Seeker of Legends (Fate of Legends Book 2), page 40
Gammon had known he was losing her, and that he was losing himself. That’s why he’d taken off his Seeker medallion…and she’d nearly betrayed him and told Master Thorius.
She opened her eyes, looking down at her staff. Her knuckles were white; she loosened her grip, taking a deep breath in, then letting it out slowly. Gammon had lived for her, had sacrificed his soul for her, and had died for her.
Don’t let them change you, he’d said. Be the woman I loved.
She took a deep, shuddering breath in, gripping her staff tightly. A vision of Gammon lying on the ground came to her, blood pouring from his neck. And Dio staring down at the man he’d killed with those soulless silver eyes.
Feeling nothing.
Sukri lifted her gaze to the river, gritting her teeth.
I’ll make you feel something, she vowed.
She would play the Lady’s game. She would practice day and night, devoting every waking second to getting better. It didn’t matter how many bruises she got, or how painful it would be. Nothing could hurt her more than what he’d already done to her. She would train until she was good enough to stand toe-to-toe with Dio, no matter how long that took.
And when that time came, she would make him pay for what he’d done.
Chapter 34
Dominus’s suite in the Acropolis was enormous, displaying the wealth and status of his position – second only in power to King Tykus himself – in spectacular fashion. His four-post bed was opulent and exceedingly comfortable, the other furniture equally well-made, designed to provide for his every need.
He stared at all of it despondently, feeling utterly trapped.
A fine prison, this.
He turned to face the only door in and out of the suite. Three armed guards stood there, and he knew there were more waiting on the other side of the door. If he’d been allowed to keep his cane, he would’ve made quick work of them. Unarmed, it was unlikely he would be able to defeat them.
What have I done?
He looked down at his own hands, studying them as if seeing them for the first time. As if they were someone else’s. Everything he’d done, he’d done for the kingdom. He’d made it his life’s work to protect Tykus, to preserve the greatest nation in existence, a beacon of humanity in this terrible world. And it had all come to this…a prisoner in his own home, doomed to die a despised criminal, labeled a traitor for all eternity.
A traitor that loved his country, and did everything in his power to serve it!
He laughed bitterly, causing one of the guards to glance at the others uneasily. Dominus went silent, knowing what it must look like to them, the great Duke of Wexford accused of high crimes, laughing to himself while pacing endlessly in his room. The actions of a madman, someone corrupted.
Someone guilty.
There was a click, and then the door opened, more guards entering the room. Duke Ratheburg followed closely behind, and Dominus’s own private physician, a man in long red robes. Dominus stared at the two, swallowing past a sudden lump in his throat. He stood at his full height, refusing to appear anything less than what he was in front of these men. The Duke of Wexford, a man of confidence. Of impeccable moral fiber.
“Good evening, Dominus,” Ratheburg greeted coolly. “It is time for your Test.” He gestured at the assembled guards. “Hold him fast,” he ordered. “Stand him up and force his right forearm outward.”
The guards obeyed, surrounding Dominus at once. He resisted the urge to fight back, allowing the men to grab his limbs. They forced his forearm forward, so that his hand was palm-up.
“Doctor, if you would,” Ratheburg continued, gesturing at Dominus. “An incision, from his wrist to his elbow. Through the skin only, so that the fat is exposed. Avoid vital structures, of course.”
“Yes Duke Ratheburg,” the doctor replied. He walked up to Dominus, reaching inside a pocket of his robes and retrieving a scalpel. Made of obsidian, Dominus knew it was so sharp that it would separate his flesh with the barest of effort. One guard brought a bucket, positioning this on the floor just below Dominus’s forearm.
“Don’t move now,” the doctor urged, giving Dominus an apologetic look. Dominus glared at him.
“You used your scalpel to heal me once,” he stated coolly. “Now you use it to harm me. Have you forgotten your vows?”
The doctor glanced back at Ratheburg, who gestured for him to continue. He turned back to Dominus, refusing to look him in the eye, instead focusing on Dominus’s forearm. He pressed the scalpel onto the flesh there, just below the hollow at the front of the elbow. Dominus felt a slight pinch, and steeled himself for what was to come.
If you must die, he told himself, die well.
The doctor slid the scalpel downward, and Dominus flinched slightly, clenching his teeth at the sudden, sharp pain. His skin gaped open, the flesh parting quickly, crimson blood pouring from the wound. Yellow fat was exposed, its bumpy texture in stark contrast to his smooth skin. The doctor ended the incision at Dominus’s wrist, then backed away quickly, returning to Ratheburg’s side. Dominus stared down at his wound, watching as blood poured down the edges, dripping over his hand and dribbling into the bucket. He turned his gaze to Ratheburg then, staring at his fellow Duke unblinkingly. Ratheburg’s expression was stony.
“Shall I apply a bandage?” the doctor inquired, wringing his hands. Ratheburg shook his head.
“No,” he answered. “This room is contaminated,” he added with a grimace. “It will be removed stone by stone, and replaced.” He turned his gaze to Dominus. “His blood is of no consequence now.” He nodded at the doctor, then at the guards. “Leave us.”
“Your Grace,” one of the guards protested, clearly hesitant to leave Ratheburg alone with Dominus.
“Now.”
They exited the room, leaving the two dukes alone. Dominus ignored the throbbing pain in his forearm, knowing all-too-well that the wound was only temporary. It would heal, and when it did, it would reveal the corruption of his soul. Indeed, the bleeding was already slowing to a steady ooze.
“Ratheburg,” Dominus began, but Ratheburg held up one hand.
“Please understand that I am completely aware that this is only a formality,” he interrupted. “I saw your leg,” he added, gesturing at Dominus’s right leg. “You showed it to me yourself after you killed your son.”
Dominus said nothing, knowing that the man was right. His foot had been partially amputated by his doctor, and despite this, had grown gangrenous and infected. He looked down at his own bare feet, seeing them utterly whole.
“The law requires a Test to confirm corruption,” Ratheburg stated. “A Test we both know you’ll fail.”
“Rathe-”
“I’m disappointed in you,” Ratheburg interjected. “I believed in you, Dominus. I believed you to be the best among us, the greatest man in the kingdom besides Tykus himself.” His gaze hardened. “I looked up to you, Dominus.”
“Let me explain,” Dominus insisted.
“Explain what?” Ratheburg retorted. “What is there to explain?”
“This isn’t my fault,” Dominus replied. “I didn’t choose this.”
“Then who did?”
“My son,” he answered. He shook his head bitterly. “Conlan…changed when he was a teenager. Starting having notions of ‘improving’ mankind. He wanted to use illegal artifacts to make us stronger…wanted us to be like the Kingdom of the Deep.”
“He was corrupted?” Ratheburg asked, clearly surprised.
“He was,” Dominus confirmed. “And his will was slightly more powerful than mine,” he confessed. “I sent him here to cleanse him of these horrible thoughts, but it didn’t work. And it was too late for me.” He sighed, lowering his gaze to the floor. “He knew he’d corrupted me,” he continued. “He told me right before he died.”
Ratheburg considered this, staying silent for a long moment. Then he too sighed.
“If that’s true,” he replied, “…then I’m sorry, Dominus. I suspect it is true,” he added. “It explains why you sent him away, and why he tried to destroy the Ossae of Tykus. But,” he added, “…you should have notified the authorities instead of sending him to the Acropolis.”
“You’re right,” Dominus admitted. “I should have.”
“Why didn’t you?”
Dominus shrugged.
“I loved my son,” he confessed. “I knew what would happen to him if I outed him. Or maybe he’d already corrupted me.”
“I suspect so,” Ratheburg agreed. Then he frowned. “I don’t understand. How did Conlan get led so far astray?”
“I don’t know,” Dominus admitted. “It happened when he was a teenager. He’d started traveling to the kingdom then, learning about the city.”
“Someone corrupted him.”
“Maybe,” Dominus conceded. He’d never considered the possibility. It was stupid not to; given his station, corrupting Conlan would have proven a very effective way of corrupting him. He stood there silently, his mind reeling with the possibilities.
“Not maybe,” Ratheburg countered. “Definitely.”
Dominus nodded, swallowing past a lump in his throat. Ratheburg shook his head.
“This is tragic, Dominus,” he stated wearily. “That a man such as you would have been taken down by his own son, through no fault of your own. Especially after what Conlan did…after what happened to your wife. Someone got to you through him. And we should all be terrified by that fact,” he added. “If they got to you, they could get to any one of us.”
“Agreed,” Dominus stated. “But who in the kingdom would do such a thing?”
“Rest assured,” Ratheburg replied, “…that I will do everything in my power to find out.”
Dominus nodded, feeling some small consolation from that. Ratheburg was a man of his word; he would not rest until Dominus was avenged.
“Thank you, old friend.”
“You were a great man,” Ratheburg stated. “I find it monumentally depressing that that man is gone.”
“I’m still that man,” Dominus protested. Ratheburg raised an eyebrow. “For the most part,” he corrected. “I still believe in the kingdom. I would still die to protect it.”
“You will,” Ratheburg replied coolly. Dominus grimaced.
“Everything I did, I did for the kingdom,” he insisted.
“You’re corrupted now,” Ratheburg retorted. “You feel that you are still yourself, but this is merely an illusion, Dominus. You’re lost now…and what remains of you is something that cannot be allowed to live.”
“But…”
“You’ve become,” Ratheburg interrupted, “…the very abomination your son strived for.”
Dominus clenched and unclenched his fists, staring at Ratheburg, resisting the sudden anger that threatened to build within him. He had the sudden urge to kill the man, to snap his self-righteous neck. There was no doubt in his mind that he could do it, were he to try.
He let the emotion come, knowing that it would leave just as quickly. Moments later, it did so.
“I can still be saved,” he insisted, forcing his voice to remain calm. “I can be the man I was before. I can be Cleansed.” Ratheburg gave him a withering glare.
“No amount of Cleansing can save you now,” he retorted. “Only the Ossae of Tykus could do that…and we all know how that turned out for Conlan.”
“I would never dare to harm the Ossae!” Dominus nearly shouted. “How could you possibly…”
“No Dominus,” Ratheburg retorted, raising his own voice. “How could you?”
“I…”
“You used your disease as an excuse to send your own son to be swallowed whole by Tykus!” Ratheburg shouted. “You murdered him, then neglected your duty to become Tykus again, all so you could dabble in wild artifacts to heal yourself!” He glared at Dominus, his lower lip trembling. “If you really cared about your duty, you would’ve healed yourself, then offered yourself to the crown and become Tykus. Tykus would have removed your corruption, and you would have served our kingdom well.”
Dominus stared mutely at Ratheburg, unable to reply. There was nothing to say. The man was right.
“Goodbye,” Ratheburg muttered, his voice almost too quiet to hear. “Whoever you are.”
He turned to go, opening the door. Suddenly there was shouting. Dominus looked past Ratheburg, spotting guards rushing down the hallway toward them. The guards skid to a halt before Ratheburg, their brows dripping with sweat.
“Your Grace!” one of them blurted out. There was panic in his voice.
“What’s going on?” Ratheburg demanded.
“The kingdom,” the guard replied. “It’s under attack!”
Chapter 35
Vincent glanced through the long vertical bars at the cell beyond, eyeing the tall man seated cross-legged on the gray stone floor. The man stared back at him silently, hardly seeming to blink. Vincent shifted his weight from foot to foot, his hand going to the hilt of his sword sheathed at his hip. He knew the prisoner couldn’t possibly get out of his cell, not to mention the fact that the guy was unarmed. But he also knew who the man was.
High Seeker Zeno, the leader of the Guild of Seekers.
Vincent turned, glancing at Thomas, his fellow guard. Thomas looked bored, leaning against the wall behind him, his eyes half-closed. Vincent nudged him.
“Wake up,” he said. Thomas jerked awake, glaring at him.
“The hell,” Thomas grumbled. “I was sleeping, asshole.”
“Not on the job you’re not,” Vincent retorted. Thomas glanced at Zeno, then gave Vincent a look.
“What’s the guy gonna do,” he replied. “Spit on us to death?”
“You’re a guard,” Vincent countered. “We don’t get paid to sleep.”
“I do,” Thomas retorted.
“Yeah, well not with this guy,” Vincent shot back. “You know who he is, right?”
Zeno continued to stare at them. If he minded them talking about him, hardly showed it. The man was like a statue.
“Doesn’t matter who he is,” Thomas replied. “He’s in there, and we’re out here.” He gestured at the cell. “See those bars?” he asked. “He’s gonna have to lose a lotta weight to squeeze through ‘em.”
“Yeah, well I don’t want you sleeping,” Vincent insisted, eyeing Zeno uneasily. The guy freaked him out.
“Fine,” Thomas muttered. He crossed his arms over his leather uniform. “But I’m transferring to a different wing,” he muttered. “Fucking hate working with assholes like you.”
“Shut up,” Vincent retorted. “And do your goddamn job.”
Thomas rolled his eyes, but didn’t try to go back to sleep, to Vincent’s relief. He knew that Thomas was right, but he also knew that he didn’t want to be the only one awake working this shift.
“I hear this guy’s supposed to be a badass,” Vincent ventured. Thomas snorted.
“Doesn’t look so tough to me.”
“Easy for you to say,” Vincent grumbled.
“Yup,” Thomas agreed. “I’m on this side of those bars.”
Vincent said nothing, his eyes returning to Zeno. The guy was still looking right at him. Just sitting there. He wondered what the man was thinking. He knew the charges against Zeno, knew that the man was almost certainly going to get the death penalty. But what if he didn’t? What if Zeno was declared innocent, and went free? He was the head of the Seekers, after all. He could have Vincent and Thomas murdered…and he’d probably get away with it too.
Fuck, he swore under his breath. He had a kid on the way, after all. His first kid. Hopefully it was a girl…he’d always wanted a girl. His cousin’s daughter’d just turned two, and she was frickin’ adorable.
“God this job sucks,” Thomas grumbled.
“Every job sucks,” Vincent retorted, irritated that Thomas had interrupted his train of thought. “If it didn’t suck, they wouldn’t pay us.”
“They practically don’t.”
“I got another mouth to feed on the way,” Vincent shot back, “…and you don’t see me complaining. This is overtime for me.”
“Shoulda pulled out,” Thomas muttered.
“Go to hell.”
“Already here.”
Vincent sighed, shaking his head. How he’d gotten stuck with this asshole was beyond him.
“You know…” he began, but he was cut off by the sound of a bell ringing in the distance. It was incredibly loud, loud enough to hurt his ears, even through his helmet.
“What the hell?” Thomas blurted out.
“The alarm,” Vincent stated, his heart leaping into his throat. He grabbed the hilt of his sword. “Shit.”
“Probably just a drill,” Thomas ventured. Vincent glared at him.
“And what if it isn’t?” he shot back. The alarm meant one of two things: either a prisoner was trying to escape, or…
“Stay here,” Thomas ordered. “I’ll check it out.”
“Hey,” Vincent complained. “You can’t leave your post!”
Thomas ignored him, unsheathing his sword and jogging down the hallway. He reached the end of it, turning right and vanishing from sight. Vincent watched him go, then glanced at Zeno, who hadn’t moved so much as a centimeter. He wondered if the guy was even breathing. Still, Zeno was staring at him.
Fuck.
The bell continued to toll, the sound echoing through the prison. Vincent stared at Zeno, then looked down the long, empty hallway, wiping sweaty palms on his pants. He gripped the hilt of his sword, switching his weight from one foot to the other.
Come on Thomas, he thought.
He glanced at Zeno, who still hadn’t moved. If the guy was perturbed, or even curious, he certainly didn’t show it. Vincent turned away from him, glancing down the hallway again.
Where in the hell are you man?
He heard shouting, then the ringing of metal on metal. A blood-curdling scream echoed down the hallway.
Shit!
Vincent drew his sword, holding it out before him, and took a step back. Suddenly he saw guards backpedaling into view at the end of the hallway, their swords drawn. One of them shouted, then lurched backward as a long, thin blade impaled him through the belly. Men in black and gold uniforms came into view, spilling past the remaining prison guards and rushing down the hallway toward Vincent.
