by Lee Ramsay
Her voice grew sultry as she ran her eyes down his body. “Our bodies will also become aroused when faced with what they desire, and they will demand satiation.”
“You are mad.”
“Not mad. Aware. One does not study the living form for generations without gaining insight into its capabilities – or how to manipulate it.” Ankara left Sathra’s side and sauntered toward him. She ignored his flinching away as she caressed his cheek with her palm. “You wish your freedom? It possible you may find a way to escape, and you are welcome to try. No dungeon is perfect. A dozen people, perhaps a score, have managed to slip their bonds over the centuries. Honestly, I have never kept track.”
Tristan narrowed his eyes, the echoes of words about this woman coming to him once more. “This is a game to you, isn’t it?”
The woman’s eyebrow arched with amusement. “The centuries become dull unless one finds interesting distractions.”
“Why?”
“Why do I want you to try to escape, or why do I do this? You are a curious creature. In seven centuries, perhaps two people have asked questions rather than beg for mercy.” Ankara tilted her head, raven hair spilling across her breast as she tapped the dagger against her thigh. “I shall answer your first question. As I said before, prey is truly alive only when hunted – especially when cornered. The essence of their life is so much sweeter when taken.”
“I will not play your game.”
Ankara laughed, her lips parting to reveal perfect teeth. “If you do not play, you will remain here, and I shall feed off your fear and suffering; I will have won. If you escape and are caught, you will be brought back to this chamber; again, I will have won. If your strategy is to remain passive and pliant to sour the essence, I’ll slit your throat and drain you dry. You will be dead, and I shall still have been sated.”
“And what of my second question?”
A thin line forming between her brows, she laid her hand on his chest. Her forefinger toyed with the delicate skin of his right nipple, coaxing it to hardness. “I would be interested to see how you play chess. You have an uncommon clarity of thought to remain curious, where these others are content to shiver in silent fear. Do you presume you might outthink me if you ask the correct questions?”
“If you’re as good as you think, I’m not going anywhere. Answering a question hurts nothing.”
The sorceress rolled her shoulder in a shrug, her hair rippling with the motion as she caught and held his eyes. Her smile took on an edge as she viced down on his nipple and drew the tender skin taut. Cold numbness radiated through his chest as the dagger’s edge sheared through his flesh, followed by a blaze of pain.
Tristan choked as his tongue lodged in the back of his throat as pain spread across his chest. As shock retreated before agony’s onslaught, he loosed a cry that reverberated from the walls. Sweat bit at the wound and sank teeth into raw nerves as blood washed down his belly.
“Who says I need a reason? Despite my curiosity, who you is of little significance. What is of consequence is how long your hate keeps you alive, sustaining you and in turn sating me. Do try not to be boring.” Ankara lifted the scrap of severed skin in front of his eyes once his scream dwindled to distressed panting. She jiggled her hand in front of his pain-glazed eyes to make the scrap of skin dance between her fingers. Menace laced her voice when she spoke again. “I believe you shall be Sathra’s first, but I wish to have the first taste of what makes you who you are.”
Bile flooded Tristan’s throat as the sorceress lifted the bloody scrap to her lips and placed it on her tongue. Her eyes grew heavy-lidded as she swallowed, an erotic groan of pleasure rising from her chest. She surged against him, hair rippling against his skin as she pressed her body against his. Nails raked his back as she wrapped her arms around his torso. Blood welled from the gouges as her mouth suckled the wound at his breast.
A queer sensation tore at the core of his being as he screamed.
Chapter 31
A dull ache radiated through his shoulders, cramping the muscles of his neck. Dozens of hurts throbbed across his back, legs, and arms, burning with an itching heat to match the raw wound in his chest. Disjointed memories crashed together. His hands had been severed; they must have been, as he could no longer feel them.
A cold wave of adrenaline swept through him. His heart throbbed against his ribs as a wedge of pain lanced through his skull. With a cry of terror, he thrashed awake; the violence of his movements rattled the manacles holding his arms over his head.
Cramps and stiff muscles protested as he shot to his feet from his awkward supine position. Blood rushed into his hands as the pressure on his wrists eased, setting the nerves buzzing. He ignored the discomfort and examined his hands. Eight fingers and two thumbs. He was intact.
Mostly intact, Tristan amended as he looked down at his chest. Coarse black thread stitched the wound of his excised nipple closed. Lye’s acrid stench rose from the injury; the burning of raw flesh beneath the suture told him the wound had been cleaned. Gouges left by Ankara’s fingers stung as he straightened his spine, the scabs cracking as the skin pulled.
The chain fixed to his manacles rattled as the youth scrubbed his face. Perhaps two days’ growth stubbled his cheeks and throat. Gloom pressed close, the coals in the braziers glowing a sullen red.
Though his stomach was empty, it did not rumble or pain him. Likewise, weak though his muscles were, he was not lightheaded from hunger or thirst. His bladder and bowels had evacuated at some point, but he had no memory of doing so or of anyone cleaning away the waste.
In truth, he remembered nothing much beyond Ankara’s firm body pressed against his, groaning and writhing with pleasure as she suckled the wound in his chest. He must have lost consciousness; he could recall neither being released nor having his injury tended. The sorceress was not lying about ensuring he lived if he had been tended to in his unconsciousness.
He recalled Ankara mentioning people escaping in the past. Adrenaline flooded his system as he wrapped his hands around the chain and yanked, causing the complex metal apparatus fixed to the chamber’s ceiling to rattle.
“Stop!” a woman’s voice hissed from the darkness. “They’ll hear!”
Tristan ignored her, and wiped his sweating palms against his stomach in a futile effort to dry them before spreading his hands as far as the manacles allowed. He wrapped the chain around his palms to gain a better grip and jerked once more. The force popped several stitches in his chest, releasing a trickle of blood as the scab tore open. The apparatus banged and shook, rattling the other prisoners’ chains. More voices, male and female both, begged him to stop.
Fire roared in the braziers, stinging Tristan’s eyes. The chamber’s door slammed open, strangling the prisoners’ protests as though a hand gripped every throat. Urzgeth’s eyes rested on Tristan as his bulk filled the arched doorway. Thick-soled boots thumped against the floor as he strode toward the young man, huddled prisoners shying away as the hem of his heavy leather coat brushed against them. “You’re awake.”
“You’re observant.”
“There is fight in you, then. It won’t last. It never does,” the Dushken said with a shake of his head. His square hand dipped into a pocket sewn to the outside of his coat and drew out a plain metal flask stoppered with a dark brown cork. “I’m to give you this when you wake. Are you going to drink it, or must I force it down your throat?”
The youth opened his mouth as he glared into Urzgeth’s black eyes. The Dushken pulled the stopper and tilted the flask against the young man’s lips, pouring enough of a rich, yeasty liquid across Tristan’s tongue to swallow without choking.
He spat the mouthful in the huntsman’s eyes when the aged Dushken took the flask away from his lips.
Tristan did not see the fist that slammed his jaw and dropped him to his knees. The play in the chain hooked to his manacled wrists snapped taut, catching him before his face smacked the stone floor, but his shoulders nearly wrenched
from their sockets. Blood salting his lips, he grunted as the huntsman wrapped his fingers around his jaw and wrenched his head back.
Urzgeth’s yellowing canines showed behind his curled lips as an ominous rumble rose from his deep chest. Beads of amber liquid dripped from his bearded face. “You are not the first to try tempting me into killing them. You will not be the last. None have succeeded.”
Tristan’s fingers clawed the tough skin of the huntsman’s hand, his breath coming in rattling pants. “I haven’t tried to annoy you yet.”
“Please, tell me when I should pretend to be impressed.”
The flask pressed against the youth’s lips. He kept his lips pressed together and jerked his head away. The drink stung his torn sutures as it dribbled down his chin and chest.
Urzgeth rammed his knee into his side, driving the young man’s breath from his lungs with an explosive exhalation. The flask smacked against his teeth, the drink splashing as he struggled to breathe without drowning. He swallowed, the bite of yeasty alcohol burning its way down to his belly. Once he drained the flask, the huntsman stalked away without a backward glance. The door closed, leaving the room in silence broken by the fires crackling in the braziers.
Tristan stretched his neck’s twisted muscles and spat a gob of blood to the floor. Alcohol seemed a strange thing to give a prisoner, and he wondered at its breadlike flavor. When the hollowness below his breastbone abated, he realized the drink provided some of what his body needed to sustain itself.
As the rishka took hold, he discovered alcohol also covered its bitter flavor.
The effects were subtle at first, akin to what came from drinking too much whisky. Tingling numbness set into his lips, followed by spreading warmth relaxing his limbs. His hearing dulled, then grew sharp; he heard every breath the other prisoners took, the gurgling of their guts, and the rattling of their chains. As the minutes slid by, a sense of disconnection from his body slowed his ability to think. Rough stones bit his knees, and heat from the braziers seemed at once both distant and startling in their clarity.
He shook his head – or, rather, attempted to. He tried pushing himself to his feet and found he could not. A terrified cry welled up within him, but his throat refused to make the sound.
His breathing quickened to meet the slight elevation of his heartbeat.
The horror of the rishka, he realized, was that it robbed him of his body and will. He recalled the sensation from his time in Sathra’s interrogation chamber. Other than a slight wander, his thoughts remained clear.
Time crawled, each moment growing longer as his heart slowed. His mind scrabbled at the edges of its cage as his body waited. The cold thrill of adrenaline rushing through his veins did nothing but draw his skin tight and make the hair on his arms and legs stand on end. He screamed his frustration, the sound deafening in his skull – but his mouth remained silent.
Pity and relief colored the other prisoners’ faces as they cast sidelong glances at him. He wondered what they knew.
The chamber door opened once more. Three sets of footsteps approached, two bare and one booted. From the corner of his eye, he spied the pale legs of two women shrouded in white silk and the heavy black trousers and tall boots worn by a guard. Try as he might, he could not turn his head or his eyes toward his captors.
“Key.” Ankara’s voice was thick, low, and smoldering as she spoke the command.
The guard fumbled for the ring on his belt. Keys rattled as he sorted through them and handed the sorceress the one she wanted.
The skin on Tristan’s wrist twinged as the key turned in the manacle, and the tumblers opened with a soft click. His left arm fell to his side, pain lancing through his shoulder as stiff muscles shifted. A moment later the other manacle loosened, leaving him kneeling unbound with aching hands resting on his thighs.
He was not foolish enough to think mercy was being granted.
Sathra’s voice was calm and analytical. “The rishka appears to be working. I was unsure it would. He was resistant during questioning.”
“This is a different formulation, recognizable by the differences in how it presents. The formula used to question a prisoner deprives them of some motor control; their eyes tend to wander, as do their thoughts. This recipe deprives its victim of bodily control while leaving them cognizant of their surroundings.” Ankara took Tristan’s chin between her fingers, inspecting his features with critical eyes. “Their eyes remain fixed in this state, and their bodies pliant to both stimulus and command. I could lay a hot iron on his skin, and he would not react. He would place his hand in a lit brazier without hesitation if I so ordered him to, and he would remain there while his flesh blackened and burned away. Neither his pulse nor his breathing would quicken more than a whit.”
“They are prisoners, and we have Dushken and guards to handle them. Why bother with such a drug?” Sathra asked.
Ankara gave a slight roll of her shoulder. “It amuses me to do so. Worry not; you will comprehend why in time. For now, I want you to observe. Stand up, boy.”
Tristan wanted nothing so much as to refuse the command. He thought he was succeeding until his muscles realigned his center of balance. The movement was slow and deliberate, but his legs straightened until he stood before the sorceress.
A throaty laugh rose from the grand duchess’s chest – a laugh he was growing to fear. Her soft hands pressed against his shoulders. Sheer silk brushed his shins as he stepped backward under her guiding touch. Cardamom rose from the pulse points of her wrists, cloying in his lungs.
“The body does not need the whole of the mind to survive; your heart beats whether you will it or not. We have deluded ourselves that we are masters of our flesh when we are little more than animals with a measure of control. Flesh will slip our will’s yoke with the right application of knowledge, and will answer the demands of another’s hand on the bridle.” The sorceress glanced over her shoulder at the younger woman, unbound black hair tumbling around her shoulders. “Like the flow of energies I have taught you mastery over, people can be manipulated to an equal effect – and with far less of a drain on your gifts.”
Sathra nodded, trailing along behind Ankara with a bemused expression. “A person with this form of rishka in their blood makes for a more useful servant. They can be assigned tasks, freeing us to attend to other matters.”
“Not entirely. You can get rote behaviors and simple deeds from a person in this state, but the rishka ensures they will remain silent – and therefore trustworthy. Unfortunately, the drug needs to be refreshed in their system, which makes it an unreliable method for retaining control.”
“Then why bother with it at all?”
Tristan’s knees brushed the cool, sleek satin draped over the bed at the back of the chamber. Realization dawned regarding her intent, causing his heart to lurch in his chest. The sorceress smiled as comprehension lit his eyes. “It is an amusing way to draw the vitality you will need to sustain yourself. Our young friend understands.”
“You have shown me the spells written in your books, and I have seen you siphon away others’ essence. I understand how the magic fuses the victim’s life force with your own.” Sathra gestured at the bed. “This seems unnecessary when we can extract what we need without soiling ourselves.”
“I fail to comprehend your reluctance,” Ankara chided, her hands running across Tristan’s chest. Her thumb pressed down on the sutured wound until the scabs broke and released a trickle of fresh blood. “You have been anything but chaste these past few years.”
“I might consider it if he was Anahari, but he is Ravvosi.”
The sorceress clucked her tongue. “I see I have failed to breed out hubris in my attempts to better our people. I also see that, for all that you claim you understand what I do, you understand nothing.”
“Pray enlighten me.”
Ankara’s hands wandered across Tristan’s body with feathery touches. His flesh stiffened with arousal despite the revulsion churning within him
. “Long has mankind sought the secret of youth, desperate to live and preserve all which makes them who they are. It is in the seed that the living essence is strongest. We must settle for the immortality the gods give to all creatures – birthing those they can teach, and who will remember them when they are gone.”
A slow pull of her fingers undid the laces knotting her robe closed. Silk slithered down her body with a shrug to pool around her ankles. Her palms rested on his shoulders as her knees wedged between his, and she used her slight weight to push him back on the bed. Flesh whispered as she dragged herself along his flank; the fullness of her breasts flattened against his side as she pulled herself upward on one elbow while her other hand slipped between his legs to stroke his stiffening manhood.
Tristan tried to scream as his body reacted to the sorceress’s feathering touch, but the sound remained locked in the confines of his skull. A groan slipped from his chest as her caresses set his nerves aflame with pleasure. Intellectually, he recognized what she was – an ancient mind, cruel and foul. His body, however, perceived a beautiful young woman stirring it to desire. As her hand closed around his turgid shaft, purpling the swollen head against the pallor of her flesh, an involuntary gasp choked his breath.
Her eyes fixed on Sathra to savor her discomfiture, Ankara paid no mind to his reaction. Her eyes grew heavy-lidded as her tongue teased the thin skin of his uninjured nipple until it stiffened, then laid her cheek on his chest. “Women are the field from which all life springs, and like the earth itself, they nurture the life they bring forth. Yet as a field remains fallow without planted seed, so too does a woman need a man. If there are gods, they have odd humor – for if a woman is the opposite of man as life is the opposite of death, it is the height of irony that men bear within their bodies that which is needed to create life. It is fitting for us to take what they are unwilling to give, when all too often it is we who receive it unwillingly.”
