“Aye,” Rabin said. “I was dead long before we were to meet, Riel.”
“Why did they kill you?” the Akkadian demanded. “What had you done?”
“Crossed their vile path,” Rabin snorted. “Apparently they were…hungry.”
“They raped you, as well?” Tamara asked, ignoring the Akkadian’s hiss.
Rabin blinked and turned to Evann-Sin, cocking a brow at the disgusted look on the warrior’s face. “They raped you?” he asked then hooted. “By the Prophet but that is rich!”
“I’m honored you find it amusing, you worthless mealy worm,” Evann-Sin snapped. He waved away his friend’s laughter.
“More amusing than…” Rabin began then coughed to hide his merriment for the look on his friend’s face was not conducive to continuing the teasing.
“They didn’t rape you, then,” Evann-Sin wanted clarification.
“No,” Rabin said with a shake of his head. “They killed me to keep me from telling what I know.”
Evann-Sin blinked. “They are part of the alliance?” he gasped.
“Hell,” Rabin snorted. “As far as I can tell, it was their idea.”
“What alliance?” Tamara asked. She looked from one warrior to the other.
“A Prophet-be-damned alliance,” Evann-Sin said, gritting his teeth. “An alliance I aim to squelch.”
“Before or after we take our revenge on the Hell Hags?” Rabin inquired.
“If those bitches are part of the plot, we need to see to them first. Pull the root and the weed will die,” Evann-Sin replied.
“I’ve never killed a woman,” Rabin sighed, “and I’m not of a mind to start, but I intend to see them punished for what they did to me.”
“They will be,” Evann-Sin assured him.
“What of the other one?” Rabin asked. “What do we do about him?”
Evann-Sin frowned. “What
other
one?”
Chapter Four
Kaibyn Zafeyr turned his eyes from the glare of the blazing sun. Already his mouth was dry and his flesh hot. He could feel the searing heat beating down on his head and knew this would be an agonizing way to atone for his sins.
“You should fear the Wrath of Alel,” the captain of the palace guard sneered. “He has judged you and found you guilty!”
Where was his protection?
Kaibyn thought hopelessly. Where were those who were sworn to protect him? Had they abandoned him? Did they, too, seek his death? What had he done to offend them?
“Lay him down,” the captain ordered.
The brutal hands of the Osteran slaves that held him tightened on Kaibyn’s arms and the heavy weight of the iron chains pulled painfully on his torn and bleeding wrists. The dark men dragged him down to the blistering sand and as his bare back touched the hotness, he cried out.
“You will know pain far greater than this, you Rysalian demon,” the captain smirked.
Kaibyn had no powers in the light of day, and he was helpless to prevent the Osterans from unchaining his wrists, pulling his arms wide apart, then anchoring them with heavy hemp to the iron stakes which had been driven into the hot desert sand. As his legs were spread apart and his ankles bound to another set of stakes, he felt the first moments of blind panic.
The captain of the guard hunkered down beside him and snaked out a ruthless hand to yank Kaibyn’s face toward him.
“My woman swears you did not touch her. If you had, I would have gutted you,” the captain hissed from between tightly clenched teeth. His fingers dug cruelly into Kaibyn’s chin. “How many women did you corrupt before you were found out, demon?”
Kaibyn stared steadily into the captain’s glaring eyes, but did not answer. His life was forfeit anyway and he would protect his ladies for as long as he could.
The captain’s lips thinned into a long, nasty line and he nodded, as though he could read Kaibyn’s thoughts. “You will scream,” he prophesied. He glanced up at the noonday sun, then back down at Kaibyn. He relaxed his fingers to slide them up Kaibyn’s cheek to pat him almost tenderly. “Before the Eye of Alel turns your skin as black as the darkest Osteran, you will talk. This, I promise you.”
Grinning hatefully, the captain stood up, put his fists on his hips and stared down at the bound man. “But will you scream before the scorpions find you, I wonder?” He cocked his head to one side. “Before the blinding pain their venom spreads through your worthless body?”
Kaibyn had never been so hot. The sun’s rays were like invisible fire scorching his flesh, and all the moisture in his mouth had fled. Not a hint of the life-sustaining wind that had borne him to this mad world stirred to ease his discomfort.
“Perhaps a serpent will seek you out,” the captain chuckled. He nudged Kaibyn’s bare thigh with the toe of his sandal. “A strike here.” He touched the linen that covered his prisoner’s hip. “A strike there. I am told the viper’s poison will not kill you. Is that true?”
“The sun will kill him, Meketre,” a bored voice put in. “Leave him to do its work. I am sweltering here.”
The captain turned and bowed politely to the High Priest who sat beneath the relative comfort of the canopy of his litter. “As you will, lord,” Meketre replied.
Kaibyn winced as the captain drew back his heavily muscled leg and delivered a particularly savage kick to Kaibyn’s side. “When the jackals come down from the mountains,” Kaibyn heard the captain saying. “They will tear the flesh from your bones and devour your organs. There will be nothing left of you to enter the Underworld.”
“His kind are not allowed in the Underworld,” the High Priest reminded Meketre. “He has no ka.”
Meketre shivered. A man without ka was truly a demon. With one last look at the bound man, the captain of the guard turned away, the memory of the sweating face and blistering flesh etched into his mind.
Kaibyn strained to hear the last jingle of harness, the last huff of a horse’s nostrils, the fading laughter of the captain of the guards as they left him to die. He strained at his bonds, but knew he had no strength with which to free himself. The light of day was his rival, and the glaring red ball above him, his most vicious enemy. His existence would end beneath the sun’s eager glare.
Steaming minutes passed into baking hours then heated to a suffocating intensity that made it hard for him to draw breath into his seared lungs. He could feel the skin over his lips cracking and darted out a dry tongue to touch the bleeding corners. All he could see was a white-hot blur before his eyes, but he knew soon the sun would blind him and he would be in at least one form of his precious darkness once more.
Sudden sharpness pierced the calf of his left leg and he yelped with surprise, wondering what manner of predator had attacked. Although there was no animal, insect or reptile in the land that could take his life, during the daylight hours, he could experience their bites and venom just as a human man could, he could feel the pain just as any man would and be agonized by it.
Another sting at his waist brought an involuntary jerk of his body and he felt something scampering over his naked belly and onto the linen breechclout covering his hips. When another sting kissed the top of his left thigh, he opened his mouth and bellowed with rage, pulling frantically against the hemp that cut into his wrists and ankles. As a venturing scorpion crawled up his shoulder and stuck its venomous tail in his throat, he screamed in pain.
Zara and Dakhla looked at one another as the screams filled the hot desert air. The two women had risked much to come after their lover, but neither would turn back. Both would risk even more for Kaibyn, but they had to wait until the sun set before they could rescue him.
“I can not bear the sound of his agony,” Zara whispered and as another piteous scream ripped through the air, she buried her face against Dakhla’s shoulder.
“There is nothing we can do,” Dakhla replied. She put her arms around her sister and held her.
There were four other women with the two sisters. All of them were sobbing quietly as the screams came. Each was clenching her fists, nails digging into bloody palms, head bowed beneath the weight of her guilt.
“He can not last much longer,” one of the older women said.
Dakhla looked over at her mother-in-law and nodded her agreement. Her gaze shifted to the sun that was now low in the sky. It would be an hour, maybe two, before this horrible day was ended.
“How could she have betrayed him?” the youngest woman there asked. She put up a trembling hand to wipe at the tears coursing down her smooth cheek.
The Lady Auklet shrugged. “To save herself from her mate,” she answered. “He is insane, we all know that.”
“Hush!” Dakhla insisted. “You speak of our king!”
Auklet gave an unladylike snort. “And because he is king he can not be mad?” She flung out a dismissive hand. “Ugly, insane and mean as a pit viper! This is his doing, not the queen’s.”
“She betrayed Kaibyn to her husband,” the second youngest woman stressed. “It is no other’s fault save her own.”
“Yes, Meritaten, and for your mother’s sin, we all must suffer,” Zara agreed.
“Not as much as Kaibyn does,” Dakhla reminded her sister.
“Her days are numbered,” Auklet grated. She looked to the beautiful doe-eyed girl sitting beside her. “I would not be your mother for all her beauty and grace.”
Meritaten nodded. She understood well that her mother had fallen from the good graces of her mentally defective husband. The young girl shuddered, closing her eyes to the quiet of the late afternoon. There was no doubt in her mind that the king wanted her as a replacement for his out of favor queen. This scandal involving the Rysalian would be all the impetus the insane fool needed to force Meritaten to wife.
“Why must it be so quiet?” Teti asked.
The other women raised their heads for the terrible screaming had stopped. In unison, their eyes went to the horizon where the sun was balanced on a single ray. As they held their combined breaths, the russet orb sank behind the shimmering western sands.
“Now!” Dakhla spat.
The women scrambled to their feet and raced to their horses whose reins were being held by their sole male companion.
“We must hurry, Omahru,” Auklet ordered. She put her foot into the waiting hand of her Osteran slave and the hulking giant lifted her into the saddle.
Omahru did not answer his mistress for it was physically impossible for the dark man to do so. The Lady Auklet’s husband, the High Priest, had cut out Omahru’s tongue when the slave was only a boy of three.
“Without a tongue, he can not repeat what he hears in this household,” the High Priest had declared.
At age ten, the dark man had been castrated to ensure the wellbeing of the lady and her daughters.
Dakhla swung herself into her saddle and pulled cruelly on the reins to turn the beast toward the desert. Digging her heels into the stallion’s sides, she whipped him into a run, oblivious to the other women following closely on her heels.
Their earlier ride out of the city of Marrupa had been nerve-racking for the women feared their husbands would see them and stop them. But, with the Goddess’ help, the six women had been able to flee the watchful eyes of their guards and individually make their way to a curve in the stream that ran just beyond the city gates. The journey to the place of Kaibyn’s execution took them across the stream and into the cooling desert—a distance that normally took fifteen minutes to travel was accomplished in less than ten. By the time they reached the Killing Ground, their mounts were lathered and the chill night air was settling in.
“There!” Meritaten cried out, pointing. “There he is!”
As the riders neared the spread-eagled body, a jackal standing over Kaibyn howled his anger at their intrusion and raced away, darting damning looks over his shoulders as he ran.
“Did it hurt him?” the youngest woman cried out.
Dakhla spared the girl a spiteful look before answering. “Nothing can hurt him, now, Teti.”
Omahru was the first to reach Kaibyn and he vaulted from his mount, his naked feet digging into the hot sand as he ran. He stopped, squatted down and reached out to touch the unmoving chest of the bound man.
“Well?” Auklet demanded as she shifted uncomfortably in her saddle. “Is he…?” She stopped as the dark man held up a restraining a hand.
Dakhla could feel her heart thudding in her chest as she waited. Beside her, her sister and the other women were gripping their mount’s reins as tightly as they had once held Kaibyn’s body to their own.
With his hand still on Kaibyn’s chest, Omahru turned and looked at his lady. He shook his head slowly.
“No!” Teti sobbed and she let go of her horse’s reins to bury her face in her hands. Without the firm command of its rider, the mare sidestepped away from the man on the ground and flung its head in fear.
“Teti!” Dahkla hissed. “Control yourself and your mount! You knew he would not be alive!”
“Omahru,” Auklet said firmly, drawing her servant’s attention to her. “You know what to do. We dare not be gone long; we will be missed, but we will return when the moon has risen high.”
The Osteran nodded. He went to his knees beside the dead man, took out his knife, slid the blade under the hemp and began to saw at the bond that held Kaibyn’s wrist.