The magistrate closed his ledger and shot her a deadly look. “I am finished here,” he told her. “And so are you, Thazienne Uskevren.”
The two guards dragged Tazi out into the cool, evening air. The distant roll of thunder echoed, and Tazi half-consciously realized that the nightly rains were about to commence. The Thayan sentries took her through to a rather large building annexed to the magistrate’s offices. To Tazi, it looked like nothing so much as a grandiose stable. After the initial shock of her sentence, Tazi was numb. Now, her mind was thawing, and she began to study her surroundings very carefully.
Two other men stood guard in front of a pair of large double doors. One of her escorts approached them, and he and they exchanged a word. Tazi supposed it was a password of sorts, but she suspected that as the two easily recognized each other, the safeguard was merely a formality. The two doormen slid the long beam aside that secured the doors across the center and swung them in for Tazi and her party. She was shoved into the black maw, and the first thing that struck Tazi was the smell. It was beyond nauseating. As her hands were still bound behind her back, she couldn’t block her nose, but she stopped in her tracks and turned her head aside, her face twisted in disgust. The guard who struck her earlier, obviously used to the smell of human waste and sickness, laughed as he shoved her harder.
“Sorry to offend yer sensibilities, ‘milady,’ ” he mocked. He and his cohort exchanged a raucous laugh.
As they pushed her through the building which had been a stable for centaurs some years past, Tazi was horrified at what she saw. The whole structure was two hundred feet long and one hundred fifty feet wide. There were rows and rows of former stalls. These stalls had been converted into pens of steel and wood. The metal bars were woven so that each cluster of folk could see the other captives, and there were a few openings in each cage to allow small articles to be passed in and out by the guards and the occupants within. But the pens were placed just far enough apart so that the slaves could not reach their neighbors. Nevertheless, Tazi could see that some tried.
The first pen she passed held four men inside and one small girl. All of them were nearly naked and Tazi was shocked by how thin the girl was. Every one of her ribs was clearly visible under skin that looked like it had been stretched too tight. She was whimpering slightly, but none of the adult men raised a hand or offered a word in comfort. They were sitting about with dull, listless eyes.
In the pen adjacent to theirs, which held two women, that was not the same case. One of the prisoners, with matted hair that might have been the same color as the little girl’s, strained her thin arm through the cage and called out a name. Tazi winced when she saw the festering wounds on the woman’s arm. She had rubbed it raw trying to comfort what Tazi guessed must have been her daughter. One of the guards stationed intermittently along the aisle leaned across and hit the woman with a short staff.
Tazi’s escorts pushed her along the poorly lit aisle. Only a few torches were blazing, scattered sporadically through the stable. Underneath the smell of vomit and waste, she could also detect the odor of damp decay. She rightly suspected that these stables were never even given the most basic maintenance, not even mucking. Anger and disgust filled her up and pushed aside any fear she might have felt, however fleeting. Now, in a red haze, Tazi was searching for any way out. If she had still possessed her lock pick, the cage itself would have been simple enough. Though a heavy length of chain and a large padlock sealed off the cage door, the locks were old and rusty. Tazi recognized the style and knew they presented no challenge, but she was empty handed. She suspected her best time to flee would be when the guards actually unlocked the pen.
However the deeper she went into the stable, the more difficult she found it to scheme. The conditions only worsened. Just like the first set of pens, obvious families were kept apart. The better to demoralize them, Tazi thought. And each prisoner was nearly nude, their emaciated bodies covered by varying degrees of sores. It was a rag-tag collection as well. Not only were there humans imprisoned, but halflings and other creatures Tazi could not easily recognize, partly because of the poor lighting and partly because of their filth. Only one or two looked up as she was marched past. Tazi was overwhelmed by their unresponsive, sunken eyes. Her jaw was beginning to ache because she had it clenched so tight. The buying and selling of living creatures was something she could never reconcile herself with, and these images were beyond haunting. As she neared the end of the aisle, her captors stopped her and spun her to face one of the pens.
“Yer new home,” sneered the guard
Tazi was only able to see one other occupant. All she could make out was a small, dark shape in the far corner of the ten-foot-by-ten-foot cage. Before she could do or say anything, one of the guards spun her around again and slammed her back against the cage door. It was the one who had hit her earlier. He pushed her so hard into the door that her hands were bruised against the cage bars. His sweaty face was only a few inches from hers. And there was no mistaking the leer on it.
“Well, ‘milady,’ ” he said, “as you may have noticed, you’re a bit overdressed for your accommodations.”
“Am I?”
“I’ve been waiting for this since we took you from the tavern,” he sneered. “All right then, uniform of the day,” he ordered.
With callused hands, the lecherous guard grabbed the top of Tazi’s laced vest and started to tear it open. Tazi wasted no time. She grabbed a hold of the metal crossbar with her bound hands and braced herself. Then she brought up her left knee straight between his legs. The guard released his grip and staggered back, cupping himself and cursing. Still gripping the bar for support, Tazi swung her right leg around full force and caught the pain-blinded guard solidly on his chin. He fell to the floor, semi-conscious. She released her hold on the bars and started to run, but the other escort, still laughing about his friend’s condition, lost no time catching Tazi from behind.
He wrapped his arms around her in a powerful bear hug. She slammed her head back into his forehead and brought her right boot down on his foot, crushing at least one of his toes in the process. He loosened his hold, and Tazi slipped free. By this time, though, some of the other guards had arrived, and Tazi, bound and unarmed, was outnumbered. As the reinforcements started to unlock her pen, the first guard had recovered enough to charge at her with a murderous gleam in his eye.
Two of the others stopped him.
“Let it go,” one of them said to the enraged guard. “She’ll get hers soon enough. Remember?” he finished, and Tazi wondered at the last, cryptic remark. The injured guard shrugged his way out of his comrades’ restraining grip.
“All right,” he muttered. He stared at Tazi once more and seemed mollified at the thought of her “getting” hers. His foul humor was almost restored by the time he helped his partner up.
“Let’s get a drink,” Tazi heard him tell the other, and they sauntered off.
The remaining guard swung open the cage door and pushed Tazi inside. With her hands still bound behind her, she lost her balance and fell to the dirt floor. As she struggled to turn around, she heard the ominous snap of the lock’s closure.
“Damn.”
Tazi squirmed around on her backside to get a better look at her cellmate. The dark figure remained in the corner of the cage and. Judging by its size, Tazi suspected it was another child. She was certain he or she must have been terrified.
“It’s all right,” she said soothingly. “I’m not going to hurt you. I was only hurting those men so that we could get away.”
Thinking that her words had made the child feel safe, Tazi watched as the small shape separated itself from the shadowy corner and moved slowly a few feet into the dim light. She gasped in surprise at her error: her roommate was not a child at all, but a dwarf.
Tazi initially thought the dwarf must have been a prisoner for a long time. His coloring looked terribly off. She assumed it was a male because it had a ratty beard, but she wasn’t
sure. Tazi remembered Cale had once told her that some of the females sported them as well. He was very gaunt compared to the few dwarves she had met in her life.
“They’ve gone for now,” she told him. She moved her bound arms a little and said, “Could you help me untie my hands?”
The dwarf squatted down and turned his back to her. Tazi was taken aback because she had initially thought he was scared and that was the reason why he was unable to help her. Now, as she got a better look at him, she changed her mind. His coloring, she realized, was not off. It was naturally gray. And even though he was not as stocky as the other dwarves she knew, Tazi could see his arms were wiry and muscled. He wasn’t wasted; that was his natural state. Tazi searched her memory and came up with a name: duergar. He wouldn’t help her, if what she had heard about the creatures was even partially true.
She shrugged and moved to her knees. Tazi stretched her arms down as far as possible and sat back, fitting her backside between the circle of her tied arms. She straightened her legs in the air and formed a V with her body. She passed her bound hands under the length of her legs and over her feet so that they were in front. The leather thong that tied them together had a piece that dangled somewhat. Grabbing it with her teeth, she started the process of pulling it apart.
Between mouthfuls of leather, she grumbled at the dwarf, “This would go much faster with a little bit of help, you know.” The only response she got was best described as a snort.
Once her hands were free, she resisted the urge to throw the line away in anger. Instead, she tucked it in her waistband, thinking to herself that she never knew when it might come in handy. Tazi massaged her wrists, and winced at the raw spots. As she circled her arms around in an effort to restore the circulation, she regarded her cellmate once more.
He wore a tight, long-sleeved tunic and pants, though they were both ragged. Tazi wondered how he had managed to keep his attire. Everyone else she had seen was nude. Then she realized she had kept her own clothes, so perhaps he had put up a good fight as well. Like most dwarves, he had hair around the side of his head but was bald on top. His beard was short and hung in little, matted braids. The brief glance he had given her revealed he had the blackest eyes. Tazi tried once more to make conversation.
“How long have you been here?” she asked.
Silence.
Tazi decided to give up for the moment. She settled her back against one of the cage walls and started to watch the guards, learning their patterns.
After an hour, Tazi straightened as a guard approached, carrying something at waist height. On closer inspection, it turned out to be a tray. He stopped at her cell and placed the tray on the ground near one of the small, deliberate openings between the bars.
“Back away,” he ordered Tazi and the duergar. When they obliged, the sentinel slipped two bowls into the cell, picked up his tray and continued to make his way down the aisle. Tazi watched as he repeated the same steps at each pen.
The dwarf snatched one of the bowls and moved to the far corner of the pen. By the sound of the slurps, Tazi guessed the stuff was edible. She picked up the remaining bowl and sniffed it. It would never win any cooking awards, but it smelled all right. She sipped it experimentally and realized the broth was little more than lukewarm water. Tazi began to understand why the others were so emaciated. Not sure when the next serving might arrive, Tazi gulped hers down. The guard returned to collect the dishes, and they doused the torches as they passed.
The dwarf continued to ignore her, and she pillowed her head on her arms and lay down for a few hours of sleep. After that, she would figure out what to do next.
Tazi awoke suddenly. Lying on her side, she pushed herself upright and leaned on one arm. Blinking sleep from her eyes, she looked around. For one moment, she was disoriented. She didn’t know if it was day or night. Only a distant torch flickered, providing little illumination. As soon as Tazi spotted the bars though, she remembered everything.
A shuffling sound drew her attention to the door of her cage—the same sound that had roused her. Tazi jumped to a squatting position and placed both her hands on the ground in front of her. From outside the pen, she recognized the murmur of the lecherous guard’s voice. He was chuckling softly about something with his cohort. Tazi heard them grapple with something decidedly metallic and realized they were fumbling with the lock to her prison. Then there was the telltale snick as the lock disengaged.
Come to finish me off, she wondered silently, or perhaps take up where you left off on my vest? Tazi decided to remain silent; better to let them think she was asleep and give her the advantage, however brief. Her breathing quickened, and she tensed. She recognized that their amorous advances might yet prove her means of escape.
Come on then, boys, she thought. Come on.
The heavy shuffling continued, and Tazi found herself squinting, straining to see what was going on. The noise didn’t sound like the men moving about. She turned to see if the dwarf was awake as well, but she couldn’t tell in the darkness. Tazi cursed to herself and planned on working alone. A strange gurgle puzzled her, and she didn’t know what to make of the sound other than knowing it was in her pen. In a burst of light, the mystery was solved.
The guards relit most of the gutted torches. By their flames, Tazi had her answer. Lumbering just inside the pen was a creature almost eight feet tall. It was covered in short, gray-green fur, mottled in a few places. The body was generally humanoid, but its hands ended in claws. It had a yellowish mane and the head was hyenalike blended with something else. Instead of a canine snout, the creature’s nose resembled a pig’s snout. The creature was much beefier than any gnoll she’d ever come across—obviously well fed. She deduced that the animal was someone’s creation, a wizard’s experiment or even his pet. It was covered in rags and makeshift bits of armor. A sword dangled from its belt, but Tazi knew that weapon was not what made the gnoll dangerous. What made it truly lethal was the fact that someone, the guards more than likely, had taken a smoldering stick and put out its eyes.
There were other wounds, but none as severe as the ones to its face. It clawed at them piteously. She inched back and turned to check on the dwarf once again. In the torchlight, she could see that the duergar was very aware of their predicament. Even with an ally, they were both still unarmed. Backing toward the dwarf, she faced the monster holding her breath.
For one moment, no one moved.
The lecherous guard let out a sudden whoop, and his friend moved around the cage near Tazi and the dwarf. He rammed his longstaff in toward the gnoll and jabbed it in an open wound at its side. The now-enraged beast moved toward Tazi, flailing its claws.
The other guards surrounded the cage, calling and shouting. Tazi thought they were trying to anger the beast until she heard numbers—they were calling out bets, wagering on how quickly she and the dwarf would die. As the gnoll lumbered closer, Tazi tossed aside all other thoughts and focused on the threat before her.
Another jab incited the beast further. It charged Tazi and the dwarf. They split up and each ran to a different side of the cage. The gnoll smashed into the bars and howled. The guards stabbed at it further, only this time the gnoll stayed in place and swung its long arms around him, trying to strike its tormentors. Tazi and the dwarf met up on the other side of the pen.
“If you can maneuver behind it and get low,” Tazi whispered to him, “I think I could knock it over. A good crash into the metal bars, and we might be able to knock it senseless.” The dwarf just ignored her.
The sentries stopped their torture of the gnoll, and it turned toward Tazi like the beast was regaining its bearings somewhat. It stood tall and raised its odd snout in the air. It snuffled from one side and the other.
It won’t take long to sniff us out in this little pen, she thought.
The beast began to shamble in Tazi’s direction. With each hesitant step, the gnoll swung one of its massive arms out in a wide arc. Tazi could hear his claws whistle through the air.
She looked to the dwarf in hopes that he might attempt her plan and move up behind the beast, but he was trying to climb the cage and get above the creature’s reach. But the guards decided that was not allowed, and several of them used their staffs to smash at the dwarf’s hands until he fell. Tazi felt the cage bars behind her and realized she had no where else to go.
“Don’t be shy, ‘milady,’ ” she heard from behind. And she felt the sharp jab of a staff in her back as the lecherous guard forced her closer to the gnoll.
Tazi whipped around and grabbed the staff before the startled guard could retract it. Pulling it about two feet in, Tazi leveraged the weapon against a bar and pulled it toward herself as hard as she could. The wooden stick snapped and she was left with a small club. She turned back in time to duck as the gnoll nearly took off her head. Trapped in the corner, Tazi had nowhere to run. The gnoll smelled her and yanked her to her feet. The beast’s claws tore into the flesh of her upper arms. The gnoll raised her high overhead, nearly smashing her skull against the pen’s ceiling. Tazi gripped the club with both hands and swung it full force against the beast’s head. The weapon made a solid crack as it struck the gnoll’s jaw. It screamed in a mad frenzy and tossed Tazi across the cell, unknowingly at the dwarf.
The dwarf didn’t even attempt to break Tazi’s fall, but hurried out of the way. The gnoll had caught his scent by this time and made a move for the duergar. But the dwarf nimbly dropped low and rolled beneath its legs, pausing only long enough to deliver a devastating punch to the beast’s groin. The dwarf clambered away, and the gnoll continued to swing its massive arms, desperate to claw either of its opponents.
Tazi regained her footing and slipped past the monster, but the gnoll turned and sprang into the air after her. They both tumbled to the ground. The gnoll flipped Tazi onto her back and pinned her with its massive bulk. Tazi looked up into the horrendous visage of the beast, with its blood and pus-matted fur and snapping jaws a few inches from her face. She only had one chance. Just as the beast reared back its head, opening its mouth wide to rip out her throat, Tazi freed her hands enough to use the wooden shaft again. When the beast descended on her, she wedged the club between its yellowed teeth, barely keeping its head above hers. Tazi twisted her head to one side and called to the dwarf.
The Crimson Gold Page 8
