Chapter Sixty

Speranzi found herself awake in the red light of a setting sun. Her armor was gone, and instead she was dressed in nothing more than the sack cloth that adorned the slaves she so recently saw being sold.

She blinked several times as her memory came back to her and between blinks of her eyes she saw a mob gathered…

Her hands were secured behind her back, and she felt the wood beneath her body, through the haze of her waking vision she saw the smooth polish and the place she must have been came almost instantly to her mind. ‘The auction block. Are they going to try to sell… me?’ The notion was almost laughable, absurd even. Above her, out of the corner of her left eye, she saw the noose swaying in the breeze. ‘No. No they won’t do that.’

As more of her memory returned… ‘Wait, I took life today… my Geas…?’

She didn’t get a chance to wonder more when she felt the hand on her back and hot breath on her ear. “The merchant says you wanted a chance to speak… but you’re not going to take it you vicious little bitch…” Damadeqi’s voice whispered in her ear, “I knew you should have been executed the moment I laid eyes on you, anyone who said we should accept surrenders from those animals was never truly on our side. But better late than never. When I stand you up, you’re going to express remorse, devotion to the gods, and then you’re going to hang.”

“And if I don’t?” Speranzi couldn’t see the woman who was crouched over her.

“You killed nine of my paladins. They’re dead because you chose to harbor runaways.” She hissed into Speranzi’s ear, “You love them so much… you can die like one of them.”

Speranzi closed her mouth. ‘Well shit.’ She mused with an almost detached sense of irony. ‘Skana will be fine, I left her under the bed. Illyana is guilty of only being an elf in the same room. They probably picked up everybody else. As long as nobody says anything stupid, then I’m the only one who has to pay for this. Of all the rotten luck.’

She felt herself being hauled to her feet, and noticed that they were now secured by chains of orichalcum and clinked as she was moved.

Damadaqi’s voice, with the power of a paladin’s projection, rang out over the mob and called all to order. “Baroness Speranzi Jadara of the Northern Kingdom of Qadish, you are accused of acting in concert with the merchant Corwin Amber and the body of your one hundred soldiers of the Black Quiver Company, with the unlawful harboring of runaway slaves, hiding them with an intent toward their liberation. How do you plead?”

“Guilty, of course.” Speranzi said and took a step forward on the auction block. It put her just beneath the noose, and she took a moment to look over the crowd while they booed and hissed and cast rotted vegetables her way, they bounced and splattered across her tattered brown sack that served as a mockery of clothing. Her eyes were centered on the back, an old trick she learned to help project her voice even with her paladin skill of projection activated.

The power coursed in her body, and as her eyes moved over them, capturing each in her gaze on its quest to find the farthest person in the mob, the thrown garbage and condemning shouts began to die.

“With one thing to add!” She exclaimed, “My soldiers acted purely on my orders and mine alone. Neither they nor the fat merchant bear any guilt. They followed me out of fear and only obeyed my orders. As you know, no one is guilty if they are only following the orders of the one who leads them. The guilt, what there is of it, is mine and mine alone.”

Speranzi felt the smug smile at her back and continued on. “As for the runaways, I forced them to come here in my company. If not for me… they might have been far, far out of your grasp.” She felt the press of that knowledge on her soul, but wouldn't allow the steel in her voice to bend like her bow under the weight of her guilt.

“You may now express your remorse, give your oath to the gods, and receive their mercy.” Damadeqi’s simpering smile might have been out of view, but her condescending arrogance was like nails on a chalkboard in Speranzi’s mind. Every word a callback to the nightmare she’d been to work with in the last war.

Speranzi snapped her wrists apart, yanking the chain taut and sending an echo over the crowd. “Remorse? I have no remorse!” Speranzi roared, “Your city is vile pus on the ass of the gods! Is this what I fought for?! The humanity I and so many others sought to protect! Women ripped from husbands to be the bedmates of people who despise them! Children scrubbing floors and eating worse than dogs! Or drawing the carriages of their fathers! Or checking strangers into hell itself to abuse their own mothers!” She leveled an accusing finger at the mob.

“I fought to protect mankind from demons, demihumans, and all manner of monsters that would cause you to wet yourselves and hide… but if I had known that this was what I defended?” She spat from atop the platform and the glob of phlegm struck the stone hard enough to be heard dozens of people back, “I would have held the door open at Prioche!”

“That’s enough!” Damadeqi roared behind her, but Speranzi took the deepest breath and roared out, hoping to reach the entirety of the city, “Elves are people too!” Her vicious gaze and heated words, condemnation so far from the begging and pleading they expected as they were, that the crowd stood still in a mix of silence, disbelief, and fear while the echo went on across most of the city.

The words hung in the air and she spun on her heel, showing her back to the mob and staring daggers at Damadeqi, “Fuck. You. Hang me.” Speranzi demanded.

The Paladin Commander stared in open mouthed shock at the impossible words, and Speranzi mentally groaned. ‘Slow witted doesn’t even begin to describe this idiot.’

“Crucify! Crucify! Crucify! Crucify!” The mob bellowed and resumed hurling everything they could from insults to horse waste that was yet to be cleaned up, and it spattered off her ragged cloth to land in clumps at her feet.

But slow witted or not, Damadeqi Somat approached with her sword clenched tight in her hand, not yet drawn, but no less threatening. “You’ll hang, alright!” She barked.

‘I will not scream.’ Speranzi vowed, knowing even while she thought it, that she was lying.

Skana woke up to the bellowed words of her commander, her eyes flew open and above her she saw the underside of the bed. After that as she tried to gather her senses, she heard the sound of groaning, it was in Illyana’s voice. She crawled out from under the bed and scrambled up to all fours in time to see Illyana’s shredded body lying on the floor in a puddle of blood and covered in wounds. Her face and body were covered in slash marks, her legs flung open and revealed horrendous wounds.

Illyana’s fingers were all bent in different directions, her ruby lips were split and a hole in her cheeks revealed a number of teeth were knocked free. She coughed and blood spilled out the hole and added itself to the spot on the floor.

“I…told them the wrong… the wrong way… I g-guess she didn’t m-make it out.” Illyana had tears in her eyes that glistened as Skana came closer.

“Oh god… oh all the gods… what… did they do to you…?” Skana gasped as her hands went to hover above the horrific abused flesh, the wet blood splashed a little around her knees as she hovered over the elf woman.

Illyana didn’t answer, she didn’t need to, the evidence on her body told the story.

“It was w-worth… s-someone f-finally said it… we’re people too… we’re people too… I’m a p-person…I’d almost forgotten th-that…” She struggled to hold out her shaking, shattered hand toward Skana.

“I-I got one of them too…” Her smile was a shredded mess, “Thanks to you…”

“Just stay still, don’t move! I’ll go get a potion from somewhere… or a magic caster! This place has to have a healer!” Skana exclaimed and enfolded Illyana’s hands in hers as gently as she could.

The light was rapidly fading outside, shadows from the dying of the light began to race along the floor of the Golden Roan’s room.

Illyana tilted her head toward the set of drawers by her bed. “Dr-Drawer.”

Skana shot up to her feet, Illyana’s blood staining her feet and spattering around in all directions as she rushed to the drawer, out of the corner of her eye she saw the ripped and ruined sheets, stained beyond disgust, and stinking beyond foulness to Skana’s nose, she nonetheless forced herself to focus on the task at hand.

She yanked the drawer open and found a small glass vial with a crude wax seal, the contents didn’t look like the usual healing potion, being white rather than the familiar red, but with no time to argue, she rushed to Illyana’s side.

Outside, a scream ripped over the city. Speranzi’s scream. And after it, came cheers that could only belong to an angry mob.

“They are… they are crucifying her.” Illyana choked back a sob, “She called us people… and they’re killing her for it…” She shook her head when Skana stood over her.

“Not- healing.” She gave a bitter, drawn look up and pushed the potion away as Skana held it close. “St-Stamina…” She inclined her head toward the window where a second scream went up. “Rooftop. To wall. G-Go out on th-the lake. B-Beg the old man of the rocks for help…”

“H-Hold… a human’s touch… never thought… would like… hold on…just a l-little while.” Illyana gurgled out her words.

“I can get you out!” Skana urged and winced as a third scream went up outside. “I can get you both!” Despite her protest, she went to her knees and pulled Illyana into her lap, dropping the option into the bloody pool where it rolled a few feet away. The elf woman weighed very little, her naturally pale skin was rapidly losing what color it had. “I promise, I’ll get you out!”

Her eyes were losing the luster they’d recovered before the day began, and her tattered limbs, crisscrossed with cuts and stab marks, rose with great difficulty to cling to Skana’s waist.

Illyana looked up, ‘She’s so warm… I never noticed humans were warm like us…’ The slave thought while she felt life fading away and spoke what she knew to be her final words. “I. Am. Out.”

“No…No.” Skana whispered and shook the elf’s now limp body. “Illyana… Illyana…” Skana’s lower lip began to quiver.

But there was no motion, no response, she lay still in her rest. “This wasn’t supposed to be how you were set free… It wasn’t!” She whispered the declaration.

And as the last of the darkness outside consumed the room within, Skana laid the body down back in the red pool that was now black with the settling of the night. She snatched up the stamina potion and tried to work out what Illyana meant. ‘The old man of the rocks…’ She recalled the story, and other tidbits only half listened to the first time around. ‘You should have paid more attention.’ Skana cursed herself and after quickly dressing in her armor, she went to the window.

Being disturbed was the last thing on her mind, ‘I’m guessing the whole place, visitors and all, got hauled in… that must have been chaotic.’ Skana thought as she jumped down to the ground floor and then raced toward the low wall. Hopping over that was easy, but only slightly harder was ascending to the rooftop of the nearest building.

The orderly city made Laylan look chaotic by comparison, and this worked to her advantage. Little crime meant little reason to be wary, and she was able to easily avoid the patrols on the road below.

So Skana ran and hopped her way across the city in the direction of the screams until the moonlight gave her better direction. There, atop the city wall, was a crossbeam that hadn’t been there before.

‘Gods above… she wasn’t wrong…’ Skana swallowed the lump in her throat and kept her quivering lip still by holding it between her teeth hard enough to sting, then picked up her speed until she reached the highest roof closest to the wall… and jumped across the gap.

Her outstretched hand caught the edge and with one grunted effort, swung herself up onto the top of the wall. Her eyes darted left and right toward the distant guards. They were walking at an equal, measured pace, and moving away from her.

‘Good order has its weaknesses at least, it makes them so predictable.’ With that thought, she walked toward the cross where Speranzi hung limp. Her forearms were nailed to a crossbeam, and feet were nailed to a triangular section of wood secured down below. Blood still dripped from open wounds, but the commander of the Black Quivers was still breathing.

“Speranzi… Speranzi… what have they done to you…?” Skana gasped in almost mute horror. The breathing of the woman on the cross was labored and spasmodic, each gasp brought clear pain through even the unconscious body, and it was one of those that brought Skana out of her horrified reverie.

[Lesser Strength] She activated her martial art and then before removing the woman from the cross she looked down over the side of the wall.

As expected of the city on the water, there was a flowing stream down below, right at the gate over which Speranzi had been nailed. Even to her uneducated peasant mind it was obviously intended to serve as a kind of small moat, and it flowed as a tributary into the lake. “This will be the second time I’ve had to carry you out of something you got yourself into… you should have let me fight with you…” She spoke to the unconscious woman and grabbed the cross with her arms, climbing up the way she used to climb trees as a girl. She found herself eye to eye with the blonde woman and reached over to pluck the first nail from her forearm.

The hot, ragged breath of her Lady was against Skana’s cheek as she grunted and yanked the iron free to throw it away over the wall. It splashed down into the water, and then she stretched out her arm after shifting her grip on the thick beams again and wrenched the next one free. That nail too, splashed into the dark water below.

Speranzi fell forward without that support and was caught on Skana’s shoulder. “This is going to hurt, a lot.” She said to the unconscious woman. ‘Idiot. She can’t hear you.’ Skana taunted herself and pushed her hand against Speranzi’s body. She glanced left and right, the patrols on the walls were concerned with external threats, not internal. It never occurred to them to look twice at the condemned, and up against the cross as Skana was, they couldn’t have seen her clearly.

She breathed a sigh of relief that caused some of Speranzi’s hair to sway, then waited until the patrol was as far away as possible. One deep breath later as she braced herself, and she dropped down to the base of the cross and in one smooth motion grabbed the nail in her right hand and yanked it free.

It nonetheless must have been agony for Speranzi to fall against the nail in her feet as she tumbled, as she was startled awake with a low cry of anguish just as Skana caught her across both shoulders. That nail was added to the waters below, and Skana immediately whispered, “Be quiet. It’s me. There’s a way out!”

Speranzi’s blurry vision gradually came into focus, but even had it not, she recognized the voice. “Illyana…?”

“Later. She said to take care of you first.” Skana answered, “Can you use any of your martial arts? Any magic? Or are you depleted?”

Speranzi grunted as she lay limp across the woman’s back and didn’t resist as she was adjusted to ride upright with her head over Skana’s shoulders and arms hanging limp over the front of her body. “I can… I can try…” croaked out.

“Here.” Skana said and popping a hole in the little glass vial she held it to Speranzi’s lips. “Drink. It’s stamina potion, Illyana said it should lend you some strength, she told me there’s help out on the lake…”

“That’s… insane.” Speranzi croaked and looked out on the placid surface of the lake, the sheer size of the thing was too broad to see the end of it, even from the top of the wall, “What else but monsters can be found out there?”

“Do you have another idea?” Skana demanded, and didn’t wait for an answer, no sooner did Speranzi throw the vial away to shatter on the city street far below, than Skana jumped over the wall.

They fell for what felt like an eternity, but in reality it was nothing but a hand’s worth of seconds before they splashed down in the water.

Were it not for her arts that greatly enhanced her strength, Skana was fairly sure her armor, even light weight as it was, would have dragged her under, especially when she had one arm wrapped around the still mostly limp Speranzi and she had to pull and kick her way toward the shore.

The water was cold in the dark of the night, and as it splashed into her mouth and drenched both their bodies Skana whispered, “I’m glad this didn’t happen in winter.”

Speranzi did her best to help, kicking her wounded feet and waving her arms, the stamina potion having lent her enough strength at least to not be total baggage. She however, couldn’t laugh at the black humor of her rescuer.

The feel of the cool, soft silt on her right hand brought a gasp of relief to the former brigand, and she gasped as she dug her hand in as deep as she could and hauled them both forward in one powerful lurch, dropping her commander bodily into the water right on the shore.

“My… soldiers? Corwin? Ahmorantha? The other workers?” Speranzi asked while she lay limp on her side.

“I don’t know.” Skana answered truthfully, she bit back the explanation of Illyana’s death a second time, and pointed toward a nearby boat. It wasn’t much, just a simple craft with a single sail and some oars lying against the rim. It wasn’t much, but it didn’t need to be. “They were all gone after I woke up from the nap you put me into.” Skana answered, and Speranzi was quiet while Skana helped her up and started to heft the commander again.

“It was the only way I could think to ensure you survived. They wouldn’t expect to find you in there with me…but…” Speranzi paused and grunted as she found herself riding on Skana’s back again, the peasant’s hands clenched to the bare thighs of the Baroness, she finished, “I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine. You were just returning a favor. That’s the second time you saved my life, no, third, if we count the test at the Fortress.” Skana answered and huffed as she carried the woman over to the small craft. There were boats aplenty, but most required multiple crew, this one, a simple pleasure craft as evidenced by the fact that it had only a single pole for fishing and not a proper net, could be handled by just one person.

They paused briefly in the cool night air and looked up at the bright white moon that shone its light down in the darkness. ‘In different circumstances, I’d think this was romantic…. A moonlit night on a placid lake in the cool night air…’ Skana clenched her eyes shut as the reality asserted itself, the horrific sight of Illyana’s abused and mutilated body dying in Skana’s arms… ‘I’ll never forget that… and never forgive it.’ She vowed as she sat Speranzi down while the little craft rocked back and forth, threatening to topple the already drenched women back into the water before the sail could be unfurled, the rope cut free, and she could take up the oars and start to row.

Speranzi looked at her hands and feet, the stamina potion she’d been given kept her awake, and would to some small degree facilitate healing. But they were ugly, ugly wounds and even with the potion’s aid, the pain was like fire in her mind, held at bay only by her discipline and experience with the pain of battlefield injuries.

“I can help.” She said while Skana worked the oars.

“You can help by doing nothing… I have no idea if this is going to work or what, but Illyana lived in Wenmark for a very long time, she must have heard stories about this place, and if nothing else then we’re at least out of there, who would expect us to go out on the water, we should be safe for a while at least.” Skana asserted, and Speranzi looked over their shoulder toward the shrinking wall of the great, holy city.

“Corwin mentioned stories about this lake, an ancient city or citadel or something… I don’t pay much attention to old legends, but maybe she’s talking about that?” Speranzi offered the tentative suggestion and leaned toward the side of the boat to look down into water so dark and deep that she could not see to the bottom.

“Maybe.” Skana agreed, “It sounds a lot like a story I heard back in Laylan, the night- that night, I mean.” Skana flushed red in the face, but Speranzi only nodded while she watched the water. “I heard a story about how wishing rocks were thrown into the water and collected here. Maybe there’s a connection?”

Speranzi had no answer, she had only her own thoughts. ‘You screwed up, you screwed up bad. Now everybody is taken captive, you have no idea where they are… they’ll probably not be killed, but…’ The array of punishments that they could face in that city were grim ones. In all probability they would be sold into slavery in the mines and farms around Wenmark. Corwin…’Corwin… his uncle might get him out of this…’ she hoped, but had her doubts. Doubts that ran circles in her head until they were so far out onto the lake that the shores of dry land were out of view.

Before Speranzi could say anything, ask any questions, Skana stood up and put her hands around her lips to magnify her words and shouted, “Hey! Old man! Old man of the rocks! Do you exist?! Are you out here?! We need help! My…” She looked briefly down at the wounded Spranzi then resumed her shouting in the rocking boat, “My friend needs help! If you’re real, could you show up! If you don’t, they’ll probably catch us, kill us, and throw us into the water to pollute your lake! Heeeeeey! Old maaaan! If there’s a magic spell or something, I don’t know it! So could you get off your ass and show up already!”

“Is being rude really the best way to get help, even from a… whatever?” Speranzi asked with one eyebrow raised.

“It gets people’s attention, I can apologize after they’ve started listening.” Skana explained, and the air around them was complete and total, the breeze was gone. The only noise to follow her call was the rocking of the boat and the splashing it made as it disturbed the placid waters.

Speranzi finally broke the silence as a thought occurred to her. “Did Illyana escape?”

“No, why?” Skana asked as she sat down between the oars to wait for… something or nothing.

“Because you said Illyana lived in Wenmark.” Speranzi pointed out. Her eyes narrowed at her rescuer. “Lived. Like she doesn’t anymore…”

Skana mentally cursed her slip of the tongue, and said nothing, her heart seized up as the desire to lie rose in her breast, but instead, her eyes glassed over so thickly that even with only the moonlight, Speranzi could clearly read her face.

Speranzi’s eyes welled up, “Gods… is this why I stayed alive? Is this why? Just to see a flower start to bloom before it gets stomped down into the muck… how… how did she die? Why did she die?!” Speranzi’s bitter words came out like vomit into the air, her vicious eyes locked on her rescuer as the demand for answers reached Skana’s ears.

Skana’s arms hugged her body as the words she’d held at bay came out, “She said something, misdirected them, I think. They must have come back, or maybe they never left after coming into the room… or maybe… maybe she was protecting me while I was under the bed… she never… she never told them I was there. No matter how they brutalized her… what they did… she protected me…”

“An elf… died for…” Speranzi killed the words as soon as they left her lips, “Illyana, died to help us?” She corrected herself, the memory of the elf woman’s bright eyes as she unburdened herself of things she could never have said before… the bright and even cheerful way she’d called Speranzi ‘Teacher’ as she regained bits and pieces of her confidence and grasped hold of a hope for a future now denied to her…

Speranzi had felt hatred many times in her life of one sort or another. Mostly it was for immediate opponents who were a threat to her soldiers, sometimes it was a brief flare up of the sort that prompted her to slay the village priest.

But thinking of the ravaged, ruined body of that beautiful slave that was so close to being free of the cause of all her torment, and thinking of all those who were responsible in one way or another?

The catalog of sins she had ignored in her faith for her whole life flipped through her mind like the pages of a tightly bound book, and what little doubts she had were stripped away. Speranzi struggled to turn around and face the city that was now well out of view then forced herself to stand. Her feet felt like they were on fire, and Skana reached out to steady her as she wobbled, but Speranzi batted the hand away.

“Fuck you! All of you! I reject you! I hate and despise you! I reject the gods, I want nothing to do with you but your destruction! To erase your works and crush you! I will never serve you again! I break my geas and my oath, my soul is no longer yours! Whatever I have to do, whatever I have to endure, I will do it and I will burn your holy places to ash!” Speranzi roared, unthinkingly activating her paladin skill of projected voice… but from so far away, even that could not have reached the walls.

But when she looked to the heavens, she had the hope in her heart that it reached the gods at least.

“What an interesting promise. I thought I heard someone out there. I don’t have any interest in just ‘helping’ a mortal… but I know your voice, breaker and maker of oaths, and I never thought I’d hear it make a promise like that.” The voice seemed to come from every direction at once, and the boat shook and trembled with the reverberations of the voice as if it were about to break apart.

Skana looked around, her head darting in all directions as she sought the source.

But Speranzi did not. She recognized that voice as surely as it recognized hers. She whispered the name, “Damaxa… you are the old man of the lake? How are you even here… you were sealed away!”

“No, don’t be ridiculous, mortal. The old man is one of my… well you could say he is a comrade of mine. He heard the voice of one he knew, and called for me. Now to my surprise, I hear the voice of one known to me? This is no coincidence. As for the rest, if you want answers, if you want the power to achieve your goals… prove it. Dive into the water and swim to the bottom.” Damaxa’s voice was silken in its smoothness and ran like melted butter over hotcakes, and every word was said as if he were offering noon tea to an honored guest… not bargaining with an offer of power or death.

“Deals with demons are never in our favor.” Skana pointed out, and to their mutual surprise, Damaxa’s voice became laughter that rocked the boat and cracked the sides apart in places.

“I’m not offering a deal with me. The offer is not for a mere demon contract, no… come down here, and you will bargain with a god that even I would fear to cross. I will not offer twice, make your choice, mortals… drift on the surface… or dive down to the Hidden City of Tovenari, and find everything that you seek, and more.”

Skana shivered at the honeyed words, the fine hairs of her arms stood on end as the rumbling voice continued to crack the boat.

Speranzi looked over the side, then touched the drenched fabric of the slave garb that had been meant to shame her at her execution. She turned and bowed toward Skana.

“I will be grateful to you forever… but I see no other way out of this. I’m sure that it won’t be long before word of what’s happened spreads, the priests and temples will stain my name, all my company’s goods and savings will be taken… even if I’m not hunted down, I see no other way to punish them all for what they’ve done…” Speranzi held her breath for a moment while she sought the words to say, and in a rare moment of her life, she foundered.

“You’re not going alone. So don’t talk like it’s goodbye.” Skana retorted and stood up straight. “I told you I’m following you everywhere. Even if it kills me.”

Speranzi looked at Skana for a lengthy moment and found no words that she could use to argue her out of it, then turned her eyes down toward the water. “All or nothing, demon.” She said, “Make your choice.”

And with that, she dove over the side with Skana only a half step behind her.

Down… down… down they went, Skana was still wearing her armor and equipment, and so quickly caught up and surpassed Speranzi, who grabbed the woman around the waist.

They held their breath and kicked their legs, Skana flailed her arms out and back, out and back in a desperate bid to reach the depths.

The deeper they went, the more the pressure increased, until the weight of the water pressing in on all sides of their bodies was like being smothered by a small mountain of heavy carpets.

Then their lungs began to burn.

They were enshrouded in darkness, pressed on all sides, and their lungs were on fire for what felt like an eternity, their tight clasped lips had minds of their own, desperate to open up and suck in air… where there was only water.

Skana’s body began to spasm first, she was no longer ‘swimming’ as they sank, she was drowning.

Speranzi refused to let go. ‘I never imagined an end like this.’ She told herself as water began to fill her lungs when her mouth opened and all went black. ‘What a horrible way to die… but still better than…’ Blackness took her as a few tears left her eyes to add to the waters of the lake, and the thought went unfinished.