Cyrenna knelt down behind the beam and began working on Perseathea‘s chains.
"The moment has come.” Masseeia arched an eyebrow, her words sapping like syrup. “Little Askca is about to suffer the family tradition."
Perseathea swallowed hard into her throat. She loved Essicka. Essicka was her only sister. For a moment in the old stable, she had found her long lost sister. But Masseeia’s jibe rushed all the poison of betrayal back, stabbing it cold into Perseathea’s heart. Essicka was her sister, but Askca… Askca was her child.
“Do not even speak her name.” Perseathea graveled out.
"What's the matter?" Masseeia leaned into her with a sly grin. "Don’t like the thought of what your little girl is about to suffer? Know it all too well, do you?" Cyrenna, overhearing the First Commander’s antagonizing, ceased her manipulation on the chains, knowing better than to be this close if Queen Perseathea did rouse.
"Askca is going to be laid wide open out there.” Masseeia paused, relishing the idea. “In front of Gragore. In front of you, and there's nothing you can do to stop it. You’ve failed her, Perseathea. There‘s no denying that."
Perseathea tensed every muscle at Masseeia‘s words, desiring more than anything to be free of her chains and ripping the woman‘s throat out. “You may be right.”
“Of course.”
“I have failed my daughter and I know I‘m about to die. But there is one thing I can do first.”
“What’s that?”
“I can push you straight into hell.”
Perseathea busted against her chains, purpling the skin on her arms as she strained toward Masseeia. Cyrenna stayed place behind the Queen, eyeing the chains nervously. The links still held, but not all the locks were linked up.
“And I will drag you down with me.” Masseeia smiled back at the Queen with doe eyes, her tone unaffected. Cool. “We’ll go together.”
Perseathea stopped her fighting, calming herself. Realizing that now wasn’t the time. She would have to wait for a better opportunity.
“A dark fate chases after you Masseeia.” Perseathea paused. “It craves you.”
“I’ll take my chances.” The First Commander shrugged off the comment. “Today is a day I’ve longed for. Ached for. Your death comes as sweet as honey to my lips, and Askca, well, young Askca has so much more to anticipate, doesn’t she?” Masseeia prowled back into Perseathea’s face, slinking like a snake. “Your precious little daughter… you’ve kept her safe at such a cost for all these cycles, and look where it has gotten you.”
Perseathea glowered, hostility pumping her veins hot, but she forced her calm, focusing only on the chains now hanging a bit looser around her body. Masseeia must have
realized them as well, because her next glance was down to Cyrenna.
“How loose are those chains?”
“Not loose.” Cyrenna looked up with nervous eyes, her tone unconvincing.
“Loose enough, I wager.” Masseeia smirked. “Keep them taut for now.”
Cyrenna cinched up on the chains and Masseeia dipped back a couple paces, slipping into an abandoned horse stall. She slid her finger over an assortment of weapons as seductively as she would a lover, enticing herself with the cold touch of the iron. Her finger stopped on a stone mallet. Picking it up, she ambled back over to Perseathea.
“Do what you must, Masseeia,” Perseathea aid, “I will not cower to you. Not this day, nor any other.”
“Well now,” Masseeia began tapping the mallet against her palm. “I think today might really be your last chance.”
“If I am to die today,” Perseathea kept a steely eyed glare, “it will not be while bowing in pity to you.”
Masseeia’s eyes flashed up. “What did you say?”
“You heard me.”
Masseeia’s hand turned white gripping the mallet. “You speak of me as if I’m the one who’s evil. I am Essicka! I am the sister you left behind.”
“You may have been Essicka. Once. But no longer. Now you are nothing but dead and loathing on the inside. You no longer stand as a woman, but something else, something wicked and distorted.”
“Your empty heart makes me anticipate your death all the more.” Masseeia hissed, turning red with anger.
“Look at you. Foolish and emotional, ranting on this way. Where is the cool headed warrior I know?”
Suddenly, Masseeia rushed Perseathea, grappling into the Queen’s neck to mash her head against the post.
“You heed me,” she ground out the words, “I delivered Askca to him. I led him to GarTaynia and to you as well, my Queen. And I know about Palius.” She clawed her fingers deeper into Perseathea’s neck. “Do not speak down to me as if I am beneath you. I’ve never been beneath you. No, I’ve lurked over every day you’ve lived, every word you’ve spoken, and every breath you’ve taken, for longer cycles than you can count. You may have forgotten me, Perseathea, but I never once forgot you.”
Masseeia’s eyes narrowed. “I am going to savor the sweetness of the air when it smolders with the smell of your blistering flesh, blacking to a crisp over your bones.” And then, as if she’d spoke not a word, Masseeia sunk back, settling into her mallet tapping again.
“As I said…” Perseathea squared her jaw, “foolish and emotional.”
Masseeia swung the mallet. Black. The Queen’s head busted against the post, dropping to her chest, a trickle of blood streaming her swelling lips. Masseeia lifted the woman’s chin. The Perseathea’s eyes were shut and her cheek already purpled into a near black.
"Oh how far you have fallen, my Queen." Masseeia let Perseathea’s head drop, then turned her eyes to Cyrenna. "Now unchain her."
Chapter 60
The yard loomed dusty and barren in the midmorning sun. Only the stone block, me, and the four soldiers dotted its’ center. The slab. A crude cut of solid stone, it drew ten paces by five, and each of its’ corners bore an iron ring. Blood stained the rock, trapping the memory of a hundred dead men. Unspeakable cruelties. Beating, flogging, lashing, burning… all had made for a gruesome spectacle on this slab. The slab was said to be a stone carved from Hell itself, then laid to earth by evil spirits conjured up by the dark witch. Today, it possessed me.
I laid sprawled out, ankles and wrists chained to the opposing rings. Exposed. Rough burlap, covering more as a two sided square of material, scratched down the middle of my hips. my body trembled against my will, and the cold of the slab chilled my skin. My mind stormed with panic, pleading a way of escape, but I refused to let it show on my face.
And then my Queen, my mother, was brought back out, and the sight of her bruised my heart like a blow to the chest. Queen Perseathea drug behind one of the soldiers, her chains twisting loose as her body left a trail of thick blood in the dirt. When the man lifted her up, her body flopped about, her eyes shut. Two soldiers bound her to the stake and she just stood there, lifeless, her head hanging at her chest.
My mouth went dry. I’d never seen her this way, the great Queen Perseathea of GarTaynia, and I couldn’t imagine this to be true. It felt more like a trick to my eyes. Queen Perseathea had only been strong and untouched, even in battle, all the seasons of my youth. She was the most mighty of our tribe. One of the five Queen’s of the Nation. But today, she stood unconscious, bruised and battered. Bleeding and unaware. And at long last, I saw the human side of her. The real person. Not just the magnificent conqueror I had made her out to be.
I pulled my stare away, refusing to look a moment more. The shake in my body worsened. I closed my eyes and in my dark refuge I could hear the mumblings of Laidea, Hippolyta, and the braves, belligerent and muffled in the cell down the path. The cell of the condemned. He will kill them. I stifled a warmth of tears welling in my chest, swallowing them back down.
“I can’t let this happen.” I said to myself. “I can’t let you do this.”
Gragore, who hunched but a stone’s throw away placing ruins in a symbol in the dirt, turned around to me. Standing, his eyes blazed black.
Letting his remaining ruins drop to the dust, he stomped over to the slab. Hovering over me like a viper. Pressing his palm against my forehead, he bruised down on me, gritting my head into the rock.
“You have no choice.” He said, grinding his teeth as his face turned a plum color. “Today is my fate. Mine!” He pushed off of my head, pacing away.
“Even if you force your seed on me a thousand times I will not let this child be born!” I cried out, surprised by my own shout, anger boiling back into me.
Gragore spun around, lynching into my throat. “You will or I will take your young sister in your place!”
“Any child your seed forms in me will be cut open at
birth!”
Gragore bashed a fist into my face.
Black.
Caressing a hand over his blood strewn knuckles, Gragore glowered down. “You will speak not one word against my fate.”
And with that, he paced back to his ruins in the dust.
Chapter 61
Footsteps crunched the dirt, stirring up the dust as he approached me. Dark in my head, I felt the rays of morning sun warming my skin, my heart pounding wild in my ears. The murmurs of the men gathering in the surrounding fields of the fortress intertwined into a soft buzz of noise. Wind snapped the banners high atop the fortress walls. And the footsteps crunching the dirt stopped. Shade fell across my face, cooling me in his shadow.
“I, Gragore the Reaper of an Empire, stand before you, dark powers, ready to claim my destined domination. It has been prophesied through your dark seer that I,” he beat his chest, “shall rise up your invincible kingdom. I have done what was told of me, scattering my seed far and wide. Taking and molding those seeds into a mighty army stemmed by my own blood. Your dark witch has led me since my youth to this day, and now, under the eyes of no man, I demand the pinnacle of my harvest.”
Silence pursed Gragore’s lips, as if he expected an answer from these malevolent gods to whom he spoke. He glanced to the four soldiers at each corner of the slab. All stood quite and unmoved, their backs to me like statues. He gave one last suspicious account of the inner fortress, searching its’ edifices and stables, glancing up its’ high walls. Satisfied we were alone, he turned eager eyes to me. Pulling himself onto the slab, he settled in between my legs, eyeing the blood trickling my nostril. His lips twisted into a perverted grin, and I felt my stomach turn sour, twisting and burning. For a moment, I thought I might vomit. Edging up further into my thighs, Gragore lounged himself onto an elbow, taking in the smell of blood on my upper lip. Fearing he was about to kiss me, I tightened my lips and my eyes. Refusing to look on him. Relishing it, he traced the blood till it tipped his grimy finger red.
“Not by lust, but by power, you beckon my arousal.” He whispered in my ear, his voice like gravel. “So helpless,” he steamed hot breath onto my neck. “Oh that your skin were already gray with death and cold to the touch. Then, my daughter, you would truly tempt me.”
He lapped at my ear with a thick and gorging tongue. Keeping my eyes tight, I strained my neck, pulling away from him, but there was no where to go.
“But we’ve fate to create first. Then after you will
turn cold, I will come to you once more.”
His hand groped down my body, sliding down around my hips.
“Start the fire.” He ordered without looking up.
A set of heavy boots ground toward the post where Queen Perseathea stood bound and unconscious, her head hanging. Gragore sludged his tongue down my neck, easing his heavy frame on top of me. Sliding his hand down, he tugged the burlap up around my hips. I could feel him looking at me, but I kept my eyes shut. Hiding. Pretending. Waiting for my moment.
“My flesh shall part your innocence,” his hot breath misted my chin as he shifted his hand, slipping himself ready, “and my son will be summoned.” His mouth hung open in grunts as he steadied himself.
I lay under the warlord, dormant and hiding in the darkness of my head. I weighed into the slab, still… but for the wobble of my hips in his hand. A stone’s throw away, a fresh fire crackled to life, snapping at the base of Perseathea’s post. The woman drooped unaware above its’ impending heat, the musk of burning wood smoldering up into the dusty and dry breeze, covering the lingering reek of the wet, burnt grass of early morning.
The four soldiers held their rearward guard and the banners whipped the wind. Snapping. Clapping. Everything else about the day seemed to go silent. Everything except for the sound of Gragore shuffling above me, grunting in my ear, pressing his weight into me. The smell of my blood still dripped my nose, tickling, and I tried to go somewhere else in my head.
Settling his palms into the stone at each side of my ribs, Gragore lifted his body ready. The tip of his intrusion hung beneath me, grazing my inner thigh. The weight of him ground down on me, pinning me to the cold stone.
He groaned. “My daughter….”
Flames sped up the pile of kindling, prowling toward Queen Perseathea’s already pinking feet. Gragore smoothed his palm over my thigh, pulling me in closer, then slipped his hand back between his legs, lifting himself to me. He settled down onto my chest, crushing my breath, lunging for his first thrust.
My eyes sprung alive, and I dove my chin into the warlord’s neck. Sucking in a chunk of his flesh, I bit. Grinding my teeth, I grizzled at his throat, tasting his salty sweat mix with the tang of his hot blood. A shriek vibrated up Gragore’s chest and I looked into his purpled face as he pulled away from me, tumbling back off the slab. Like an animal I strained up, staring after him. Watching as he stumbled, I spat out a thick portion of his flesh, displaying my red stained teeth to him, wanting him to see his own blood smearing my chin.
Gragore said nothing, only groaning and grappling at his bloody neck. My eyes darted to the Queen. The fire charged her feet, tearing up the branches in wild orange and yellow slithers. I strained again, busting at my chains.
“No!” I shouted and the four soldiers gave a peripheral glance, but kept their backs to me as ordered. Gragore scowled down on me with wicked black eyes, cupping red stained fingers around his throat.
“I will finish this!” He stomped back to me, lurching up the slab and slamming back into me. I knocked back into the rock, his bruising plunge forcing coughs from my gut. The warlord clawed back between my legs. I clenched my fists till they paled, my chains rattling around him in defiance as I fought for breath. Thrashing beneath him. Fighting him. Even as he attacked, milling me into the cold stone, my eyes leapt back to my Queen. Perseathea’s legs blazed scarlet amidst the flames, blistering as the smoke billowed up around her limp body.
“Mother!” I shouted, my voice ragged and high pitched. Desperate.
Gragore wrestled, holding my arms down, mashing them into the rock. He brought his hips to mine again.
“No!” I screamed at him, bucking and shifting beneath his body. “I will kill it! I will kill this baby!”
Gragore spoke no words and did not pause to look me in the eye. Instead he kept constant, meticulous, slipping his hand back down my body. Smoke from the steak choked into my chest, burning my eyes as it wafted over the slab. I felt Gragore slide his hand to the side of my ribs. The bob of his intrusion grazed my thigh again, rushing my body hot with sick. Causing me to thrash harder, kicking and brawling as much as my chains would allow.
Gragore only bore down stronger. “Shhhh.”
“No!”
He tipped into me. But before he could continue, something split the air. Gragore tensed. Pulling up from, his eyes bulged. I darted my eyes across the yard. The four soldiers stood as if nothing had happened and I saw no one else. Another whoosh came before I understood. Arrow. It cut into Gragore, protruding both sides of his forearm. Clenching his jaw stiffer, he gritted out in high pitched pain. I glanced up his arm, finding the first arrow protruding out the back of his shoulder.
He clawed at the injured arm, stumbling off me and to the dirt. Blood spurted his arm, thick and red. The warlor
d staggered about, his frantic eyes searching the empty yard. His four soldiers stood place, never looking back to me, but I could sense there eyes moving over the fortress as well. Gragore groaned out, clutching at his twice wounded arm.
“Find them…” he ground out. The four men cautiously turned to the warlord, noticing his bloody arm. “Find them!”
The soldiers split ways, sprinting throughout the yard.
“There!” One of the soldiers shouted. “The north wall!”
Gragore lifted his chin, his face contorting with cynicism.
“Five?” He garbled out a strained laugh despite his pain. “A meager five Amazons bring attack on me?”
Still scrabbling rigid fingers at his bloody arm, he turned back to me, wobbling back to the slab.
“But sir…” another soldier spoke up, “how did the five get passed all the men in the field?”
Chapter 62
I looked up to the north wall. At the crest stood five Amazons. Most conspicuous stood a stoic woman, her body brandishing the paramount symbols of the queen hood. I did not know this woman, but next to her stood familiar faces. Valasca, Malaia, Kelius, and at their end… Palius, bow in hand. I marveled at them, as puzzled as I was impressed by Palius’ appearance, but my mind soon diverted. Gragore was slithering back on top of me, weighing down, the warm blood of his wounds smearing my skin.
“It will take more than arrows to keep me from my fate.”
I wrestled, twisting my hips in a challenge of chase beneath the warlord. Pulling my chin over his shoulder, I shouted up to my friends.
“She’s is in the fire!”
The five split, scrambling down the wall.
“They will not stop this.” Gragore promised in my ear, his sweaty, smoke smudged face reeking the air between us.
“Guard the corners.” He barked, rushing his men back to the slab.
Another succession of arrows split the air and the four soldiers dropped. Then… a rumbling. I rolled my head about on the stone, searching the mysterious thunder. Heavy and deep, it was growing. Louder and louder. I tipped my head back, staring up to the heavens, but there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. The roar raged up into a storm of noise. Booming. Torrential it sounded, until it demanded the ground to shudder. The vibrations carried up through the stone and into my body.
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