Chapter 13 - Blood and Salt

  “Meal time, traitor,” said a man wearing blue of the royal guard.

  Eildred Aegis tensed. He felt at the iron binds keeping his wrists pinned to a wall. Rust had chewed away at the chains.

  The guardsman made a show of sniffing the bowl of gruel he'd brought with him before cringing. “Couldn't be me eating this crud,” he said. “Like a Flaming dog spat out its bile.” He bent low, slapping Eildred's cheek. “Perfect for a traitor.”

  Eildred betrayed no emotion with his face. Instead he slammed his head into the jailor's nose. The man fell on his rear, letting out a nasal cry. That smug sneer of his twisted into knots of rage. Twin lines of dark red dribbled down his nostrils.

  Eildred roared, straining every muscle in his neck. It came out as a ragged, throaty cry. He tugged on his wrist binds with as much strength as could be mustered by his thinned form. The rusted chains snapped. Shards clinked to the floor. Eildred lunged before the jailor could unsheathe his sword halfway. He flicked his arm out, and the remaining length of chain ripped across the guardsman's face.

  No knight I raised would be so frail.

  But the man in question was just so, reacting by touching his wounds whilst whimpering, rather than fight for survival. Eildred kicked the man beneath the chin. The guard bit his tongue and rolled over. Blood began pouring out into the cell. Eildred bent down and grabbed the guard by his hair, slamming his face into the filthy floor. He then unhitched the man's belt and took his sword and knife.

  Eildred was out of his cell in a heartbeat. He paused for a breath and glanced at Finral's cell. He could not let the old chamberlain free. It would only slow him down.

  “Eildred, what's the commotion?” Finral mumbled. “You alright in there?”

  “Farewell, my friend,” was all Eildred said.

  “Ah, escaped have we? Go, then. Do not worry for me. Emeria needs you more.”

  Eildred had already started running, barely catching those final few words. His niece might have needed him, but he needed his vengeance first. That thought had kept him alive for so long. Fury became strength. Hatred became life. The very air he breathed twisted in his lungs like acrid smoke burning his chest from inside out.

  Eildred had waned over the long months imprisoned. He was weaker. But the roaring drums in his chest propelled his legs onward. Excitement coursed through him. He could smell his freedom just up ahead. He saw it in the light of the open door just beyond the rising stairwell. He loosened the sword from its sheathe, skipping steps on his ascent. Almost there.

  Eildred thought a thousand things in the span of two seconds. Beyond the dungeon gates, two more guards would await, or should wait, if shift rotations were the same as in his time. After that, there'd be an open stretching hallway with one man around the corner, another patrolling, and another at the far end. But the hall had open windows leading to the rear of the courtyard. Once outside, he would be freed to break for the city, and then he'd be lost to his captors.

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  The plan clicked as he rose the final stretch of steps. A shadow appeared in the doorway beyond. Eildred did not hesitate to draw his weapon. But he'd barely wrought it from its sheath when something collided with his chest, stealing his wind and knocking him back. His heart skipped several beats as he tilted the wrong way. Hope was rent from his chest and frustration filled the void left there.

  Eildred did not fall back on the stairs as he expected. He was instead flown to their bottom and thrown to the floor. A silver haired woman fell upon him, knee upon his chest, and a scarred but muscled arm pressing down on his neck. Eildred lashed out with the chains still attached to the manacle on his wrist, but the violent fluttering of her wings blew aside the chains with wind. Eildred wheezed for air. None came to him. He reached up to wring his captor's neck, but too quickly did his strength flee from his now weakened vessel. His vision blurred. The world turned black.

  ***

  “Ah, awake at last.”

  Eildred groaned as he came to. He lolled his head from side to side, blinking several times. The space was dark, light flickering. Candlelight it must have been. He almost asked for the time when he felt at his arms. They were pinned against the wall at his back.

  Eildred jerked awake. Despair sunk its vicious hooks into his spine. He howled as might a caged beast and tugged at his new binds to no avail. Several feet before him, Odain chuckled. “You,” Eildred hissed with a rasped voice. The winged woman stood next to him, only she was wingless now, and her hair was a mix between silver and black than pure silver. Eildred seethed through clenched teeth. He tasted blood from his gums. That woman. She'd taken everything from him. She'd thwarted his vengeance.

  “Now now,” Odain began, “if you wanted your cell cleaned, you could have just asked politely.”

  Eildred looked around, seeing the dark stone floor look a little less full of refuse and dust.

  “But instead you went and nearly killed a man for it,” Odain continued. Curiously, he had his sleeves rolled up. His hands were inside of a pail of some sort, mixing around some kind of liquid. He poured a white, grainy powder into the pail.

  Salt, Eildred realized. And such a large quantity for something so valuable.

  Odain turned to the woman. He handed her a serrated knife and dragged a finger across his own thigh from the groin, all the way down to the knee. “First one goes there,” he said. “Deep, but not too deep. Oh, and take his trousers off.”

  Eildred shook and kicked violently as he realized what was happening. He roared and wheezed, straining both throat and lungs. The woman stilled him with a kick to the gut before pulling down his trousers, leaving him exposed and humiliated. She gripped his thigh too close to the groin, positioning the knife as Odain had commanded. Eildred felt the cold bite of metal on his manhood and tensed. He clenched his jaw, preparing for the worst, staring death into the woman who ignored him wholly. Her focus for the task given her was mechanized, unnatural. She was the perfect slave.

  The knife bit down. It was dragged along a nerve. Eildred screamed.

  “Ah, not to worry,” Odain said beneath the blood curdling cries. He tapped the hilt of the Thousand Sun Sword. “I'll Heal those wounds for you. After we're done that is.” He nudged the pail of salt filled water forward.

  Eildred struggled to breathe. Pain radiated along his leg. He watched with horror as the woman dipped her hand in the pail and pulled out a clump of soggy salt. She massaged it into his wound, keeping as still and emotionless a face as ever, not even flinching at his pitched cries.

  “Now, next one is here,” Odain said, drawing a line just beneath his own ribs.

  The woman did as told, lifting up Eildred's shirt.

  “I'll kill you,” he managed between breaths. “I swear I'll kill you,”

  This gave the woman pause. She cocked her head, curious. All the silver threads in her hair had faded to full black again, and the strange glow in her eyes was gone. When Eildred said and did nothing more, the woman pressed her knife beneath his ribs and drew another line with its edge.

  Eildred screamed again.