Death Angel's Shadow (16 page)

Dron Missa started and laid aside his dirk. He had been nervously tapping the born handle against the table.

"What now?" Jan wanted to know.

"Good question," Gaethaa cursed. "We do nothing now--nothing we can do until morning! By then Kane will be half way across Demornte, no doubt! And for the moment we can't stop him. All we can do is patch up Bell and try to pick up Kane's trail when it gets light.

"Well, what's the story with this girl we captured?" he asked, as Alidore took a seat beside him.

"Got kind of a crazy story on her, but they all say about the same," Alidore explained. "Her name's Rehhaile, and she's the one Gavein mentioned earlier as spending a lot of time with Kane. Seems she's his mistress, although I gather she's pretty much anybody's who wants her. Lived in Sebbei all her life--family died in the plague--and makes a living anyway she can. Seemed fascinated with Kane when he showed up, so she's been living with him mostly since then.

"The townspeople consider her to be a sort of witch. They say she's been blind since birth--and that bears out--but she seems to have some type of second sight. It's claimed she can look into your mind and see through your eyes so to speak. They say she can read your thought--scan tell exactly what your feelings are and what you're thinking. I tried her and the story seems to be true."
Gaethaa nodded solemnly. "A witch with psychic powers. Cereb has been telling me of such--he noticed her from the first. Just the sort of creature to be in league with Kane! Obviously she sensed our intentions when we met her on the street and ran off to warn Kane while we were wasting time here with Gavein. Damn the luck!"

"What are you going to do with her?" Jan persisted.

"I'll decide what to do with her tomorrow. She may be of some use to us yet, so we'll hold her for now. As an accomplice of that devil, she deserves death."

"No objections to our having some fun then?" murmured Mollyl, winking at Jan.

"She cost us our quarry," Gaethaa said coldly. "But don't you guys tough her up so she won't be of use to me later. Doesn't look like she knows anything important about Kane, but maybe there'll be something."

"Even if we must execute her," Alidore protested, "is it right for the men to rape her? This seems like pointless torture."

"Can't rape a whore, Alidore!" laughed Dron Missa, joining the other men in a squabble over seniority.

After the others moved away, Alidore remained at the table beside Gaethaa, a frown still troubling his tanned face. His wine cup stood before him untasted. An occasional twitch flickered along the square line of his jaw, as if there were words that must be uttered, but that he kept to himself.

Gaethaa noticed his lieutenant's mood and turned to him in concern. The Kamathaen lord prized Alidore's comradeship highly. He had admired the Lartroxian youth's tough courage and intelligent zeal when Alidore had first joined his band nearly two years ago. Alidore had been in his late teens then, and Gaethaa, about a dozen years his senior, had grown to consider him a younger brother. He knew he could count on Alidore to stand beside him in any battle and he relied on his counsel in deciding many points of strategy. While most of his followers over the years rode behind his banner for gold, adventure, revenge or other personal motivations, Gaethaa recognized that Alidore more than any of the others was drawn by the same idealism he felt. His present mood puzzled Gaethaa.

"All right, Alidore," he said quietly. "What is it? Something has been gnawing away at you for a good while now. I've watched it building up inside you bit by bit. Out with it--what's bothering you? You know you don't need to hold it back from me if you don't feel right about the way something is going."

Alidore bit his lip and raised his wine cup, not yet meeting Gaethaa's eyes. "It's nothing worth... It's vague..." he began uneasily. "Just something that's been getting to me more and more as it keeps showing up. I don't know, maybe I'm getting battle fatigue after too many campaigns. I just notice it more. Nothing definite I like to bring up, but..."

Gaethaa watched him anxiously, knowing that in time his lieutenant would speak his mind. This much reticence was out of character for him.

"It's this girl Rehhaile..."

"Rehhaile?" Gaethaa's hawk-like face twisted in surprise. "Rehhaile? What's there about the witch that bothers you?"
"Well, it's not just her, it's a lot of things that keep hanging in my mind. She's an example is all," Alidore continued. "The mutiny we had at the border of Demornte. The execution of the prisoners when we destroyed the Red Three. The way we took the town apart last year in Burwhet when we took on Olidi and his gang of raiders. Those men you let Mollyl torture to tell us where Recom Launt would attack next. The hostages you let him butcher when you refused to lift the seige of his fortress..."

"The alternative was to withdraw--to turn tail and let that murderous robber baron regain his stranglehold on the trade routes. And I had to know when and where to strike for that first battle with him. The lives of his henchmen and of some hostages were unimportant weighed against the greater good I accomplished there by destroying Launt and permitting thousands to cross his domain in peace. Perhaps the men were a bit out of hand in Burwhet, but regardless of the destruction we caused there, Olidi and every last one of his cutthroats died in the fighting. Burwhet could rebuild and prosper with that gang of renegade bandits finally scoured from the land. Those weren't prisoners we executed--they were accomplices of the Red Three and tainted with the ogres' inhuman crimes. As for the men who turned traitor to me in the shadow of Demornte, any man who's ever carried a sword in his lord's army knows that mutiny is punishable by death. No leader could ever command respect and discipline of his men if he ignored blatant desertion. We've been through this before, Alidore.

"This sorceress Rehhaile--in view of her youth and ignorance I could have overlooked her living with Kane. But she deliberately gave him warning of our presence here, and for that crime she must pay the price. If we had taken Kane by complete surprise--as it seems likely now we would have--our mission here would be completed. Anmuspi might well be alive still, although it's foolish to think we could have taken Kane without some casualties. Foolish to speculate over what should have happened anyway."

A woman's moan of pain broke from the upstairs of the tavern, accompanied by thick laughter.

Alidore winced. "Why not give her a clean death then? Why torture her like this?"

"She's a wanton--you told me as much yourself." Gaethaa shrugged. "She's not getting anything such a woman isn't used to. Besides the men need a break--they've ridden long and hard without any sport. Let them have their fun--I'll deal with Rehhaile tomorrow maybe."

Alidore still seemed troubled. "It's all logical when you explain it. I'm not implying we've ever stooped to senseless brutality, of course. I don't know, maybe my backbone's getting soft. It seems like there could be a little room for mercy..."

Drawing a hand across his high forehead to push back the blond locks that drifted down, Gaethaa drew a deep breath and leaned back in his chair. His blue-gray eyes grew bitter in memory. "Sure, mercy. Remember the time years ago when Reanist talked me into sparing that girl we found chained in the sorcerer's tower? The people of the region protested, but Reanist had an eye for beauty and insisted she was only a prisoner. That night her kisses killed Reanist and five other good men before my sword ended her inhuman thirst, and even Cereb Ak-Cetee wasn't certain what manner of demon we had harbored. Or earlier when we spared Tirli-Selan's family, then had to return later and fight a far more costly battle when we learned that they were bloodier despots than their uncle.

"Alidore, it doesn't work out like you'd hope for it to. I've let too many men die from blood poisoning still begging my surgeon not to amputate all of a gangrenous limb. Poison spreads. A tiny cancer will ultimately corrupt and destroy the strongest organism. Let a fragment of evil evade your exorcism, and it will inevitably flourish to cause even more death and suffering to humanity. False mercy is worse than ill-advised in my struggle against the forces of evil. Its consequences can completely pervert and destroy all the goals for which I fight."

Gaethaa's face grew pale with emotion. His eyes glowed with vision, and sweat glistened over his forehead. A tremor passed through his clenched hands, as his voice shook with intensity.

"I am called Gaethaa the Crusader, and the name is one I hope to be worthy of always. I have made my life a crusade against evil, and it is a crusade that will end only when the last spark of life fails me. When I was a child I listened to the great sagas told by my father's soldiers around the fires--and I listened to the darker tales they whispered of the strange lands where forces of evil held power over all who dwelt therein. Even then I vowed to myself that when I became a man I would not waste my life among the perfumed sycophants of Kamathaen nobility. I turned my back on indolent court life, and chose instead a life of riding against the cold wind with a war cry on my lips and a sword raised in my hand. I worked from childhood to prepare myself for this life. For tutors I drew upon the best tacticians available to teach me military strategy; my training at arms was at the hands of masters of their chosen weapon. I learned to read and converse in a dozen languages, and the wisest scholars of our age instructed me in logic and philosophy--for I knew it was not sufficient that I learn to wield a sword untemptered by reason, nor allow other men to be my ears and tongue.

"Alidore, I have seen the cold light of good! The cold light shed by truth, righteousness justice. The cold light that dispels the darkness of evil! The universe is structured on these two forces--the power of good shining as a beacon of cold, clear light against the smothering blackness of evil! And as surely as sunlight drives away the night, the cold light of good annihilates the darkness of evil!

"And I have vowed to serve the cold light! To destroy with a sword of cold light the shadow of evil that darkens our world! Darkness is vanquished by fight, and the forces of evil fall before the powers of good! But in the battle of light against darkness there can be no intermediate shades--no twilight powers! Those who do not follow the cold light are children of darkness, and they must and shall be destroyed by the cold, clear fight of good!

"And if my crusade at times strikes you as without mercy, it is because there can be no mercy, no uncertainty in this struggle! The cold light shall burn away the darkness of evil, even if a thousand must die to drive back the shadows! Their suffering is a petty price to pay for the ultimate victory!"

Totally swept up in the spell of Gaethaa's exhortation, Alidore listened with mind awhirl--uncertain at times whether he served a saint or madman.

Gaethaa had been silent for several minutes before Alidore broke from his near trance. "I'm sorry to have sounded unworthy of the confidence you place in me, milord," he spoke dazedly, not certain how the Crusader had interpreted his misgivings.

A quiet smile crossed Gaethaa's face, and he rose to brush his fist against his lieutenant's shoulder. "Why are you apologizing, Alidore? Your concern is understandable, and mercy is an invaluable principle when it is called for. Your feelings are misplaced, that's all, and I hope I've done a little toward clearing away the confusion in your mind. You need to remember that we're only a badly outnumbered few aligned in a cosmic struggle between diametrically opposed forces. Softness in this struggle isn't mercy, but unforgivable stupidity.

"Look, it's getting late, and we'll be up and after Kane as soon as there's daylight outside. I'm going to get some sleep now, and why don't you turn in yourself. You're exhausted now, and a lot of things will be clearer to you in the morning."
Alidore watched his leader depart. Things were a lot clearer after listening to Gaethaa, be realized. Still he did not feel like turning in. A strange restlessness still haunted him, and he sat up mulling over his thoughts and slowly sipping his wine. Sleep did not come, perhaps because every time his eyes started to close he caught the sound of choked cries from the room above.

At length when the others lost interest, Alidore went to Rehhaile also.

It was near dawn when Alidore left Rehhaile and started to pull shirt and trousers over his lean body. She was not asleep, but turned toward him on the bed, her uncanny blind eyes red from tears. There were many sullen purple bruises marring her tan skin, and her back was crossed with livid welts. Compared with other women whom Mollyl had amused himself with, she hadn't been badly messed up, Alidore thought.

She looked so forlorn there on the rumpled bed, and Alidore felt remorse for what they bad done to her. She hadn't been like a whore at all--there had been no hardness, no professionalism. In a way it had made him feet like he had raped one who loved him, and Alidore couldn't shake the awful feeling of betrayal.

Rehhaile ran a tongue, over swollen lips, sensing his guilt. "Don't feel too bad. You were kinder than the others at least." Alidore muttered something and offered her a cup of wine. "What is to happen to me now?" she asked, and he felt uncomfortable and told her noncommittally that this was for Gaethaa to decide. Weakly she sat up and touched her bruised abdomen tenderly, a whimper hovering on her lips. "Why are you doing this to me?"

Alidore looked away. He could tell her that she deserved no better because she had chosen to align herself with evil, but somehow the words seemed unreal now. "You did a foolish thing when you helped Kane escape. In doing so you have thwarted the cause of justice, and punishment must be carried out."

"Was raping me an act of justice? Do you think I deserve what is being done to me?" Rehhaile responded illogically.

Alidore was fumbling for a reply, when a shriek echoed from the stables!

Kane had not fled Sebbei.

Regaining his strength, he had crossed the small lake in the darkness. Reaching the inner wall of the city, Kane had lain hidden among the tall reeds while Gaethaa and his men floundered about in a futile search for him. Silently he had watched from the shadows as Gaethaa returned to Sebbei. With noiseless step he had followed his enemies back to Jethrann's tavern.