by Dave Duncan
“Yes! You said he would be mine. You gave him to me! A gift to me!”
“I don’t remember. Are you sure?”
Kalkor had not raised his voice any more than necessary to let it be heard over the wind, and his calm, steady smile did not vary by a twinkle, except when rain or spray blew in his face. Darad likely had little more intelligence than a starving dog and no compunctions at all about anyone else’s life or death. Yet apparently his own fate still mattered to him, for he flinched before Kalkor’s unspoken threat.
“Well . . . I thought so, sir. Must’ve misunderstood you.”
“You do that quite often, Wolf. Don’t you?”
Incredibly, the ogre cringed even further. “No, sir I mean, aye, sir . . . I mean I’ll not do it anymore, sir.”
“I certainly wouldn’t advise it.”
Darad hesitated, lips moving, and then growled, “But you remember this, Thane: He’s a liar! He’ll lie to you.”
“I don’t think so.”
The giant hesitated, puzzled, knowing he had been dismissed and yet unwilling to go away and leave Rap babbling of sorcerers and Sagorn and Thinal and Andor and Jalon. Had he really expected Kalkor to kidnap Rap for him from a jotunn settlement, and then never want to know why?
“He’s mad, too. Imagines things.”
“Darad,” Kalkor said in the same conversational tone as before, ”it is my custom to present gifts to my guests when they depart. Would you care to choose something now? Something heavy?”
The monster took a moment to work that out, and then his eyes turned toward the ranks of green hills marching at the ship. “North for Pandemia,” Kalkor said, “but I can’t give you any clearer directions, because I don’t know.”
Darad turned and rushed off downhill, along the gangway. The blue fires came back to look at Rap. The quiet smile almost seemed to want to share amusement; but that would be a dangerous assumption to make.
“I see I have more questions to ask than I thought I had. His stupidity is disgusting. Now . . . Have you ever seen one of these?”
The thane reached behind him and produced a gruesome artifact that Rap had not noticed tucked in there. The handle was a wooden cylinder, short and polished, possibly even smoothed by long use. Attached to one end were many fine chains, each about as long as a man’s arm. They looked as if they might have been dipped in black mud, and dark pellets still clung to the tiny links.
Rap could only shake his head. His voice had failed him. He licked salt from his lips.
“This one’s of dwarvish make, I think, but the imps use them in their jails. They use them on their troops, too. Now I find that absurd! If a man doesn’t measure up, kill him and find another—why mess around? Yes, this is an impish punishment. Jotnar don’t use such barbarities.” The gull-wing eyebrows rose inquiringly.
“No, sir.”
Kalkor beamed. “Wrong! Aye, sir! Sometimes wanton cruelty is useful. One has a reputation to maintain, after all. It’s messy, though, and best done ashore. Find a suitable tree, tie the subject up by his wrists . . . The men take turns. The one who kills him wins. I have yet to see a man survive more than twenty-two lashes, but he was a quite elderly bishop who didn’t want to part with a minor treasure he had hidden away, so you might do better. Five strokes would ruin a man for life, I think—applied with enthusiasm, the chains will cut to the bone, you do understand?”
“Aye, sir.”
“So, faun, I am going to ask some questions, and you are going to answer. I am very good at detecting lies, and every lie earns you one stroke with the cat-o’-nine-tails. Behave yourself and I won’t hurt you. I may kill you, but it will be quick. Now, are we clear on the rules?”
“Aye, sir. Sir . . . may I have a drink of water?”
“No. First question: Who is king of Krasnegar?”
“There isn’t one. Holindarn is dead.”
Kalkor nodded, as if pleased—as if Rap was confirming Darad’s news. Kalkor had not known, so obviously Foronod’s letter had never reached him.
Had the factor guessed what he was inviting into Krasnegar? Or had he seen Kalkor as inevitable and just wanted to get on his good side as soon as possible? All Kalkor’s sides were bad. Rap’s feet were starting to throb worse than his hands.
“Second question: Describe Inosolan.”
Rap took a deep breath and weighed the agony of being flayed against the probability that nothing he could possibly say could ever make any difference . . . but his mouth had started speaking already. Cowardice had a thousand disguises and if it called itself exhaustion and weakness and exposure and—don’t matter anyway, cowardice it was still. Nevertheless, he was not man enough to stop himself talking.
“Somewhere between an imp and a jotunn in height. Hair gold . . . darker gold than . . . well, that man sewing the boot? About that shade. Green eyes. Slim. She rides and—”
“I’m only interested in her body. Is she beautiful?”
“Aye, sir.”
“Face me while you’re speaking. Show me how big her breasts are. Mm. I like them bigger. Is she a virgin?”
“I don’t know!” Rap almost managed a shout.
Kalkor chuckled softly, the sharp sapphire fires never leaving Rap’s face. ”You have occult farsight, don’t you?”
“Me, sir? No, sir.”
“That’s one, Rap! I warned you! One stroke. Can you control it, turn it on and off at will?”
“Sometimes,” Rap muttered. Darad had the brains of a herring. He had talked far too much for his own purposes. Like Gathmor, Kalkor would never willingly part with a seer.
“It’s not easy, is it? So you’re discreet? Do you love her?”
“Inos? Love her? Me? I was . . . No, of course not!”
“That’s two.”
“Two what?” Rap snarled. The pain of those chains could never be worse than the pain now pounding in his hands as the blood came back. And his feet . . . Oh, Gods! . . . his feet . . .
“Two lies, two strokes.” Kalkor waved the whip gently, letting the chains swing like a pendulum, jingling.
In his sudden, utter shock, Rap forgot the torment in his hands and feet. ”No! I was a stableb—” Oh, Gods! Love Inos? Kalkor shook his head wonderingly. “You didn’t know? You hadn’t realized! How sweet! My heart bleeds, my gorge rises. Rap, I’ll take back that `two’! I haven’t felt so moved since the praetor of Clastral offered me his daughters. But let’s be quite clear on this. You lust after Inosolan?”
Rap nodded, too shattered to speak. How had he dared? So that was why he had this crazy dream of finding his way to her side—to be a lover, not just a servant? She had kissed him once, and then let him return the favor. They had held hands. Puppy love! Hopeless love. It was unthinkable—she was a queen and he was a churl. He had been deceiving himself all this time. Gods, Gods!
And that was why he had been so disturbed when he had seen a man coming out of her tent in the looking glass vision. He had been jealous! Fool! Fool! Fool!
And Kalkor was watching him with amused contempt as if he could read all this appalling revelation unwinding in Rap’s mind.
“More than you lust after any other woman?”
“Aye, sir.” By the Powers, it was true!
“Well, that is a recommendation, but I don’t know how reliable a faun’s taste would be. Where is she now?”
“I don’t know.”
The bright-blue eyes seemed to grow even brighter as Kalkor frowned, regarding Rap carefully. He waited while the ship topped another spume-swept crest, then he probed with care: “Roughly?”
“Probably in Zark, sir. A sorceress abducted her, and she was a djinn.”
The thane was surprised. “Truly? I really thought the Wolf had gotten his head banged once too often! How did you know my name?”
“Saw you . . . in the . . . magic casement.” Rap had to force the words out. The pain was knotting him now and getting worse. His arms and legs would have been a torment by themselves, but he
was barely noticing them over what his extremities were doing to him.
“Do you know where in Zark she is?”
“Arakkaran, sir.”
“That’s two now, Rap! The truth?”
Struggling to concentrate, barely managing to speak instead of just scream, Rap said, “The sorceress said she came from Arakkaran.”
“But you don’t think Inosolan is in Arakkaran. Why not?” Shocked, and hurting too much to plan any convincing lies, Rap blurted out a confused account of his meeting with Bright Water and Zinixo, and how the wardens had all been trying to steal Inos away from the sorceress and one another. He expected the thane to throw him overboard for spinning such a yarn—and it would have been a blissful release—but Kalkor, amazingly, seemed to believe him.
The questions thudded home like arrows, Rap croaked out answers in a blur. Describe Milflor harbor . . . how many men in the Krasnegarian army . . . He shaved the truth as much as he could manage, until Kalkor shook his head gently and said, “We’re up to five, Rap. I thought I’d warn you. We’re looking at real damage now, I’m afraid. Next question . . .”
His instinct for truth and falsehood seemed to be infallible, although Rap’s face was so battered that it must be very hard to read, and often the wind whipped the words from his lips. The penalty count was up to “Nine!” before Rap abandoned any further efforts to deceive. Thereafter he just let his tongue babble. He didn’t care anymore. The pain in his hands and feet was driving him mad. If he had the strength, he’d climb over the ship’s side and drown himself.
He must have fainted, because afterward he remembered speaking while lying flat, his bruised cheek against the cold wet planks. Later he sensed two enormous dirty feet right in front of his nose. From them young Vurjuk sprouted like a spare mast.
“. . . clean him up,” Kalkor was saying. “Can you trawl him on a rope without killing him?”
“Can try, sir.”
“Well, make it brief and find him some clothes afterward, because I would prefer that he live awhile yet. “
“A flogging match?” Vurjuk’s voice rang with boyish eagerness.
Thane Kalkor did not answer impertinent questions; the look in his eye was enough to make the kid bleat, “Aye, sir!” and jump to obey orders.
Stripped, trawled, dried, clothed, watered, and fed, Rap discovered to his surprise that he was still alive, although he wished he wasn’t. He was still incapable of walking, but he crawled aft to where Gathmor lay, and gave him a drink. Then he dragged over a battle-ax, which was the only sharp thing within reasonable distance, and found even that hard to hold in hands so grotesquely swollen. The jotnar must have noticed what he was doing but they did not interfere. By the time the last of Gathmor’s bonds parted, Rap was so weary that he was capable of nothing more. He fell asleep where he was, in much the same place he had been before.
3
Rap was kicked awake and told to report to the thane. Reeling and stumbling, he hurried aft, confused by the ship’s new motion. Falling was inevitable in his state, but he managed to make all his impacts on inanimate things—oars, benches, tubs. To land on a sleeping jotunn might cost him half his teeth. The sun was just rising into a blue and promising sky. The wind was strong, but no longer dangerous, and Blood Wave was surging northward over the last remnants of the storm swell. Even the creak of wood and rope had taken on a more cheerful note. Perhaps today he might get dry for the first time since Durthing? Then he reached the stern and sank to his knees before the throne, where Kalkor was just making himself comfortable.
For a few minutes Rap was ignored as the thane rummaged in a leather bag, looking for something. All over the boat, men were stirring, rising, stretching, scratching, cursing.
“Roll that up.” The thane’s gesture indicated his hammock, so Rap rose and attended to the hammock. He could not straighten under the low headroom, but in his condition he had very little desire to. He was as shaky and weak as a sick kitten, staggering with every pitch and roll.
He tucked hammock and blanket on top of the mountain of loot, but before he could kneel—or just fall—down again, Kalkor held out a hand to him. Rap stared at its burden in dumb incomprehension, and then looked into the jotunn’s arrogant blue contempt.
“You lose a finger for every nick. “
It was without question a razor. Still gaping, Rap took it, opened it, and found the finest steel blade he had ever seen, obviously dwarvish. He tried the edge; before he felt anything, his thumb was oozing fine specks of blood.
“Idiot! “ Kalkor said. “Well, you know the rules. Get busy.” Rap’s hands were still stiff and swollen, and if they had not been shaking before, then they certainly were now. He moved near to the chair and tried to steady his head against the overhead beams—had he been a fraction taller he could have rested his shoulders against them instead. He was stooped over Kalkor, and much too close for comfort or even for easy work. The thane was offering his face . . . and neck.
Why shouldn’t Rap just cut his throat?
Kalkor’s sky-blue eyes gleamed. He knew what Rap was thinking, and he smiled up at him as fondly as a lover. When he spoke his voice was very soft. ”Don’t even be tempted.”
To dry-shave a man on a leaping, heaving boat in a state of shivering weakness when the slightest knick would bring mutilation—for Kalkor’s threats would never be idle—that was a totally impossible task. The very prospect brought sweat leaping out all over Rap’s body. It was utterly, completely, insanely impossible! As well ask him to fly to Zark.
“I’ll give you about five more seconds,” Kalkor said.
Rap took him by the nose and lifted. The jotunn stretched his upper lip and Rap stroked it with the razor. He did not forfeit a finger with that one. He wiped the blade on his sleeve and prepared to try again. Kalkor had missed shaving for several days; his golden stubble was long and tough, his skin dry and surprisingly soft. Rap’s own face was streaming, as was all of him.
He could not have been wetter had he just emerged from the sea.
Why shouldn’t he just slit Kalkor’s throat? The man was an egregious monster, a killing, raping, looting horror without peer. Even this whole shaving charade was a form of torture. The crew would be watching and laughing—and admiring their leader’s courage. Rap’s opportunity to make the world a safer place for human beings was one that any half-decent man should be glad to sacrifice his life for. Trouble was, he might not reach the rail in time to gain an easy death, and if the rest of the jotnar caught him, what unspeakable torments would they inflict on him?
Kalkor was watching with a sleepy sort of disdain. He looked completely relaxed, lounging on his throne, being shaved by his new thrall, but he wasn’t relaxed to Rap’s farsight. His eyes were half closed, and yet alert, and while his hands hung slack and loose, the muscles in his shoulders were knotted hard as steel. Thane Kalkor was not quite the uncaring suicidal hero he was trying to portray.
Rap realized he had stopped breathing, and paused to resume. He wiped his forehead, although the sweat wasn’t running into his eyes, which were still puffed and blurred. He had been working with them closed.
Kalkor was still watching. “Strop?” Rap croaked. “In the bag.”
Rap fished out the belt and began sharpening. When he was ready to shave again, Kalkor tilted his head back, baring his throat.
“Tell me about Darad and this curse of his.”
Rap pulled skin taut with fingertips, slit off whiskers with a deft stroke. A slash would be so easy, the world so much better! He could not remember what he had told Kalkor about Darad the day before. “There are five of him.” He must watch the crests—Blood Wave had a nasty habit of twitching her tail when she went over the tops, as the wind caught her hull; if he lost his balance he would lose a finger for certain. “Only one of them can exist at a time. They were a gang of wild kids. About a hundred years ago . . .”
So easy to kill. Was he not man enough? He felt no real guilt about Yggingi, and this
jotunn was a thousand times worse than the imp had been. Make the try and get it over! He pushed Kalkor’s chin to a better angle. He was steadying his own head against a beam and getting splinters in his scalp. This would be easier if he could stand upright. Without the acuity of farsight it would be impossible.
“Each of the five has a talent . . . “ Now the razor seemed to be tugging more, and it wasn’t for lack of sharpening. Kalkor was starting to sweat too. He was still striving to seem relaxed and limp in his chair, and yet he was growing tauter and tauter. A fine sheen of damp showed on his forehead and chest. Was this ordeal going on longer than he had anticipated? Likely he had expected Rap to nick him on the first or second stroke . . . all right so far; half done now. Probably Kalkor had planned to end the game when he got to ten nicks. A seer with no hands would be easier to keep prisoner. But if he wanted to mutilate Rap like that, he would do so anyway, regardless of how many times Rap cut him.
Talk was easier while stropping than while shaving. “Darad doesn’t need to call for help very often, so he’s aged. He stays too long. Thinal, on the other hand, is still just a kid.” Rap gripped Kalkor’s ear and pulled a little harder than necessary.
Not a game—it was a trap. Nicks were not what the jotunn expected, but an attack, Rap moving to cut his throat. Strop some more. “Jalon’s the minstrel, the artist . . . “ He was talking without thinking, but he didn’t mind revealing the gang’s great secret. He owed nothing to any of them. The only thing he left out was the word of power. Kalkor already had a word of his own, and might be tempted to become an adept. He might very well extract Rap’s word, also, and three words made a mage. Kalkor as a mage was a brain-curdling thought.
His talent was fighting, so Andor had said. Could a mere occult genius fend off a razor attack even if it was launched from such close quarters? Perhaps. Probably. So Kalkor was not nearly as vulnerable as he looked. If Rap tried to avenge Durthing, then Kalkor could still block him.
And the man was really sweating now. It made the shaving harder, but Rap could afford to take his time. He was beginning to think he could win this game, unless Kalkor deliberately cheated by moving, and so far he had played fair. So Rap was stropping after almost every stroke, dragging it out.
