Centyr Dominance (8 page)

Gram took in the scene around him with no less horror
than the spectators did.
I didn’t have a choice!
his heart cried within
him.
Did I?

Doubt assailed him as he heard a young boy’s cry,
“Mother!” Across the street a man was restraining the child who sought
desperately to rush to his dying mother’s side.

I don’t even know which one she is.
He
stared at Chad in shock as the man yelled at him once more. He hadn’t even
heard him the first time. “Let’s go, boy! The town guard is comin’.”

“Why is this happening?” he asked the woodsman.

“I don’t know, but if we don’t get moving we’ll be
wondering it from a jail cell.”

They ran, continuing down the road and hoping to find
a clear indication that the path they followed did indeed lead toward one of
the city gates. Before they got such a sign however, they encountered another
group of blank faced residents blocking the road ahead of them. Without
thinking, they turned left, ducking down a blind alley and hoping to find a
route to escape.

Fifty feet in they discovered their mistake. The alley
ended in a stone wall. They were trapped, and people were filing into the only
way out. Chad strung his bow and loosened the arrows in his quiver.

“How many arrows do ye have, boy?” the ranger asked
him.

Gram stared blankly at him before his mouth answered
for him, “Five.”

“Give me your quiver,” said the older man.

“I have a bow as well,” he argued. Men were running
toward them already.

“No time, an’ no sense wasting arrows,” said the
archer. His bow was up already and two arrows were in the air before he
finished his sentence.

Gram’s heart wasn’t in it anyway. The thought of
shooting people now, after he had killed so many, made him sick, but there
seemed to be no alternative. Chad Grayson’s bow thrummed with a steady beat as
he drew and released, the man’s arms working a deadly rhythm. In the span of
less than a minute his arrows were gone, and seconds later he had emptied
Gram’s quiver as well. Seventeen people lay stretched across the road, most of
them dead already, though one or two still clung to life with arrows sticking
out from their bellies.

“I’m out, lad,” said the archer. “It’s gonna get ugly
from here.”

It’s already ugly, it’s horrific,
thought
Gram. “No,” he said suddenly. Glancing upward he pointed for his companion’s
benefit.

“It’s twenty feet to the roof. Even in my youth I
couldn’ta climbed that, even if’n we had the time,” said the archer.

Rather than explain, Gram knelt and linked his hands,
clearly indicating the other man should step onto them.

“It’s too far!” protested Chad. “Even with help, I
couldn’t jump that far.”

“Just keep your leg stiff,” said Gram. “I’ll do the
work.”

More people and a few guardsmen were appearing at the
opening of the alley. Shaking his head in denial, Chad nonetheless picked his
bow up and slung it over his shoulders. Stepping onto Gram’s hands, he locked
his leg into place, balancing himself with his hands on the young man’s broad
shoulders.

Standing abruptly Gram heaved upward with incredible
force, launching his friend skyward. Chad yelled obscenities throughout his
ascent until landing at last on the slate rooftop. Miraculously, he kept his
balance, although he was clearly shaken by the experience. Looking down he
called out, “Now what?”

Gram looked up as he bent his knees, trying to judge
the distance. With little time to contemplate, he leapt as hard as he dared.
For a moment he felt as though he was flying, and then he was past the edge of
the roof. He continued on for another ten feet before falling back to crash
onto the hard slate tiles. They cracked and crumbled around him as he fell on the
far side and began tumbling down the sloped roof.

He flailed as he rolled, trying to arrest his fall,
but it was hopeless; his armored hands could find no purchase. His only
consolation was that when he eventually tumbled off the roof it was on the
other side of the building. His armor, cunningly crafted, stiffened when he
struck the cobblestones, saving him from broken bones or worse, but he still felt
bruised inside it. Chad leaned over the edge, then turned and lowered himself
carefully before dropping the last ten feet to join him.

The young warrior found his feet quickly, but as he
was about to set off at a jog Chad tapped his shoulder. “There’s no one on
this side to see us.” The hunter finished by pointing at a cellar door close
to where they were. An iron padlock secured the door.

Gram understood him immediately. Gripping the lock in
two hands he set his shoulders and twisted. The lock hasp proved stronger than
the metal band it passed through, with a pop the mounting tore loose, leaving
the cellar door without a lock or a place to put one. Hurriedly they opened
the doors and descended the stairs, pulling the doors closed over them.

“I don’t think anyone saw us entering,” muttered Gram
softly.

“Hell, I can’t even see us,” observed the ranger.
“It’s darker than an old lady’s…”

Gram placed a hand over the other man’s mouth before
he could finish the sentence. “There are people moving on the street above,”
he whispered. In point of fact, there weren’t, but he truly didn’t want to
hear the end of the saying. Some phrases could not be unheard. He waited an
appropriate interval before speaking again, “It looks like we’re in someone’s
root cellar.”

“Smells like it anyway,” agreed Chad. “I don’t know
how you can see anything in here with the doors shut. It’s as black as pitch
in here.” He paused for a moment and then continued rapidly, “Blacker’n the
inside of a cow’s ass.” The hunter snickered as he finished his addition.

“You just had to say something like that, didn’t you?”

“I was just testin’ to see if cow parts bothered you
as much as women’s naughty bits. Now I know, all I need to do is say somethin’
about c—mblrlph!” The older man’s voice became garbled as Gram’s hand covered
his mouth. He chuckled lightly when the hand was removed.

“Next time I’ll stuff a moldy turnip in that cesspit
you call a mouth,” grumbled Gram.

The hunter grinned at him, “Yer a terrible liar, lad.”

“I wasn’t lying. There are turnips everywhere.”

“Nah, not that. I meant about the people above a
minute ago. How can you see so well in here?”

“Grace—the dragon bond, it does more than make me
stronger. My senses are all keener.”

“Now that’s interestin’,” said Chad, rubbing his chin
thoughtfully in the dark. “How about yer nose?”

“Well, yeah…,” answered Gram, but then he stopped as a
rank odor rose to fill his nostrils. “Damn, that’s bad!” he hissed, trying to
keep his voice down while still emphasizing his dismay at the awful stench.
Despite himself, he began giggling and his laughter held an almost hysterical
note.

Chad laughed along with him, until at last he worried
that Gram was losing control. “That’s enough, you’re goin’ to give us away.”

“More likely they’ll notice the foul odor emanating
from the cellar,” countered Gram. “What did you
eat
anyway?”

“I think it was that trollop’s beer—or maybe the
turnip soup…”

“I take back what I said about the moldy turnip then,”
said Gram, choking on another short laugh. “That might be the death of both of
us.” He went silent for a while after that, and the somberness of their
situation settled over him once more. “How can we be laughing like this, after
what just happened?”

“This ain’t yer first time killin’ people,” observed
the hunter.

“It was different before. They were assassins, and it
was about protecting someone else. This was butchery. Those people never had
a chance, but they just wouldn’t stop…” Gram didn’t go further, his throat had
a large lump in it. When he spoke again it was a question, “How can you be so
calm?”

“Everyone’s different. Some laugh, an’ some cry after
a battle, but it’s the nighttime that’s the worst, when you’re lyin’ alone in
your bed.”

Gram could hear the old pain in the other man’s
voice. He knew the archer had killed hundreds in the war with Gododdin and
probably others even before that. “How do you deal with it?”

Chad gave him a false smile, “I don’t. In the daytime
I live, I laugh, an’ I go on without thinkin’ on it. At night, well, I drink—a
lot.”

They didn’t talk for a while after that, but
eventually Gram broke the silence with his most awful question, “How many do
you think I killed in the street back there?”

“It looked worse than it was…” said Chad, “…eight,
nine, maybe.”

“That’s pretty bad,” said Gram despondently. “Some of
them were women too.”

“I killed eighteen.”

Gram lifted his face from his hands, “You only had
seventeen arrows.”

“The guy in the market,” reminded the ranger. “I
gutted him. He won’t make it.”

“Some of the arrows might not have been fatal,”
remarked Gram. He winced internally as he said it, realizing that whether two
or three survived, it was still a slaughter.

“Nah, none of them are goin’ home today. I didn’t
wing any of ‘em. I learned that lesson the hard way a long time ago. I put
every fuckin’ one of those shafts through somethin’ vital.” Chad’s words were
filled with bitterness and perhaps a sense of self-loathing, but he wasn’t
finished, “I’m a murderin’ bastard maybe, but I ain’t leavin’ this world
without takin’ as many with me as I can. When I die, it won’t be while I’m
holdin’ a bow, more likely it’ll be a knife in the dark, probably from a woman
I was drunk enough to think loved me.”

Gram wasn’t sure how to respond, so he settled for,
“Now you’re just getting morbid and tragic.”

“It’s only tragic if they stick you before you get
what you paid for…”

“I think I liked it better when it stunk in here, and
we were laughing like fools.”

Chad grinned, “Careful what you wish for lad.”

Gram tried not to gag.

Moira’s head was yanked roughly back, while another
one of the king’s guests prepared to open her throat with a feast knife. It
wasn’t an implement normally used for murder, but since those attending the
king weren’t allowed to carry weapons, it was all the man had. Her eyes rolled
in stark fear as he turned the sharp edge inward to do the job. She knew it
would be more than adequate.

“Stop,” said another voice out of her current range of
vision. “Celior needs the knowledge she has. Killing her will violate our
bargain.”

The knife stopped, lying cold against the skin of her
neck. King Darogen answered whoever had spoken, “Explain his reasoning, we
were told her progenitor already had the information required.”

“The wizard still resists your attempts to deconstruct
his brain,” said the channeler.

“His physical form continues to shift; eventually he
will tire. You will have your information then,” said Darogen.

“You cannot be certain of that. Even if he does
falter, your attempt to absorb the information in his head may fail,” countered
the channeler.

“There is no reason to think his offspring has the
knowledge Celior desires.”

“You do not understand humans then,” argued the
channeler. “Even if she doesn’t, she can be used as a bargaining tool to
weaken his resolve.”

“Our consciousness comprises a billion such minds,”
said Darogen, “we know far more about humanity than a creature like your master
could ever dream to understand.”

“Then consult them!
They
may understand, but
clearly
you
do not.”

A short pause followed, and then Darogen spoke once
more, “It appears you are correct. The female seems to lack her father’s
ability to transmute himself, therefore we will take her mind. If the
information is there, we will no longer need the sire, if it is not, we may
still use her body as leverage against him.” The king stepped forward, giving
no appearance of feeling the terrible pain his shoulder must be causing him.

The knife vanished and two other men gripped her head
fiercely, using their fingers to force her mouth open. Moira’s jaws were
strong, but their combined strength overcame her, and slowly they pried her
teeth apart. Darogen’s face loomed close, and his lips opened. Something
metallic glinted as he pressed his mouth against hers.

No!
Moira’s mind was
screaming as she felt something cold and hard crawling over her tongue. Sharp
legs cut as the strange metallic insect pulled itself forward, seeking the back
of her throat. Thrashing violently against the men who were holding her, she
had no hope of escape. Panic obliterated her reason, but the fear brought her
remaining power into sharp focus. With little thought she created a shield
within her mouth, encasing the strange monster there and crushing it. A
terrible taste made her want to retch as the shield vanished. The men holding
her relaxed, and she managed to spit the strange metal thing out.

“She still retains too much strength,” said the
channeler. “The moon-shackles are not sufficient for this.”

“Lock her away,” commanded Darogen. “We will try
again later. Once she is unconscious the process will be easier.”

One of the guards who had entered after the start of
the confrontation spoke up, the tremor in his voice indicating that he was not
under the same control as most of the others, “Y—yes, Your Majesty. What about
the Baron?”

“Will you take him?” asked the channeler.

“He knows nothing, and his body is dying already.
Lock him away for now. We can dispose of his body later, once we have a
suitable explanation for his death,” pronounced Darogen. The king’s dead eyes
locked on the guard who had spoken, “You and the others from outside, wait for
me in the next chamber. I would speak with you privately.”

It doesn’t control all of them,
thought
Moira.
It’s going to do the same thing to them, to keep them from talking
about what they’ve seen. What was that thing?
She spat as they dragged
her limp body from the room, trying to clear the awful taste from her mouth.

Glancing down, she idly noticed that the dress the
Baron had loaned her was ruined. One of the men that had been holding her had
been badly wounded by her sword before she had been shackled. His blood had
left huge stains on the fabric. Her magesight, which thankfully still
functioned, showed her that the men coming behind her were carrying Gerold’s
unconscious body with them.
Poor Gerold.

Exhaustion had her full in its grip now, as the
adrenaline of her battle faded away, leaving her cold and shaking. Even so,
her mind worked furiously, trying to understand what had happened, and more
importantly,
why
it had happened. She couldn’t come to any reasonable
conclusion, but one thought stood out to her,
my father is definitely still
alive, and they have him.

Down they went, until at last she was brought to what
must be the dungeon. Moira had read of such places before, but never seen
one. Her father hadn’t seen the need to build one, and no one had ever wanted
to let her see the one in Lancaster, even though it was mostly empty. The one
here in Halam had evidently seen good use, however. The smell of mold and old
refuse perfectly matched with what she had always thought a dungeon would be
like.

Each cell was a stone room cut from the bedrock beneath
King Darogen’s castle. While the interior walls were stone, the front wall
consisted of nothing but iron bars and a door. Gerold’s unconscious form was
dumped in one cell, and she was shoved into the one next to it. The click of
the iron lock held a terrible finality as the door closed.

Moira wondered if she had the strength to foil the
lock. She knew already that she was incredibly weak now. The shackles had
robbed her of most of her strength. Her magesight still worked, and obviously
she maintained a certain amount of power within her own body, but the shackles
seemed to bleed away any aythar that she tried to manipulate outside of her own
person.

Her hopes were dashed when two of the men remained
behind, standing guard outside her cell. She knew that even if she had the
strength to manipulate the lock, she wouldn’t have enough to fight the guards.
Shit.

That wasn’t very ladylike.
She
could almost imagine Grace chiding her for her language. Gram’s dragon had
been her first spellbeast, living as a teddy bear and playmate for years before
taking on her new role. Grace had never approved of Moira’s occasional lapses
into foul language.
But she isn’t here right now, and I’m damn well screwed
if I don’t figure out a way to get out of this.

I need to be clever.
She
spent several minutes trying to do just that, but her mind came up blank.
It
always seems so easy in the books.
She changed tactics,
What would Lady
Rose do?

That was no help either. She couldn’t imagine Gram’s
mother being locked in a dungeon. The image refused to come to her. Imagining
her mother in a prison cell was easier for some reason, but then her mother’s
solutions to such a situation were of no use to her either.
I can’t just
rip the bars apart with my bare hands.

“Mom wouldn’t have been captured anyway,” she muttered
to herself. “She’d have fought her way free.”

A vision of her sword cutting through the man in the
audience chamber flashed in her mind, and a sick feeling swept over her.
Worse, it was followed by the memory of the people who had thrown themselves in
front of the King. Despite the many bizarre experiences of her childhood, she
had never killed anyone before.

Tears welled in her eyes, and she began to cry. The
nervousness and anxiety of the past few days had worn on her, even as she had worked
hard to put forward her best face. Her father had always been strong, and her
mother stronger still, and yet she knew she was just a child. No matter how
she had tried, it had all been a façade, and now she was out of her depth. She
wept long and hard, hating herself for doing so but helpless to stop herself.

After a time, her tears stopped and her head felt
clearer.
Stop feeling sorry for yourself and think about what you have.
That
was easy, not very much, but now that she was calmer she realized she did still
have some assets.
The dragons will be looking for me, and Gram and Chad
will know exactly where I’ve gone.
Gram or either of the dragons alone
would be enough to put an end to King Darogen and any number of his soldiers.
Chad was not to be discounted either; the ranger was deadly with a bow.

I just have to survive until they rescue
me.
The thought reassured her, but it wasn’t satisfying.
She was a wizard, and the daughter of a man who had almost single handedly
rewritten the course of history for Lothion. She couldn’t sit idle.
I have
more than just allies.
She still had her magesight, and obviously some of
her abilities still worked. Her brother came to mind then, and she wondered what
he would do.

Thinking of Matthew annoyed her. He would have chided
her for letting herself get into the situation to begin with, not that he would
have done any better.
He’d probably be trying to devise some overly
complicated enchantment to get himself out of this.
Simultaneously, she
found herself worrying about him. She had left him alone, back in Lothion.
What
if he’s gotten himself into trouble?
It wasn’t long ago that she had had
to reattach one of his arms after an experiment of his had gone wrong.

Thoughts of her brother did lead to one good idea,
however. Lifting her manacles in front of her, she examined the subtle runes
engraved on the milky white stone they were made of. She might not be quite
the enchanter her father and brother were, but she still knew a lot about
enchanting.

A few minutes’ careful study told her a lot. The
method used to produce the effects of the shackles on her aythar, was overly
complicated and inefficient. If the designer had done the job properly, the
shackles would have completely sealed her abilities. Instead, they merely
drained away the majority of any aythar she tried to project beyond herself.
On a weaker mage that might be enough to entirely stop them from using magic,
but for a stronger one, it didn’t quite do enough.

They were probably made a long time ago,
by someone who wasn’t very good at it.
Despite the flaws in it,
she couldn’t see any way that she could break the enchantment while the
shackles were around her wrists. She considered attempting to shatter them by
banging them against the stone floor, but she couldn’t be sure how much aythar
they were storing. The reaction produced by their destruction might well end
her life.

She noticed one of the guards staring at her then.
Her magesight told her that he was back in control of his own mind again,
though he seemed somewhat confused about what had happened earlier. If he
remembered losing control of his body, there was no sign of it, he would have
been more fearful. Instead, she was guessing that he had a blank place in his
memories.

At the moment he was having some decidedly unvirtuous
thoughts as he watched her. She tried not to shudder.
He’s at least ten
years older than I am, how could he even consider something like that?
Of
course, she had learned quite well over the past week that many men had no
qualms when it came to fantasizing about girls much younger than themselves.

Moira turned her attention to Gerold. She could see with
her magesight that he was still breathing in the cell next door, but he was
slowly bleeding to death. Focusing her perceptions carefully, she could tell
that he was lucky to be alive at all. The spear had slid through his
midsection without nicking his stomach or intestines, but his liver had been
torn, most of the bleeding was from the veins there. If it had cut the artery,
he’d have been dead already.

He might live if I could seal his wound
and stop the rest of the bleeding.
There was no way she
could do that at the moment, though. Even if he had been in the same cell, she
couldn’t muster enough aythar to do much of anything physical.

Her mind froze then, as another idea came to her.
I
can’t do much on a physical level, but what about mentally?
Her eyes went
to the guard once more. He was still watching her, and his aythar had a
distinctly lewd cast to it.
If he were closer…

She knew he would love to be closer, if it weren’t
against the rules. She fought down a feeling of disgust.
I can’t believe
I’m even considering this.

But Gerold was dying, and she was his only hope.

Moira stood and approached the bars, her gaze meeting
the guard’s in an open challenge.

The man stared back at her in silence, not sure what
to make of her sudden change in behavior.

Don’t talk, you’ll screw it up,
she
told herself. Instead, she licked her lips.

That got his attention. The guard straightened and
walked closer, “What do you want?”