face. ‘No one would teach a traitor that spell.’
‘I wasn’t a traitor when they did. I was a rising star in the satanic firmament. I’m not exactly great at it since I’ve only used it once or twice. Just as an exercise, you understand. It’s not pretty.’
‘You wouldn’t–’
‘It takes maybe ten minutes for the curse to work its effect. It…
shrivels your insides slowly. The pain starts out bearable, but that doesn’t last. The way you treat your body, it might work faster. Maybe you’ll be in agony for five minutes or so before you die.’
‘No, you–’
‘And then, of course, you get to spend eternity walking around as a corpse that’ll do anything I tell it to do. It’s a truly horrible way to die, and even when you’re dead, there’s no rest.
Shall we get started?’
~~~
Constance walked out of the bedroom and closed the door behind her. She looked unhappy. She was rubbing at her hands as though trying to wash away blood and her eyes were shadowed. ‘He didn’t know much, but Radekar’s name came up again.’
‘What about Pashi?’ Kana asked.
‘He’s sleeping. I didn’t have to go all the way and, frankly, I didn’t want to.’
‘We heard him… screaming.’
‘Yeah. I didn’t have to go all the way, but he didn’t believe I could really do it until it started hurting. And I’m thinking that Radekar is probably our best bet. He has a house in the southern city, not far from the arena. The slave pens are supposed to be under it. If we wait until after midnight, it’s likely we can sneak in and locate Rain without too much trouble.’
‘That seems reasonable,’ Mimi said. ‘I hope she’s there. I want out of this city. It’s like Soansha is further from me here than anywhere I’ve been except the Dragon Blight.’
‘The elven pantheon isn’t much worshipped here.’ Constance glanced back toward the door. ‘There’s another reason I want to wait. I need a bath. I feel… Dirty doesn’t quite cover it.’
Kana flashed her a bleak grin. ‘That’s probably a good thing.
Means you’re human.’
‘Means I’m not a satanist.’
‘And that’s a good thing too.’
26 th Dekarte.
Getting into Radekar’s slave pens was surprisingly easy and unsurprisingly disgusting. When Constance had mentioned ‘sewers’
in her explanation of the best way into just about any house in Sintar, Kana had questioned her use of the term ‘best.’ Constance had amended her statement.
It was winter and the rains had washed much of the stuff Kana was most worried about out of the tunnel they were walking through.
The smell was another matter. It was difficult to see where the acrid stink was coming from since the bricks which lined the place seemed fairly clean. It was probably the kind of smell that soaked into the fabric of a place and stayed there. Kana suspected that it was currently working its way into her pores and that it would stay with her through a dozen or more very hot baths, assuming that she would be allowed into any public baths smelling like a sewer.
‘This should be the place,’ Constance said, indicating a set of metal rungs sunk into the wall. Above was a metal grating which looked pretty solid. ‘Aneshti, you’re up.’
Aneshti climbed the ladder. Kana was glad it was Aneshti doing the climbing. She was not too keen on doing so herself for a couple of reasons. She did not really want to touch the metal with its acid-etched surface. She thought she knew what kind of acid had left the metal corroded like that. She was also fairly unsure that the rungs would hold her weight while she climbed, but it seemed like things were going okay for Aneshti as she got to the top.
Aneshti was not too keen on the plan because it meant working with a dangerous substance and with a spell she was working from scratch. ‘Everyone stand back,’ she called down. ‘This might get a bit messy.’ Knowing what the elf was going to do, everyone moved out from under the grating. This proved to be a good idea since, a few seconds later, something began to rain down from above, narrowly missing Aneshti as it fell. The liquid hissed when it hit the floor of the tunnel and the acrid smell got worse.
‘She managed to create it then,’ Mimi said.
Up above, having created a pool of acid on the ground beside the grating, Aneshti used another spell to form the pool into a tentacle of noxious chemicals and have it reach over to the
padlock holding the grate closed. It took a bit more than ten seconds for the acid to eat its way thro
ugh the internal workings of the lock, and Aneshti was biting her lip the entire time, worrying over losing control of the acid or being spotted. When the metal around the keyhole of the lock began to look melted, Aneshti pushed her pool – now a blob – of acid as far away from the grating as she could and then started down the ladder.
‘We should probably wait a few seconds before touching that padlock,’ Aneshti said as her boots hit the bricks. ‘It was still hissing when I left it, but I’m pretty sure it’s not really holding anything closed.’
‘Well done,’ Kana said. ‘That’s a masterful bit of creative magic.’ The alternative they had come up with was for Kana to heat the lock up so that it was weak enough to break. It might have worked, but it would have likely left her drained of power and would have taken far longer. Theoretically, she could raise the lock to the melting point of iron, but that would take her about forty-five minutes and leave her dead from exhaustion. It had been decided that that was not a viable plan.
‘I have my moments.’
Constance was the strongest of them, and their leader, so she went up to lift the grate. Their entry point was in the corner of a yard within the walls of the house. It was a fairly big house with its own stables and two wings of accommodation. The stables possibly explained some of the stink: horse urine seemed like an even worse effluent than the human version. Now, they needed to work out where to go next and the stables were as good a place as any to hide while they examined the area and chose a path.
‘We need to go down,’ Constance said. ‘I have no idea how to go down from here.’
‘There don’t seem to be any guards,’ Kana observed. ‘I’d have expected guards.’
‘There’ll be some in the main building and there are sure to be some below. Some of the gladiators probably don’t mind the job too much, but most of them would run if they got the chance.
That’s a fact we can use to our advantage, I think.’
‘Freeing slaves does sound like a noble goal,’ Mimi agreed, ‘even if slavery is legal here.’
‘Also a fine distraction,’ Aneshti said. ‘I figure we have to go inside and look for stairs down. No choice.’
The Girl Who Dreamed of a Different World Page 25