The answer: for his child, and for the good of the world. With Soulhunger, Taiana could search the Keeps to find Jaia and other Bucelarii to take up arms against the Sage. It was a gamble—fiery hell, he wasn’t certain he could trust her, not after everything he’d learned—but he had promised to help her.
“Take it, but remember that it is for you alone to carry.”
“But what about you?” Taiana asked. “What if the Elivasti find you?”
“Do you remember what I have spent the last fifty years of my life doing?” The Hunter forced a confident grin. “I have dedicated myself to slipping through the shadows and moving about unseen. There are none in the south of Einan that can match my skill at assassination. It is a skill that will serve me well here.” If he ran across any Elivasti, he would deal with them the way he dealt with any threat.
“And take these as well.” He stripped out of his leather armor, sword belt, and baldric. He kept only his dark cloak and a pair of plain, utilitarian daggers—they were all he needed.
She hesitated before taking them. “I fear I will not see you again, and you only just returned to me.” Her hard, commanding façade cracked, revealing the tender, affectionate woman he remembered.
“I will find you,” the Hunter said, gripping her hands in his. “Soulhunger will draw me to your side. Nothing—not the Elivasti, the Abiarazi, or the gods themselves—will keep me away.”
Again, he caught the strange expression on her face as she pulled him into an embrace.
“Go,” she whispered in his ear, “but do not put yourself in unnecessary danger. There are those even we cannot help.”
The Hunter drew back. “And that doesn’t bother you? That they are taking children into Khar’nath?”
“More than you could possibly imagine.” Taiana’s eyes darkened. “I only need to think of the Elivasti dragging Jaia into the pit in chains, and the thought sets my blood boiling. But that is not our mission right now.” Her face hardened, and grim resolve shone in her expression. “We must focus on freeing our brethren and finding our daughter. We need warriors to fight the Elivasti. Just the four of us Bucelarii are not enough to overthrow four hundred Elivasti soldiers. Arudan is in no condition to fight.”
The Hunter hated to admit it, but she wasn’t wrong. He couldn’t stand the idea of inactivity, of simply sitting by and doing nothing while children were being harmed. But with just four fighting men and a pale-skinned former Secret Keeper, the odds were firmly stacked against them.
“But go, Hai'atim. My love.” She pressed a quick kiss to his lips. “Go and return to me soon so we can find our daughter together.”
The Hunter gave her hand a little squeeze then nodded and strode from the room. He found Garnos waiting for him near the front door of the house.
“Let’s go,” he told the Elivasti. “Take me to Khar’nath.”
He fell into step beside Garnos as the man descended the stairs to the lower floor and, glancing up and down the empty streets, slipped into the night. The light of the stars added to the soft blue glow of the Keeps, providing ample light for them to see their way.
The Hunter watched Garnos from the corner of his eyes as they hurried through the streets. The Elivasti moved without a word, and he made remarkably little noise despite his heavy blue armor. The man, like so much else in Enarium, was a mystery. He was Elivasti, yet he acted against the oath he and his kind had sworn to the Abiarazi. Not even Master Eldor had broken the vow of fealty—he had chosen death before dishonor.
“I may not be a mind-reader,” Garnos said after the Hunter’s fifth surreptitious glance, “but it doesn’t take one to know what you’re thinking.”
“And what am I thinking?” the Hunter demanded.
Garnos turned into a darkened alleyway between two stone buildings two and three stories tall, stopped, and turned to face him. “You’re wondering if you can trust me, and looking for the first sign of treachery so you can put a dagger in my back before I put one in yours.”
The Hunter inclined his head. “You’re not far off the mark.”
“You may not trust me,” Garnos said, “but Taiana does.”
“That’s not enough for me.” The Hunter folded his arms. It felt strange to be without his leather armor—he’d been wearing it for so long it almost was like a second skin. “I cannot trust anyone who would stand by while his kinsmen clap children in chains.”
“Are you telling me none of your kind ever did anything wrong?” Garnos raised an eyebrow. “There is not a drop of innocent blood on your hands, as a result of either your action or inaction?”
The Hunter had no response to that. His hands bore more blood than anyone would ever know. Some of it belonged to people that might not have had to die.
“I can understand the revulsion you feel.” Garnos’ violet eyes met his. “It is the same I feel when I see what my kinsmen are doing.”
“So why stand by and let it happen?” the Hunter asked. “Why not do something about it?”
“What do you think I’m doing?” Garnos’ voice turned sharp, edged with bitterness. “I am breaking the oath my people swore to the Abiarazi in the hope that Taiana can bring about change. Change that will prevent my son and daughter from sharing the fate of everyone else I know.”
The Hunter’s eyes narrowed. “From where I’m sitting, the Elivasti here have it far better than the Bucelarii or the humans.”
“Perhaps on the surface it may appear so,” Garnos snapped, “but the truth is that we are just as much captives here as the humans that occupy the Pit.”
“Except you wield the power.” The Hunter glared at him. “You hold the key that keeps them imprisoned.”
“And, as with anything else, abusing power taints its wielder more than those under its control.”
The Hunter snorted. “You’ll have to explain that one to me, Elivasti. How is a jailer as badly off as the poor bastard locked away in his cell?”
“You want explanation?” Garnos’ violet eyes flashed, and his voice rose in intensity if not in volume. “When I was a young man, I had a friend that was like a brother to me. A kinder, more honorable Elivasti could not be found in all of Einan. Then came the day that he was assigned to guarding the Pit and its prisoners. My assignment was to aid in the maintenance of the Pristine Enclosure. Our duties kept us apart for just a few short days, but when I saw him again, the friend I had known my entire life had changed.” The man gave a little shudder. “It was no man, but a monster.”
“What do you mean, a monster?”
“Precisely that,” Garnos said in a hard voice. “The kind, honorable Ustus I had known was gone, and in his place remained a cruelly sadistic thing. He laughed as he spoke of the torments he and his fellows inflicted upon their prisoners. Pitiful men and women that had done nothing more than try to eke out a miserable existence, tortured and beaten for the entertainment of the man that had once been my friend. Worse, the other Elivasti in his unit didn’t simply permit it, they encouraged it. He was rewarded for his cruelty and given a position of command in the Pit. Since that day, he and all the others like him have gone out of their way to make the lives of the poor souls below far worse than the living hell it already is.”
“But not you?” the Hunter asked. “Didn’t you say your place was in the Pit as well?”
Garnos nodded. “When I saw what they were doing, I demanded that I be given a posting in the Pit. But not so I could join in their inhumanities. Instead, I requested it so I might try to ameliorate the atrocities.”
“How’s that working out so far?” The Hunter didn’t bother to hide the anger in his voice.
“I have done what I could.” Remorse echoed in Garnos’ words. “When my life ends and death comes to claim me, I will die knowing that I tried.” His voice took on a bitter edge. “That is more than could be said for most of my kind.”
“You tried?” The Hunter’s fists clenched. “Trying is not enough. You must actually make a change.”
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br /> Garnos met the Hunter’s eyes unflinchingly. “I am doing what I can to atone for the barbarism and evil of the rest of my kind. You may not consider it enough, and that is your right. I leave it to the Long Keeper to decide.”
The Hunter could understand the sentiment—he’d spent the last months in pursuit of his own atonement. His mission to hunt down the Abiarazi on Einan had begun as a penance for killing Brother Securus, the Cambionari priest in Voramis. He’d continued killing demons when they murdered Bardin and threatened Hailen’s life. Ultimately, he’d accepted the task as his responsibility. His forefathers had nearly ruined the world, so he would do what he could to mitigate the suffering caused. Garnos was doing precisely as he was.
“Perhaps I may have misjudged you,” the Hunter said. The grudging admission was the closest he’d come to offering an apology. “Your help is appreciated, especially if you can get me within striking distance of the Sage.”
Garnos nodded. “As I told Taiana, I will see what I can find and send word the moment I have anything.”
“Then that will have to be enough.” The Hunter motioned toward the mouth of the alleyway. “But first, take me to Khar’nath.”
“This way,” Garnos said, continuing through the alley. “There are no gates leading out of the city, but there is another means of leaving.”
The narrow lane connected to a larger street that ran alongside the city wall. A short distance to the south, a stone stairway climbed the ten paces to the top of the wall. They walked along the parapet for a few dozen paces before they reached a section of wall that had crumbled. The wall was damaged enough that even Garnos could climb down with relative ease.
A few paces of flat ground surrounded the eastern walls of Enarium before the land rose to rugged, jagged mountains. The peaks to the east and south of the city rose higher than even the pointed tops of the blue-glowing Keeps. The city would only be visible from the west—the direction he’d come—but the Empty Mountains provided concealment from the three other directions.
He followed Garnos along the outside of the walls, clinging to the shadows by instinct. Starlight alone barely gave them enough illumination to see, but Garnos seemed to know the way well enough. They traveled a few dozen paces to the north before the Elivasti turned up a small path that cut around a shorter mountain peak.
“Only a few of my brethren know these paths exist,” Garnos said. “Ustus and I would sneak outside the walls to play in these mountains.”
The path wound through the mountains and provided cover for them to get within a hundred paces of Hellsgate unnoticed. However, their steps led toward a broad expanse of flat, rocky ground easily fifty paces across, directly beneath the walls of Hellsgate.
Tension thrummed within the Hunter as he scanned the walls for any sign of watchers. Though he could see none, his wariness didn’t diminish. A cold breeze wafted past his face as he loped along beside Garnos across the empty land and ducked into the shadows of the cliffs beyond. He felt the familiar thrill of sneaking through the night; it reminded him of his years spent as an assassin of Voramis before the Bloody Hand had come for him.
Thoughts of the Bloody Hand brought his mind to Kiara. He’d been so worried about Hailen he had all but forgotten about her.
“The woman that was with the boy,” he hissed at Garnos. “Is she with the Sage as well?”
Garnos’ face twisted in contemplation. “No, our master only claimed the boy. I do not know what happened to the woman. If she still lives, you will find her in the Pit.”
The words drove a dagger of ice into the Hunter’s gut. Kiara had tried to help him on the road to Enarium, had fought beside him and protected Hailen. Were it not for her, the Stone Guardians would have killed the boy. He couldn’t let her suffer whatever horrible fate awaited her in the Pit.
I owe her better than that.
His heart sank as he turned to Garnos. “I have to go into Khar’nath.”
Chapter Thirteen
“Are you mad?” Garnos hissed. “There is no way I can walk you through Hellsgate.”
“Then we find another way into the Pit.” The Hunter refused to give up. “If I can’t go in the front, I’ll climb down the back.”
Garnos shook his head. “There is a reason why this side of Khar’nath is unguarded. The walls of the Pit are all the deterrence required.”
At that moment, they came around the last rocky outcropping, and the Hunter got his first proper view of Khar’nath. The rugged land ran for ten paces from where he stood, then dropped off steeply to disappear from his sight. But there was no mistaking the bright red glow emanating from the walls of the Pit. The brightness seared his eyes, painful after the darkness and shadows outside Enarium.
The Hunter’s gut tightened at the sight. The last time he’d been in this place, he and the rest of his kind had faced extinction. He could almost feel the terrible heat of the flames from that night, smell the burning sulfur and the scent of charred Abiarazi flesh.
But there were no flames, no blistering heat. Instead, the walls of Khar’nath were lined with crystals that filled the night with a bright crimson glow. What had looked like fire was actually the red brilliance emanating from the jagged shards that covered the wall like glittering daggers of bloodstained diamonds. The radiance let off a warmth that drove back the mountain chill and lent the air a near-overwhelming humidity, but it was nothing like the heat from his memories. The smell that hung thick on the air lacked the sulfur and brimstone he remembered.
Instead, it reeked of human detritus.
The Hunter estimated the Pit was at least a third of a league across and thirty paces deep, with the walls covered by crystals. Below, a sea of ragged shelters and crude shanties spread in a haphazard disarray as far as the eye could see. Wood, canvas, and cloth had been stitched together like some horrifying patchwork that offered pitiful protection against the mountain chill, sun, and rain.
Moans, cries, and the occasional scream drifted up from the Pit, accompanied by a stench that twisted the Hunter’s stomach. He scarcely dared to breathe, so thick and putrid was the odor of rot, mud, filth, human offal, blood, and death. It was like some enormous pigsty, yet farmers treated their hogs with far more humanity than this.
Rage flared in the Hunter’s chest at the sight of so much suffering. He whirled on Garnos. “What in the Keeper’s name is this?”
“It is the Pit.” Shame burned in Garnos’ eyes as he spoke. “It is as it has always been. Since before my time, and before my father’s time, and before his father.”
“I don’t care how long it has been like this!” The Hunter’s voice rose to a furious shout. “Why are those people in there?”
A long moment of silence passed before Garnos shook his head. “Because our master commanded it.”
The quiet resignation in the Elivasti’s voice chilled the Hunter to the bone. He does not question why they locked humans in the Pit. He simply accepts it. As Garnos had said, this had existed for centuries, perhaps longer, and it had become a part of the life of an Elivasti in Enarium.
“What in the bloody hell does the Sage want with all these people?” the Hunter snarled. “Why does he have them penned in here like Keeper-damned animals?”
“I don’t know.” Remorse echoed in Garnos’ voice. “All I know is that our master has commanded it, and we must obey. Why he adds to his collection of miserable souls, I could not say. Until yesterday, no more than a few of his most trusted have ever left Enarium or set eyes on our masters. We received instructions and were expected to obey. It is the oath we swore to the Abiarazi.”
Again, the oath of the Elivasti! Master Eldor had sacrificed his life rather than defy the Sage’s order to stop the Hunter or die trying. But that had been a noble decision. There is no nobility in this.
“Trust me, I have not simply accepted my master’s orders without question.” Garnos almost sounded apologetic. “I have spoken with many of my brethren about our…duties. Most follow without
question, preferring things continue as they always have. Our fathers passed down the knowledge of our service to the Abiarazi, and our fathers’ fathers. It is as much a part of our lives in Enarium as the rising sun and the stars at night.”
“The misery and anguish you cause has become so commonplace you have accepted it.” The words left a bitter taste in the Hunter’s mouth. He’d brought more than his fair share of suffering to the world, yet he’d never come close to inflicting suffering on this scale.
“What choice is there?” Garnos’ eyes hardened. “Death would be a far kinder fate than what awaits me and my family if it is discovered that I am working with my master’s enemies.”
“Then go.” The Hunter raised a clenched fist. “Scurry back into the shadows and your life of comfort while others suffer at the hands of you and your kind. I, for one, will not stand silent and watch. I will enter the Pit alone.”
Garnos shook his head. “There is one way into Khar’nath, and that is through Hellsgate.”
“And climbing down the walls.” The Hunter shot a glance at the glowing crystals protruding from the walls of the Pit—they offered plenty of hand and footholds. He could make the descent in a matter of minutes.
“Do you know how many of those imprisoned within have believed the walls of Khar’nath their path to freedom?” Garnos frowned. “Most gave up within the first minute, for those voracious shards shredded their flesh to ribbons. The stubborn few that persisted died of blood loss before they made it halfway up. Those crystals are sharper than spikes, and far crueler than mere steel.”
The Hunter snorted. “Perhaps the humans could not escape, but I am no human. Razor-sharp crystals or no, that is my way in.” If Kiara was down there, he had to at least find her, let her know he hadn’t abandoned her. He owed her that much for what she’d done for Hailen.
“Even if you do survive the climb down,” Garnos told him, resignation in his voice, “you will either have to risk the crystals again or break through an army of Elivasti to leave the Pit.”
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