Kingmaker's Sword (Rune Blades of Celi) (2 page)

Then, even as the exhaustion of the effort began to creep through him, out of sheer desperation, he tried something he had never done before. He concentrated on the muscles of his body—arms, shoulders, chest, back, legs—willing them to a strength beyond that of a sixteen-year-old boy, seeing them as hard and tough and useful as a fully trained warrior’s in the peak of condition.

Mouse got to his feet. All his life, they had beaten him. They called him disobedient, obdurate, rebellious, obstinate. He could add mulish and bullheaded to that list. They had not been able to beat it out of him. They had never broken him as they had broken the other slaves. He wouldn’t let them do it to him now.

Foxmouse they called him—or just Mouse—because his hair was as red as the pelt of the little rodent. But he had seen the tiny rodent successfully fend off cats that threatened its young. If his namesake could defy enemies so much bigger and stronger than it, he could try to do no less.

The tiny cell contained one unglazed window. It showed as a pale oblong in the dark stone of the wall. Two iron bars transversed it vertically. Even without the bars, it was too narrow for a grown man to climb through. But Mouse was not a grown man—not yet.

Mouse went to the window and put his hands to the bars. Taking a deep breath, he began to pull. He strained until the muscles and sinews of his arms popped and stretched with the effort. But the bars remained stubbornly and firmly straight in their mortar bed.

Gasping for breath, he let go. He thought about the house-guards who would come for him with the dawn and drag him to the pens where they castrated sheep, where they used the same filthy pincers on troublesome slaves. He thought of them laughing as they left him to bleed to death or recover as best he could after the
gentling.

“No,” he whispered. “No! By all the gods, I won’t let them do that to me.”

And he had to avenge Rossah….

Cold rage flooded his belly, seeping through his body like oil into a wick. His muscles tightened, shivering with the intensity of his anger. He clenched his fists until his fingernails dug painfully into his palms.

Mouse turned his back to the window and reached up above his shoulders to grasp the bars firmly. He used the entire weight of his body, the full strength of his anger and grief, the leverage of his hips against the stone. The effort caused bright sparks and whorls to dance before his eyes and the blood roared in his ears. The rough stone ground cruelly into the naked flesh of his hips. Every muscle distended and strained, and began to tear. He gritted his teeth hard enough to crack his jaw, and pulled harder.

The bars gave way so suddenly, he staggered forward and sprawled full-length onto his belly, cracking his forehead painfully into the opposite wall. Bright flashes exploded behind his eyelids. He shook his head, trying to clear it. It was a few moments until he could find the strength to sit up. He still held the two iron bars in his hands.

The mortar, he thought fuzzily. It must have been old and rotten, weakened by years of exposure to the damp, salt air.

He got to his feet, then had to reach out to steady himself with one hand against the cold stone of the wall as another wave of dizziness and nausea washed over him. When he finally trusted his balance again, he went back to the window.

Dawn was coming quickly. Already, a pale glimmer of light showed above the eastern wall of the landholding. Mouse dropped one of the iron bars to the floor and tossed the second out the window. It took him only seconds to scramble up to the broken sill. He took a deep breath, then expelled it to make himself as small as possible as he squeezed into the narrow opening. The rock frame scraped his skin raw and he felt warm blood trickle down his back and chest. He bit his lip against the pain and strained harder.

He popped through suddenly, and tumbled to the packed earth below the window, knocking all the wind from his body. He lay there gasping for a moment, then groped around until he found the iron bar, and scrambled to his feet.

To his left, the back wall of the holding rose two man-heights. Beyond that wall lay the river, a sheer, dizzying drop to the deceptively smooth water below. To his right lay the main gates, guarded day and night by Lord Mendor’s most trusted house-guards. Ahead of him, across an expanse of open courtyard, stood the stables—and a hiding place.

Limping, Mouse ran to the back wall. Roughly built of raw stone, it provided enough chinks to serve as hand and footholds. Tucking the iron bar under his arm, he swarmed quickly up the wall. At the top, he paused to look down at the dark, glimmering river and the swirling whirlpools that were plainly visible in the first light of dawn.

No, not that way. Die one day he undoubtedly would, but not now. Not that way, and not before he made a determined effort to avenge Rossah. He had no wish to drown in that turgid, yellow water.

He turned away. Balancing carefully, he made his way along the narrow wall toward the stables. He was nearly to the stable roof when the reaction from the healing hit him. He stumbled, then caught himself barely in time to prevent himself tumbling off the wall into the river. He went awkwardly to his hands and knees. The sharp rocks dug cruelly into his flesh, drawing more blood. Cold sweat broke out on his forehead and chest, stinging in the raw abrasions. His body trembled with fatigue. He closed his eyes and clung desperately to the wall, fighting off dizziness.

Finally, he crawled unsteadily the rest of the way to the stable, gripping the edge of the wall with a strength born of terror. Using very nearly the last of his stamina, he slithered under the eave of the thatched roof and fell heavily to the floor of the loft. Below, one of the horses snorted, startled.

Mouse had spent most of his life in the stable. He knew it better than anyone else knew it, even the Stablemaster. As a child, he had found secure places to hide from the Stablemaster’s wrath. One of those places was right there in the Stablemaster’s own stable, a small cleft in the thatching of the roof, barely large enough to conceal a full-grown man, but roomy and comfortable for the boy Mouse had been. He still fitted into the small hollow, but the fit was tighter now.

Even in the thick gloom shrouding the loft, Mouse had no trouble finding the hiding place. He crawled up into it and wrapped himself in the old horse blanket he had stolen so many years ago. Trembling and shivering with exhaustion, he closed his eyes. Only sleep could replenish the strength and energy healing himself had cost. Once he was strong again, he would find a way to exact his revenge.

His last conscious thought was of the dogs. But they would track him to the wall and think he had gone over into the river. Perhaps they would think him dead and not bother hunting any further.

***

It was dark when Mouse awoke. He lay huddled in the old horse blanket, the iron bar cradled in his arms. He woke slowly, not moving, and listened intently without opening his eyes.

A quiet murmur of voices came from the stable below. Mouse could not quite make out the words, but he recognized the voices of the other two stable slaves. The soft, unmistakable sounds of hay being tossed into feeder troughs and the quiet snuffles and snorts of feeding horses told him it was not long after the dinner hour. It would be at least four more hours until midnight when the Stablemaster would retire, sending the two stable slaves to their beds before him. An hour after that, Mouse thought it might be safe to leave the stable.

Every muscle of his body screamed in protest as he snuggled deeper into the blanket. Hunger gnawed at his belly and thirst raged in his throat. But he was used to that and could ignore it for a while longer. He closed his eyes and tried to think of a way to accomplish the revenge he needed more desperately than he needed to ease the hunger and thirst.

A sudden shout from the stable yard startled him and he froze, hardly daring to breathe. A troop of horses clattered into the stable, their iron-shod hooves loudly on the polished stones of the floor. One of the dogs growled, then yelped as a hard hand cuffed it.

“Hela, Gredad,” the Stablemaster cried. “Any sign of the lad?”

Gredad swore. “None,” he said. “We took the dogs along both banks of the river as far as the estuary. He’s gone to the sea, is what. Drowned and dead. Good riddance, is what I say.”

Mouse clutched the iron bar. His fingers tingled as the strength of his grip forced the blood out of his hands. They wouldn’t be looking for him within the Holding. He had time for his revenge.

Gredad grunted. “Lord Mendor wanted to see his balls roasted and fed to the pigs. ‘Twould barely appease young Lord Drakon, though. He wanted the lass, but unsullied. He’s mad enough to spit.”

“Let him spit,” the Stablemaster muttered. “Serve the little bastard right.”

Gredad chuckled. “You’d be well to guard your tongue, my friend,” he said. “That young whelp never forgets an insult and never lets one go without retaliation.”

“Well, I can’t say as I blame him about the lass. She was a choice morsel.”

“Oh, very choice indeed.” Gredad laughed lewdly. Mouse squeezed his eyes shut against grief stronger and sharper than the pain of his abused muscles. Nothing would ever erase the stark images of the brutal use Gredad and the house-guards made of Rossah. Nor would Mouse ever forget the appalling expression of ecstasy on Drakon’s face as he watched. Or how Drakon looked when the men were done with Rossah, and he stepped forward, his dagger drawn…. And when he was finished, he casually told the guards to throw Rossah’s body onto the dung heap behind the stables. He discarded her as if she were nothing more than rubbish.

Mouse set his teeth into his lip to bite back the moan of pain. Nothing but trash...

Lying in bed with Rossah two nights ago, Mouse had told her he would die if it might prevent her having to go to Drakon’s bed. She had placed gentle fingers over his lips, and shook her head.

“I will go as I must,” she whispered. “Nothing can prevent it, and I would not have you die for me. It’s only your love that makes all this bearable.”

“We could escape together,” Mouse said eagerly.

She shook her head. “No,” she said. “We’re slaves. We could never be anything but slaves. If they caught us, they’d kill us. It would be so much better if you could only accept the fact of your slavery, Mouse. I wish you could.”

“As you have?”

“Yes. It’s real. You can’t wish away reality.”

“We could go to Isgard where nobody knows we’re slaves.”

“And how would we live?” Again, she put her fingertip to his lips. “No,” she said. “Come, kiss me again. We haven’t much longer. Don’t waste the time talking of impossible dreams.”

“I hate him,” Mouse whispered fiercely against the softness of her hair. “I hate Drakon.”

Below, the Stablemaster set the slaves to caring for the guards’ horses. Mouse fell asleep again, his eyes stinging with unshed tears.

When he awoke, there was no sound but for the quiet breathing of the horses. Carefully, he lowered himself down to the loft floor and crept to the ladder. He held the iron bar firmly tucked under his arm as he made his way down to the aisle between the box stalls. One of the horses, still awake, turned lazily to watch him as he stole past, but made no sound.

Mouse paused at the stable door, peering out into the paddock. The full moon turned the yard into a place of pale washed silver and hard black shadows. Nothing moved. He heard nothing but the soft soughing of a gentle wind in the boughs of the fruit trees. No lights showed in the windows of the main house that bulked large against the star-splashed sky.

He started across the yard toward the shelter of the laundry and ran full tilt into a man who stepped out of one of the privies next to the stables. The man grunted in pain and cried out as Mouse caromed off him to his knees in the packed dirt.

Gredad! Oh, gods, it was Gredad.

The Guard Captain recovered quickly from the winding Mouse had given him. “You!” he cried, staggering to his feet.

Even as Gredad opened his mouth to shout for the guard, Mouse swung the iron bar. It caught Gredad on the side of the head. The sound it made was like dropping an overripe melon onto a stone floor. Mouse’s belly contracted into a knot of revulsion as Gredad collapsed like an empty sack.

Mouse caught Gredad by the heels, dragged him back to the privy and shoved him inside. He dropped the bloody iron bar on top of the body and closed the door, then stood leaning against the unplaned wood, panting and listening hard. But nothing disturbed the silence. Nobody had heard Gredad’s startled exclamation.

Mouse darted across the yard to the laundry house. He needed something to cover his nakedness. Garments and bedding hung, some dry, some still damp, from lines strung across the back of the shed. Identifying articles only by touch, he found a shirt, a tunic, a pair of breeks and a thick, warm woollen cloak. There was even a pair of boots, sent for cleaning and polishing, that fit reasonably well.

Pleased, he dressed quickly. The clothing was loose in the waist and a little short in the arms and legs, but it would do. A short length of line wrapped twice around his waist served as a belt to keep the breeks from falling around his ankles.

Fumbling in the dark along the shelf next to the huge wash tubs, Mouse found a small leather bag containing flint, steel and tinder, and shoved it into his shirt. He nearly knocked over a lamp as he groped further along the shelf, but snatched it up in time to prevent spilling the oil.