Rykoto would live in his eternal hell only if all thirteen seals remained intact. Should even one seal be removed, there was a possibility for him to reenter the world of Aelinae. One seal that she knew of was missing. It was hidden at Paderau Palace, but if there were more missing—a dread-filled shudder shook her to the core.
The scroll claimed Daknys set clues into the temple that would help the Chosen One keep Rykoto imprisoned. Unfortunately, these clues could also help free him. According to the scroll, if the clues were deconstructed in the proper order, they would reveal instructions to undo the bonds that kept Rykoto imprisoned. The text ended abruptly and she searched the space where she’d found the scroll for a second parchment that held the rest of the tale. She scanned every scrap of paper on every shelf but found no other mention of Rykoto.
When certain no one was looking, she tucked the scroll inside her boot. Valterys had more wards and alarms set on his room than she ever placed on her own, which meant she would have to wait for his return to gain access to his private library, where she suspected the rest of the scroll resided. If she were Sabina, she’d bat her eyelashes or thrust her breasts under the seneschal’s nose in an effort to flirt her way into Valterys’ rooms, but she’d probably look like a fool. Perhaps she should’ve paid better attention to Sabina’s princess lessons, she chided herself. Not that she ever would admit that to her friend.
Her fingertips tapped along the dragon’s wings of her sword. ShantiMari flowed through the halls like liquid, flaring in spits, sometimes with spells embedded into the threads. Caer Idris was a place of Dark power where rules of ShantiMari were enforced, but there existed an undercurrent that made her queasy. Tracking her unease to a single thread would be futile. She placed a hand over her vorlock scar where the poison thrummed beneath her skin. There, hidden amid the venom, was the black stain the phantom had given her.
The constant throbbing had become a daily nuisance she no longer thought about, and she realized with a start that too much of the past season had been spent on pursuits not of her choosing. At least the phantom wasn’t among the courtiers spying upon her at Caer Idris, she thought dryly. Or making her do things against her will.
The seneschal darted behind a column and Taryn suppressed a laugh. What I wouldn’t give for a pinch of the phantom’s ability to compel right about now. I’d command the seneschal take us to my father’s rooms at once, she told Kaida, absently rubbing her scar, ignoring the rush of irritation.
To what end? If you so chose, you could enchant the entire castle into doing your bidding, but you are needed elsewhere. Let us explore.
Explore? Would you like to elaborate? Inside? Outside?
Kaida padded away from the nook into a crowded hallway where several courtiers shuffled past, avoiding eye contact with her. The seneschal followed at a discreet distance, but Kaida increased her pace and after several turns, lost him. Taryn jogged to catch up, curious why the grierbas suddenly wanted to lose their escort.
Are we looking for something or are you just bored?
Kaida ignored her.
At last they came to a door leading down a long flight of stairs. A few torches flickered in the semi-darkness and Taryn hesitated, but Kaida forged ahead. After several minutes, she debated turning back when they came to a locked door. Kaida pawed and scratched at the door, whining.
“What is it?” Taryn asked. Even though she whispered, the sound echoed off the stones and she flinched.
Something is beyond here. We must follow the scent.
Taryn paused for a moment. What could lie beyond a locked door at the end of a very long set of stairs? Nothing good, Taryn told herself.
Against her better judgment, she touched the lock and it snapped open, the door swinging wide to allow access into a hallway that stretched far into the darkness. Kaida skulked along the wall. Ahead of her, a few torches lit the way, but it was still quite dark. Taryn wanted to turn back, but Kaida insisted she follow.
With each step they took, Taryn began to realize they were in the castle dungeons. Unlike those of Celyn Eryri, these were often used, and more than once, they heard the whimper of a prisoner, or brushed past bony fingers that clutched the cell bars.
Where are you taking us?
Just ahead. Kaida padded to a cell and sat on her haunches. She whimpered into the blackness beyond.
The face of a boy appeared, looking first to Kaida and then to Taryn.
You must take him from this place, Kaida told Taryn.
Why this boy when there are dozens of other prisoners?
He is not a boy. He is a woodland faerie from the Narthvier and will die if you do not take him away now.
Taryn placed her fingers over the faerie’s. “What is your name?” she whispered in Eleri. The boy shook his head, pointing to his mouth. “You cannot speak?” She reached out to touch his forehead and he jerked away. “I will not hurt you. Come here,” she begged softly. He moved a fraction closer to her, his eyes wide with fear. She stretched her fingertips through the bars and touched them to his temple.
We are friends. We can help you.
His mouth gaped and he made small sounds like a mewing kitten. Darennsai?
I am Taryn ap Galendrin, Darennsai of the Eleri.
He prostrated himself, touching his head to the ground, making more of the strangled sounds against the dirt. Taryn carefully untied the strands of ShantiMari looped around the cell bars before clicking the lock open. The door creaked as she opened it, sounding like a gong through the dungeons.
After a moment, when nothing stirred in the darkness, she crept to the faerie, touching his back. Little more than bone existed beneath his tattered tunic. He looked up at her with eyes full of fear.
We are going to help. She lifted him into her arms, shocked by how light he was. Do not make a sound. We will get you out of here.
He nodded, stroking her long braid for comfort.
She stepped through the door, slowly closing it behind her before replacing the lock. Voices in the hallway made Taryn’s heart stutter. She darted after Kaida down a dark corridor and waited for the voices to pass. As they approached, she realized they meant to pass where she stood holding the faerie.
Blindly, the little group inched deeper into the shadows, where they tucked into an alcove seconds before a bright light illuminated the corridor. Zakael and Valterys walked a few steps toward her, then through a door to their right. Her heart rammed against her chest, her mind whirling frantically.
They were supposed to be away from the castle. Valterys lied to her. She shouldn’t have been surprised, but she was. And hurt. She set the faerie beside Kaida with an admonition to remain where he was and keep silent.
Keeping close to the wall, she crept to the door they entered. Lights flared inside a dank room with all manner of chains and torture devices hanging from the ceiling and walls. Valterys stood in front of a man suspended from his bound wrists.
Half-healed wounds oozed into dirt-smeared bruises on his naked body. Another man, naked like the first, was tied to a wooden contraption that caught Taryn’s breath. Ropes looped around his legs, binding them into a crouch, with his arms pulled taut against a wooden board, his feet dangled above the floor. Zakael stepped into her view and slapped the man across his cheek with the back of his hand.
Blood oozed from the prisoner’s lips and Zakael did something that made Taryn’s stomach churn. He leaned in as if to kiss the man, but instead licked the blood in several long strokes, a look of bliss on his face. It took all her will to resist the urge to burst into the room, ShantiMari flaring.
Surely her father and brother would subdue her, leaving her no better off than the tortured men. As if hearing her thoughts, Zakael glanced toward the door and she ducked.
“I’ve told you, these men know nothing. They’ve been here three moonturns and their stories have yet to change,” Zakael said.
She peered through the opening of the door, keeping a rein on her emotions.
“Get me the rod,” Valterys commanded, pulling at a piece of flesh that flapped loose on the suspended man’s bare chest. “I’m going to ask you once more and this time you will tell me what I want to hear.” Valterys held up a long metal object that glowed red on one end. The prisoner’s eyes filled with terror, raw and primal, and he whimpered into his shoulder, trying in vain to escape from the hot poker.
“I’ve told you, my lord. I don’t know anything about an assassin.”
Valterys placed the rod against his skin, searing flesh. His scream cut through her and she leaned against the wall, palms clammy, heart racing. “I was on patrol—nothing more, your lordship!”
“Are you not one of Empress Lliandra’s guards? Were you not with them at Celyn Eryri?” Valterys held the rod close to his face.
“I was there, but I was sent to scout the mountains after the empress arrived.”
Taryn fought to calm her shaking legs, settle her breathing. Her ShantiMari demanded to be unleashed, yearned for justice.
“So you saw no Shadow Assassin?”
The guard shook his head. “I only know of the attack at Paderau. I wasn’t there, but others talked about it.” He was frantic, his eyes wild as he pleaded with her father. “That’s all I know. I swear it.”
Valterys touched the poker to the man’s face. When his screams died down, he said, “You lie. You knew the assassin was caught and you know who released him. Was it one of your men? Who? You must know something.”
Taryn gasped, clamping her mouth shut. The assassin was free.
“No! I swear it!” He sobbed while Valterys held the rod close to the burn he’d just made. “I was on patrol in the mountains when he was freed. I’ve told you this before, your lordship. I never saw the assassin or the Eirielle.”
Valterys raked a blade on the man’s chest, making deep cuts in his skin, and then ordered Zakael to clamp weights to his nipples.
Taryn gagged. The weights would pull the skin farther and farther down, essentially skinning him. Cries of pain echoed through the room, pounding her with their desperation.
“How long do you wish to keep these men here?” Boredom tinged Zakael’s voice. “I believe they know nothing of the assassin.”
“Perhaps, but whatever knowledge Lliandra possesses on this matter, I must have. Even the most trivial piece of information could be important.” Valterys turned his attention to the man bound to the board. When he saw Valterys, he shook his head and groaned.
“To what end? You have the girl—isn’t that all you need?” Zakael asked.
“This is where it gets interesting, my son. Rykoto keeps blathering about three things and the scroll says I need her sword, her blood, and—” He paused and Taryn held her breath, waiting for him to name the third item. “Nadra’s tit, will you stop that?” Valterys chided his son. “When I’m finished, you may kill him or whatever you like.”
Taryn thunked her forehead against the wall in frustration. Fucking Zakael. She’d been this close to learning the third item. She slipped a finger inside her boot, sighing at the sound of paper crinkling. The scroll was safe.
“When will you take her to Rykoto?” Zakael asked as he flicked one of the weights on the hanging prisoner and then stroked his flaccid cock. The poor man groaned in agony while trying to turn away from Zakael.
“What did I just say?” Valterys warned, a dangerous, bitter edge to his voice. “As for Rykoto, the timing must be perfect. I believe the codices point to mid-summer.” Valterys tapped the man in front of him. “I think he’ll make an excellent sacrifice for our god, don’t you?”
Zakael peered over his father’s shoulder. “You’ve plenty of other prisoners for that purpose. Are you sure you want to sacrifice one of Lliandra’s men?”
Valterys’ laugh was cold, unaffected. “Why not? It would be a suitable end to him, don’t you think? To be given to the one he’s sworn to protect his empress against? Put him in the first cell and see that he’s fed. Rykoto is getting stronger and demands more nourishment.
“Stay away from the girl. I need her to believe me to be a kindly, if not confused, old man and I won’t have you interfering with my plans.”
“If not for me, she wouldn’t even be here,” Zakael argued.
A vicious chill entered Valterys’ tone. “If not for you, she’d have been here sooner. You’ve cost me dearly, and once again I must fix your mistake. Be certain those armies are at the border by mid-summer’s night. I need Lliandra’s eyes cast away from the north. You are not to engage Lliandra. This is only a distraction to buy me time with the girl.”
His footsteps paused on the other side of the door. “Do not fail me again.”
Taryn darted away just before he yanked open the door and stormed down the corridor.
She cradled the faerie close, wrapping him in her ShantiMari to soothe his uncontrollable shaking. When her father’s footfalls faded to nothing, the trembling lessened, but did not abate. The cries of Lliandra’s men drew her attention back to the room and she crouched against the door. The faerie buried his face in her tunic, a skeletal hand clutching her braid. She chanced a glimpse into the room and stifled a gasp.
Zakael, his breeches lowered to his ankles, stood in front of the man bound to the board. One hand gripped the prisoner’s hair while he pumped his cock into the poor soul’s mouth. His other hand, meanwhile, stroked the suspended man’s erection. Her brother’s moans mingled with the muffled cries of the captives, the sound disturbingly rapturous in the torture chamber. He threw his head back and pumped harder, cursing the men, calling them vulgar names with a devilish smile on his face.
Her impulse was to look away, to deny what she saw, but she could not. Those men deserved more than her cowardice.
The strangled gasps of the man bound in front of Zakael tore at her. He was pinned in that hell without hope of an escape. At least the man hanging by his wrists could turn his face to the side, away from his captor.
Kaida, I can’t just leave them.
There is no time. We cannot save them all, Darennsai.
Taryn hesitated only a second before she sent a thread of ShantiMari to the prisoners with a gentle suggestion that their hearts stop beating. One of the men shrieked and she doubled her efforts with the fervent hope for a peaceful transition to the other side. It wasn’t much, but it was all she could do for them.
The faerie curled closer to her, away from their anguished screams. She made as little sound as possible as she sprinted through the corridors. Zakael’s grunts and the dying men’s whimpers echoed in the darkness, mocking her. This was a side of her brother she wished she’d never witnessed. He was truly devoid of compassion, of goodness. She’d hoped, fervently so, there was a spark of kindness in her brother but he’d proved to her there wasn’t. A small part of her died in that room alongside those men.
From the continued trembling of the faerie, she assumed he’d experienced Zakael’s special kind of torture. For that reason, and for those innocent men who suffered at the hands of her brother’s twisted needs, she vowed vengeance. The faerie touched her cheek and shook his head. His soft brown eyes filled with tears and spilled over, coursing fresh tracks down his filthy face. A bony finger pointed toward the dungeons and back to her and then to himself before he again shook his head.
She didn’t have time for his riddles. She’d sort it out later, after they’d escaped.
The heavy door leading to the upper castle stood slightly ajar and Taryn paused to probe the other side with her ShantiMari. Sensing nothing, she cast it open and hurried up, taking the stairs two at a time. Her breathing grew more labored with each step, until she thought her chest would collapse from fear. If Valterys returned, or Zakael left the dungeons, there was nowhere for her to hide.
When at last they reached the final step, Taryn dared hope they might make it to her rooms unnoticed. She glanced around the empty hallway and then ran in a near-blind sprint, with the faerie boy clinging to her.
It o
nly took a few minutes to pack her leather satchel and saddlebags. Into them, she threw her clothes and anything they might need on the road. The faerie stood self-consciously in one of her old tunics, which hung off his slight body. She rolled up the sleeves with a promise they would find him proper clothes and shoes as soon as they could. When all was in order, she grabbed her traveling cloak and a blanket for him, and then covered them with shadow.
At that time in the afternoon, the stable was nearly deserted. A few stable boys diced against the back wall, far from Nikosana’s stall. Taryn set the faerie in a darkened corner, placing a finger to her lips for silence. He nodded mutely, his eyes like saucers in his gaunt face. With great care, she saddled the stallion, pausing every so often to listen, but the stables remained quiet. Just as she lifted the faerie into the saddle, bells rang out and her veins froze with fear they’d been discovered missing.
The stable boys and several guards strolled casually past the open barn door, and she breathed warmth into her chilled body. It was only dinner bells calling the servants in to dine. She took advantage of the momentary chaos of the shift change and rode brazenly through the gate, even waving at the guard as she passed. Valterys had told her to tour the city and that’s exactly the image she wished to portray. The faerie huddled in front of her, invisible to anyone who looked. Kaida loped beside them, her golden gaze scanning the streets for danger. When they reached the western gate, Taryn kicked Nikosana into a canter and left Caer Idris behind.
Chapter Thirty-Three
The room was decidedly feminine and made for pleasure. In the center of the room, dominating the space, sat an enormous circular bed. Around the room, alcoves housed odd-looking chairs and other accoutrements that brought a blush to many a client’s cheeks. Expensive couches stuffed with feathers and covered in rich velvet were placed strategically for special viewing. Rhoane reclined on one of the comfortable settees, stretching his legs in front of him, absently tracing his runes. When the door opened, he assumed a look of compliant boredom. The look of surprise on Nena’s face cracked his demeanor and he smiled like a caught child.
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