Chronicles Of Aronshae (3 Book Omnibus)

by J. K. Barber

  Sirus heard Misae’s voice in his mind. She wants to know how we traveled through the crystal, she supplied, sensing through their link that in his pain and mental wanderings that Sirus had not been paying attention to the Ice Queen’s inquiry.

  “I cannot,” Sirus replied, quickly adding “Mistress” to his answer. He braced for the pain he knew was coming and was not wrong. As the wave of torture passed, he came back to his senses hearing Misae’s voice.

  “Mistress,” she said, her tone imploring. “Please, I beg you, stop torturing Sirus.” The beast talker could see and feel Salamasca’s response to the plea as Misae was driven to the frozen ground by the eldritch pain that inundated her body. As a testament to the dragon’s resilience, she only took a couple deep breaths after the pain had passed before she spoke again. “If Sirus, if any of us, could answer your questions, you know that we could not refuse. The enchantment you have placed on all of us is simply too strong.”

  Sirus couldn’t help but admire the young female dragon’s mind. Misae argued logically, while managing to appeal to the Ice Queen’s vanity. Misae’s intellect combined with her sister Isa’s cleverness would hopefully serve them well in the future as they tried to discern a way to free themselves from the Empress’ magical chains. Sirus thought back to their meeting with Tomas and he grinned inside. Soon enough, he thought looking at the Empress of Ice. Soon enough, you will reap what you have sown. Sirus quickly steered his thoughts away from their meeting with the elder dragon back to the matter of their travel along the Ley Lines. Sirus knew that the Ice Queen was unable to read his thoughts, nor was she aware the dragons could communicate with each other mentally, but even thinking of the plans they had discussed on the Sapphire Isles in Salamasca’s presence made him uneasy.

  Instead, Sirus thought of the story that Isa had concocted of their journey here. “As I said, Mistress,” he began, attracting the Ice Queen’s attention back to him. “We did not travel through the ‘Ley Lines’ you spoke of. The exact manner of our travel here is still not known to us.” Both statements were on the surface true. The dragons did not travel through the Ley Lines, they traveled on them. Sirus could feel Isa’s mischievous satisfaction as he told the carefully crafted half-truth. Also, none of the dragons knew how they traveled along the glowing channels in the Void, no more than a bird knew how it flew aloft on the winds. It simply did so out of instinct, an innate ability to use its limbs to propel itself through the skies, in much the same manner as the dragons propelled themselves through the Void.

  Unfortunately, as clever as these misdirections were, Sirus knew that eventually the Ice Queen would see through them. Salamasca was many things, but stupid was not one of them. Luckily, the veracity of Sirus’ answers would not be put to the test today it seemed as the door to the training yard, in which the dragons and their ersatz mistress had spent the morning, opened. Sirus sent a silent prayer to the Great Mother, which drew the usual feelings of curiosity and confusion from the other dragons. He had tried to explain the religion of the Great Mother to his clutchmates before, however they were still unable, or unwilling, to put much stock in something they could not see or feel. The concept of a being who lived above them and was also somehow all around and in them at the same time was an idea they could not wrap their draconian minds around. Sirus told his brothers and sisters he would try to explain it again to them later, but that now was not the time. His siblings mentally shrugged as they turned their attention to the figure that stepped out into the training ground.

  A tall man in chainmail, wearing a tabard bearing the Ice Queen’s emblem, approached, stopping a good distance away from the dragons. He eyed the drakes with obvious unease, but stood his ground before the huge creatures, apparently fearing his Queen’s wrath more than the ire of the dragons. His voice cracked as he called out to Salamasca and he had to start over twice before finally calling out. “My Queen, we have word from Lady Roane.”

  Grinning coldly one more time in Sirus’ face, the Empress turned away contemptuously and walked over to the waiting man. As she approached, the man fell to a knee on the snowy ground and lowered his head.

  “Yes, Kranesh,” she said impatiently. “What is it?’

  The timid man began to rise, but the Ice Queen, moving her staff with surprising speed, stuck the man on the shoulder, slamming the man back down to his knees. “Did I tell you to stand?” she asked, her voice cold and inhuman, contrasting with the force with which she had felled the man.

  “N… no, My Queen,” Kranesh said, his voice choked with fear. “My humblest apologies for having dared to presume….”

  Salamasca cut the groveling man off. “What is the message?” she asked, anger creeping into her hollow voice.

  “Lady Roane wishes to speak with you… at your convenience, of course,” the man replied.

  “Very well,” the Ice Queen said sighing. She reminded Sirus, for a moment, of a young girl who had been told she would have to put her toys away and come inside to do chores. Salamasca gestured to the Shadow Walkers that had been standing silent the entire time, their dark cloaks not moving in the chill wind. Sirus had forgotten the creatures were there and silently admonished himself for his lapse of vigilance. “Leave that one,” the Empress of Ice pointed at Walron. “No one is to ride him but me.” A swelling of pride from the large dragon at being singled out by the Queen leaked through the barrier Walron had erected in his mind. Sirus made a mental note that though formidable, the wall that Walron had formed was not impenetrable. “The others need to be broken further,” Salamasca continued, looking pointedly at Sirus. “Ride them until they can fly no more,” she said as she walked away, a small laugh escaping her lips.

  Chapter 11

  Jared lunged forward, only to be brought up short by the chains attached to his wrists. The large blue-skinned brute slammed his huge fist into the woodsman’s stomach, doubling him over and driving the air out of him. The ice orc laughed, a deep guttural sound that reminded Jared of a bear choking on a fish bone. The orc put his hand under Jared’s chin, raising the hunter’s face so he could look into the brute’s black eyes. Jared, despite his left eye being almost swollen shut from an earlier beating, glared back at his tormentor. Jared bared his teeth, blood dripping from his split lip and staining his teeth red, and growled; a low snarl that started deep in his chest but was loud and quite distinct despite the hunter’s clenched jaw. The orc responded by laughing more and slamming his elbow into Jared’s face, driving him to the ground.

  The woodsman made to rise again, but Sasha cried out. “Jared! No! Stop, please!”

  Jared turned his body so that he could see the swordswoman. Through the red haze that covered his eyes he could see the pain and fear on her face; pain at the agony inflicted on him and the fear that he might not survive another beating. Sasha’s concern pierced the rage that clouded his mind and his vision began to clear. Jared looked up at the orc that stood above him from where he lay in the mud and spat blood into the muck and filth in which they had been kept, murder in his eyes. “Soon,” he promised the orc. “I’ll get out of these and then we’ll have another ‘talk,’ one that is going to end with your blood staining the snow.”

  Though the orc couldn’t understand Jared, or the hunter him, the message seemed to get across the language barrier between them. The orc laughed again, and gave Jared a short kick to his already bruised ribs. Hearing a satisfying grunt of pain and a small cracking noise, the orc walked out of the tent, still chuckling to himself.

  “Why do you do that?” Chyla whispered, coming out of her hiding place in the folds of Katya’s robe and starting to sneak across the muddy ground towards the injured hunter. The tiny Nhyme looked equally angry, concerned and confused. “The more you provoke him, the more he beats you.”

  “Why not?” Jared growled, his voice seething with carefully controlled rage. “They’re just going to kill us and eat us… hopefully in that order,” he added. “I will not be some sheep, bleating contentedl
y while I wait to be slaughtered. If you want to happily march into the stomach of one of those things, be my guest, but don’t tell me I should be nice to the guy who’s going to be eating my liver later on.”

  Chyla’s eyes widened at the mental image and she stopped, standing paralyzed halfway between Katya and Jared.

  “Jared!” Sasha hissed, looking towards the other captives to see if any of the soldiers had noticed the tiny woman.

  “What!?” he snapped, turning his bruised and bloodied face to the young swordswoman.

  “You snapping at Chyla, or me, will not help matters. We need you calm and focused if we’re going to get out of here alive.” Sasha gestured with her chin to the other captives, an imploring look on her face.

  Jared looked around the crude tent at his fellow prisoners. They had all suffered in their days of captivity. Sasha and Katya bore several cuts and bruises on their face and hands, the only parts of them that he could see because of their fur-lined clothing. While they were all bound, Katya had the further indignity of having been gagged as well. The orcs had seen what the sorceress could do with her words during the battle in the Illyander camp. The brutes were not taking any chances. The little water that Katya had been allowed was poured down her throat quickly and the gag swiftly tied back into place. Chyla had asked why the orcs had taken them captive or bothered giving them water. Unfortunately, the Nhyme girl had seen firsthand why. The first day one of the Illyander soldiers had been dragged out of the tent after being beaten into unconsciousness. After a short time the young man had started making noise again. A horrible wailing had sounded from outside the tent and Chyla had snuck under the edge of the animal skin wall at the back of the enclosure, despite Jared warning her against it. The young Nhyme had returned quickly, flying into Katya’s robe to hide. Chyla had refused to emerge for several hours and her tiny sobs could be heard by Jared’s sensitive ears. When at last she showed her face, she relayed what had happened to the young soldier. Though they all suspected what had happened, to hear the Nhyme girl tell the story of the poor man being impaled on a spit and then roasted alive affected them all.

  A few days later when another soldier, this time a young woman, was beaten and then dragged out of the tent, they had all reacted, yelling and kicking as much as their bonds would allow. Jared had managed to kick the feet out from beneath a passing orc, maneuvering enough to bite the creature on the arm before being struck in the head with the butt of a crude sword. Jared’s world had exploded into stars and pain for several moments afterwards before blessed darkness finally enveloped the hunter. He awoke sometime later to his wounds being healed by Chyla as she hid in the shadows that surrounded him. This was one of several beatings that Jared had received at the hands of their captors, a fact frequently lamented by Chyla as she took care to heal only those injuries that were hidden by their clothes. Though they had been stripped of all weapons and armor, the Illyanders had all been left their clothes. At first Sasha had wondered why, but the reason became apparent. The captives were no good as food if they froze to death.

  The orcs had also done their best to feed their captives, trying to keep them healthy. However, once the Illyanders had figured out where the meat in their bowls had come from, they refused to eat it; subsisting off water and the bread that the orcs had plundered from the human’s camp. It was enough to sustain the prisoners, but they could all feel themselves getting weaker.

  Sasha hissed at Jared again, her voice low in an attempt to keep her words private. “If you keep making them angry, they might kill us all the sooner.” She gestured again, as well as her bonds would allow her, towards Katya, the ten soldiers that remained and Mala.

  The hunter’s eyes followed the gesture and his gaze stopped once again on the swordmistress. For some reason that Jared could not fathom, Mala had not been manacled to a stake in the ground like the rest of them. Instead the older woman had been thrown into an iron bound wooden cage, barely large enough to hold her. The cage was such that Mala could only sit if she hunched her shoulders and could only lie down if she pulled her knees up to her chest. The swordmistress had been uncharacteristically quiet since their capture, but Jared could see a rage seething behind her watchful eyes that mirrored his own. Neither of them dealt well with captivity.

  Sasha, on the other hand, had been the voice of reason and the leadership. She had been working hard to keep everyone’s spirits up, encouraging them to bide their time and wait for the right opportunity to escape. Though she could not give them specifics, she shared with the other captive soldiers that one of their numbers had escaped and was doing everything he could to bring about their release. Everyone just had to be ready to seize the chance when it presented itself.

  Sasha continued speaking, taking Jared’s silence as understanding, this time though, her voice was lowered, speaking to the hunter privately. “When Niko returns, you need to be in shape enough to fight, not barely able to move because you’ve been beaten again since you couldn’t keep a hold of your temper.” The reproach in Sasha’s tone was obvious despite her lowered voice.

  Jared growled.

  “Don’t you dare growl at me,” she said, her voice still laced with censure. “You wouldn’t be getting beaten up so much if you could keep your fool mouth shut!”

  Jared’s bared teeth turned into a wolfish grin, the gesture making him wince in pain at his split lip. The hunter licked the blood from his lip but did not reply. Instead he turned his attention to the tiny Nhyme woman who was still hovering above the ground between Sasha and him, using the body of the swordswoman to hide her presence from the other soldiers. “I think the coast is clear, if you wanted to fix me up a little here.” Jared rolled over, maneuvering his legs so that he could sit up. He grunted several times as pain lanced through his chest. “I think he cracked a rib with that last kick.”

  Chyla’s innate concern for her friends overwhelmed her anger at the hunter, and the Nhyme snuck the rest of the distance across the ground, slipping behind Jared so that she could perform her magic unobserved. Almost immediately, the woodsman felt warmth move across his injured side. Jared did his best to keep his breathing as shallow as possible so as to allow the rib to fully heal. After a few minutes he felt the pain in his side cease and Chyla hopped covertly up to his shoulder. She placed her hands on Jared’s lip but the hunter moved his head away.

  “No, leave the lip. We don’t want them to get suspicious when I look less wounded than I should be.” Jared thought of the face of his tormentor and the muscles in his arms tensed, pulling again against the chains that held him captive.

  For just a moment, panic turned to ice in his veins as he felt the lupine side of him rail against the captivity. He needed to be free, to run, to get away. He pulled harder against his chains, rattling them.

  “Jared!” Sasha whispered, her voice imploring him to calm down.

  The young hunter took a moment to collect himself, taking several deep breaths to bring himself back under control. When Jared was calm once more, he looked to his shoulder at Chyla. The young Nhyme girl looked ready to fly away, torn between helping her friend and saving her own life.

  “I’m sorry,” he whispered, so softly that he barely heard his own voice. “For that… and for earlier.” Jared knew that Chyla was just as scared, if not more so, as the rest of them.

  Chyla placed her hand over Jared’s left eye. “Don’t worry, I won’t heal it completely, just enough so that you can see out of it… when the time comes.” The Nhyme smiled weakly. She was trying to remain optimistic despite the situation, but her spirits were falling, as were all of the captives’.

  After Chyla was done, she returned to her usual place inside Katya’s hood. The last several days had been rough on the Nhyme girl. Though she had not been beaten like the rest of them, the large amount of healing magic the tiny woman had had to perform had taken its toll on her. Chyla was exhausted and Jared and the twins knew it. None of them would be able to keep things up like this for
much longer.

  Jared silently admonished himself. He didn’t need to aggravate the orcs like he did but most of the time he truly could not help himself. The hunter felt the animal panic begin to rise within him again and he took another few deep breaths, willing himself to be calm. All the years that Sirus had harped on the young hunter about needing to be still and composed so that he would be able to use his gift safely were paying off in ways that neither of them had anticipated. If not for Sirus’ relentless teaching, Jared felt certain he would have gone over the edge days ago. Then he would have been useless to Sasha and Katya, unable to protect them as he had promised. Talas’ words echoed in Jared’s head. If you gave your word, you have to keep it. It’s really the only thing that separates us from the other beasts that crawl across the Mother’s bosom.

  Jared smiled slightly. Not the only thing, old man. Right now years of “stupid” lessons taught by another crotchety old man are keeping that line intact as well.

  The woodsman’s attention was pulled away from his musings by Sasha’s whispered voice.

  “Chyla,” the swordswoman said quietly. “Chyla, wake up. I know you’re tired but I need you to do me a favor.”

  A tiny head popped up over Katya’s shoulder. Both Chyla and the sorceress had quizzical expressions on their faces. “Huh?” the Nhyme said groggily. “What?”

  “I want you to take Katya’s gag off,” Sasha said. Jared, Chyla and even Katya began to protest but the swordswoman waved them all off as best she could with her manacled hand. “I have an idea, just hear me out,” Sasha said to their unasked questions.