No more water, then. Only pain, and a pinpoint of light before him. The back of his head felt like someone was pounding on it with a hammer. His left shoulder and right leg were on fire, and each time he tried to move them, fresh pain lanced through them.
“You awake now?”
Someone kicked him roughly in the side, which made his body jerk away, sending new spears of pain shooting down his wounded leg. But his vision was starting to come back to him now, and he could see the three men standing above him. One was holding an upside-down bucket, no doubt the source of his recent drenching. He seemed to be enjoying Rhys’ discomfort.
Then one of them saw his eyes focus and ordered, “Get him up.”
The other two grabbed him by his arms and lifted him roughly to his feet. The pain from his wounded shoulder nearly made him pass out again. One of the men reached out with a length of cloth and wiped it once across his face, quickly. Possibly he had meant to remove the spittle that Rhys had coughed up, but in its wake the cloth left streaks of grime that did not smell good. Hard to say which was worse.
“He’ll see him now,” the third man said, and he nodded for the other two to drag Rhys along. Along the way he cast the bucket aside, and Rhys could hear it land noisily on some stone surface. There was the sound of water dripping in the distance, but he could not tell where it came from.
He tried to walk, but his right leg had stiffened from its wound and he found it hard to move. They neither slowed nor stopped for him, but merely dragged him along at the same inexorable pace, whether his feet were under him or not. It hurt far less if they were under him, so he struggled to keep up.
Where am I? he thought desperately. His surroundings offered no clue. The narrow, windowless stone corridor they were dragging him through might have been in the lower levels of a keep anywhere in the known world, and there was no telling what manner of building stood over it. But they could not have taken him very far in his current condition, he told himself. And Magisters did not like to go close to the Wrath, so it was unlikely that anyone had provided sorcerous transportation to move him. Which suggested that he was still in the Alkali Protectorate, and probably not very far from the place where he’d been taken down.
I am a Guardian, he thought, as his wounded arm was jerked half out of its socket by an impatient escort. No man has any reason to harm a Guardian.
But he no longer had Favian’s letter of passage on him, and after what had happened in the glen, he wasn’t all that sure they would respect it if he did.
They dragged him into a large room that was so brightly lit by comparison to where he had been that he blinked his eyes in pain as they adjusted. His two escorts forced him to his knees, and one of them grabbed him by the hair and forced his head to bow down before releasing him. He was in no condition to argue with them. There was a single figure at the far end of the room; as Rhys raised up his head once more it walked slowly toward him. As he struggled to get his eyes to focus properly he could hear booted footsteps and the jingle of spurs.
“Identify yourself,” a harsh voice commanded.
The nebulous dark shape in front of Rhys finally resolved into the figure of a man: short, broad-shouldered, physically powerful. There was no mistaking the Alkali cast to his features. Glancing about the room, Rhys saw that all the other men present—and there were only men—were of the same type. Black-haired, ruddy-skinned, with broad features and narrow, almond-shaped eyes, the Alkali had not changed in appearance since the day the Wrath had fallen. Or so it was said. Certainly they disdained to take mates from among the other peoples of the north, claiming that “foreign blood” was inferior to their own.
“My name is Rhys.” His voice was raw and rasping; it was hard to make the words form properly. “Rhys sera Kierdwyn.” Normally he would not lie about his heritage—normally there was no need to—but he was suddenly wary of admitting to his royal ties. Sera Kierdwyn meant only “servant of Kierdwyn,” and was a name that any man who served the royal famly might claim. “I am a Guardian of the Wrath,” he said. Even in this battered state, there was pride in his voice as he spoke the title.
“Indeed. A Guardian. How fortunate for us.” The man’s tone was dry. “I take it you believe the Alkali Protectorate does not have Guardians of its own. Otherwise our loving brothers to the west would have no reason to enter our territory. Yes?” He waited for a response, and when Rhys offered none his voice grew hard and cold. “Why are you here, Guardian of the Wrath? Tell me honestly, for I can read the truth in a man, and lies will cost you dearly.”
He drew in a deep breath, trying to steady his nerves. You are innocent of any wrongdoing, he reminded himself.
“The Guardians of Kierdwyn feared that the Wrath has been weakened. They saw that their brothers in Alkali had gone silent. They sent us here to seek out the reasons for those things.”
“Indeed. How benevolent of them. How . . . paternal.” The black eyes narrowed; it seemed to Rhys they burned with hate. “And so they sent a Skandir into the heart of our territory, with no word of warning to precede her. For our own good, of course. Is that the story?”
A sudden lump in Rhys’ throat made it hard for him to speak. “Namanti . . . is she . . .” He could not finish the question.
“The Skandir bitch? Dead, and lucky to be so. Her interrogation would not be half as pleasant as yours, I assure you.”
He shut his eyes for a moment. Don’t let him see how much that affects you. Don’t let him have that power over you. “We carried a letter,” he said hoarsely. “With the seal of Kierdwyn’s Master of the Guard. In accordance with custom—”
“Where?” His interrogator spread his hands wide. “I see no letter.” He looked to the men who had brought Rhys into the room, now flanking him. “Do either of you recall this person having a sealed letter?”
“I do not,” one said.
The other shook his head. “Nor I.”
Rhys hung his head. He didn’t want his captor to see the fury in his eyes.
“You see, Rhys nas Kierdwyn? I warned you not to lie to me.”
He wanted to scream out his indignation, he wanted to curse this man before all the northern gods—how dare he treat a Guardian of the Wrath like a common criminal! He wanted to—
And then it sank in what had been said.
Shaken, he looked up. His interrogator was holding a leather-bound book open in one hand and was leafing slowly through the pages. Favias’ maps. “You signed and dated your notes, you know. Such a well-trained Guardian. I am sure your Master would be quite proud of you.” He snapped the book shut. “So you are the son of a Lord Protector, but not one officially acknowledged as such. Very interesting.”
There was nothing he could say that would make the situation better, so he said nothing.
“That would make you half lyr, would it not? Possessed of the gift of the gods. Whatever that is supposed to mean.”
Rhys drew in a deep breath, fighting to stay calm. “If you know that I am lyr, then you know why I was sent here. If one of the Spears has been damaged, you will need someone to repair it—”
His interrogator slammed the book of maps down on the floor, silencing him.
“You really do not understand, do you?” He lowered himself in a crouch until his eyes were level with Rhys’ own. “There are no gods,” he whispered fiercely. “All the things you were ever taught about them were lies. All the missions you have undertaken in their name were hollow tasks. Meaningless. The Wrath is the work of men, nothing more, and if you understood the source of its power you would vomit up every lesson you’d been forced to swallow. An entire lifetime of lies.” He stood again; his expression was dark. “The gods—if there are gods—are surely laughing at our gullibility.”
He’s mad, Rhys thought. He glanced at the other men, who seemed unshaken by the tirade. They’re all mad. Most likely the Wrath was responsible for that. The Guardians knew how to resist the power of that ancient curse, but few men outside their ran
ks would be able to do so. Spend enough time within range of its baleful magic and you might begin to believe all sorts of crazy things—including dark fantasies like the one this man had just described.
“Please,” he said. Struggling to keep his voice calm, to remove even the faintest hint of confrontation from his tone. “Let me speak to your Master of the Guard. Give him my books, let him read my notes, let me explain to him why I was sent here. He knows our customs and our purpose. He will know how to judge me.”
The interrogator stepped back. His black eyes narrowed. “Do you know who I am, Rhys nas Kierdwyn? Do you have any idea where you are?”
Rhys hesitated, then shook his head.
“I am Anukyat,” he pronounced. “Master of the Guard for the Alkali Protectorate. So now you know.”
Rhys’ opened his mouth, but no words would come. The room seemed to spin about him.
“Take him back,” Anukyat ordered the men standing behind him. “Lock him up. We may have use for him yet, or at least for his lyr blood . . . now that the gods no longer have any use for him.”
The two Alkali Guardians lifted Rhys by the arms again, and dragged him away.
“Hold, there!”
The guard approaching the Citadel gate was not mounted, but walking beside his horse. The animal was limping badly and clearly was in no condition to support a rider. A makeshift bandage around the guard’s head was covered with blood, obscuring much of his face and covering one eye; where his skin was visible it looked as if it had been ground into the dirt. He, too, was limping.
“More fighting today?” The sentry asked. The guard shook his head, then winced and put a hand up to his face, as if trying to hold back the pain. “What, then? Took a fall?”
The guard grunted and nodded. “Cursed scree,” he muttered hoarsely. Then he bent over coughing, disappearing behind the bulk of the horse. When he stood up again, the sentry could see a trickle of blood coming from his mouth.
“Best see the chirurgeon right away,” the sentry said, and waved him on in.
With a curt nod, the injured guard and his horse limped into the courtyard. After a moment of looking around, he located the stables and led the animal in that direction. A young boy in a well-worn tunic ran out to greet him as he unlatched his supply pack from the saddle and slung it over his shoulder. The same for his weapons. The boy waited patiently until he was done, then wordlessly took hold of the horse’s reins and began to lead the animal gently away, clucking reassurances to it as they went.
They would find the rock wedged into its shoe soon enough, Kamala thought. Hopefully it would look like an accident.
Positioning the heavy pack so that it would shield her face from view, she studied the courtyard for a moment and then, having gotten her bearings, headed toward the shadows behind the barracks.
Rhys’ cell was dark and damp and barely three paces across in either direction. Not that he was likely to be pacing any time soon. A heavy iron cuff on his ankle secured him to a chain that was fixed to the back wall of his prison, with just enough room to allow him to lie down on a moldy straw mattress or to occasionally piss in the metal pot they had provided. Even so, the turnkey who pushed his food and water through the slot in the door, just far enough for him to reach it, did so with obvious unease. Evidently he thought that Rhys was dangerous.
It could have been worse. They’d chained his arms behind his back when the chirurgeon came to examine him, which had made the man’s inspection of his shoulder exquisitely painful. Two burly guards had pinned him down for the examination itself, as if they were afraid that even in his weakened state he might overwhelm them. But at least the poisons in the shoulder wound had been drawn out and a poultice applied, and the same had been done to the deep puncture in his thigh. They might hate him here and they might fear his strength, but for whatever reason, they clearly wanted to keep him alive.
At least for now.
Exhausted by the day’s events, he lay back upon the dank mattress and wished he could fall asleep. He knew that he would need all his strength for whatever came next, so he shut his eyes and did his best to relax, despite the throbbing of his wounds. And maybe he even did sleep, on and off. Maybe, in the dim twilight of his cell—lit only by a few weak beams of lamplight that squeezed through the barred window in the door—he passed in and out of sleep without realizing it. Certainly nightmares could hardly be worse than his current prospects.
What in the name of the gods had happened here?
For a thousand years now, the Guardians had served the Protectorates. A thousand years of training to fight an unseen enemy, of searching high and low for every scrap of ancient lore that might help prepare them for battle, a thousand years of willingness to brave the most fearsome curse known to mankind if the gods required it of them. Ten centuries of utter dedication by men and women who answered to no greater politics, served no foreign purpose, acknowledged no distraction. Their neutrality was sacrosanct, their honor was legendary, and, as a result, there was no place in the Protectorates where they were not welcome.
Until now.
There are no gods, the Master of the Guard had told him. You serve a lie.
What could make such a man abandon his faith and turn him against his own kind?
Show me the cause, Rhys prayed to his gods. Teach me how to address it, that the Guardians may remain strong, and we can serve you as you intended.
With a sign he shut his eyes, exchanging one pain-filled darkness for another.
And while you are at it, please get me out of here.
The new prisoner made Kato nervous.
He shouldn’t have. He’d been a turnkey for ten years now, first in the keep of a southern lordling with a penchant for imprisoning his political enemies, now here in the Citadel. The job was much the same. Keep the doors locked. Make sure the prisoners were fed enough food to keep them alive, if not to keep them comfortable. Call for help if anything unexpected happened.
But.
You weren’t supposed to put Guardians in prison. He knew that.
You also weren’t supposed to question a Master of the Guard. Not in public, not in private, not even in the darkest recesses of your own head. Ever.
So when those two rules came into conflict, what were you supposed to do?
Don’t think about it, he told himself, as he made his rounds, peering into the grated slot in each door, checking to be sure each prisoner was present and alive. The latter mattered more with some than with others. Just do your job. In truth the place was nearly empty, despite its impressive capacity. Prisoners didn’t last long this close to the Wrath—a mind already weakened by confinement and fear couldn’t stand up to that malevolent power for very long—so anyone of real value to Master Anukyat was generally sent south for safer keeping. Maybe that would happen to this Guardian, eventually. Maybe he’d be gone soon, and Kato would not have to worry about him anymore.
With a sigh he settled down onto the rough-hewn bench he had placed opposite the Guardian’s cell and poured himself a cup of warm ale from a ewer on the table beside him. Anukyat’s Citadel was located at the farthest reaches of the Wrath’s power, which meant that a sane and healthy man could get through a day well enough, but Kato didn’t envy the soldiers who had guard duty farther north. Sometimes he thought he heard them screaming in their sleep. Or maybe that was himself he heard screaming, in the grips of his own Wrath-born nightmares. Either way, this was a cursed region for sure. If you asked him (not that anyone ever did), the ancient Alkali warriors who had abandoned the Citadel in the first place had had the right idea.
On the other hand, working in the shadow of the world’s most fearsome curse meant you were paid generously, which did a lot to compensate for the nightmares. Or so Kato told himself.
Sighing heavily, he took a long, deep drink of his ale. He was so lost in his own reflections that he almost didn’t notice the footfall on the stairs.
Almost.
He put his cup down a
nd looked up at his visitor, half expecting to see some messenger from Master Anukyat, or perhaps the man himself. No doubt he would want to look in on his newest charge, Kato thought. Make sure he was alive and all that.
But it wasn’t Anukyat, or his messenger. In fact, it wasn’t a man at all.
She was tall and barefoot and dressed in nothing but a man’s linen shirt, open down the front. Her legs were impossibly long and the hem of the shirt, falling to her upper thighs, seemed barely enough to cover her. Where the neck gaped wide on one side the inner curve of a breast was visible, its ruddy tip teasing the eye through the thin white fabric. And her hair! It was a bright red, the color of fire, and wild in its style, as though she had only just rolled out of someone’s bed.
He tried not to stare at her, but failed miserably. He did manage to shut his mouth after a moment, but that only left him speechless.
“You are Kato?” the apparition asked him.
Dumbly, he nodded.
She smiled and began to walk toward him. The sight of her breasts swaying beneath the thin fabric made all the blood rush to his groin, leaving his brain high and dry.
“Someone upstairs said your job was tense and you would appreciate a little . . . relief. Is that true?”
“Who—who said that?” he stammered.
She took a step closer to him, and put one hand against his chest. He could smell her closeness as her index finger traced a line down his doublet, down to the ties of his codpiece. She pulled at the end of one tie until it released, then slid her hand inside the garment. “Now that’s a secret. Let’s just say you don’t owe me anything for this—it’s all been taken care of.” She stroked the swollen length of him, up and down, an agonizing rhythm. “Someone must like you a lot,” she whispered, closing her hand about his balls. The pleasure of it was too much to bear; he closed his eyes and moaned as he reached out for her—
Wings of Wrath Page 17
