James West - Reaper Of Sorrows

“And the people of Valdar?”

“Mitros made whores of the women and girls. The men and boys, he forces to work the mines, day and night. All this he does on the authority of Lord Sanouk.”

Rathe inclined his head, indicating the others. “What afflicts them?”

“Joshil went mad after Mitros forced him to watch the rape of his wife and daughter-her crime was refusing to sell herself. Karmath, there, is the lucky one. He was born simple, and used to help the blacksmith. The rest of the women, Mitros broke in the same way he broke Joshil’s wife. Seems neither Mitros nor his men enjoy bedding insane women.”

“And how did you manage to avoid such a fate?” Rathe said. He could not understand what was afoot, but without question it had nothing to do with traitors receiving justice.

Erryn’s eyes fell. “I didn’t avoid anything … until this last time,” she said, face reddening in the wan moonlight. She looked up, hatred burning through the tears in her eyes. “Are you going to let us out, or not?”

“No,” came a hissing rasp. “He’s about to join his fellow traitors.”

Rathe faced Treon. Before he could challenge the captain, Erryn shrieked a warning. Rathe turned at a flicker of movement off to one side. Caisel, lips and chin still coated in blood, swept toward him, while another shadow closed from the other direction. Rathe’s sword whispered out of its scabbard as he stepped toward Caisel, preparing to relieve the fool of his burdensome head.

“Behind you!” Erryn cried.

A cudgel slammed into Rathe’s back, driving him to his knees. He tried to bring his sword to bear, but Caisel and some other brute fell on him, using fists and boots. The cudgel fell again, smashing his sword from his grasp, then again. Erryn screamed, and Treon laughed.

Rathe blocked a boot swinging toward his face, but another stomped his head, and yet another slammed into his ribs. When the cudgel fell again, it brought a throbbing darkness filled with a woman’s screams.

Flat gray light streamed into Rathe’s eyes. His head felt cracked, swollen, muddled. The rest of him fared no better. He had come awake before, but this was the first time he felt lucid. It took a moment to realize the squealing racket stabbing into his ears was not the voice of a demonic harridan, but wagon axles wanting for a coat of grease.

Wagon …? The thought drifted, unanswered.

Eventually things started coming back. Arriving in Valdar, drinking ale with Loro in a raucous tavern, beating two guards, speaking with a woman … Erryn . For a long time, that was all he remembered. Then he recalled someone’s hissing laughter, and a trio of men battering him senseless.

A cool hand touched his brow. “Not much of a champion, are you?” Erryn said with a smirk.

Rathe squinted at her, realizing that she cradled his head in her lap. “How long since we left Valdar?”

“Three days and nights, and now most of another day.”

“Help me up.”

“Rest easy,” Loro said. “Those bastards beat you near to death.”

Rathe craned his neck, wincing at the stiffness. Loro rode beside the wagon, his bulk hidden under a heavy woolen cloak. Disregarding the man’s suggestion, Rathe sat up with a groan, ignoring a wave of queasiness. He had less success pushing aside the pounding in his head.

Gingerly, he probed his ribs, back, arms, and anywhere else that had suffered from the beating. Of pain, there was plenty, but he found no broken bones. The worst was his swollen sword hand. He flexed it, gritting his teeth against the silvery bolts of agony that ran from his fingertips up through his forearm. If trouble came, he would have need of that hand. He kept opening and closing his fingers, warming and loosening them.

“What’s the mood of the men?” Rathe asked.

Loro shrugged. “First off, they griped, as men will after a night of heavy drinking. Now, I expect they just want to get back to Hilan and a proper bed.”

“That’s not what I meant,” Rathe said.

Loro faced him, stubbled jowls waxen and eyes tight in the muted light. “As to you, most doubt you are a traitor, and name it folly that Treon has locked away the Scorpion. Their favor won’t help you any once we reach Hilan. If I do not miss my guess, your days as a soldier are over. If you are lucky, you might squash turnips for his lordship’s supper until the years are through with you. If not, an executioner will be sharpening his axe for a bite at your neck.”

Rathe could not argue those points, which meant the last decision he wanted to make, must be made. Envisioning his head falling free of his neck and plopping into a bloody basket was almost as terrible as imagining a life spent in Sanouk’s kitchens. In the end, he decided that he had no real choice … and maybe he never had one, if what Nesaea foretold about the Khenasith, the Black Breath, held any truth.

“Can you break us free?” he asked.

Loro’s eyes went wide in mock surprise. “You no longer want to shame Treon by becoming the captain of Hilan? You’d rather shrug off the chains of honor and duty, and ride free as a brigand?”

“We can laugh at my foolishness later,” Rathe growled. “For now, I need to know if you can get me out of this cage?”

“ Us ,” Erryn growled.

Loro patted an axe’s wooden haft protruding from under his blanket roll. “Aye. I also have your sword and dagger. Treon was so excited to catch you up to no good, he missed me collecting your weapons. I suppose I must ask if you are sure you want to take the road of a lawbreaker? As you once told me, to do so is to be a man hunted all his remaining days.”

“Seems I have no choice,” Rathe said. “Besides, a deeper treachery is stirring in the north than we have been told.” At Loro’s questioning look, Rathe explained all that Erryn had told him about the former brigand Mitros, and his odd pact with Lord Sanouk.

“I can understand Sanouk’s idea to use brigands to keep the peace,” Loro said slowly, “but not his need for taking prisoners. There are no mines in Hilan, and he has servants enough from the village. And, far as I can see, most of the prisoners he’s getting are mad. What use are they?”

Rathe shook his head, brow furrowed.

“He needs food and rest,” Erryn said to Loro. “Once we are freed, we can sort out these matters.”

Loro warned, “Be ready, for tonight you will become a lawbreaker in truth. For now, get some sleep, brother.”

Loro kicked his mount into a quicker pace, and Rathe let Erryn guide his head back to her lap. She pulled a loaf of bread and a wineskin from under a pile of straw in one corner.

“You can thank your friend for this,” she said, careful not to let any of the other soldiers see her feeding him. The wine tasted sour on his tongue, but he gulped it down, along with the bread. Erryn took some for herself, but not much.

After the meal, he began to drowse. Just before he dropped off, he murmured, “Where are the others who were with you?”

“Your captain put them in the other wagon. Seems he thought it amusing to leave the ‘lovers’ together.”

“Perish the thought,” Rathe grumbled.

Erryn smacked his head a stinging blow. “I may not be as tempting as one of those perfumed slatterns you are used to in Onareth,” she growled, “but neither are you as fetching as the stories say.”

Wincing, Rathe rubbed his head where she had hit him. “Don’t let my present untidiness deceive you. I clean up nicely.”

“As do I,” Erryn assured him.

Rathe cracked an eyelid, imagined her without a grimy face and matted hair, and decided she just might be telling the truth.