The Crown Of Yensupov (Book 3) (32 page)

“Thank you, no,” the king said. “I wish to thank you, ambassador for getting us this far from the wraith. I’m indebted to you.”

“Your Majesty must eat and drink while you can,” Saxthor insisted. “We’ll have to escape from the city and travel all night without stopping to eat. You’ll be happy you ate the hot food now.”

“Perhaps you’re right,” Calamidese said. The royals ate in silence.

The strain of freeing the royal family and getting them here has traumatized the ambassador, thought Saxthor. Discovered, the orcs would’ve killed them all and hung them from the city gates as an example to those who oppose the Dark Lord.

Meanwhile, Saxthor was busy, directing preparations for the escape. He hadn't introduced himself or told the king who he was. “Where are Bodrin and Tonelia?” Saxthor asked.

“When we found the royal family, we convinced them to come with us to escape the city. Our embassy guards may be all that’s left of organized, armed resistance, and they’re the king’s only hope of escape.”

“Yes, yes, but where are Bodrin and Tonelia?” Saxthor asked again.

“When we left the grand duke’s palace a block up from the Sekcmet Palace, Bodrin and Tonelia said they would follow behind us as rear guard.” The ambassador hung his head. “We snuck past a cohort of orcs, but they spotted us, when we got further down the street. We ran on ahead and heard a scuffle behind us. I think Bodrin took on the orcs to delay them and give us time for escape.”

Saxthor’s hand gripped Sorblade. “How far away was that?”

“That was a block up and two over, Teldor Street.”

“See to it the king and his family eat, and use the facilities,” Saxthor said. “Have the remaining food packed with the other necessities, alert the staff, and be ready to leave, when I return. Remember we must travel fast and light.” Saxthor turned, motioned for Tournak and headed for the door.

“Yes, Your Highness,” the ambassador said, bowing as the door closed behind the two men.

*

King Calamidese jumped up. “Highness? Was that the Neuyokkasinian prince everyone is looking for?”

“Yes, Your Majesty, and it's he that's responsible for your rescue,” the ambassador said.

The king slumped down in his chair. All my life I’ve been told the Neuyokkasinian royal family was my worst enemy, he thought. Now a prince of that house saved my life and family from the very evil alliance I made to destroy them.

*

Saxthor and Tournak made their way up the street outside the embassy. Scattered remnants of citizens ran this way and that frantic to escape. Even those that stayed to loot, now abandoned their ill-gotten gains to get away. Orcs had pillaged, but now reformed into their cohorts. The orderly, deliberate way the invading forces took over the city was in sharp contrast to the panic that sent the citizens scurrying like darting rats. Some turmoil resulted in fires, and with the fire brigades gone, too, only a few orcs attempted to put out blazes to save the city for their winter encampment.

As dusk descended, darkness settled on Sengenwhapolis. No one lit street lamps and most houses, now abandoned, remained dark.

Only orc contingents patrolled the deserted streets. Avoiding the orcs, Saxthor and Tournak made their way in search of Bodrin and Tonelia. They went up two blocks and still no sign of the two staunch fighters, though they found the site of the skirmish.

“No sign of them here,” Tournak said. “If they’ve been taken prisoner, we’ll never find them in time.”

They began knocking on doors to see if anyone saw what happened to Bodrin and Tonelia. Tournak found an old woman who cracked her door. “I saw a man and a woman fighting with a group of orcs about an hour ago,” she said. “They both had black hair, his medium curly, hers long and straight. She was beautiful, those blue eyes against her olive complexion. He was handsome and well-muscled.” She was past the blushing stage, but her eyes twinkled above a missing tooth in her grin.

“Which way did they go?” Saxthor asked.

She shook her head and pointed toward the palace. Saxthor’s heart sank.

“The surviving orcs took the two prisoners, and dragged them off to the palace dungeon. I heard them mention the Sekcmet Palace, and that’s the direction they dragged them off to,” the old woman said. “That’s all I know.” She started to close the door then opened it again as Saxthor and Tournak turned away. “One thing, those two killed half a dozen orcs. Those savages were furious. The orcs will torture them in that dungeon. You won’t be able to free them.”

She shut the door and Saxthor heard a heavy bolt slam over. Saxthor was torn between his closest friends, and saving the ambassador and the royal family. I can’t abandon either, he thought, and turned to Tournak.  “I have to try to save Bodrin and Tonelia. You go back to the embassy and get those people out of the city.”

“You’re wasting time,” Tournak said.

Saxthor pinched his lips and shook his head, but Tournak stood firm. They raced up the street in the direction the old woman pointed. Within minutes, they reached the palace, but now the gates were sealed and orcs stood guard there.

“We won’t be able to get back into the palace that way,” Saxthor said.

“We don’t have much time, Saxthor.”

Saxthor nodded and led as they slipped around to the back entrance, where vendors had delivered food to the palace kitchens. After checking to be sure that no one followed, Saxthor tested the door. It was as they left it earlier. He pulled the door open a tiny crack, holding his breath, fearing the door would creak, but it made no noise.

“No sounds or light,” Saxthor said.

The two slipped through the guardroom and into the kitchen, dark and empty.

“Looks like they ate all the food and left,” Tournak said.

Saxthor led Tournak up the small spiral stairs back to the corridor they’d come from earlier. “We need to find the dungeon.” He looked up and down the hall but saw no servants left to waylay for directions. He remembered as an unsupervised child he had tumbled down the stairs behind the formal staircase leading to the audience hall. Those obscure stairs led to the dungeons. Saxthor rushed to the grand staircase. Sure enough, behind the staircase’s right side was a door to hidden stairs. The two men slipped down to the vaults.

Bare-chested orcs in leather aprons hammered at forges and stoked fires used to make shackles or torture prisoners. Saxthor could see about a dozen orcs in this dungeon’s section. The room was windowless and the ceiling low. Straw strewn on the floor soaked up blood and gore from tortures. The mingle smell of smoke, blood, and gore was nauseating. Prisoners hung from the walls in chains. One was in a cage suspended from the ceiling and more were in a cell, facing the torture chamber.

There wasn’t time for battling their way out if discovered, so Saxthor took out the Peldentak Wand and surrounded Tournak and himself in the veil of invisibility. They crept into the room, avoiding the orcs at their forges, then moved on to the next room searching for Bodrin and Tonelia.

They found Tonelia in a cell at the room’s far end. Bodrin was stretched full length on a wooden table, stripped to the waist with bloody welts all across his chest. Relishing the thought, two grinning orcs stood ready to torture Bodrin.

“You fat, hairy orc, you look worse than a troll,” Tonelia yelled from her cell. “He doesn’t know anything.”

Tonelia’s nerve never wavers under pressure, Saxthor thought. Not wanting to get into a struggle that would only draw more orcs, he developed a plan.

At the next room’s edge, an orc was hammering a shackle at the forge. When the orc looked away, Saxthor moved, taking a molten piece of iron from the forge and tossed it into the animal skin clothing of the orc about to whip Bodrin.

Held in by the hide, the iron quickly burned the torturer and glowed still, as it burned through the animal skin. The orc bellowed, tearing at the burning hide. The other orcs, the one at the forge included, turned to see what the orc in the adjourning room was screaming about. Pain intensified rage, and the burned orc turned on the orc smith at the forge.

“What you doing, you clumsy fool?” The burned orc asked. His eyes flashed. He rushed the forge, grabbing a glowing poker from the coals and thrusting it into the smith’s stomach. The two fought with iron rods banging and sparks flying.

In the mayhem, Saxthor tossed another piece of iron at the orc by the table holding Bodrin. That orc joined the fight, and others joined in until most of the dungeon’s orcs were embroiled in the pandemonium. Saxthor would grab red hot metal from the forge and burn this one, then that one, to keep the fight going and make them all the madder.

With all orcs entangled, both men began dispatching orcs with metal forge tools. The orcs never caught on and continued to fight with each other until only one still stood, gasping for breath. Tournak sent him into unconsciousness.

Saxthor ended the veil of invisibility and put away the Peldentak Wand. He released Bodrin and tied an orc on the rack. Meanwhile, Tournak searched the orcs and got the key to release Tonelia. The four disappeared up the staircase just before an ogre came to see what all the noise was about. Saxthor motioned for Tournak to help Bodrin up the stairs, while he defended their retreat just inside the staircase, watching the ogre.

The ogre threw water on the few living jailers.

“What’s going on here?” The ogre asked the first conscious orc rubbing his battered head with his bloody hand.

“Look there.” The orc pointed to his burns and bruises. As the other survivors came to, they did the same and blamed each other for starting the fight.

“Why’s that fighter tied down on the table?”

The orcs looked around at each other for an explanation, but none was forthcoming. The ogre and orcs figured out that Bodrin and Tonelia were gone. By then, the four fugitives were in the kitchens about to escape the palace through the guardroom.

* * *

The energy ripple of Saxthor’s invisibility veil jolted the drowsy wraith, just rising in the palace cellars. This mysterious power surge is coming from within the palace, he thought. Formed with the Dark Lord’s blood, the wraith knew his master sensed the nearby energy ripple’s source as well. The wraith didn’t take form, but flew through the palace, level by level, as a vapor, searching for the energy source. When it reached the dungeons, it saw the rubble and numerous orcs dead or crippled. It assumed a wounded orc’s substance and listened to the ogre’s story about the fight and two fugitives’ disappearance. “If you knocked each other unconscious, who knocked out the last one standing?” the wraith asked.

The wounded looked around at each other perplexed.

“We don’t know,” an orc said.

The ogre stepped forward. “The last two must have knocked out each other at the same time.”

The silent wraith glared at the ogre, who stumbled backward.

“You stupid oaf; then who released the prisoners?”

There was no reply and the wraith looked over the fidgeting, wounded orcs. The wraith screamed. “You all released the prisoners!”

With that, wizard-fire streaked through and incinerated every orc in the dungeon and their ogre captain. The wraith discarded the orc shell and returned to the audience hall above to analyze the situation and contemplate his own next move.

*

Crippled from the rack, Bodrin leaned on Tonelia, walking back to the embassy between Saxthor and Tournak, with swords in hand.

“We’ll encounter orcs at any time. I know you’re hurting Bodrin, but we must hurry,” It hurt Saxthor seeing Bodrin, straining to hobble his breathing heavy.

“I’m going as fast as I can,” Bodrin said.

“I know my friend,” Saxthor said. “Can I help you -- carry you?”

“Looks like you could move faster on longer legs now,” Tonelia said to her Bodrin. Her twitching lips grinned; she hugged him to her. She gave him a quick kiss on the cheek.

“That’s right, take advantage of a cripple,” Bodrin said. Obstinate, her humor seemed to spur him to move faster.

The group was able to move through the dark, deserted streets unobstructed until a detachment of orcs emerged from an alley. Tonelia pressed Bodrin against a wall and wrapped herself around him, kissing him for all she was worth. Saxthor picked up her ploy and started to sway begging them to move on in a drunk’s slurred voice. Tournak followed suit and they all appeared to the orcs passing by to be defenseless drunks. When the danger passed, the four resumed their trek to the embassy. Bodrin was silent the rest of the way, but Saxthor caught his smile in the moonlight.

As they entered the embassy courtyard, Bodrin turned to Tonelia, “It’s amazing what a man has to go through to get a kiss.”

“Don’t let it go to your head, big boy,” Tonelia said. Bodrin frowned and slumped to his most pitiful pose. Tonelia could hardly help herself. She kissed him again, this time, a peck on the cheek.

“Where’re the orcs, when you need one?” Bodrin asked.

Sweating, the ambassador appeared, having rushed to greet Saxthor as soon as the watch spotted them coming.

Before he could speak, Saxthor began his preparation’s checklist. “Have the king and his family eaten? Have you packed the essentials and assigned them to their respective carriers? Is everyone ready to travel?”