“I am under the impression it is rather more urgent than that.” The captain of the guard replied coolly, regarding the broken horn of the Minotaur and wondering how he had managed to sustain the injury that had twisted his spine and sent him to the very bottom of the palace pecking order; maybe it was a games injury or an expedition that had gone terribly wrong? Certainly, looking at the creature’s dirty armour and having already witnessed his unpleasant personal habits, it was not convincing when the guard had said he would give the place a good clean. The Gaoler clutched at his back frequently, straining as he shuffled along, it was unlikely he ever bent down to clean anything in his restricted state.
“If it is in there, I will find it, you can assure the matriarch of that but I’ve never missed an execution yet and I’m not going to clean out the cell and miss the main show today.” The gaoler sniffed. “I love watching the legs kick whilst they dangle at the end of the rope, it’s like they are trying to run on air and then when the neck snaps…” The gaoler stopped in mid-sentence and stared open mouthed at the open door before him. “How?”
“Why is the door open?” Aelius remarked, a feeling of dread swelling in the pit of his stomach. “I was of the understanding that most jail cells had locked doors to keep the prisoners in.”
“But it was locked.” The guard replied pushing hard against the cell door to dislodge an obstacle behind it and step into the room, staring around it as if expecting to see the prisoner exactly where he had left him. Aelius looked over his shoulder noting a chair lying on its side on the floor, clearly the obstacle that had partially blocked the door, an upended slop bucket in the far corner, its bottom cracked and staved in, the bed with the bundle of rags scrunched up in one corner and some seeds scattered across the floor. The window high up on the far wall was solidly barred, too small to squeeze through and well out of the reach of a tiny prisoner.
The maimed Minotaur pulled the door back and stared behind it, noting the damp walls and accumulated mould growth but alas no hidden Halfling. Then he looked up towards the ceiling, way too high for a Halfling to scale and again realised there was no miniature convict to find.
“This makes no sense. Where could he have gone?” the gaoler wailed. “What am I going to do. The matriarch will be very unhappy. No one has ever escaped from her dungeons.”
Aelius did not know what to say. Part of him wanted to comfort the Minotaur who was about to become a permanent fixture to his own dungeon, if the Matriarch let him live after his mistake, whilst another part of him wanted to shake the creature as hard as he could. He stared around the room as the gaoler threw the blanket from the stone bed up into the air, just in case the Halfling had shrunk to half his size and was somehow hiding there.
There was nowhere to hide. There was the chair, the broken bucket under the bed and nothing else. He spun from the room walking out into the corridor his eyes scanning the floor and walls for clues as to where the fugitive had gone. The corridor ended at a blank wall, no windows where he could have squeezed out of, no other doors he could have entered.
Aelius started back the way he came, pushing at each cell door on reflex, searching for the slightest give to indicate the cell was empty and a viable hiding place. Instead he got curses, abuse and maniacal laughter from behind the doors. He looked into another cell and saw the gaunt starving faces of humans who had somehow upset the Minotaur ruling class. A skeletal child, its stomach swollen from malnutrition, lay on the dirty straw floor, clearly too weak to move, her parents too emaciated to help.
The captain fought back the pity he felt, trying to maintain his professional standing, he was Aelius, captain of the matriarch’s guard after all. All of these people had threatened his ruler, somehow, although in his heart he knew there was no way a child such as he had seen in the last cell could have done anything to offend his queen and deserve such an appalling punishment. It occurred to the Minotaur that his queen had rather a large number of ‘criminals’ in her cells.
Aelius shook his head angrily, embarrassed that he was even considering such treasonous thoughts. He looked down on the floor, trying to focus his mind, his eyes searching for tracks through the puddles as the passageway headed away from the cell. The only footprints still gleaming in the damp appeared to belong to Aelius and the crippled guard. There was nowhere the Halfling could have gone, accept this way but if the lack of tracks indicated anything it meant the little thief had escaped quite some time earlier.
The corridor turned left and opened into a chamber where the gaoler had a table and chair. The remains of a meal lay on the surface alongside a suspicious half-empty amphora of wine. Aelius turned his accusing gaze fully on the gaoler, who immediately held his hands up in protest.
“I swear I never had any.” He stated. “The amphora has been with me for several days.”
“Then you must have been asleep at your post.” Aelius snapped, his frustration at the Halfling’s escape and the inner conflict in his mind finding an outlet. “The matriarch will not be pleased at your negligence of duty.”
“I have neither left my post or slept, nor have I drunk anything.”
“Then where has your prisoner gone?” Aelius demanded. “Answer me that.” The gaoler lowered his head in submission, meekly averting his eyes as he looked around the floor of the chamber before his gaze drew him to the only exit from the room, a flight of stairs leading upwards and out from the dungeon.
“There is only one place he could have gone but I cannot explain how.” The gaoler wailed. He hobbled for the stairs, grunting and swearing as he tried to manoeuvre his twisted body up the steps. Aelius moved to follow, checking the chamber with his keen eyes, noting nothing amiss, no signs of a fleeing refugee; it was as if the little thief had disappeared into thin air.
It seemed to take an eternity to climb the stairs following the crippled Minotaur but eventually they reached the first landing that offered an open door out onto a courtyard where the scaffold awaited Ashe Wolfsdale, or the option of stairs to a higher level in the tower. The morbid image of the noose hanging from a crossbeam momentarily caught Aelius off guard. He observed the barrel placed under the rope to enable the condemned prisoner's head to reach the noose and realised that such forethought indicated similar executions of small people, maybe children, had taken place before. His mind turned to the image of the emaciated child back in the cell.
Why were they hanging the Halfling? All he had done was collect coins that people had thrown away. Even to a seasoned soldier such as Aelius, used to following his matriarch’s orders without question, the sentence seemed grossly out of proportion to the crime. He looked around the courtyard. The portcullis was down, guards stood to attention on either side and other guards patrolled the walls high above. All was as it should be, as if the Halfling had never left his room.
Aelius marched across the courtyard, stepping through the shadow of the gallows and beneath the snapping brightly coloured pennants of Taurean hanging above the portcullis, his attention directed towards one such guard who visibly straightened as he approached before throwing a sharp salute.
“Have you seen any sign of a Halfling passing through this courtyard?” The captain questioned. The guard looked confused, trying to peer around his captain and see if there was any sign of a small creature walking about.
“Not right now sir.” The guard replied. “Although I understand there is a Halfling prisoner of some importance below. The matriarch even came to see him. Although as I understand, he must have done something treasonous as they are going to hang him in a few minutes. I presume this is the prisoner you are talking about.” Aelius smiled despite himself.
“You are a sharp soldier.” He replied. “You seem to have your ear to the ground but are your eyes as good as your ear for gossip? Have you seen the prisoner since the Matriarch visited?”
“No sir.” The guard shook his head. “If the Halfling had come out here, I would have seen him.” Aelius had a feeli
ng this would be the response he would get and was not surprised at the guard’s attempt to confirm his diligence. It appeared that Ashe Wolfsdale had literally disappeared into thin air! Mora was going to be extremely angry at this setback, especially as it appeared the ring had gone with him.
The weary captain looked beyond the guard and through the portcullis, watching the servants going about their duties. One serving girl was feeding a flock of chickens, throwing seed from a bucket at her side. The chickens squawked and scratched at the grain energetically, a bright blue bird with a long flowing tail darted between their pecking forms, snatching seed from their beaks and flitting from one side of the pen to the other. The chickens started to jostle and one pecked out at the servant making her shriek and drop the bucket to the floor spilling the grain and creating a miniature riot at her feet. The bucket rolled about as she turned and fled, leaving the poultry to fight it out amongst themselves.
The gaoler came up alongside him gasping for breath and breaking Aelius's train of thought. There was something about that serving girl, tugging at his mind but it was fleeting like a dream and as difficult to remember upon awaking, especially with the crippled Minotaur wheezing at his shoulder.
“Maybe he kept going up.” The gaoler gestured, pointing back to the tower they had just exited. Aelius let his eyes roam up the outside of the oppressive stone structure, there were at least four floors to the thing and it did have an opening out onto the ramparts above.
“Well he never got out here that’s for sure.” Aelius snapped, spinning about and heading for the open door, gesturing to the guards on either side of the portcullis to follow him. He went back onto the landing and turned to the ascending stairs, taking them two at a time. The first landing had two locked doors and the stairway spiralling upwards. He took another step and set off up the only logical way left open to an elusive prisoner.
The next landing had two exits leading off to a long corridor, which had several doors leading to guard quarters but with the extra two guards to assist in the search, this escape route was swiftly dismissed, as the passage led back around to the landing in a loop, leaving no other exit. They took the stairs again, armour clattering as they climbed the steps, before arriving at the top to push open the door and access the battlements.
The wind on the exposed ramparts blew away any fog remaining in Aelius mind. He gasped at the shocking chill after the shelter of the palace walls but remained alert enough to send the two guards heading off in separate directions to scope the walls and ask the sentries already patrolling if they had seen any sign of the escaped Halfling.
He leant against the crenulations nearest to him and stared down to the courtyard far below, catching his breath and allowing his mind to focus on the problem at hand. His eyes scanned the view searching for a little figure running away, only to find his eyes drawn back to the serving girl who was back in the chicken pen finally reclaiming her dropped pail now that the chickens had sated their appetite.
What was it about this scene that kept drawing him back? It could not be the serving girl; they were all fully vetted and knew the punishment for failing to do as their masters wished. Betrayal was very unlikely. The chickens? Poultry was poultry as far as Aelius was concerned. He watched as the girl finally shooed away the last aggressive chicken and scooped up her bucket to return to her chores.
It was so odd; the fact there had been no attempt to take the gaoler’s food especially by an escaping prisoner deprived of nourishment. The watery tracks in the corridor belonged to the gaoler and himself, as if no one else had walked along the passage. The fact the chair had been blocking the cell door from opening as if it had tumbled recently. Then there was the bucket. What was it about the bucket?
One minute it was in the corner of the room, the next, impossibly, it was nearly under the bed. How did a bucket move by itself? The realisation hit the Minotaur hard. The reason the tracks in the corridor showed footprints going one way only, with no sign of an escaping Halfling was that the Halfling had not escaped! He had still been in the cell in the one place Aelius had been unable to check because the gaoler had been in the way and the gaoler could not check, because his spine was bent and twisted.
The damned Halfling had been under the bed the whole time! What was more, something had been in the jail cell with him, hiding in the remains of the broken bucket. Aelius was sure of it. He turned to whistle to the guards, summoning them back to him as he made for the stairs. He reached the first landing in a rush, heart beating fast and peered down over the handrail to the flight of steps below. Was that a noise of little footsteps running up the stairs towards him? He charged for the next flight leaping down them his armour sparking on the metal runners marking the edge of the steps.
A loud raucous tweeting from an animal clearly being tortured rose up from the base of the tower. Aelius had heard that sound before when he had been on the El Defensor, back when the Halfling had been trying to teach his mangy bird to fly. The bird! Damn it was so obvious now he had all the facts. The bird was under the bucket.
Aelius tore across the next landing charging down the steps two at a time, he turned the corner, the younger guards charging down the steps behind him. He roared aloud, announcing his charge as he practically flew around the corner, only to collide with the crippled gaoler working up the stairs towards him. The two Minotaur smashed into each other, Aelius unable to slow his momentum and carrying both of them bouncing down the steps.
They crashed into a heap at the bottom, Aelius shaking his head and looking up to notice the unmistakable figure of Ashe Wolfsdale slipping through the open door and out into the courtyard, a bundle of scruffy black and white plumage perched on his shoulder. Aelius shoved the gaoler off him and struggled to his feet, crashing through the door just in time to see the Halfling balancing on the barrel under the gallows. Ashe clambered up the very rope meant to hang him, then pulled himself up onto the cross beam before leaping like a swashbuckling hero for the pennants hanging above the portcullis. The captain of the guard could only watch in amazement as the Halfling went up hand over hand to the top of the archway. His little legs kicked once, before he was up and over the top, taking time to pause and give a little wave before he was away.
Chapter Thirty-One
Scrave pulled the ragged keffiyeh closer around his face and huddled down in a shadowy corner at a small table he had managed to procure in a very busy bar. To any casual observer he was a tired merchant amongst similar traders, travel weary from a long day in the desert. His company consisted of excited men haggling business transactions and whispering rumours of fortunes to be made, punctuated by swirling plumes of fragrant smoke from hookah pipes and mouthfuls of exotic food. He regarded his own plate and fought the urge to push it away. He was not hungry, neither was he thirsty, despite the fact he had been running and dodging the guards in Al Mashmaah for the better part of a day. He tried to push the worrying thought from his head that he had not been hungry for a long time.
What was wrong with him? Why had he acted so strangely when he had found Kerian Denaris’s locket? Sure, the old man was a bastard, who had stabbed him through with his own sword and left him to die in a temple that was slowly sinking into a volcanic abyss but why hold that against him? He simply did not believe he could ever be obsessed with an item of jewellery the man had supposedly worn!
He reached up and felt the shape of the emerald pendant through his tunic, where it now hung at his neck and pondered. He certainly never remembered seeing the necklace when they had spent time travelling together, although something instinctively told him it was indeed Kerian’s and now this niggling thought was telling him to get outside the city walls and find the man it belonged to. An action that Scrave knew was ridiculous and a completely pointless exercise, as Kerian was aboard the El Defensor and likely worlds away by now.
Scrave also believed himself a cautious Elf who had not lived this long, by undertaking irrational actions, no matter wher
e the prompting for such rash acts came from. He was a fugitive now, especially after the disturbance he had caused in the market place. If he ran from Al Mashmaah, he risked discovery. What was more, it seemed wherever he had run today the guards had always managed to cut him off or appear ahead as if whoever was directing them was using magic to do so. If he made for the desert, the salamander-mounted guards would run him down in a matter of hours. As such, despite his compulsion to flee, he needed to do the opposite, mingle with the crowds and be invisible by staying in plain sight.
Even now, he felt his feet itching in his boots, wanting to feel the ground passing beneath them instead of just sitting here surrounded by intoxicated traders, in a dreary inn, with lacklustre food and tepid ale. He looked around at the assembly of faces in the crowd, the shifty glances of people doing secretive deals, the camaraderie raised by travelling together. It was the stark opposite of how Scrave felt. Here he was surrounded by people but had never felt so hopelessly alone.
Scrave ran his finger nervously across his right cheek, feeling the scaring disfigurement he had received at the hands of an invisible ‘assassin’ when the assailant had pierced his cheek with the very dagger the Elf now carried at his waist. He knew that the ornate diamond tattoo that lay there was no longer a fluid and beautiful work of art. Instead, it had become a visible target emphasising the wound at its centre, a puckered misshapen scar that should have been healed, if Violetta had acted on it quickly enough.
His sensitive fingertip traced across the raised skin, expecting the same ragged feel he had experienced on multiple previous occasions but instead he found himself stroking a much smoother scar than he remembered. It mattered little; his delicate Elven heritage was a joke. He was hideous now, unable to return to that world, his missing right eye adding further horrors to his visage. He was like a monster in a tragic play, expected to wail his lament from the shadows where no one could glimpse his horrific image.
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