Jalia and the Slavers (Jalia - World of Jalon) (12 page)

Daniel raised his hands high in surrender, “I know, I know. I’ll just go and get some soap and water for the shaving.”

This was perhaps the wrong thing to say and Jalia glowered at him. “We don’t need that. I’ll use the ring as it will be quicker. Magic ring, remove the hair below my waist.”

Jalia screamed as every hair below her waist was pulled out in a single instant. Her hands flew to the stinging area between her legs. Daniel looked at her, first with real concern, but as he realized she hadn’t actually been hurt, the humor of the situation overwhelmed him and he burst into laughter.

Jalia rubbed her stinging skin and her face turned a bright shade of red as Daniel’s laughter increased. “Stop that right now, Daniel al’Degar. If you know what’s good for you.”

“I must say, you look pretty down there, if a little pink,” Daniel said between peals of laughter. He managed to duck the vase that Jalia threw and headed for the safety of the door. Much as he wanted too, he just couldn’t stop laughing.

Jalia picked up a heavy looking statuette and swung it around preparing to throw it. Daniel stepped through the door and closed it quickly behind him. Resting against the door, in tears of laughter, he felt the almighty crash through the solid oak door as the statuette smashed against the other side. For a couple of minutes there was silence.

“Oh Daniel…” Jalia called in a deceptively sweet voice.

“Yes, Trela my love?” Daniel answered in similar dulcet tones.

“Magic ring, do it to him too!” Jalia snarled.

Daniel doubled over as his crotch and legs stung as though a thousand bees had struck at once. He rolled over on the floor in an agony that slowly faded to a vicious sting.

“Not so funny now, is it?” Jalia called sweetly from the other side of the door.

16.
First Strike

The monastery on the island of Cee loomed large in front of Daniel under the pale illumination of Anvil rising. Its thick stone walls rose to a height of forty feet above where Daniel stood and the cliff behind him fell away another hundred feet to the placid lake below.

Someone had told him recently that none of the cliffs on the islands of Telmar were natural. That instead they were carved from gentle slopes after the monasteries were built to present an imposing aspect and to make attack from the lake impossible.

The monastery walls certainly looked difficult to climb. Just behind the ramparts at the top of the wall, the largest block of the monastery presented another twenty feet of difficult climb before he could reach the lowest windows. The windows were barred with iron. Normally Daniel would have regarded an attack on the monastery from this direction impractical, but it turned out this was the only way in that was unguarded and so it became his best choice.

Jalia and Daniel had discussed their options the previous night. They sat in their bedroom with a map Daniel had painstakingly copied from an original in Gorn’s house and evaluated what they knew about the islands of Telmar.

The seven islands of Telmar huddled in a circle near to the shore of Lake Telmar. They were on Ona, which was the most westerly island and nearest to the lakes shore. All but one of the seven islands encircled the island of Fum which was the next island east. The island the furthest east and beyond the island of Trey was Cee. Daniel tapped the map where Cee was.

“According to Gorn, Cee is where the Owner Jal al’Breen is based. Jal is reputed to be one of the nastier members of the Association. I think we should take him out first.”

Jalia nodded thoughtfully and scratched at her itching groin. She noticed Daniel rubbing himself when he thought she wasn’t looking and that thought brought a small smile to her face. It was only right in her mind, that the ‘father of the child’ should endure some of the discomfort of the mother. The fact that there wasn’t actually a child in the first place was irrelevant. After all, it had been his idea.

“Daniel, why don’t we kill Yandin Selda first? Everyone we have spoken to agrees he is the most dangerous of the Association and he’s their leader.”

“He’ll be the best protected and the one most on his guard. Whether we succeed or fail in these assassinations, we shall stir up the biggest hornets’ nest you can imagine. Doing it this way, he may think we’re scared of him and relax his guard.”

“So we take out two of his senior henchmen and he concludes we’re not only scared of him but that we still have two more to go before we try to kill him.” Jalia grinned at Daniel. “He’ll be our next target after these two, I take it?”

“My plan exactly. I’ll kill Jal al’Breen at Cee and you kill Del Brode at Fir at the same time.” On the map, the island of Fir was south and east of Ona. To reach Cee or Fir required either a boat trip or crossing two of the ancient bridges.

“Both islands are a long way from Ona and it will take us several hours to get there. We don’t get as much darkness to play with up here as we would have down south either.” Jalia pondered the problem as she looked at the map. “We’ll have to set off tomorrow morning or early afternoon to give ourselves time to reach the monasteries and check the lay of the land.”

“Just as soon as Una Thorn has come a calling and decided your baby can wait another day to be born,” Daniel agreed.

“Can I kill her? She must have told people I’m pregnant by now.” Jalia fluttered her eyes at Daniel. “Please Daniel; let me kill that nasty woman. I won’t ask for anything else for ages if you just let me…”

Daniel laughed at how well Jalia played the pleading little girl. As far as he knew, Una Thorn was an upright respectable woman cursed with an appalling bedside manner. He didn’t intend to let Jalia to kill her just because she was annoying. He scratched absent-mindedly at his crotch, which had started to itch again.

“No, you’re not going to kill the nasty woman, because being nasty is not a sufficient reason to kill anybody.” Jalia gave him a vindictive look. This, as far as Daniel was concerned, proved the exact point he was trying to make. “We’ll let her examine you and see what a masterly job your fine husband has done in plucking your nether regions and then we’ll change into our normal clothes and sneak out the back.”

“It’s not like you to accept we have to kill these bastards, Daniel. I’ve been expecting you to tell me we should negotiate with them instead.” Jalia pulled her knees close to her chest, having put her feet against her bottom on the chair. As she hadn’t bothered to change out of the shift she had been wearing for the examination, and that shift was fairly short, the sight this presented to Daniel distracted him.

Jalia noticed the glazed look in his eyes and prodded him with her leg. “Daniel!”

“Sorry Jalia, I was miles away.” Daniel ran Jalia’s question through his mind and tried to concentrate. “I can see the redness has gone,” he said out-loud, cursing his thoughts for betraying him.

“I shall be checking on yours later. Now can we get back to the plan?”

“We have no choice but to strike first and strike hard. There are only two of us and we face an army, possibly several armies. We have no choice but to act like assassins, however much I dislike it.” Daniel paused and studied the map. “The worst problem we’ll have is on Sep. I understand the female Owner, Silla Klint, operates from there and the bridge to it has been closed for over two years.”

“I’ll take care of her when the time comes, Daniel. I know you don’t like killing women.”

“It is not that she’s a woman. It’s that she will be difficult to get at and I understand she’s brought back more of her men from the mines than any of the other owners. Rumor has it, that she alone didn’t put all her gold into the vaults at Brinan.”

“We can worry about her later. Tomorrow we will kill two of the mine owners and see what happens.” Jalia sounded delighted by the idea. Knowing her the way he did, Daniel was sure he wasn’t being misled in the slightest by her tone.

Daniel walked further around the walls of the monastery looking for a suitable place to climb. He tied a long silk cord to the handle of his dagger. It was essential neither he nor Jalia gave any hint they had magic at their disposal, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t use it when people would assume a conventional method had been used.

Using his dagger as an improvised grappling hook he ordered it flying over the wall where it positioned itself so it wouldn’t slip as Daniel climbed the cord. Daniel put on calf skin gloves to avoid burns to his hands. It didn’t take him long to reach the top and to peer across its ramparts.

As he suspected, the guards were behaving in a slack manner. This deep into Telmar, they wouldn’t be expecting an attack launched by a single man. The man supposed to be guarding the wall chatted to a comrade some distance away. Daniel climbed onto the path running round the wall without being seen. He jumped onto a thatched outhouse roof and from there dropped to the ground.

He slipped into the kitchens of the main building of the monastery without being seen. The door to the kitchen was propped open to let fumes escape on this hot summer’s evening. Daniel heard a lot of shouting, as the monastery chef seemed to be fond of screaming obscenities at his workers.

It appeared Daniel had timed his arrival to coincide with the evening banquet. Daniel grinned at such remarkable luck. He couldn’t have picked his time better if he tried.

Jalia stared at a metal portcullis firmly set in the down position. Behind her, in the monastery of Fir moat, no less than six bodies floated, bobbing up and down on the surface of its stagnant fetid water.

The island of Fir was a peculiar shape, it looked a little like a pear that had grown lopsided so that its bulbous body was well to one side of its upper part. It was a low lying island; in that nowhere was more than twenty feet above the height of the lake. To protect the monastery, the monks built a wide moat around the monastery crossed by a single bridge.

There had been six guards on the bridge when Jalia approached. It took considerable skill, but she managed to kill all six without any of them giving so much as a shout of alarm. Sure that her problems were over, she crossed the bridge to find a portcullis blocking her path.

Sighing in annoyance at her luck, Jalia put her sword back into its scabbard and started to climb the portcullis. Twenty five feet above the ground, she pulled herself through a hole in the stonework where the drum used to raise the portcullis was housed. There wasn’t a guard in the room. The guards presumably had a bell to summon others when they needed the portcullis raised. Jalia found it hard to believe trained men could act so stupidly, but then, that was their lookout.

She quietly stole across the room and pushed a door that was ajar further open. Inside the room, five men drank beer and played cards. In other days and other times, Jalia would have liked nothing better than to join them. This time, she was going to subject them to a game where they would have far less chance than in a game of cards and the stakes were much higher.

Daniel walked through the kitchens and reached the banquet hall. The clothing he wore was typical of that worn by the other men in the hall. He sat at a bench and called for food. A serving girl came rushing over to him. Her breasts were bare and there were signs she had been hit about them. There was a look of fear in her eyes as she put down a plate before Daniel and offered him a choice of meat from her tray.

“Move out of my way, bitch,” a fat man shouted as he pushed the girl onto the floor. She fell heavily and started crying. Nobody else in the room paid the slightest notice so Daniel helped her to her feet and led her down a hallway away from the kitchens.

“Don’t hurt me, sir,” she begged though not making any attempt to struggle in his grasp. “I’m sorry I spilled your food and will do whatever you want. I’ve been trained in the carnal arts, sir. Please don’t beat me.”

She cried after she stopped speaking.

“I’ve no intention of hurting you,” Daniel said, but she wasn’t listening and had let her skirt fall to the floor. She was naked below it and Daniel stared uncomfortably at the bruises and scars on her body. “Please put that back on. I mean you no harm.”

The girl scrambled to pick up her dress. “I’m sorry I’m not right for you, sir. I’ll get a boy; there are plenty of them out there. Don’t beat me for trying, sir. I was not to know.”

“For the last time, I’m not going to beat you, unless you keep on twittering and don’t listen to me.” The girl became silent. “That’s much better. Now, I want you to come with me to the edge of the banquet hall and point out Jal al’Breen. Do you think you can do that?”

The girl nodded, her lipped pressed tightly together. Daniel led her silently back to the hall. She stood just inside the room and pointed out the fat man who pushed her over. Daniel sent her back to the kitchens. He watched al’Breen leave his seat and head towards where Daniel stood. Daniel couldn’t believe his luck could be this good.

Jalia surveyed the wreckage of mugs, tables and chairs scattered across the floor. She looked for any flicker of life from the vaguely human shapes intermingled with the broken furniture. Most of them were missing at least one limb and the floor was sticky with warm blood. Jalia stepped over a widening pool of it and headed for the far door.

At this rate, she was going to end up killing everyone in this monastery. She just hoped that one of them was going to be Dell Brode.

Jal al’Breen walked past Daniel without noticing him and carried on down the corridor. Daniel followed behind, staying back in the hope he would escape al’Breen’s notice. al’Breen went around a sharp corner and Daniel walked a little faster to avoid losing him. As he turned the corner he found a dagger pressed against his throat, and was pushed against the wall with al’Breen’s arm across his chest.

“Who the hell are you?” al’Breen demanded. The man’s arm was so tight against his chest that Daniel couldn’t answer, “I thought I didn’t recognize you and then you started following me. So talk, damn you, who are you?”

Daniel spluttered and Jal al’Breen relaxed his arm sufficiently to let Daniel breathe. Daniel whispered and al’Breen felt an intense pain. His hand fell to the floor, severed at the wrist. It still clutched the dagger.

Blood spurted from his arm. al’Breen desperately tried to stop the flow. Daniel used the magic dagger which was back in his hand to cut the man’s throat.

“I’m sorry, that wasn’t very sporting was it? I’m afraid we don’t have the time to observe the niceties this time around.” Daniel gave the dying man a deep bow.