Hundreds of cages surrounded me.
Each one imprisoned a screaming human covered in shit.
I wanted to scream with them, to drown their agony with my own. But if I started screaming, I would never stop.
It was the path to madness.
They were all screaming.
The Elvens walked between our cages in the darkness. They asked the humans questions. Most could not answer. They growled. They bashed their heads against the bars, screeching like crazed animals. They gnashed their teeth wildly at their captors. They were swiftly killed.
Soon they would come for me. They would ask me why I imagined I was worthy of her. They would torture me. The thought of further agony cascaded through the darkness of my thoughts and made me want to bang my head on the bars like the other humans. Maybe I could kill myself somehow before they came for me. End my suffering now.
There was too much of everything. Too much insanity.
I could not die like this. I owed my father and brother that much. I owed them vengeance. I would survive. The Elvens had taken a live human out with them once. If someone else had survived, I could. I could pretend I was more than the animal they believed me to be. They would release me from this cage and I would have revenge. I would kill them all.
Especially her.
The thought of her name brought her face to my mind and I had to grab the bars to keep from crying. I felt her kiss my face and lips; I smelled her blood-red hair as it wrapped around me. I heard her voice whisper in my ear.
I remembered her strangling my brother. I heard her command them to kill my father.
Why didn’t she kill me?
My legs started to cramp and I moved from my crouched position on my right side. I forgot about the corner of my cell where I had been defecating and accidently sunk my left foot into the mess. A fresh scent of shit hit my nose. I grunted in surprise and then moved my foot to the other corner. Anger filled my stomach again and I worked for a few minutes to release it. I was already covered in shit, a little more wouldn’t matter. I couldn’t lose my mind now.
Water.
I was so thirsty. I should have tried to drink my piss, but that opportunity had passed. My throat felt like it was nothing but one crusted scab. A cup of water would help me think. It would cool me. I wanted it. I needed it almost as much as I needed to wrap my arms around Iolarathe and make love to her one last time. I shook my head in frustration. I wanted to strangle her. I wanted revenge.
I could never kill her. Elvens were so strong, and she was the strongest among them. They all feared her. I did not know how to fight. I had never killed anyone. All I knew how to do was care for horses and pleasure her.
Water. I needed water. My thirst burned dark red and scratched over my entire body. I burned with fever but there was not enough water left to make sweat. I was nothing but dust and pain.
The flap of the tent opened like a lightning strike and half of the tortured humans began to scream louder. It was a crescendo of agony and the brief increase of light allowed me to see that I wasn’t in a mere tent, but a large pavilion that stretched hundreds of yards in each direction. The flap closed and the screams grew louder at the depressing absence of light.
Three Elvens walked through the rows of cages. They moved to my left and I heard them head deep into the darkness of the tent before the cries of my fellow prisoners drowned out the sound of their thunderous footfalls.
Maybe they would walk by my cage and I could ask them for some water. Or some food. Or maybe a bath. I laughed at the last thought. The only request they would grant would be my death. I would welcome an end to this pain.
Minutes passed. Hours passed. The Elvens grew closer. The screams of the humans grew louder wherever they went. The noise slammed into my ears and rang in my head like I had my ear pressed against my father’s anvil. They continued through the tent, but there was too much noise for me to comprehend what they said.
They approached my cage. I would try to reach out my hand to get their attention and beg for water. That was all I wanted.
“Subject B, five, six, seven. Has been in confinement for,” the voice paused above me and the male Elven leaned over my cage. He held a lantern in his hand and there was a brief flash of light while he read something scrawled on the top of my cage. “Thirty seven days.” The light burned my eyes and I had to cover part of my face and clench my teeth together to keep from moaning.
“That can’t be correct,” another voice said.
“That is the date here.”
“Are you both fucking idiots? I want them checked every twenty days. Do you understand? Twenty fucking days. By the Dead Gods, we are losing them quick enough as it is. I can’t afford for you two to forget about one and leave it to die here.”
The other Elvens apologized and I smelled the fear in their voices, tasted it in their bodies, and saw it in the dim glow of the lamp. I tried to get my mouth to form the words for water but nothing came out.
“You buffoons are making my job difficult. If you weren’t my cousins I’d kill you right now.” The voice stopped and the other two shuffled their feet anxiously.
I was so tired; trying to talk was taking too much energy. Damn it. I needed water. My throat burned like white coals. Thousands of daggers were stuck in my spine. My ear drums wanted to bleed. My eyes struggled to stay open. If I closed them now they might stay that way forever. This might be my last chance to make the request.
“Alright.” The Elven in charge sighed, “Don’t let this happen again. You might as well kill this one, the insanity has no doubt claimed it by now. We can use the cage for the next subject. Start making your rounds every day. Inspect the date on every cage.”
I heard the sword draw from a sheath. It sounded like a song, beautiful, short, pure, and full of the promise of release. I realized that my eyes had actually closed and I somehow managed to pry them open and look up at my executioner. The back of the blade caught the sliver of light from the crack in the tent flap and bounced it off of the walls like a mirror.
“Water.” The words suddenly emerged from my mouth. They echoed around in my own skull.
“Wait. Did it just speak?” The figure in the middle held out his hand to stop the swordsman to his left.
“I don’t know. I can’t hear anything over this racket,” the other one said.
“You dumb fuck. Your job is to ask them questions and listen to their responses.” The center figure stepped toward my cage and bent down slightly. His sharp Elven face was pale and vicious.
“Human. Did you speak?”
“Water. Please.” I pointed to my mouth and hoped that the light from the lantern allowed him to see my movements. The words were agony. The movement was torture. It would be painful to drink, even if they did give me water.
“Praise the Dead Gods. Looks like this one is stable,” he said over his shoulder. He directed his next words back to me: “What is your name, human?” I cringed and tried to form my mouth around the sound of my own name. I had been practicing the pronunciation for water and for a second I didn’t remember the name my father had given me.
“Kaiyer.”
“Good human. You’ve passed the transition phase with your mind intact. Now you will be able to serve us in ways you never thought possible. You should feel honored.” He stood up and turned to the two that escorted him. “Pull him out of there and take him to the cleaning stall.”
“But he is covered with shit. I’ll go get some humans to do it.”
“You are going to be covered in blood in a second. Do as I order!” The leader put his hand on the hilt of his short sword and the other two moved quickly to unlock my cage. The sound of the metal scraping against its parts made my brain cringe and I resisted the urge to push my hands into my ears and scream.
Hands grabbed me by the armpits and dragged me out of the cage. I tried to move my feet, but only my left one seemed to work. Even then, the toes only flexed a little and skipped across the dr
y dirt of the pavilion floor. The sudden shift from the bare, shit-covered metal cage to sandy dirt left my brain spinning. I was overloaded with too many new sensations of movement and touch and I had to fight back the desire to vomit.
The rest of the humans sensed a disturbance in the mood of the tent. Another crescendo of insane screams rose from the packed cages and beat into my ears like the slam of cymbals. It followed us from my cage toward the tent flap. I was dragged into the blinding white light of day.
To my next life.
Chapter 17-Kaiyer
I gasped and spit. Water filled my mouth, nose, and throat like an iron fist clamping my sinuses. Liquid came up out of my face as violently as I could vomit and then my stomach seized a few times more to clear any lurking water from my gut. Once I finished retching, I fell back against the cold rocks and closed my eyes again.
I was alive. For a few dozen seconds I enjoyed the sensation of my breath leaving my nose and my chest pushing against the ground when I inhaled. My body shivered with the chill of the water soaking the clothes Janci had given me.
The shiver was pleasurable. Now that I had emerged alive on the other side, it reminded me that fear was almost always worse than reality. It was a close call. I must have passed out right as the tunnel emerged in the river. As much as I had prepared myself for the various trials of life and death, luck had always played an important part in my fate.
I pushed my hands against the sand and got to my feet. I was on the bank of a river at the base of the Teeth Mountains. Midmorning light crested the eastern peaks, but I was still in their shadow. The line of sun was a few hundred yards to my west and illuminated the emerald grass and the sapphire twisting river of the valley. The sight and smell of the surrounding wilderness struck me and I took a few moments to appreciate its beauty.
Malek would have laughed. I smiled at the thought of my friend. I was not the same man I had been in my past. I could not quantify the ways I had changed, but in my heart I knew it was true. My purpose had changed.
The Ovule.
I mouthed the word silently and stretched my body to generate some warmth in my joints. I needed to get back to the castle. Then I needed to speak with Nadea about how she brought me through the Radicle without an Ovule. I also needed to speak to the empress about the research she had done on my history and see if she knew anything about my daughter.
None of which would be easy. Telaxthe wanted me dead, or at least banished from the planet. I might be able to infiltrate the castle yet again and reach Nadea. Then there was just the small matter of saving the humans of this world from the Elvens who had taken control of Nia. I had to build another army, infuse them with the Elements, and train them. The thought of repeating that process made my stomach churn slightly.
I did not want to kill anyone.
Yet it seemed to be my greatest purpose and talent.
If I had not betrayed Shlara and run after Iolarathe, what would I have done after conquering the Elvens? I wanted to believe that I would have fulfilled my promise to Shlara and built a family and a life with her. I could have helped found our new civilization, organized the government, led the newly freed human race to peace and prosperity with my friends at my side.
But I had never wanted peace. I wanted nothing but revenge, death, and Iolarathe. The Destroyer wanted to break the world that had given him so much pain. The Betrayer cared nothing about fixing it again.
I turned my back to the mountains and walked westward along the shore of the river. After a few steps I was in the sun and the warm rays heated the damp clothes that clung to my skin. The sounds of the river, wind, and birds chirping nearby somehow made me feel more alone. I had no place in this world.
Protect the Ovule.
Mulakanna’teall’s voices cast themselves through my mind again. I would find out my place and purpose in this life once I reached Nadea. It was a few weeks’ journey back to the castle. I could devise a plan for the empress before I reached the gates.
The river wound around the south side of the abandoned town at the foot of the mountains. My Elven pursuers might still be searching for me, but the river was flanked by steep grassy slopes, likely designed as flood banks to protect the town from overflow in the rainy season. They were tall enough to conceal me from any warriors in the upper reaches of the keep. I hoped they were still deep in the caverns beneath the fortress, following my cold trail.
I halted suddenly and dove against the riverbank. Something was wrong. The hair on the back of my neck stood on end and my heart began to race in time with the Earth pumping through my veins. I took a careful breath and forced my ears to identify the source of my alarm.
I heard nothing.
The animals were silent.
I heard a scream in the distance to the north. Multiple screams followed in response and a chill shook me that the sun could not warm. It was the cry of the lizard-spider monsters.
“Fuck.” I sprinted up the sloped bank to the first house and leapt on top of the thatched roof. From this heightened vantage point I could see clearly across the small town to the switchback that led up to the massive keep.
“Fucking shit!” I groaned under my breath. Hundreds of the creatures poured down the mountain. Their twisted limbs tore at the cobblestones of the street and their sickly greenish brown scales reflected the light of the morning sun like the river behind me.
At the base of the torrent of lizards, a thin wall of Elven warriors carried shields and spears, poised to block the onslaught of the monsters. There were fewer than thirty. Three of the creatures managed to rip into the middle of the shield wall and devour one of the warriors before his companions could slay a single beast. Fehalda and Vernine were engaged in the fray, but the Elvens would shortly be overwhelmed by the sheer number of creatures. The Elvens held a lower position, and they had to give precious ground to the horde to keep formation. Even if the Elvens did manage to hold the beasts off for the next ten minutes, they would soon be pushed back to the base of the switchbacks. There the monsters would be able to attack them from all directions.
The creatures must have been released from whatever magic compelled them to remain deep in the bowels of the mountain with the passing of the dragon. There were thousands of them living in the caves, and they would inflict unknown horror on the ill-prepared population of this world if they continued to spread on the surface. They were large, deadly, and smart. Two of the foul beasts climbed down the side of the road and clung to the bricks there. Then they moved laterally across the wall in an attempt to attack the Elvens from beneath. Vernine and Fehalda saw their movements, and they screamed orders to their warriors. When the lizards attacked, the Elvens were prepared and hacked off their heads before they could claim any more victims.
It was already too late. Dozens of lizard-spiders left the road, breaking away from the primary herd and flanking the Elven warriors. I could not hear her, but saw Fehalda pause briefly to shout orders from the back ranks. I could see the despair on the features of her alabaster face as she lost all hope of defeating the monsters. She knew they were outnumbered.
I pulled more Earth into my body. It filled my blood, my heart, my lungs, and my brain until I felt as though I would burst. I unleashed it as I had thousands of times before, a burning effigy of my hate. It was a globe of Fire, twisted with purple and green. It sprung toward the distant targets on the switchbacks. When it reached the battle, the beasts erupted into a sticky, fiery mass of chaos that shocked both creature and Elven alike.
I followed up with another ball of molten flame that smashed into the back ranks of the torrent of monsters. They frantically churned around the burning goop that coated them and others tried to scurry away in all possible directions like ants whose hill had been attacked.
My first two blasts had burned nearly half of the creatures. Another quarter roasted alive on the steep slopes of the mountain. I was careful to launch the attack to the middle and back of the pack to prevent damage to the Elv
en forces. But my caution had left about fifty of the monsters alive and untouched by the fire. They attacked Fehalda and Vernine’s warriors from all angles and easily broke their shield line. There was no way I could aid them now.
It would take me five minutes to reach the battle. I doubted the Elvens could last that long. I chanced a glance up the distant hill and saw that half of the Elven warriors were down, the lizard beasts ripped into their thrashing bodies. I could not make out individual screams, but the moans and cries of pain from the dying of both species floated toward me on the wind.
I was halfway there. My heart screamed in my chest and the Earth coursed through my muscles. I had to be faster. This was not an easy run. This was my body trying to destroy itself by way of my limbs kicking free of my torso. This was my vision blurring and my abdominal muscles squeezing the bile from my organs.
Stop fucking whining. Run, you fucking asshole!
My head swam and I felt my legs start to cramp, but I had somehow made it to the base of the switchbacks. It looked like my speed may not have helped. Two sets of switchbacks above me, the Elvens had been cut down to only four: Vernine, Fehalda, and two others. The group stood with their backs to each other and swung their long swords in a fruitless attempt to keep the last twenty creatures at bay.
I jumped up and grabbed onto the wall above me. Then I braced my legs against the rough brick and leapt again to make it to the turn of the first switchback. One of the creatures was climbing up the next wall to flank the Elvens from below. I grabbed it by the neck and ripped it free before I heaved it over my head. The weight of the monster surprised me. I knew they were heavy from our previous battle, but I didn’t quite appreciate their mass until I lifted one. With a grunt I tossed it over the edge of the small cliff, with hope the fall would smash the creature flat.
The Destroyer Book 4 Page 19
