by Jon F. Merz
Akira chuckled. Then Ran started laughing. Then they were rolling on the floor in hysterics. After several minutes of laughing, they sat up and Ran took a deep breath.
“That felt pretty good, actually.”
“Yeah,” said Akira. “You think it helped?”
“Don’t know, but it didn’t hurt.”
They passed the next day by sparring in the room at slow speed. Ran found Akira very much his equal in most areas. Akira surpassed Ran in kicking, while Ran bested Akira with his throws. At the subsequent meals, they spent the time talking about favorite techniques and stuffing their faces. Ran felt a measure of invigoration. Maybe this exercise wasn’t as bad as he thought it was.
The instructors came and went. Eijiro showed up a few times, only to be replaced by the Weasel and other faceless instructors. Time passed. Sometimes slowly and sometimes fast. But it passed, and that was all Ran and Akira cared about. If they could just hold on until the end, then they’d be all set.
On the evening of the fifth day, Akira went hysterical. He’d been fine, and then all of sudden he started screaming uncontrollably. He lashed out at Ran, and three instructors immediately rushed in and subdued him. Ran crowded them.
“What happened?”
“He’s done,” said Eijiro. “We’re taking him out of here.” The instructors carried Akira out and left Ran behind, alone in the room.
Despair fell upon him like a heavy yoke. Ran sat down and started crying. He was alone. Tired. Exhausted. Hungry. Cold. Hot. His body ached. His head throbbed. His friend had just been taken from him. When did this exercise end? Who had thought up this stupid thing? What did it prove? What was the point? Ran eyed the window. Maybe he should just jump out of it and save himself from this agony. Why was he even doing this?
He must have fallen backwards then and slammed his head into the stone floor. The room swam, melting into another picture of a face.
A face.
“Ran.”
Eijiro hovered over him. Ran could barely process what was being said.
“You’re finished.”
“Wha—?”
“Done. Can you stand?”
Ran tried to move his legs. They didn’t seem to work anymore. “I don’t think so.”
Eijiro smiled at him, his voice was warm and reassuring. “I’ll get help. You can close your eyes now. You’ve passed the test.”
“—Akira?”
“He passed, too. You did very well.”
Everything fell away from him then. Blackness rushed in and enveloped him in a warm blanket of sweet slumber.
Ran slept for nearly two days. When he awoke, he was in his bed. Akira was perched on a bench nearby.
“How are you feeling?”
Ran had smiled. “Great.”
“We passed,” said Akira. “But only us. Out of the five. Congratulations.”
Something exploded by the side of his head. Pain. A rock?
Ran blinked, and the images of Gakur vanished. He was back in the catacombs. Holding the pickax in his hands and swinging it hard. The last strike had sent a piece of rock zinging into his head. Ran put the pickax down for a moment and wiped the side of his head. His dirty hand came away slick with blood. Not too much, thought Ran. The injury wouldn’t be bad. But he’d have to be careful. The lack of sleep last night was taking its toll on him. Still, he decided, it would never be as bad as what he had gone through with Akira.
He heard the rumbling of the cart as Kuva pushed it back toward their work area. Ran turned to look at his friend and then saw concern etched across his face.
“What’s the matter?”
Kuva stopped pushing, clearly out of breath. He leaned on the cart and took a few breaths. “Tried to get back here as fast as possible.” He heaved another breath. “I don’t know what happened. I was down by the conveyor belt putting in the rocks.”
“Yes?”
“It’s Mithrus,” said Kuva. “He came in and started talking to one of the other slaves. The slave pointed out Cassandra. Mithrus just grabbed her and took her away.”
“Where? Where did he bring her?”
Kuva shook his head. “No idea. He just took her out of the catacombs.”
Ran saw movement behind his friend.
Bagyo.
The beast looked at Ran. “You.”
Ran hefted the pickax and thought about trying to battle Bagyo right then. But that wouldn’t help Cassandra.
“What?” he said finally.
“You come. Mithrus want you.”
Ran eyed Kuva. “If I don’t come back, don’t wait for me.” He put the pickax down and followed Bagyo out.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Bagyo led Ran down a tunnel away from the catacombs and into another area of the mountain Ran hadn’t seen before. As they walked, the ground sloped upward and the stone floor gradually morphed into some sort of tiled floor. The walls were also polished smooth. Ran glanced at his reflection several times, amazed at the amount of filth he’d managed to acquire in only a few short days.
Bagyo glanced back a few times and sniffed at Ran. That made Ran nervous. He wondered if the body odor of the other slave was starting to wear off. If Bagyo was able to smell through Ran’s attempt at masking himself, then the beast might well know that Ran had indeed been inside the conveyor-belt shaft last night.
Ahead of them, Ran saw several of Mithrus’s guards armed with short spears standing post beside a large stone door. On the doors themselves was some sort of regal seal. Probably something denoting the House of Zal, Ran decided.
As they drew closer, the guards sprang to attention, and one of them stepped forward to challenge Bagyo. “What business do you have here?”
Bagyo nudged Ran forward. “Mithrus tell me bring this one here.”
The guard looked at Bagyo and then at Ran. Finally he nodded once. “Very well. We will escort him from here. Go back to the catacombs, beast.”
Ran saw Bagyo frown and then turn away. As he did so, Ran thought he saw a glint of sadness in the beast’s eyes. Bagyo took one final sniff at Ran and then plodded back down the corridor toward the work area in the catacombs.
The guard watched him walk away and then turned to Ran. “You come with us. If you try anything, we’re under orders to kill you. Do you understand?”
Ran shrugged. “Sure.” Rather than kill them both, Ran needed to know what had happened to Cassandra. There would be time enough later to settle scores.
The other guard pulled back on the door and waited until the massive portal swung open. Both guards then took up a position behind Ran, with their spears aimed right at the small of his back.
“Move.”
Ran felt the tip of one spear bite into his back and started walking. The corridor was tiled like the one they’d just left, but the walls were covered with a variety of tapestries and paintings. All of them were of Zal. Ran managed to contain the smirk that desperately wanted to bloom across his face. Each tapestry or painting grew more grandiose than its predecessor, showing Zal in a variety of poses and heroic actions—none of which seemed to match the Zal that Ran had seen on his first day inside the mountain. It became obvious to Ran that Zal had a grossly inflated sense of self. But that was useful to Ran; he now knew one of Zal’s weaknesses: his ego.
They turned left abruptly when the corridor stopped short. Farther down, a set of glass doors barred their way. As they approached, however, these swung open and permitted them access to a grand throne room. As they walked, Ran could see more guards, Mithrus, Iqban, and then on a throne three times his size, sat Zal.
He was dressed in several layers of gilded robes intricately woven with gold thread and studded with jewels. Those clothes must be worth more than this entire mountain, thought Ran. The guards brought him to within ten yards of the throne and then bade him stop.
Zal dismissed the guards with a wave of his hand. “Is this him?”
Mithrus, standing nearby, nodded. “Indeed, your grace.”
Zal glanced at Iqban. “And this is the one you sold me, is that correct?”
“The one you said looked clever, yes, your grace.”
Zal humphed. “Indeed. Well, apparently he’s been quite clever already.” His eyes came to rest on Ran. “Isn’t that true?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Ran. “I’ve been working hard in the catacombs.”
“And apparently trying to figure out how to escape as well,” said Zal. He nodded to Mithrus. “Bring her in.”
Mithrus, in turn, nodded to several of his guards. They left the throne room and returned a few moments later. Ran turned.
Cassandra.
She struggled against her captors as they dragged her into the throne room, but stopped when she saw Ran standing there. Her eyes asked him what he was doing there. Ran merely shrugged. What else could he say? He didn’t yet know why they’d been brought here.
The guards dragged Cassandra over to stand next to Ran. When they were both in front of Zal, the small king leaned back in his throne and examined his fingernails. After a few moments, he sighed and looked at them both.
“So, Mithrus here tells me you two have been plotting to escape from my mountain.”
Ran shook his head. “As I said earlier, I’ve been working hard in the catacombs. I can’t see how anyone could escape from this place.”
“So you’ve resigned yourself to the fact that this will be your home from now on?” asked Zal.
“Absolutely,” said Ran. “I intend to do my best with whatever time I have left.”
“Excellent,” said Zal. “I’m thrilled to hear you say that.” He looked at Cassandra. “And you, my dear? What sort of things have you been up to in the catacombs?”
Cassandra eyed him and then took a breath. “Swinging a pickax at a rock wall for hours upon hours until my hands bleed. Then I cart away everything I break from the wall and pour it into the conveyor belt.” Her mouth twisted a bit. “It’s truly rewarding work.”
Zal nocked his head to one side, and the smile on his face continued to grow. “Marvelous. I’m so glad you’re enjoying yourself. To hear Mithrus talk, I would have thought my hospitality was unwelcome. That perhaps you two were giving serious thought to escaping from my lovely home here.”
Cassandra smiled, this time far more sweetly. “Why on earth would you think that?”
Zal nodded at Mithrus. “He told me one of his informants whispered something about a plot to escape. Can you believe that? Granted, Mithrus is a suspicious type, anyway. And perhaps he doesn’t think much of your suitor there—”
“He’s not my suitor,” said Cassandra. “He’s just another slave I met in the catacombs.”
Zal’s smile deepened. “Really? And did you find him attractive? Perhaps you two have even been intimate back in the pens? Have you conjugated and lived out your torrid fantasies yet?”
Cassandra said nothing for a moment. Ran watched her struggle to control her temper. Eventually, she took a deep breath and kept looking right at Zal. “No.”
“Which question were you answering?” asked Zal.
“All of them,” said Cassandra without blinking. Even if he hadn’t been standing near her, Ran could probably have felt the heat emanating from her body. Cassandra’s features looked as though they were completely immobile, as if anything more than a feather would make her explode.
Ran marveled at her self-control. For a princess, it must have been nearly intolerable to be spoken to as Zal had done. Add to that the ignominy of being held captive as a slave and it was a wonder Cassandra hadn’t simply tried to kill everyone in the mountain for forcing her to endure such pedestrian treatment.
Zal rubbed his nose for a moment and then sighed. “Well, it certainly seems as if everything is in order in the catacombs.” He looked at Mithrus. “I told you there wasn’t a problem. Sometimes it’s just a matter of talking to people. Ask them the right questions and you find out the truth behind everything. Clearly, that’s exactly what I needed to do here.” He looked back at Ran and Cassandra. “Thank you for taking the time to come and answer my queries. I really appreciate that.”
“We didn’t exactly have a choice,” said Ran. “You sent armed guards to collect us.”
Zal shrugged. “Sometimes slaves can become somewhat . . . unruly. I learned that the hard way at the very start of this little venture I’m on. Give a slave too much freedom and they will no longer do what needs to be done. Give them too little freedom and they will resent you and quest for more. But give them just enough and they will work hard enough for your purposes while being too exhausted to do much else. It’s a philosophy I’ve found works wonders with people.”
Ran wasn’t sure to say to that so he stayed quiet. Cassandra still seemed too upset to utter a word.
Zal eyed Ran. “Not that I believe a single thing you’ve told me, of course.”
Ran shook his head and started to protest, but Zal cut him off with a hand held up. “Don’t bother. There’s another thing I’ve learned in all my years: it’s that people always lie when they think it will help their situation in life. You two are clearly planning something. I don’t know exactly what it is yet, but I will find out.”
Ran steeled himself. Most likely Zal would devise some sort of torture to extract the information. Ran wasn’t too concerned. The elders at the Nine Daggers clan had put him through a very rigorous interrogation resistance course, designed to show Ran what the real world was like and how cruel it could be. The course had not been pleasant, but upon finishing it, Ran felt much better prepared for any eventualities that would involve torture.
Like what Zal was presumably planning.
Cassandra glanced at him, and Ran gave her a barely perceptible shrug. He needed to let her know that he would be fine. He wanted to say it to her, but then there was no telling how Zal would react to that. He might think Ran was boasting about his efforts to resist torture and intensify the process to try to break him faster. Ran felt confident he could hold out, at least for a few days. Hopefully by then he would devise a new plan for getting them all out of this horrible place.
The most important thing was giving them just enough information to let them think Ran was cooperating. If he could come up with a convincing story, then that would buy him time away from the pain. If there was one thing the elders had taught him above all others, it was that everyone breaks under torture. Because of that, the goal was to mitigate the amount of information disclosed. As far as Ran knew, Zal had no idea he was a shadow warrior. Perhaps he didn’t even know what a shadow warrior was. At least right now, it appeared the only thing Zal wanted were the details of the escape plan. If Ran had some time to himself, he would be able to create a story that would both satisfy Zal and preserve the escape plan.
He hoped.
He wouldn’t know until he got into the chamber and they started working on him. Some torturers were extremely skilled, he knew. Others had no idea what they were doing, aside from producing massive amounts of pain in their captives. There was danger to both, but Ran preferred ending up in an experienced torturer’s hands rather than an amateur’s. An amateur would keep going until he killed the prisoner. An experienced torturer would know when to stop and when to go.
Ran took a breath. Whatever Zal had in mind, he hoped it would happen soon. If Zal waited too long, Ran would grow weaker in the catacombs, reducing his ability to resist torture even further. As it was, Ran was tired from last night’s nocturnal foray. He wanted desperately to close his eyes and go to sleep.
He couldn’t.
“You look tired,” said Zal just then. “Perhaps you didn’t sleep well last night?”
“I slept fine,” said Ran. “But the pleasure of working for you is exhausting. There are only so many times a man can swing that pickax and not expect to be exhausted by it.”
“But surely one such as yourself should be well-accustomed to this type of activity?”
Ran held his ton
gue. What was Zal implying? Did he know Ran was a shadow warrior after all?
“Being a warrior-for-hire and all,” said Zal. “You don’t get to do that sort of work unless you’re in reasonably good condition, right?”
“I would argue that even being in shape is no match for the catacombs.” Ran rubbed his right shoulder. “I’m feeling pain in places I’ve never felt it before.” This was a lie, of course. As tired as he was, Ran wasn’t too troubled with the physical labor aspect. He hoped that by rubbing his shoulder, it would give Zal an idea of where to start with the torture. If Ran reacted strongly to any prodding in that area, then they would think the effect was worse than it actually was. Deception was paramount, after all, if he hoped to eventually survive this and escape from the mountain.
He still had a reconnaissance mission to undertake at the behest of his clan.
Briefly, he thought about Ryu and whether the falk had flown back to Chulal or not. Perhaps even now Tanka was telling the clan that Ran had been lost. Would they ever send another shadow warrior out to look for him? No. That was the nature of his life. Accept the role and the risks that went along with it. Ran and others like him knew that if they got into trouble, no one was coming to save them. In some ways, he liked that autonomy. But now was one of the times he wished he had a friend to call upon.
Zal cleared his throat. “Well, I think this has gone on long enough. After all, I have a schedule to keep. Things to do and whatnot. I’m sure you understand. And whether you do or do not is irrelevant to me anyway. What will be, will be.”
Ran nodded. “Let’s get on with it then.”
“Agreed,” said Zal. “I admire the way you’re handling this. Others in your position wouldn’t be so keen to start.”
“Sometimes you have to accept the inevitable,” said Ran, still rubbing his shoulder. “I have.”
Zal smiled. “Excellent.” He turned to Mithrus. “You may take her away and do with her whatever you wish. Knowing you, that will involve some sort of tawdry action that will no doubt besmirch the young woman for the rest of her life.”
Ran stepped forward. “She had nothing to do with this!”
