Katharine Kerr - Darkspell

“I never dreamed they’d be following Alastyr along like that,” Nevyn said. “I’ve got to work fast if I’m going to pull our apprentice out of this particular trap.”

“What? Why do you want to save him, after all the foul deeds he’s done?”

“He’ll pay for those crimes, sure enough, but under the laws.”

“But he’s the most hateful swine I’ve ever—”

Nevyn held up his hand flat for silence.

“Why don’t you go down to the great hall and your Rhodry? I’ve got some hard thinking to do.”

As soon as Jill left, Nevyn resumed his restless pacing while he considered what was to be done. He was determined to save Sarcyn from the Hawks more for the good of the kingdom than for that of the apprentice. If he died cursing and screaming under torture, his hatred and pain would fill his next life, making him a twisted threat to everyone around him. And after all, if he pitied Camdel, somewhere in his soul lay a spark of decency that might be fanned to a purging fire.

“If we can pull him out, anyway,” Nevyn remarked to the fat yellow gnome, who was basking by the fire. “Doubtless they’re heading for Bardek. I wonder how they’ll smuggle him onto a ship. Probably a large chest or suchlike would do.”

The gnome scratched his stomach thoughtfully. Nevyn considered asking Blaen to send a warband after them, but the Hawks had a long head start. Besides, since they were dweomer-trained, they would see the pursuit and be able to hide quite effectively. I could ride with the warband, though, he reminded himself, if we can catch up. It was going to be slow going for the Hawks, after all, as they picked their way through the mountains.

The mountains. Nevyn chuckled to himself while he knelt down by the fire to contact the one dweomer-master in the kingdom who could help him now.

After the Hawks tended their horses, they returned to the campfire. Sarcyn lay unmoving and listened to them talk until he finally puzzled out their names. Dekanny was the taller, the one with the yellowish-brown eyes that bespoke some Anmurdio blood in his veins, while the other, who also seemed to be in charge, was Karlupo. Once they’d eaten, Dekanny knelt down beside Sarcyn and grabbed his wrists to haul his arms up over his head, then pulled up his shirt until it covered his face, blinding him. He lay still, summoning his will and listening to the Hawk humming to himself while he did something at the fire. Finally he came back.

“I’m holding a dagger. I heated it.”

Sarcyn braced himself with every ounce of his will. Dekanny giggled like a girl, then laid the heated steel on Sarcyn’s right nipple. Although the pain seared into his very heart, he made no sound.

“I’m turning it over now, little one.”

The pain bit into his left nipple. He fought to choke back the scream that bubbled up from his throat. Suddenly he felt his bowels gush and empty.

“What a stink! I’ll turn you over and mark your cheeks for that.”

“No you won’t!” Karlupo said from nearby. “You’ve done enough for one night. He’s got to be in decent shape when he reaches home, because the masters will want him to last as long as possible.”

“Ah, he can heal on the ship.”

“I said enough.”

Then the world spun round, and Sarcyn fainted. He woke in the middle of the night to find himself still lying in his own excrement. They’d pulled his shirt down, and the rough linen chafed on his burns, which oozed some sort of liquid. He lay awake for a long time, fighting to keep from moaning, before he fainted again.

In the morning they kicked him awake and hauled him up to a sitting position. Karlupo had made barley porridge in a small kettle and brought a bowl over.

“I’ll untie your hands so you can eat,” he said. “But if you cause the slightest trouble, Dekanny will get some pleasure out of you before we ride.”

Sarcyn turned his head away. He was determined to starve and weaken himself so that he’d die more quickly under the torture.

“You’re going to eat,” Karlupo snapped.

When he still refused, they knelt down on either side of him. Dekanny pried his jaws open while Karlupo shoveled in a spoonful. The stuff gagged him so badly that he had to swallow it out of sheer reflex. They fed him the whole bowl, and the humiliation hurt as much as his burns.

Yet once they were on horseback, the pain took over. The motion of the horse made his shirt rub on the raw burns, and in the hot sun he sweated, adding salt to the friction until he could think of nothing but dying and putting an end to the pain. About midmorning his bound wrists began to swell, making the thong cut into the puffy flesh. By the time they stopped for the noon meal, his lower lip hurt, too. He realized that in fighting the pain, he’d chewed it open.

“Are you going to eat, little one?” Karlupo said. “Or do you want us to feed you again?”

“I’ll eat.”

Karlupo untied his hands and stood over him with a drawn sword while he ate beef jerky and hardtack. Then it was back on the horses again, and more agony.

By then they were well into the mountains and following a narrow track that twisted through enormous boulders. Every now and then they forded a fast-rushing stream or rode by a cracked and crumbling cliff. Sarcyn barely noticed what they passed. He had a new discomfort to add to his pain: riding all day in his damp and filthy brigga was making his thighs and buttocks chafe raw. Eventually Dekanny dropped back to ride next to him.

“Soon we’ll be making camp. I’ll have a few minutes to play with you again. I want you to make a choice. I can either put the heated blade in your armpits, or in the small of your back—twice, of course. Tonight you tell me which one you want.”

With that he dropped back to take up the rear guard and let Karlupo have the lead. Sarcyn trembled beyond all his will to stop. He knew exactly what Dekanny was doing. If he didn’t choose, of course, he would get both tortures, but if he chose, he would be taking the first step in collaborating with his tormentor. They wanted him to begin to surrender his will, to become a partner in his own pain until at last there would be a dreadful, almost sexual complicity between the giver of pain and the receiver of it.

“Dekanny!” he called out. “I won’t choose.”

From behind came only a girlish giggle of excitement. They rode into a rocky defile, topped with scrub and brush. Once, when Sarcyn looked up, one of the bushes seemed to turn into a face. Hastily he looked away. If he became delirious, he would lose his will to resist. He concentrated on his breathing and tried to put his mind far away from his aching, throbbing body, while the shadows grew ever deeper and the night grew inexorably closer.

Two hours before sunset they camped in a valley so narrow that it was more a cleft between two hills. Sarcyn sat on the ground and watched every move Dekanny made as the two Hawks set up camp and gave the horses extra rations of oats to compensate for the lack of grass. Soon, very soon, he would feel the hot blade four times.

“Let him eat first,” Karlupo said finally. “He won’t be able to get anything down when you’re done with him.”

“Very well. I’ll let him rest between each mark, too.”

Sarcyn bit his bleeding lip and stared at the ground as if he could reduce the whole world to this little patch of rock. All at once he heard Dekanny shriek. He looked up to see the Hawk staggering with an arrow in his left shoulder and a swarm of men pouring into the valley. Short they were, about five feet tall at most, but massively built and armed as warriors. Their long axes swung efficiently, twice, three times, and Karlupo lay dead with his head knocked off his shoulders and both legs cut off at the knees. Although Dekanny tried to run, a great ax slashed up from below and drove deep into his crotch. Screaming, he fell, to have his throat slit neatly with the barest edge of a blade. The warriors smiled at each other and gathered round to look at the corpses. Only then did Sarcyn realize that none of them had uttered a sound during the unequal battle.