Trial of Chains_Crimson Crossroads_Book One

by Sohan Ahmad

  Each gulp of dry western air stung the lungs like thorny barbs that pricked the gaping holes in his marred soul as he sat beyond the edge of an ostrich feather rug, tucked within the shadow of the most sunlit corner. “I survived my first year without you,” he said, hugging himself like his mother once had. There were no cakes or gifts, no songs or jesters. Cyrus nestled quietly in her arms, recalling the comforting strokes of her long, slender fingers through his scruffy black strands.

  At that moment, she was as real to him as she had ever been, a mirage listening intently to his confessions. “I think a lot about which one of us died that day. Maybe we both did, and I’m too scared to join you.” Cyrus turned to see her imagined smile. “Please say something Mother, anything will do.” But that was impossible, for she existed only in silence.

  Outside, a trembling ball of clenched fingers sought to tap against the boy’s humble door of amber oak. “Afford me the chance to help you,” it whispered until the frantic voice of a portly man called out from several paces back.

  “Mazir Dakar, your humble aide arrives.”

  “Silence!” he whispered to his elderly aide. “I have no wish to disturb the dialogue between Cyrus and his mother.”

  “A thousand apologies Mazir. I swear upon my life that the boy was alone when I last see him,” the old hand answered. “For allowing an intruder into the house of Dakar, I offer the life of first son. Please allow your humble aide to seek the guards so we may question the boy’s mother.”

  Gods grant me patience, Dakar prayed, washing caramel hands over freshly shaved stubble. “Abu, I have no desire for the life of your son. Just stop talking and make preparations for dinner. Let us leave the boy alone with his thoughts for now.” Is there nothing I can offer within this cozy home to ease the boy’s heartache? Defeated by the late hour, he abandoned his quest.

  The following morning blurred within the haze of a scorching Darakan sun. Cyrus accompanied his new master to the center of the western capital as a handful of armed guardians trailed their path. “Do you know why your father sent you to live with me?” Dakar asked.

  Because I killed his wife. “No Master,” Cyrus answered.

  “A bastard cannot be a master over another bastard,” the Mazir returned.

  Cyrus stopped his feet, his head finally rising to see thin strands of black flowing atop narrow bones of wrinkled, bronze skin. “But you are one of the Six.”

  “Indeed, I am the oldest favored son of Karda Raggar, reigning Father and War Chief of the western hordes, and still I am a bastard. My five brothers are all bastards as well,” Dakar explained. “By the laws of the Hawk, Dragon, and Snake, all Westerners are considered bastards for we do not bind ourselves to another in the eyes of the gods. So, I shall ask again. Why would you father send you to a land of bastards?”

  Words formed in his mind, but only some would part his throat. “Because this is the only place that will take me.”

  “Incorrect,” Dakar replied as their steps came to an end. “Because this is a place where you can live.”

  “Is this…?” Cyrus began to ask before his trembling eyes captured the colossus in front of them.

  “Welcome to the Labyrinth, grand arena of the Radink and the greatest spectacle of savagery on land, sky, or sea. It was our Beast King and first Father of the horde, Raggar Darak, who built it,” the Mazir advised as they gazed at a gargantuan gate of gold that soared high into the glimmering skies. Spikes half a story high, lifted from punctured soil, shaking the earth beneath their feet as mounds of clumped dirt trickled down to reveal a blinding light from within the colossus.

  The chaos of fifty thousand screaming men, women, and children burst from within the coliseum. I can almost see the words between their lips, but I hear nothing.

  “Do not fear,” Dakar whispered, pressing a palm on the boy’s shoulder. “It happens to all who see it for the first time, but we should not linger. The trampling will begin soon.”

  Why did he bring me here? Cyrus asked himself, his skin still shaking from the stampede of westerners below as they arrived at a private viewing area comprised only of the capital’s most honored houses. They sit like gods staring at their children from above the clouds. So high from the earth, sight and sound were no longer a blur. Is this how the unchained behave in the West? Cyrus was forced to avert his eyes from the throngs below where women tore at each other’s dresses and men brawled for seemingly no reason at all.

  “What do your eyes tell you, little Isirian?” Dakar asked.

  Cyrus tried to restrain his contempt. “My first time in an arena, I thought it was the worst place in the world.” But he could not. “I was wrong.”

  To the boy’s surprise, the Mazir smiled. “Bringing you here seems to have been a worthy gamble.” He crossed his fingers together and placed them under his chin like an altar as he gazed into the pit of sin. “I have seen many hells on our Earthly Mother, and only the rarest of them could rival the horrors of this horrid place,” Dakar stated, turning eyes back to Cyrus. “There will always be a worse than worst, but at least your life is still yours to hold.”

  The young slave stared at his trembling hands. The words are different, but it sounds like something Mother would say. Stillness finally returned to his skin, but then the hazy blue sky thundered. Giant coiled horns, larger than the prehistoric serpents of lore, erupted along the arena walls.

  “They’re all quiet,” Cyrus said in disbelief before the horns sung a song that made him quiver against his seat and clutch onto Dakar’s robe.

  “Fear not child, the Devil Horns cannot harm you,” the Mazir assured. “But their call signals the arrival of true demons.”

  A wooden door between the mammoth mounted trumpets, taller than thirty men and painted like fire, opened its mouth slowly to the maddening rhythm. The first to enter the sands stood a long six feet from head to toe, though his spine curved like a scorpion’s tail to understate his true stature. Slivers of azure metal bands wrapped around his slender yet sculpted muscles. In each hand, he held a large serrated steel ring crafted to rip through bone. His face was locked within a black leather mask where only narrow slits of dead, silver eyes, marked with throbbing red veins, were exposed to the light.

  Under a watchful pair of Karda’s grunts, he crept toward the center in a tempered, alluring trot, the deadly disks suddenly flying to either side. His eerie figure bowed elegantly for the crowd before the blades returned to his hands, dripping blood as feminine screams rang from each end of the arena. “Enjoy a taste of true beauty, my darling dolls of flesh,” he mocked as the two guards’ lifeless heads rolled onto the sand. Then, from within the black leather mask, a long moist tongue emerged, licking clean the scarlet sap from his sullied steel. The crowd reveled at such perversion, but the deaths of pit sentries were hardly a concern for their Father, who paid greater heed to the gnats that drank from his skin.

  While the spectacle teased the masses, out from the darkness of the wooden gate’s open mouth a second figure entered. His steps were no heavier than a hare’s; he glided slowly and softly like a spirit. The narrow, dead eyes of the masked gladiator suddenly opened wide to capture the beast that sought his life. A tight, slender body stood on powerful, toned legs as an emerald carapace sat along the contours of his chest. Strips of black-studded leather dangled from his waist, just above a pair of polished green greaves. Slithering across his shoulders was a serpent made of steel, razor-sharp silver daggers hissing from each end as thick clouds of smoke bellowed from his jade dragon helm. Cyrus could not help but wonder, Is he man or dragon?

  “Your instincts serve you well,” Dakar said, feeling the boy’s clutch stronger against his robe. “These creatures, born from human lust, laugh at death’s futile persistence. Our nightmares have become their dreams and now, slaughter is their only salvation.”

  “Who are they?” Cyrus asked, gazing into the butcher pit without a single blink.

  “They are members of the Devil Court,”
Dakar replied with a shudder, “champions from the six states of the alliance. The one whose face is bound to leather is Voldo, the Jester. He—no, it—hails from the southern sands of Zirque. Even before it was bound to chain, its hands were stained beyond redemption. The mad clown paints its skin with the blood of women and children it mutilates, removing their ears so they cannot hear their own screams.”

  The boy’s ears tingled as his hands quickly flew to them, seeking to assure their safety. Once he felt their soft contours, his pounding heart calmed, and his cold, sweaty palms returned to his side. “What about the fire breather?” he asked in a tremble.

  “Bale is champion of the capital,” Dakar said, leaning forward to get a closer look at the jade beast. “And by virtue, the king of demons.”

  Bale? Cyrus wondered. It doesn’t look like him.

  “It has been nearly a year since he seized the mantle, but his truth is foreign to me. His skin is that of an outsider, Silonician, if my eyes see clearly. One tale speaks of a seedless wolf that discovered him, abandoned in the mountains, and raised him as its own. Another sings of how he nearly killed a dragon with nothing but his hands and teeth. My brothers say he was a soldier who betrayed his lord and murdered his comrades in the chaos of battle.”

  Each clue was more familiar than the next. Cyrus finally broke free his grip on the Mazir’s robe. “What do you believe?”

  “Who can say?” Dakar shrugged. “I care little for demons and their mysteries,” he answered, pausing to gauge the presence of prying ears at his back before continuing in a whisper, “The ways of combat are foreign to me, but I am familiar with the many faces of cowardice. His resembles none in my recollection.” Just then, a large figure emerged from the apex of the coliseum. “Quiet now, my father will speak.”

  The arena quaked under the heavy footsteps of Karda Raggar as he approached the edge of his perch. He was the spitting image of the Minotaur who birthed the nation of bastards. A burly beast of dark hair and scratched brawn with eyes as black as the Jester’s soul. “I hunger,” he groaned behind the wall of beard that hung from his chin. “Fill my stomach with the rage and desperation born of your meaningless lives. Quench my thirsty eyes with your blood and burning steel.” He raised his voice to a shout: “Bore me, and I shall grind you to dust!” Before the last word escaped his mouth, Karda turned his back to the pit, tossing an empty chalice onto the sands as he returned to his cradle of concubines.

  Once the bronze cup kissed the floor of golden dirt, the raucous throng returned their roars as the pit burst into a ring of flame. Trapped within, the caged demons hardly noticed the intense blaze that threatened to swallow them. Bale walked forward, his steps devoid of haste while Voldo began circling the king of demons like a battlefield vulture. He flicked his wrists, and two buzz saws flew forth. They grazed Bale’s arms, once from the front and again upon their return. But there was no blood as the Jester reclaimed his steel.

  “Sorcerer!” Voldo shouted with a muffled tone, his eyes throbbing from within the leather mask. “Ugly things must be torn down and rebuilt. Give me your arms and legs,” he clamored as he spun like a twisting top.

  Once more, the steel rings flew forth, but with heightened speed and ferocity. Bale continued inching closer as if he were blind to the threat. The disks appeared to devour both arms and legs before returning to their master. Yet once again, the steel remained pristine.

  “Why?” Voldo asked, repeating his attacks with increasing anger. “Why don’t you bleed?” the Jester shouted. “Without them, my doll will be incomplete,” he insisted with a deranged cackle. Tears of lust began to trickle down the mad clown’s mask as he coiled atop his knees. Exploding like a fire cat in full sprint, Voldo shrieked at the height of his lungs, “Give me your limbs!”

  Sand was blown aside in the wake of his speed, and within moments, he appeared in front of the jade beast, whipping his limber arms in crossing patterns. Like flashing bolts of scorched light, the assault seemed to eradicate Bale from existence until, a soft yet grizzled voice spoke from within the cloud of dust: “Bow before your king, demon.”

  Scarlet veins throbbed in Voldo’s eyes as a gust revealed Bale at his back. “How?” he asked over and over as his words slurred with drool. The champion was unscathed, yet the mad clown crumbled, blood bursting from the tendons in his knees and shoulders. With two tethered silver daggers buried in the base of his neck, the Jester’s arms dangled limp as his steel rings dropped to the sand. “How?” he asked once more, staring at the golden dirt.

  “I’m better,” Bale answered, exhaling a cloud of jasmine-scented smoke. The king of the Devil’s Court gazed up into the clouds. “What’s your decision, Karda?” he asked as if even the gods were a bother. “I don’t have all day.”

  “Arrogant as always,” Dakar remarked as Cyrus gazed below.

  “If we were in Isiris,” Cyrus advised, “the guards would have beaten him until he couldn’t stand and the people would have been just as angry.”

  “However, we are not currently in Isiris,” the Mazir reminded.

  “Impressive as always, champion!” Karda applauded as the crowd went rabid. “Remove that weed from my world,” the Father of the western hordes said for he trampled on pretty things, and words were no exception.

  Bale retrieved his silver daggers from Voldo’s shoulders, taking ten steps beyond the mad clown, who could only mumble red dribble upon the sands. The king of demons twirled one end of his tethered daggers with blinding speed, unleashing a beam of blurred silver steel that severed Voldo’s head clean from his shoulders. The Jester’s lifeless eyes fixated onto his corpse, bent over as if in prayer. Once his head hit the sand, a wave of crude laughter erupted from the masses in what was the mad clown’s finest and final jest.

  The champion removed his dragon-headed helmet, raising it to the heavens as he howled toward the sun, chasing it off into the moon’s shadow. Cyrus jumped from his seat and rushed toward the ledge. “What troubles you, child?” Dakar asked with a sheepish grin. “Did you expect a more hideous king of demons?”

  “It’s him.” Cyrus said beneath his breath, his feet pedaling back in a slow retreat before turning away from the pit.

  “Child?” Dakar asked once more, his brow tensing at the boy’s silence. “Cyrus!” he called out as the boy continued his retreat.

  When the sound of his name dropped against the inner drums of his ears, Cyrus brushed past the noble bastard, sprinting toward the first set of descending steps. A path to the victor emanated clearly within his eyes. His gaze was fixed, and he ran hard, hopping every other step to speed his descent. But after clearing only two sets of stairs, the trail began to fade far beyond his reach.

  “I must reach the pits!” Cyrus yelled, flailing his slender arms and legs. “Release me, I beg you!” But his resistance proved meaningless against the force at his back as a half giant of a man, clad in strips of bull hide, tossed the boy to the white marble floor. No words or warnings. The half giant gripped his broad ax, lifting it high above his head to nearly doubled his height before he swung.

  Nearby nobles and favored citizens aimed their sights keenly towards the scene. Lust for blood still perfumed the air, dribbling off the lips of wicked smiles, until a voice called out, “Stay your hand!” The giant ax swooped down like a guillotine before freezing above the boy’s flickering lids. Once more, there were no words and the half-naked mammoth returned to his post as Dakar fell to his knees besides the boy. “Never leave my side again!” he warned, sweat dripping from his thinning strands to his palms.

  The nearby nobles maintained their hungry hyena glares as Cyrus opened his eyes to see his savior trembling. Why would a lord shiver for a slave?

  Noticing the boy’s quizzical glance, Karda’s bastard rose to his feet and offered his hand. “Take what you want, and destroy what you cannot take.”

  “Even without chains, I’m still a slave,” Cyrus said, accepting Dakar’s hand.

  “These are the w
ords of our Father and the one law of the West,” the Mazir added. “I hoped to keep you ignorant, but in truth, your freedom cannot exist outside of my protection. A promise was made to your father to keep you safe and happy, but even my influence has its limits. I beg you, help me keep my word.”

  “In the South, bastards don’t have fathers,” Cyrus lectured, dusting himself off. “You made an impossible promise.”

  “And what you seek is also impossible,” Dakar returned. “Refuse to adapt and you will be doomed to eternal sorrow.”

  You’re wrong. The boy believed as he peered over the nearby ledge to see the champion return to the depths of the Labyrinth amidst a deluge of praise. Bale is no one’s slave. “Mazir Dakar, I have a request, if you meant what you said about my happiness.”

  “Speak,” Dakar sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose.

  “Please, let me meet with the champion.”

  “What reason do you have to speak with a killer?” Dakar asked, raising the base in his voice.

  Cyrus shared the truth that he had recently discovered. “A gladiator’s freedom is the only kind I can hope to achieve.”

  “You wish to become one of them?” Dakar questioned, plucking strands from his shaking head. “Is your soul such a trifle that you would discard it for the illusion of liberty?”

  “What value is a soul,” Cyrus argued, “if I am not free to use it?”

  “A gladiator is free to kill and die. Nothing else!”

  “Two choices are better than none,” Cyrus answered.

  “Your mind is set then,” Dakar said in submission. “But tell me one thing. Why would the champion sponsor a nameless child into his ranks?”

  The boy summed the totality of their history as briefly as he could: “He is my friend.”

  Dakar nearly burst into laughter, yet he saw that the boy’s eyes told no lies. What tragedies could cause a child to befriend a killer? He knelt in front of Cyrus, placing a hand on each shoulder. “The king of demons answers only to the Father. I will need time.”