by Elle Clouse
Kiera hesitated, even though her stomach rumbled. He seemed friendly enough, though. She edged forward and joined him at the table. The soup smelled delicious. There was no spoon for her to use, so she lifted the bowl in both hands and drank. The soup burned her mouth. She coughed, spluttered, caught her breath, then kept drinking. She slurped down the scant vegetable pieces in her haste. So much for her table manners.
The man sipped his own soup slowly. He didn’t seem hungry, more as though he was eating to keep her company. He waited until she finished her broth to speak. “You’ve been sleeping for quite some time.” His voice rasped as though he hadn’t used it in a long time.
Her stomach continued to rumble, so he refilled her bowl, fishing in the cauldron for more vegetable pieces. This time she sipped to taste the weak flavor. “You saved me, didn’t you?”
He nodded.
“My name is...” She started to give her impostor name, then hesitated. Was it worth it to keep pretending? Her cover was already blown. “Kiera Clark.”
The man nodded. If he recognized her name, he showed no sign. “Call me Odran.”
“I hope that it’s good to meet you, Odran.”
The whiskers near his lips twitched in a smirk. There was something familiar about him that she couldn’t quite place. She sipped her soup to giver herself some time to think. “Where am I?”
“In the castle dungeon.” Odran blew on his soup to cool it.
“Where is that...wolf creature?” She couldn’t think of anything else to call it. She had never seen anything like it and never wanted to again.
“It’s...subdued for now. It will not bother us here.” He stared into his bowl, frowning.
Kiera looked around. There was a second door on the other side of the room. It was made of wood and didn’t look strong enough to keep the creature out. She could easily imagine it splintering off its hinges under the force of the monster’s determined bulk. “Can you be certain? What was that thing?”
He grimaced. “I think you said it best by calling it a wolf creature.”
“It looked like something out of a story told to children to scare them into obedience.” If she hadn’t seen the creature herself, she wouldn’t have believed something like that existed. She could still feel its breath on her neck.
He took a moment to answer. “Out here near the wilderness, things are a little more...unusual than in the central kingdoms.”
“So why is that creature down here and not in the wilderness where it belongs?
“To keep him from harming people. That was why he was trapped here in the first place.” He turned to the fire. “Although now he is used to keep people in line.”
Ian and Ayden used him, Odran meant. No wonder the servants were so closed-lipped. The threat of the beast would be enough to keep anyone silent. “But it will leave you alone in here?”
“As long as you are here or with me, you will be safe.” He touched the wall closest to him, and Kiera noticed a shimmering line running through the stone. Silver laced the walls from the exit to the sleeping chamber, glinting in the light of the hearth fire. “It avoids the tunnels with silver running through them, though I don’t recommend going anywhere alone. It’s very easy to get lost down here. There are no torches or candles beyond this door.”
Kiera rubbed her wrist thoughtfully and winced when her bruised skin protested. Then she frowned. “How did I get out of my bindings?”
“The locks were old. They were easy to pick.” He stood, and Kiera had to crane her neck to look up at him; he was very tall. “If you’ll excuse me.”
He bowed and left the apartment.
His abrupt departure startled Kiera. She sat for a moment, looking at the door and wondering where he had gone.
A howl echoed from somewhere deep within the caves, the sound frantic and crazed. She wished Odran hadn’t left her alone, even if the silver kept her safe. The howling kept going.
Kiera grabbed the oil lamp from the bedroom and pulled open the front door of the apartment. The silver in the rooms continued along the corridor wall in a wide vein. She held the lamp aloft and followed the silver until it ran thin, then dwindled to nothing. The corridor continued on and into darkness.
She wanted to continue, to find a way out, but the beast hadn’t stopped howling ever since she’d left the apartment. It was impossible to tell how close it might be. Fear won out, and she returned to the apartment.
She set the oil lamp down on the table and turned to the bookshelf. The book Odran had been reading earlier lay there, its spine creased from constant wear. She picked it up, then sighed. It was a history book and reminded her of all the research she had recently done.
Kiera hoped Erann had found Brogan in time. He might have been able to save Brigid. He was her last hope now, but how would he find her?
She could still hear the creature out in the darkness, howling and snarling. She stopped pushing down all the fear and guilt and let it bubble to the surface. Kiera walked to the bedroom as the tears started to fall. Her sobs made her head throb but she didn’t quell her tears. It was time to let it all out.
“SHIT!” BROGAN RUBBED his shoulder to ease the ache from slamming into the door. It would be sore for days, but the door hadn’t even creaked. “We sneaked back to this awful place just to be stopped by a slab of wood with iron bracers.”
The evening before, he had managed to avoid the guards and sneak into the stables, where Brigid and Erann had been waiting for him. Phelan had been ready with their gear and their escape plan, and they had made it out of the city before midnight without detection. Phelan’s contingency plans were always perfect. That is, until recently.
“I can’t believe you talked her into this,” Phelan growled from behind him. “We never should have come here. She could be dead by now.”
“Do you want to help or not? You insisted on coming with me, so make yourself useful and look for a key or a switch.” Brogan surveyed the door. The location of the door made it near impossible to spot in the dark, even with plenty of light from the moon. He’d only managed to find it again because he knew what to look for. He searched around the doorframe for a secret compartment and scoured the nearby bushes for a hidden key while Phelan did the same. There was nothing.
Brogan kneeled down and looked at the lock, then fished the tools from his pocket. Kiera deserved the skills of a master thief, but Brogan would have to do his best. The two needle-nose tools slipped into the keyhole, but the tumblers refused to make way. It would take him ages to work them open. He had the patience but he didn’t have the time.
“The guard is coming,” Phelan whispered. “We will have to come back later.”
“There might not be a later,” Brogan snapped. “We came back to get her out of there.”
“We cannot help her if we get ourselves caught.” Brogan felt his friend’s hand on his shoulder, and he realized he was right. He stepped away from the door, and they withdrew from the garden as quickly as they could. Avoiding the guardsmen was fairly easy, as they patrolled at regular intervals on the same path around the grounds.
As soon as they left the garden behind, they slowed to a walk, using the darkness to cover their presence. Few people used the path behind the stables, so they passed through the gatehouse unspotted and only a few coins poorer to silence the gateman. They wended their way through the cobbled streets of the surrounding city until the streets turned to packed dirt and farther still until it became nothing more than a deer trail, the buildings long gone and replaced by ancient trees.
They had established a small camp deep in the forest. It was the only place the guards would not search. Everyone in the damned town avoided the forest, claiming it was full of sprites, wolfkin, and brownies. Such nonsense was now their ally.
Brigid and Erann were already asleep in their bedrolls next to the small fire, but Brigid awoke as they entered the camp.
“Where is Kiera?” She glanced back and forth between them. Her complexion
was blotchy; she had been crying, and the tremble in her voice warned of more tears to come.
“We couldn’t get to her.” Brogan sat near the fire, raising a brow at Erann’s snoring. “They have her locked up somewhere in the castle, and I could do nothing.”
“We can’t just leave her there!”
“I don’t intend to, but we need a real plan. We need a way back into the castle and access to the key.” They were sunk if Ayden carried the only one.
“How will we do that?” Brigid sniffled, her eyes brimming with tears again.
“I don’t know.”
Phelan picked leaves off a bush and began shredding them.
Brogan needed to think of a plan to get her out of there and quickly. Only the gods knew what was down there or what was going on. He was so preoccupied with his failed rescue that he almost did not see a person walk into the light of the fire. When that someone cleared their throat, Brogan looked up and knew then that the townspeople weren’t as superstitious as he had thought. They had been speaking from experience.
THE FABRIC FELT FOREIGN on his skin. It had been ages since he had worn real clothing. Years of running wild in the darkness made the garments feel confining, but there was nothing to be done about it. The pelts he wore for modesty’s sake when Kiera had first awoken were not suitable.
The last time he had seen his hands, he had been a mere boy. As he extended his fingers before him, he noted their monstrous size. Where there had once been a scrawny youth, now there stood a man in his prime, built for strength and speed.
He felt the coarse hair growing from his face and set to the task of trimming it down. The dinner knife was painfully dull, but he would not greet Kiera in such a grisly manner again. She hadn’t recognized him under his scruffy exterior, but perhaps that was for the best. He did not wish to make her relive the final moments of her father’s death.
Her presence was a blessing, granting him sanity in the midst of his curse. It grieved him that they had to meet again in such a way, but he had been hiding in his self-imposed hell for too long. It was time for him to take charge of his life and stop wallowing.
He inspected his newly trimmed beard in the reflective glass over the washbasin, then nodded to himself. For the first time in years, he looked more like a man than a beast. He washed his face and ran hasty fingers through his hair.
It was time to be human again. It was time to stop wallowing and find the path out of the dungeon.
Chapter 7
Kiera woke to the very pleasant smell of breakfast over a cook fire. For the briefest of moments, she imagined she was back home with her mother in their cottage near Midhir. She stretched and felt the soft furs of the bed she slept in, and she remembered. She stood up, brushed the wrinkles from her dress, and padded into the common room.
Odran tended the cook pot over the fire. His beard was trimmed and his long, dark hair tied back in a ponytail at the nape of his neck. His clothes were new, brown breaches with suspenders and a plain white shirt. “Good morning,” he greeted without looking up. “I hope that you are hungry.”
“Very, but where can I...uh...freshen up?”
He looked at her with a raised eyebrow. “Oh, back in the sleeping chamber you will find another door at the far end.” Ordan picked up the candle holder from the table and handed it to her, the loop toward her so she could take it easily. “You probably didn’t see it since it’s quite dark in there.”
The candle was new and the holder too. Her gaze swept over the table, where a loaf of knotted bread and a wedge of aged cheese sat on a bronze platter. Odran had to have a way of getting food, but she hadn’t thought it would be from the castle kitchens.
Kiera took the candle and returned to the bedroom. The light revealed a door in the back corner. Beyond it she found every amenity she had in her guest suite above. A large basin sat on a table with a mirror mounted before it, and a pitcher for water sat beside it. She spotted the lavatory tucked in a cozy niche and secretly cheered that she wouldn’t have to bother with a chamber pot.
With her business out of the way, she washed her face and hands. Her hair was a tangle of curls and leftover pins. She plucked all the pins free, ran her fingers through her locks, then braided it. As she worked, she ignored her reflection in the mirror and focused on the silver in the walls. It gave her no security; how could silver stop a wolf?
When finished with her hair, she followed the silver lines back to the common room. There, Odran sat at the table, waiting for her with a place setting for two.
“How is it there is an apartment such as this down here?” She used her spoon to lift large chunks of vegetables from her soup, heartier fare than the day before.
Odran didn’t seem to be surprised by her question. “I know it seems a little unusual, but this is a prison all the same. Even the wealthy and noble enjoy some privilege when serving their sentence.” His manners were surprising. He held his spoon like a lord, sat straight as he ate, and kept the napkin in his lap. “Don’t be fooled, this is still a dungeon. It’s just gilded more than for the common man. Plus, the warden is normally too much for people to survive. We’ve developed a rapport over the years.”
The creature. That would make life in the dark caverns a lot less enjoyable, even with the modern conveniences. Despite the fire and the candles, Kiera was starting to find the darkness oppressive.
Odran watched her eat. “What was your crime?”
Kiera had been expecting that question, and she wasn’t going to lie anymore. “I was pretending to be someone I’m not. What about you?”
“I was responsible for the death of a man.” He cast his eyes down to the contents of his bowl, his shoulders slumped. His words were hushed and repentant.
“There is no way out?”
He returned to his senses and looked up. “There is. But I have to find it first.” Her eyebrows shot up, but he continued before she could form her next question. “It isn’t the easiest to find, since they don’t want people to find it. But I know it exists. All the legends say there is an exit out of here. I’ve been looking for it for a while now, but I haven’t found it yet.”
“A legend?” Kiera didn’t like the logic behind his search. The whole purpose of a dungeon was to keep people in.
“A week ago you wouldn’t have believed a creature like that existed.” He hiked his thumb back down the corridor that separated them from the beast.
She sighed. He was right. She sipped a spoonful of her neglected soup, thankful that it was still warm. “Is that what you do when you disappear? Search for the secret way out?”
“Yes.”
They finished the meal in silence. Once done, Odran placed his bowl aside and headed toward the door.
Kiera stood. “Let me come with you. I can’t be cooped up in here without something to do while you are gone.”
“Read a book.” He pointed toward the bookshelf, which had been straightened. It also contained more title than it had the previous night. “Please, do not leave this apartment. It’s not safe out there.”
She pursed her lips.
“You can’t come with me now. The beast is too agitated for you to be roaming around in unfamiliar dark caves. I will not risk you getting hurt.”
Something dark and insistent burned in his eyes; it made her pulse quicken. His expression softened, and he turned his back to her. “We have to be patient.”
Then he headed out to do whatever it was he did when he left. Kiera hoped he would come back with news that he had found the fabled way out of this pit. It had been a full day since she had woken up in this apartment, and she was getting restless.
“Patient. I don’t do patient very well.” The creature was out there somewhere, and she didn’t want to see it again. A memory of long, white teeth loomed in her mind. With a shudder, she turned back to the shelf and grabbed one of the books at random. It was a copy of the book of sonnets she had stolen from the library in the capitol city. The binding was worn, pages dog
-eared at certain passages, as if it had been read many times over the years. None of the other books on the shelf showed such signs of wear. Was this his favorite book as well?
She could hear the beast in the stone corridors beyond the apartment door. Whenever Odran was near she didn’t notice the beast howling, but he was only with her for a few hours. The rest of the time, he was out in the dungeons. He must have been very dedicated to finding the path out.
“YOUR MAJESTY,” FLANN whispered. “I am sorry to bother you, but I have news that you should know.”
The king opened his eyes a slit and motioned for Flann to go on.
“The servants have told me they have started to get requests from the dungeons.”
“What did you say?” He struggled to sit up. “The dungeons...”
Flann put a restraining hand out. “Please, sire. You must rest.”
“I am not that weak.” But after a moment he lay back down again, chest rising and falling heavily. “What is he asking for?”
Flann tucked the king in. “It is interesting. He’s asked for more books—romance novels—a few dresses, a chessboard, a deck of cards, more candles than we normally send, and perfume.”
The king’s brows knitted together. “Women’s items and games for two?”
“Now we know where the princess must have disappeared to.” Flann smiled. “The poor girl is in for a fright, but it doesn’t seem like he’s harmed her. And if he’s in a state of mine to be making requests, she’s safe down there with him. In the meantime, until he’s ready to emerge, we need to figure out what to do about Ayden and Ian. They are the only ones with the key to that door. They most likely put her down there to die.”
The king sighed. “How long has she been down there?”
“A few days.”
“And he’s already making requests.” The king smiled. “A very good sign. Provide him with whatever he asks, no matter how bizarre. Keep this quiet as well. Ayden has a way of knowing much that goes on in the castle.”