Mercenary, page 30
part #2 of Heart's Desire Soul Destroyed Series
Reya had didn’t react, keeping her teeth clenched, for it was all she could do not to moan with pain at the slightest movement.
The first night she’d been electrocuted until she’d lost consciousness. When she’d awoken, it had started again, and it was only when Ira grew bored that he gave up and retired to sleep.
Through snatches of conversation she learned that they slept during the day and hunted at night.
Her arms were numb, dried blood coating them from the cuts she’d sustained from pulling against the manacles during torture. Ira released her when he awoke, laughing at the pain it caused her when the blood flowed freely through her numb limbs. He stroked her hair as he would a hound then kicked her viciously in the side. Gasping for breath, she was dragged to the cell.
“Attend your needs if you can,” Eema sneered.
Clumsily she managed, using the hole dug into the ground before being quickly dragged back to the manacles beside the throne. Once safely secured, water was poured carelessly into her parched mouth, spilling over to soak her vest.
“Feel better?” Ira asked, holding a bowl of meat. “Would you like something to eat?”
Human meat? She nearly gagged at the thought but kept her face impassive, looking away from him, seeking Mara. Her stomach churned when she saw her lying still upon the ground, still chained to the post.
“What have you done to her?”
“Oh, she’s such a poor sport. Didn’t take well to being told to eat up like a good girl. Put up such a fuss, which isn’t polite. A couple of my brothers assisted her and got a bit carried away.”
“You slimy little bastard!” She lunged forward but was jerked to a halt by the manacles. “If you’ve killed her-”
“Would I do that? She merely got knocked around a little, but she’ll be fine. And I really don’t like being called names.”
His fist connected with her jaw, slamming her head back against the wall.
“Not nice at all.” Sitting down on the throne, he contemplated his captive thoughtfully. “Now what shall we do tonight, hmm? Oh, I know!”
The unholy gleam in the orange eyes caused a foreboding in her heart.
“Eema, bring me the cane.”
A twitter of excitement flew around the cavern and a chanting arose. “Cane! Cane! Cane!”
Taking a long thin rod from Eema, Ira swung it in the air sharply, producing a vibrating humming.
Reya shuddered inwardly. She’d seen it used before in place of a whip. It raised welts on the body if used carefully, and bone-deep cuts if it wasn’t.
“I don’t want to damage this lovely skin,” he said cheerfully. “So I’ve come up with an ingenious method. Where is the lotion?”
“Here.” One of the female hybrids proffered a pot.
“Very good. Rub it in well, my sister. I want to ensure our guest feels every bit of justice we mete out to her.”
The lotion was slapped roughly onto her legs, arms and stomach. It felt cold.
“Don’t relax, my dear.” He studied her bruised face. “For it gets worse, much worse.”
Stepping back, he swung the cane. It didn’t cut the skin but she couldn’t prevent the gasp that escaped her. The welt on her skin rose instantly, the lotion soaking in.
It felt as though she was being branded. Red-hot agony burned into her flesh, and she thought for a split-second that she was mistaken, that the cane had sliced through her flesh and beneath to the organs.
“Hurts, doesn’t it?” Ira smiled. “That’s the lotion. Wonderful stuff, isn’t it?”
“Go to hell,” she panted.
“Trust me, before this is over, you’ll wish you were. It is heaven compared to what you’ll feel this night.”
The cane cut across her stomach and the muscles in her arms bulged as she tried, unsuccessfully, to curl up defensively against the agony. As the cane rose and fell and the welts appeared, the lotion soaked in and the cavern resounded with the screams she couldn’t hold back.
When she finally fainted, they were relentless. Buckets of cold water were thrown over her until she regained consciousness, then it started again. Ira only called a halt when he got hungry.
Afterward he looked at his prisoner and smiled. The proud mercenary only remained upright because the manacles held her there. Her clothes and hair were soaked with sweat and water, her skin a mass of angry welts. They looked so harmless, those welts, but they weren’t.
“Eema,” he called. “Put more lotion on our guest. I don’t want to think it’s all been washed off with sweat. Be a waste of my efforts!”
The hybrids laughed. Several had grown bored and wandered off in different directions.
Ira frowned. “If you’re so bored, go above ground and see if you can find any food.”
They nodded and scuttled away.
~ * ~
Eyes closed, Wes sat cross-legged on a cushion. The cabin was dim, and a faint smell of incense wafted through the air.
Silently Maverk wondered if this was really going to work or if he was just wasting his time and Reya’s. But what choice did he have?
Wes had requested his presence. “Because your emotions for her are strong and will lend me strength.”
Maverk hoped so.
“Just sit quietly and say nothing,” Sinya instructed before shutting the door, leaving them alone.
Wes waved Maverk to one of the cushions on the floor. “Sit and concentrate on Reya.”
As if he could do anything else. Thinking of her was all he’d done since she’d fled.
He watched Wes now, as he’d done for the last two hours. The boy sat with his eyes closed, an oddly empty expression appearing on his features as though he wasn’t really here. Spiritually or something, Maverk wasn’t sure. Cramps had started to set in, but he feared moving too much in case the boy could really find her whereabouts but was distracted by his movements. He would wait until his limbs shrivelled and fell off if it meant finding the lass he loved.
Suddenly Wes moaned, a rivulet of sweat sliding down his face. His eyelids fluttered, showing glimpses of white. His hands, so quietly and calmly clasped in his lap, now started to wring together, squeezing so hard that spots of blood appeared where the nails cut into the flesh of his palm.
Maverk wondered uneasily if he should get help.
“Reya,” Wes whispered. “Such pain.”
Without warning a welt appeared on the thin arm, then another and another, red and angry. Sweat poured down his face to saturate his shirt.
There was no longer any doubt in Maverk’s mind that the pirate’s young brother could find her.
Wes suddenly arched back and screamed before falling limply forward. Maverk caught him at the same time the door burst open and Sinya and Franc raced into the cabin.
“I think he fainted.” Maverk eased the boy onto the floor, placing a cushion beneath his head.
“It’s normal,” Sinya assured him, kneeling beside Wes.
“He started sweating, then these welts appeared-” He stopped, astonished.
Wes’s skin was smooth, dry and unblemished.
Sinya nodded. “I know what you mean. What he sees imprints itself on his body but not, thank God, for long.”
“But what did he see? He didn’t say anything.”
“He will in about half an hour,” Franc said. “That’s how long it takes him to recover.”
It was the longest half-hour of Maverk’s life.
When Wes finally recovered and recounted what he’d seen, Maverk blanched.
Minutes later when they left the ship, dawn was breaking. They found Stellar and Isham waiting for them.
“You sent word for us?” Stellar asked.
“Aye,” Maverk replied tightly. “We know where the entrance to the cavern is. Do you still wish to seek out your ‘children’?”
“How could you have found them? We have searched for years!”
“They hide well. If you want them, gather your people and follow us, but first you must agree to allow us to enter and rescue Reya and Mara first.”
“You’ll be caught.”
“I’ll risk it. I won’t risk the lives of the lasses any longer.”
Stellar nodded. “If that is what you wish. We will gather our people and come, and while you rescue your women, we’ll take care of the skinners.”
The deaths of the skinners would be a mercy to anyone travelling in these parts. Thinking of Reya in their clutches, remembering what Wes had told him when he’d awoken, revulsion prickled down Maverk’s spine.
“The stench of rotting corpses, human flesh roasting... she screams in agony... the fires burn hotter... they won’t let her sleep, offer no reprieve... her skin...”
He shook his head. He couldn’t dwell on it or he’d throw caution to the wind, charge into the hidden cavern and be killed. He would seal the doom of all.
“Let’s go.” He swung around to face Sinya. “Is the ship ready?”
“Ship?” Isham narrowed his eyes.
“The cavern is not far but we need the spaceship to shelter in, just in case.” Sinya strode toward it as he spoke. “We take no risks, at least, none more than necessary.”
“Do you have the electrified nets?” Stellar called to one of the men, who nodded. “You have everything? They cannot be allowed to escape this time.”
“Don’t worry, we are prepared.”
“Nets?” Sinya stroked his goatee.
“To capture them when they run,” Stellar explained. “Then we deal with them.”
Maverk just hoped the plan played out. “Let’s get a move on. I want to be away from this godforsaken place as soon as possible with the lasses.”
“You won’t get any arguments from me.” Sinya started bellowing orders to his crew.
~ * ~
The ship landed five miles from the ruins of Yennan, and the desert people and pirates disembarked quickly, the de-activated nets on a hover tray in their midst
“This is a sand dune.” Isham looked puzzled. “One of hundreds. Are you sure the skinners hide below?”
“Aye.” Maverk nodded curtly.
“How did you find it?”
“Just be glad we did.” Sinya pushed past them.
Maverk shrugged when Isham raised his brows at him, but privately he wondered why Sinya didn’t reveal Wes’ strange gift. Until he remembered that these desert people were scientists, and how cold-blooded they’d already shown themselves to be. It still made him shake his head to think how they’d acquired their ‘mini-mercenaries’, but now was not the time to think of that.
Quickly he followed Sinya up the sand dune until they reached a scrubby bush squatting in the sand. He glanced at his companion then over his shoulder to see that half of the pirate crew waited below, lasers drawn and eyes scanning their surroundings, while the remainder of the pirates waited grimly behind himself and Sinya. All held stun guns, as lasers were too dangerous to take into a fight in close quarters. The desert people waited silently nearby with the nets in their hands.
Taking a deep breath, Maverk held his stun gun in one hand and pulled firmly on the trunk of the bush, which trembled and started to move.
Feeling the ground shift beneath them, they scrambled back. A hole appeared as the bush and part of the ground slid aside. Red and orange flickered and Maverk could see that the hole went straight down on an incline, rough steps cut into the rocky floor. The flickering was due to flaming torches pushed into niches in the rocky walls.
Taking a deep breath, he gagged at the putrid stench wafting up the steps. Movement made him look up to see Stellar holding out a strip of material. She gestured to the lower half of her face and he saw that the desert people had tied masks over their mouths and noses, a protection of sorts against the stench.
Cloths were passed around and soon everyone wore one. It didn’t help a lot, but anything was better than nothing.
Nodding to Sinya, Maverk started down the stone steps. All was quiet. Obviously the skinners slept.
They moved deeper, finding the passage cool, and he noted the paintings on the walls, stick figures and strange symbols. The paint used was unknown to him. Some of it was red and seemed fresh while other designs were brown. Sudden realisation had his skin crawling. It was blood. He didn’t look at Sinya, but could feel the other man’s tension.
The passage opened into a huge cavern which they entered cautiously. It was seemingly empty of anything alive, but the many holes in the walls were foreboding.
It was the other things they saw, though, that made more than one of the following pirates grimace in disgust.
Maverk registered the horrors within the cavern but his gaze searched desperately for Reya.
Sinya nudged him and pointed. Following the direction of his finger, he saw a young girl curled up near a post in the middle of the cavern, a thick collar around her neck with a chain attaching her to the post. Thin and shivering violently, her blue eyes were wide with shock. A mop of curly black hair was tangled around her face.
Mara. His stomach clenched. What had they done to her? And where was Reya?
Frantically he scanned the room until he spotted, next to a rough-hewn rock throne on the far side of the cavern, a slim figure manacled spread-eagled to the wall. Even from here he could see the raw red welts covering her body between the rags she wore. Her head was slumped forward, red-gold curls tangled around her face.
Reya.
Was she still alive?
Tearing his gaze from her, he looked at Sinya and silently pointed to Mara. The pirate nodded his understanding. The pirates split up, several going with Sinya, while a couple followed Maverk. The remainder stood guard in the deserted cavern.
Stopping before Reya, Maverk slid his hand between the tangled, sweat-drenched tresses to feel for a pulse in her throat. Thank God, it was there, faint but discernable.
One of the pirates was already picking the lock on the manacles at her ankles while another worked on her wrists.
Gently tipping her head back, Maverk swept her hair aside to look at her face, anger and pity bubbling up inside him at the bruising and cuts on her cheeks, the split lip and the tear stains. He knew then that the torture had been horrendous for her to cry.
That hurt him more than anything. That she’d been in so much pain and he hadn’t been there to help her. But by God, he was here now, and he was getting her out of this hellhole.
“Ready,” Franc whispered.
Nodding, he supported her while the manacles were opened. She fell forward and he swiftly bent and slung her over his shoulder. Without wasting a second, he turned and started down the steps, seeing that one of the pirates cradled Mara to his chest and was already at the entrance to the passage.
“No! No! The woman is mine!” a voice bellowed furiously. “I am Ira and she is mine!”
The walls of the cavern seemed to come alive. Out of the small holes in the walls squirmed small, diminutive figures, their faces twisted, bones not quite right, features neither child nor adult. They snarled, their teeth flashing sharply as drool slid from the mouths of many. Orange eyes gleamed with feral delight.
“Food.” A skinner smacked his lips hungrily, hooking clawed hands into the air in anticipation.
The pirate holding Mara bounded up the passage toward the surface.
“Stun them now,” Sinya ordered.
The pirates started firing at the skinners who grabbed knives from the depths of their clothes and howled shrilly as they moved forward in a nightmarish scene, some moving swiftly on hands and feet, hunched over.
The skinner that had spotted them lunged towards Maverk.
Franc and Ephim threw themselves at him, grabbing his arms, struggling with the male whose eyes glittered a furious orange as he roared, “She is mine! Mine! You will give her to me! You will give her to Ira!”
Maverk realized that this was the one who’d abused Reya so viciously, and while part of his mind wanted to kill him, he knew he had to get her to safety. She was his first concern. He started across the cavern, leaping over the bodies of the stunned skinners.
Still more crawled out of the walls.
“Watch out, Maverk!” Franc shouted.
Spinning around, Maverk saw both Franc and Ephim scrambling to their feet. Ira was lunging after him, skinning knife in hand.
The strength of the young man was incredible, his speed uncanny. Before Maverk had time to move, Ira launched himself forward, knife raised.
He reacted instinctively, bracing himself and lifting his booted foot. Ira crashed into it and Maverk shoved him back with powerful force, knocking him backwards, the knife Ira held spinning away into the air.
Stunned, Ira shook his head before getting slowly to his feet, swaying. He glared at Maverk, then someone behind Maverk caught his attention, and a shock of recognition lit his eyes. “Mother?”
The net Stellar and Isham held was flung over his head and body, and he was borne to the ground.
“No! No, Mother!” Ira screamed, thrashing helplessly. “Release me!”
The screams echoed in Maverk’s ears, making his chest tighten. The next words made his scalp crawl.
“I’ll cut your liver out while you still breathe and eat it bloody and raw! Release me!”
The net electrified, sending his body shuddering on the dirt floor before he fell limp.
Stellar looked up, her pink eyes unremorseful at the task ahead. “Leave, Maverk. We finally have the skinners in hand and will end this reign of terror. It’s our mistake, our work to complete. You have wounded of your own to attend.”
“Aye.” He turned and saw that the desert people, with the help of the pirates, had every skinner trapped in nets, and the animalistic howling scraped down his spine. “Can you be sure they are all here?”
“Having kept track through attacks, we know how many are left.” She looked across the cavern at a woman doing a count. When the woman raised a hand, Stellar nodded. “They are all here.”
Maverk nodded. Now that they didn’t have to fight, he bent forward to slide Reya off his shoulder, straightening with her cradled against his chest, her cheek resting on his shoulder, then he strode towards the entrance to the passageway. Sinya waited there for him with his pirates behind him. Maverk noted that several had minor wounds but none serious. Their expressions were stoic, and he had no doubt that while they’d not forget what they’d seen, they had no doubt seen worst. It was, after all, the Outlaw Sector.
