Werelord Thal: A Renaissance Werewolf Tale (60 page)

And now she understood the unhappiness in
Thal. His adoration had not masked his aching despair. He had
feared that his desire would destroy her, yet he had been too in
love to stay away.

He will come for me, she thought believing
that his love would demand it.

Altea blinked and the light came back into
her eyes. The gray hues of stone and iron rejected outright the
hope in her heart. Prisoners had clung to the dream of rescue in
this nasty place many times, yet no memories of miracles softened
the cold hard edges of the slimy cell.

Down the hall, a woman screamed. Fresh panic
stabbed Altea when she heard her terror reflected in another. She
pushed herself up as the next prisoner arrived.

Altea did not recognize the woman. She was
older and raggedly dressed. Her gray streaked hair was in wild
disarray. She kicked and cussed while being manhandled into the
adjoining cell. The two men started beating her. Their punches
landed hard and the woman was soon in a ball on the floor. Then
they kicked her.

“Stop it!” Altea cried overcome with empathy
for their fresh victim.

The man with greasy blonde hair whirled. His
eyes tore into Altea and she quailed back from him. The memory of
his hand between her thighs gutted her courage.

He came to Altea’s cell. She surged to her
feet in a wild panic when he put the key in the lock. Reaching
through the bars she tried to keep him from turning the key.

He laughed at her pitiful effort and punched
her through the bars. Her head jerked and she tasted blood. He came
in, punched her again, and threw her down. She landed on her
stomach and he kneeled behind her and grabbed her ankles. Spreading
her legs he pulled her up against his body. She screamed and
twisted and tried to hit him but she was as defenseless as a
chicken held upside down by its legs.

He punched her hard in the small of her back.
The pain was sickening. Altea moaned as he exposed her bottom.

“You can have your sport with them after they
confess.”

Her tormentor turned his head. “Brother
Vito,” he said and got up.

Altea scrambled away to her corner and pulled
her gown over her legs. Vito and Tenzo advanced into the cell
block.

Vito said, “I want to announce her confession
in the morning and get her sentenced.”

Tenzo said, “Brother Vito, are you sure we
should move so quickly?”

“The people need action,” Vito said. He
looked over the cell block, judging that the Magistrate had been
correct about its sturdiness. The cells did look capable of holding
Thal. He hoped that the men he had sent with Rainer succeeded. If
not, he assumed the jail was baited well. The blonde woman despite
her battered state was beautiful, and he would give her the gift of
dying young.

“Will the Magistrate really sentence his own
stepdaughter?” Tenzo wondered.

“It’ll be best to get him to do this quickly
before he can recover his wits or worse yet ask his friends for
help. I need all the better classes to understand I’m not a man to
be resisted,” Vito explained.

Tenzo nodded.

“Application of torture is the recommended
way to get a genuine confession,” Vito said.

Glancing over the women huddled in the cells,
Tenzo figured they looked ready to agree to anything.

Miguel entered the cell block carrying
writing materials. The dank environment revolted him but he girded
himself to perform important duties.

“Which way to the torture room, Constable?”
Vito said impatiently.

“Through that door I think,” Tenzo guessed.
He had not had a chance to acquaint himself with his new place of
employment.

“Start with the Magistrate’s stepdaughter,”
Vito said.

Tenzo’s men dragged Altea out. The blackness
beyond the torture chamber door had a sickly slaughterhouse smell.
The room had no windows.

“We need more light,” Miguel complained.

After setting up some lighting, everyone came
in with the prisoner. Miguel was relieved to find a little desk
where he could work.

Vito scanned the room, recognizing some of
the equipment from drawings in books. He knew this room would be
the wellspring of his power.

“Strap her to that table,” Vito said.

Altea resisted fiercely. Tenzo had to assist
his men. Leather straps were slapped across her arms and legs. Two
men held her down while Tenzo tightened the buckles.

Vito bent over Altea. He brushed a lock of
her golden hair out of her face. Tears washed through the grime on
her cheeks.

“Did you like your werewolf lover?” he
whispered.

Altea turned away from him, refusing to
acknowledge what he said.

Vito took her chin and forced her to face
him.

“Confess your witchcraft and intercourse with
the Devil,” Vito said.

She shut her eyes and shook her head. Her
very soul recoiled from the stigma of confessing such lies.

“God will forgive you if you repent and
confess right now,” Vito urged.

“I’ve done nothing!” Altea screamed into his
face.

“Tell her what we already know,” Vito
said.

Miguel cleared his throat and brought out
Tenzo’s sworn testimony against her. He read off the details of her
marketplace dalliance with the werewolf known as Thal Lesky.

The vignette used to condemn her summoned her
longing to live forever in that moment when they were last
together. She recalled his face and his touch and wished that the
world could be different.

“Confess your unholy perversions,” Vito
said.

Altea did not respond even if the time to
regret her actions had come.

“We know also that you’ve been trying to
seduce your stepfather,” Vito said.

Outrage made Altea forget her bindings. All
her limbs jerked against the straps. “That’s not true. He’s been on
the verge of raping me for days. Whatever he told you is a LIE!”
she raved.

Vito shook his head. His narrow bald face
possessed no sympathy. To him her guilt was beyond question, and
Altea wondered why he required the cruel formality of a
confession.

“Please bring Father Refhold. He knows me. He
knows I’m no witch. I’m just a woman!” Altea said.

Vito rubbed his chin, pondering if he should
involve a local priest. “I will allow you to make your confession
to your own priest,” he decided.

“No, no, no!” Altea protested. “I want Father
Refhold to tell you I’m not a bad person.”

“I don’t see how he can do that,” Vito said.
He gestured to Tenzo to get things going.

Tenzo and his men puzzled over the board and
stone weights stacked next to the table. Miguel’s quill scratched
across paper. He checked the spelling of Altea’s name and prepared
the statement of her confession. He took facts from Tenzo’s
statement and added details to embellish the shocking value of her
crimes.

“I see how this goes,” Tenzo muttered,
lifting the board. He placed it over Altea’s torso. “Put a weight
on it,” he instructed.

Another man hoisted a stone block. “Christ
that’s heavy,” he groaned. “Sorry,” he muttered when Vito’s eyes
flashed at him. He dumped the weight on the board and Tenzo kept it
steady. An awful groan was pressed out of Altea. Beneath the
grinding pain she could not draw a breath farther than her
collarbone.

“Stop. Stop!” she pleaded.

“Put another on,” Vito said.

The sellsword turned jailer loosened his
shoulders and asked his counterpart to help him. Together they
lifted the second weight and deposited it on Altea. She squeaked,
unable to breathe. Pain shot through her chest as ribs cracked
beneath the cruel burden.

“Say you are guilty of witchcraft,” Vito
demanded.

Only wheezing groans came out of Altea. Her
eyes rolled back.

Vito’s mouth puckered with a sinister frown.
This technique was not suiting him. She was passing out. “Take them
off!” he snarled.

The two men obeyed. Altea gasped back to life
and screamed. Drawing a real breath had assaulted her with pain
where her ribs were broken. Tearfully she moaned and begged for
release.

“Confess or I’ll do it again,” Vito said. He
watched the dread play across her face. The poignant detail of her
tortured thoughts upon her maidenly features fascinated him. He had
not expected to glimpse such delicate beauty in so loathsome a
situation. He shook his head a little to dispel her glamour,
knowing that her wicked magic must be making his mind sparkle.

The young woman surprised him when she licked
her cracked and bloody lips and shut her eyes. Her silent resolve
irked him.

He grabbed a lantern and inspected the
chamber. He recognized a few devices and made his decisions. He
took the thumbscrews off a rack on the wall and commanded his men
to sit her up.

Tenzo grabbed her by the hair and pulled her
upright. She screamed because the movement aggravated the wreckage
around her chest.

The thumbscrews clunked onto the table. “Use
these on her,” Vito said. He imagined that they would deliver awful
pain but still leave her able to walk. He wanted to be able to take
her into the Court for a public sentencing. Her ravaged beauty
would be a good lesson for people vulnerable to heresy.

Tenzo took her by the wrists while the man
with the dirty blonde hair positioned the little screw press over
her thumbs. Altea was too subdued by injury to put up much of a
struggle.

When he began turning the screw, the pressure
was subtle at first, but after a few more twists the crushing force
against the delicate flesh and bones became awfully vivid.

“Stop! Stop! Stop! I’ve done nothing,” she
said. “Please God no!”

He kept turning the screw. The other man
grabbed her around the neck to keep her in position. Her words
degenerated into a helpless yowl as the thumb bones cracked.

Blood oozed from the little press. The tips
of her thumbs were purple.

“Confess, woman, or he’ll turn those thumbs
to pulp,” Vito warned.

Her sobbing came in hysterical gasps. Pain
ruled her senses and she was incapable of thought.

“Confess to your witchcraft!” Vito said and
slapped her.

His blow snapped her out of her agonized
stupor. She looked away from her broken thumbs dripping in the
metal vice. This pain would be nothing compared to the fire they
would light under her. She moaned, but refused to give him the
satisfaction of breaking her.

Vito recognized that she was prepared to lose
her thumbs just to spite his effort. It was time to take the step
that she could not resist. He told his men to remove the
thumbscrew.

Altea received no relief when they took off
the grim contraption. The broken digits dangled uselessly. Blood
seeped from flesh ground into shattered bones. All she could do was
cradle her swelling hands in her lap and watch them unstrap her
legs. The men hauled her off the table.

“Put her in the maiden,” Vito said, lifting
his lantern and illuminating the coffin-like metal box with a
vaguely female face.

“I’ve heard of these,” Tenzo remarked as he
opened the iron maiden. He touched one of the spikes and
shuddered.

The two men holding Altea backed her into the
tight box. She was shaking with mortal fear. Tenzo began to shut
the door. Vito stood to the side and held up his lantern so it
would illuminate the spikes as they approached Altea with the
promise of lingering death.

She screamed and her bravery broke like an
icicle falling onto stone.

“I’m a witch! I confess. I’ll tell you
anything. Please don’t! Don’t! Don’t!” Her words descended into
wailing as the gruesome spikes poked her tender body.

Vito stopped the closing door. Leaning into
that void beyond hope, he hissed, “You’ll say that in Court. Nice
and pretty or you’ll die in this thing.”

Altea nodded. “Yes…I…will,” she promised,
barely able to utter words.

“God bless you woman for returning to
Christ,” he said.

Altea could not believe it when the spikes
withdrew. Ten little points of blood seeped into her soiled gown
but the wounds were shallow. Although her execution was certain,
she felt utterly redeemed to see the door swinging wide.

“Brother Miguel, write that she confessed to
her crimes,” Vito instructed.

Miguel nodded without looking up. His face
was shiny with perspiration. He told himself that her Devil worship
had made her resist confession with such ferocity. Innocence could
not possibly have been the source of her strength.

Altea passed out when they put her back in
her cell. Broken and bleeding, she was awoken once from her fitful
faint by the screams of the other woman in the torture chamber.

Martin leaned over his desk and mopped his
brow with a cloth. The stuffy air in his office clawed at his
temper. The meeting he had just finished with three of the Aldermen
had been uncomfortable and embarrassing. Martin had needed to
defend the abrupt intrusion of the Jesuit outsider into municipal
affairs, but amid so many murders, Martin had successfully argued
that they needed any help they could get.

“Thank you for impressing upon those corrupt
bastards the severity of the threat,” Martin said to Zussek, who
was pouring wine for both of them.

“I wanted to make sure you weren’t seen as
colluding with these Devil worshippers,” Zussek said and handed a
glass to Martin.

The Magistrate took a sip and noticed that it
was watery. Some servant had been filching the wine at his office.
He hated to suspect his secretary, but it was the least of his
problems.

“Thank Christ I got them to give up their
men-at-arms to support me. Vito doesn’t have enough sellswords,”
Martin said.

“The beast won’t be able to choose his ground
tonight,” Zussek encouraged. “He’ll come for you and be killed in
the trap.”