Brothers of Blood (Fall of a King Book 2)

by James Fuller

  “You miss nothing with those dark desert eyes. That one has yet to be tested, but he will get his chance on the morrow. It is my hope that he fights as good as this one.”

  “I hope you are wrong about that,” Reed smirked bitterly. “If he is, I might stop coming here. I am losing too many fighters this visit and dead men make no coin.”

  “It is not your men I enjoying killing, but I do enjoy spending your coin. No, my friend - it is Jeriki’s men I enjoy killing the most.”

  “Many share the same sentiment as you on that one. Shame it seldom occurs.”

  Lance held the purse of coin he had won from Reed, admiring its weight. “Hopefully that is something I can remedy for a while at least.”

  Reed poured himself another drink from the clay pitcher. “That arrogant bastard needs to be humbled and if I cannot do it, then at least you might.”

  Lance laughed cheerfully and tossed the coin purse back to his dark-skinned friend.

  Reed’s brow rose in question.

  “That should be more than enough for the two blonde wenches you brought with you.”

  A rough hand prodded Zehava forward, towards the holding cells. He stumbled, barely able to keep his feet beneath him. He tried to suppress the after-battle jitters that rattled through his limbs, as it did many soldiers.

  “You fought well again today,” the brute escorting the bloodied Zehava said.

  Zehava rolled his eyes with a stone-faced glare. “This sickening butchery is hardly worth praise.”

  The brute flashed a rotten, toothy smile. “Tell that to my full coin pouch.” He nudged Zehava into the awaiting cell. “Hopefully, your friend here can fill it some more.”

  Zehava said nothing and slumped down onto the wooden bench beside Dahak and two other fighters. He grimaced as his sore muscles protested the movement. He leaned forward, retrieving the wet rag from the bucket of filthy water and began washing the dirt and blood from around his new wounds. By tonight, Elsrath would come and heal all the serious wounds on all Lance’s fighters - but for now, while there were fights still in progress, it was not permitted.

  “Glad to see you still among this side of the dark road, blood brother,” Adel - the dark-skinned Morian - said with a grin, his ivory teeth seeming brighter against his dark complexion. “You faced some tough opponents today. The bald axe-man was said to be the toughest fighter in Slade’s camp. I did not truly expect to see you again.”

  Zehava spat blood and glanced up at the Morian. He was a gangly-limbed man - his body riddled with scars and dark dotted tattoos. His left ear was stretched by a large wooden hoop, the right a mangle of flesh where a duplicate had once been. The Morian did not look like much, but his speed and skill with a blade was fierce. “I will not be so easily removed from this world.”

  Adel grinned and went back to watching the crowd.

  “It is almost my time,” Dahak muttered, his gaze blank as he stared at the throng that surrounded the pit.

  Zehava tossed the bloodied rag back into the bucket. “One more fight and then it will be you.”

  “Who will I be fighting?” Dahak asked, tone full of dread.

  “You will be fighting one of Jeriki’s men. A half-breed savage about your size, who has fought half a score of times already. You will want to kill him quickly if you can; the longer you are down there with him, the better his odds will be, I think,” Tor, a large burly fighter, said from the other side of the cell. He was another one of Lance’s best fighters, who had survived a half score of fights himself. The scars that marred his frame were testament to that.

  Dahak’s eyes glistened wetly. “I do not think I can do this, Zehava.”

  “Then, you will die quickly,” Tor replied, his tone emotionless as he turned back to the pit.

  “Do not listen to him, you hear me!” Zehava snapped. “You will fight and you will win, you have to.” He knew his voice sounded desperate but he did not care.

  Dahak looked into his friend’s eyes and could see the worry. “If I do lose—”

  “You will not!”

  “If I do, Zehava, if I do,” tears slowly made their way down his dirt-stained face, “tell Shania…” he swallowed, the words catching in his throat. “Tell her I loved her and will wait for her on the other…” This time the words would not form, painful honesty cutting off the words.

  “I will, if it comes to that, but it will not. You will win your fight and every other fight until this is over and we are free.”

  “Do not fill his head with that bullshit,” Tor scoffed in disgust. “The freedom you knew before this is just a dream now. The only freedom you will find now is to embrace the beast you can become down there…or the freedoms you have won, once you reach the dark road.”

  Zehava turned a fierce eye to the large fighter. “You are not helping.”

  Tor spat on the floor and turned back to them. “No, you are not helping him. False hope is a cruel deception that gets men killed.”

  The cell door opened and Lance and two other men stood there. “It is your time,” Lance pointed to Dahak. “Do not disappoint me; I have a large sum of money placed on you.”

  Dahak stood up and looked down at Zehava, his eyes searching his friend’s for some sliver of hope that Zehava would find a way to stop this from happening. He swallowed back everything as he left the cell.

  The two men escorted him through the jeering, wild crowd toward the pit. Zehava lurched to his feet and gripped the bars tightly, lifting his head as high as he could to see if he would be able to witness any of his friend’s fight.

  “You wish to see your friend fight?” Lance asked casually and the look on Zehava’s face spoke more than words. “Come then and get a closer look, but I would warn you if you try do anything stupid, it will be fatal to you… and your friends.”

  Zehava quickly surveyed the scene below and his heart sank, seeing both held war-axes and small bucklers, not swords. He knew his friend had never found comfort in the weapon and he could see Dahak’s unease as he gripped the haft.

  His opponent was a deranged looking man - the savage in him showing through more than his western half. His hair was thick and wild, like a mane around his sharp, structured face. He was nearly the same size as Dahak except his body was covered with lean muscle and the way he moved provided evidence that he was skilled. There was no doubt the man was a killer; the hungry gleam in his eyes dispelled all doubts.

  Zehava felt his heart race as the fight began. They began circling one another, sizing each other up before the first blows were unleashed.

  Dahak locked eyes with the menacing half-breed, his fear rising within him. His palms were already sweating to the point he feared if he swung the axe, he would lose grip of it. How he hated feeling this way - he was a soldier of Draco Kingdom, not some untrained farmer - he had been in several battles, this pathetic panic should have left him by now.

  The half-breed faked to the right, causing Dahak to overcompensate, leaving his left side exposed. His opponent shifted quickly on the balls of his feet, arcing his axe down for his legs. Dahak dropped his shield, deflecting the strike into the dirt. The half-breed punched his shield forward, the edge smashing into Dahak’s face, flattening his nose and throwing him back.

  Dahak’s back pressed against the dirt wall, stopping his awkward retreat. He tried to blink away the stinging haze that assaulted his eyes. The sudden roar of the crowd alerted him to the unexpected charge of his opponent and he threw himself to the side, just as an axe blade buried itself in the hard dirt wall.

  Dahak swung the flat of his shield into the man’s back and pushed himself into the center of the pit. He tried to wipe his eyes, but his opponent allowed no time for that as he came at him in a rage. The half-breed’s axe chopped and slashed again and again, cracking and chipping away at Dahak’s shield, forcing him to lose the center.

  Dahak’s arm and shoulder screamed in agony with every powerful blow it absorbed and he knew he could not keep this up. He drop
ped his shield a hand span as the next blow came down and the head of the axe cleared the shield. Dahak pulled back, trapping the axe blade and tearing it from the man’s grasp. New adrenaline coursed through him as he realized his opponent no long held a weapon and he pushed forward, his own axe leading the way. The wild-haired man slapped the attack aside with his buckler and kicked out, catching Dahak’s knee. Dahak grimaced and was barely able to keep himself on his feet. Another powerful kick to his leg dropped him to his knees. He swiped his axe forward, trying to keep his attacker at bay until he could regain his footing. The half-breed gripped his shield in both hands and slammed it down across Dahak’s axe, tearing it from his slippery grasp. A vicious knee to his head was quick to follow and Dahak was thrown back, dazed.

  He scrambled awkwardly, a loud ringing distorting his hearing as he tried to focus his blurry eyes on the coming attacks. He raised his shield up in time to stop his enemy from breaking open his skull and once more his arm cried out. He felt his shield being grabbed and before he could do anything, he was being thrown into the side of the wall with such force that the air exploded from his lungs. He knew he was as good as dead now. He fought to regain his breath and could do nothing else.

  Zehava watched in horror as his friend was battered and beaten below. Panic coursed through him as Dahak slammed into the side of the pit wall and slumped, defeated, to the cold earth as his opponent retrieved one of the fallen war-axes. Zehava desperately turned and without thought, snatched an iron-tipped spear from one of the men beside him. Before anyone realized what was happening, Zehava hurled the projectile at the half-breed’s exposed back. The spear found its target, the tip punching out of the man’s chest. The war-axe slipped from his hand as he stared down at the spear protruding in front of him.

  The crowd erupted in outrage.

  Lance’s eyes went wide as he looked from Zehava to Jeriki’s dead fighter, then to the raging crowd around him. “What have you done, you idiot?” Quickly, Lance motioned to his men to begin breaking up the crowd before things got out of hand.

  Zehava felt an explosion of pain as something struck him across the back of the head and he hit the ground; several strong hands found him and held him still. He did not struggle - he knew it would be pointless. He had done what was needed to save his friend, at least for now. He was hauled to his feet - all around him were people cursing and yelling, he had to assume it was all meant for him; he almost smiled.

  “I almost thought we had something good here, you and I!” Lance screamed, running his hand through his hair nervously, his eyes flickering over across the pit at the group assembling. “You likely just killed yourself,” Lance hissed, “and maybe even me.”

  Zehava smirked callously. “I can live with that.”

  Lance’s face contorted in fury and he landed a powerful fist into Zehava’s guts, which would have doubled him over had it not been for the two men holding him up. “Get him and that useless whoreson in the pit lashed up and be prepared, things might get ugly around here.” Lance turned a vicious eye on Zehava again and was about to speak.

  “Lance!” A powerful, deep voice boomed out above the angry squabbling that was rippling through the camp. A light haired, lean man approached and stopped in front of him. He was flanked by half a score of armed men, his demeanor and expression grave. “What, might I ask, was that?” His hand rested lightly on the golden gem-encrusted hilt of his curved sword.

  Lance swallowed the thump in his throat. “I apologize, Jeriki….that was not intended. My new fighter has yet to learn his place and leave his old life behind him.”

  Jeriki flashed a sinister grin of pearly white teeth. “If I believed it to be anything otherwise you would already be dead. But that does not defuse my anger or the insult I have suffered, nor does it pay for the loss of a good fighter.”

  “Name your price for the fighter and it will be paid of course…as for the insult I—” His mind raced for some way to make this insult up to his powerful rival. “I have something that might appeal to both your desire of flesh and even more so, your appetite for retribution.”

  Jeriki looked at him, anger giving way to curiosity. “Pray tell this thing you have to offer me that might stem my desire to tear out your heart.”

  “What is happening out there?” Luna asked nervously, pacing her small cell.

  “Not really sure,” replied Nina, trying to adjust her line of vision through the small holes within the walls, “but something bad has happened. It looks like they are about to draw blades and kill each other.”

  “Something always seems to go wrong when Jeriki and his men show up!” Luna muttered. “Maybe he and Lance will finally kill each other,” she spat.

  “If only we could be so lucky, right Margret?” Nina asked the newly healed, living sister next to her.

  “I would hate to be robbed of the chance,” Margret snarled in reply, though she did not rise from her bed.

  “What of Zehava and Dahak?” Nicolette asked, her voice tingling with fear.

  Nina rolled her eyes and peered out the slits once more. “Your boyfriends are still alive,” she turned back, “at least for now, that is.”

  “What do you mean ‘for now’?” Nicolette got closer to the bars of her cell, her face twisted in anxiety.

  Nina shrugged. “They are being lashed up, which likely means they had some doing in whatever is going on out there.”

  “Of course they did,” Shania muttered with a hint of sarcasm, “why could they not just concentrate on staying alive long enough for us to figure a way out of here.”

  Once more, Nina rolled her eyes. “You two need to forget about freedom. Your two lover-boys out there are lucky to have survived the pits this long, but no one lives forever down there. It is only a matter of time before a better fighter comes along. The sooner you accept that, the better your life will be.”

  “We will get out of this,” Shania growled, “with our friends!”

  Nina shrugged. “Ever the optimist.”

  “Someone is coming!” Luna said and all eyes snapped to the door as an imposing figure and two others stepped in.

  “Do not feel you need to be silent on my account,” the powerful figure called out with his arms wide.

  “Jeriki!” Luna spat and backed away from the bars of her cell, to the back wall. The slave house seemed to grow colder with the man’s very presence.

  “Ahh Luna, was it not? I am surprised to see you still here. I figured some poor bastard would have made the mistake of purchasing you by now,” he teased, tapping a thick, gold ring across the bars as he made his way down the hall, eyeing all the girls, his sinister chuckle nearly deafening to all those within. “Ah, here we go,” he muttered as he stopped in front of Nicolette and Shania’s cell. “You must be the ones I am here to examine.” His grin was full of ominous lust as he peered in, his intense eyes missing nothing. “I will take her,” he pointed to Nicolette and one of Lance’s men unlocked the cell.

  Nicolette’s face twisted in horror as the words struck home. “No!” She cried out as she backed up. “Get away from me! You cannot do this!”

  “I am in no mood for such pathetic displays,” Jeriki replied sternly, his eyes drifting to one of Lance’s men.

  “Get moving woman, or else!” Lance’s man barked, coming into the cell, his hand resting on his dagger. “I will have no further disrespect from the likes of slaves! Your friends have already cost Lance enough.”

  “No, please... please!” She cried, her knees going weak beneath her.

  Shania stepped in front of Nicolette, blocking her from the coming man, her eyes defiant. “Take me in her stead.”

  The room went silent as the implications sunk in to all those within.

  “And why would I change my mind?” Jeriki asked, his interest peeking at this odd request. “Furthermore, why would you wish to be in her place?”

  Shania swallowed back her fear. “You do not want her - she will fight you, weep and struggle and there
will be little pleasure in it for you.” She stepped forward as if in supplication. “I will not fight you, I will not cry. I will ensure you are well pleased.” Shania lifted her chin proudly, trying to keep her eyes straight ahead.

  Nicolette gasped. “Shania, no... !” But her friend was not listening.

  Jeriki grinned as he rubbed his smooth chin. “Who is to say I do not like it when my playthings cry and fight, hmm?”

  Shania swallowed her fears back once more, hoping she could control her voice. “I promise you, I will not disappoint.”

  “Shania!” Nicolette cried out again, but could make no move toward her as fear held her still.

  Jeriki moved into the cell, his hawk eyes taking in every inch of Shania’s firm body and luscious curves. “Such an admirable show of companionship.” He rested his hand upon her shoulder and she did well to suppress her flinch. It only made him grin wider. Slowly, his hand slid down her back as he deliberately walked his way around, sliding it back up to her neck. His hand cupped her chin and he tilted her head from side to side, admiring her exotic features. He leaned close to her ear. “It will not be pleasant for you; you will not enjoy a single moment of it.” He pulled away. “Do you still wish to take her place?”

  Nicolette forced herself to stand on shaky legs. “Shania, no, do not do this for me! I will go... I will go!”

  Her voice gone now, all Shania could do was nod.

  “As you wish” He left the cell, with Shania is tow. The cell door closed and Nicolette slumped back to the floor, tears streaming freely down her face.

  “You do not know how lucky you are, girl,” one of the guards muttered before leaving.

  Shania exited the slave barn with Jeriki and followed him like an obedient dog, to where his tents were sprawled. She made the mistake of lifting her eyes to steal a glance at Dahak - their eyes locking for but a heartbeat before she tore her gaze away. Her heart and soul screamed in unpleasant distress as she forced herself to continue forward, suppressing all she was into the tight shell she had lived for so many years. She heard him scream behind her.