Iron sang throughout the old dungeon, armor clattered against the ancient steps, blood pooled beneath the cracks of doors. Men screamed and groaned to the beat of sword and shield. ‘Twas the dungeon underneath the fortress of Mayamat, yea, but anybody who’d spent a minute within called it “The Crypt”. All manner of dead things ended up in “The Crypt”: sorcerers, warlocks, mother-eaters, ogres, princesses. It was guarded by the greatest swordsmen in the western world, but now those swordsmen were falling like birds stricken by blue thunder. But this thunder was of a different sort; it had come on horseback, it had broken the unbreakable walls of Mayamat, had killed the unkillable warriors held within, and now The Crypt was silent but for the moans of the maddened and the clanking of sabatons. Torchlight flickered against the dark bricks. The torturer, who had fled into this cell, brandished his whip and trembled. With her arms chained and her feet pinned together by a wooden stake, Lysa could only grin.

The door shuddered beneath the weight of a kick, and then another, and then it was coming down. Lysa flinched as the whip’s tongue lashed, but ne’er against would she be the stricken one. Instead, the tail met the tresspasser’s shield, and was useless, and then the torturer gurgled because said trespasser had offered a meeting ‘twixt his head and a mace. With the quiet thump of the torturer’s corpse, six years of pain were relieved in an instant. She’d no eye for violence, but some men deserved to be affected with it. Were she the trespasser, it’d not be so quick; she’d have repaid the lashes, aye, though perhaps not the questions. But who was this trespasser? Her vision was blurry (and perhaps irrevocably damaged by the years in the cell), but she could make him out. Chain mail, a tabard, a shield and bloodied mace, a houndskull helmet. And behind him was another man, dressed in iron plates and a brass crown.

“Only way to kill a snake is to crush its head,” said Houndskull, stepping over the corpse to look at Lysa, “But what is this that the serpent guards? This is the cell we were sent to, Lord, but your daughter is nowhere; a stranger woman takes her place. I told you the hunchback’s lie, no? That cretin was ne’er to be trusted. Even your brother wouldn’t keep a princess in this rank pit.”

Brass-crown shook his head, joining Houndskull and letting his gaze fall onto her, “You underestimate him - my brother and the hunchback both. The first is the lowest creature, and the second is the honorable heir.”

Pausing, his eyes found hers. His eyes were dark and gray, his brow furrowed beneath his crown, his face clean shaven but slick with the sweat of battle. Lysa thought he looked burdened - perhaps by the importance of his mission, or perhaps the importance of himself. Behind him in the doorway, warriors marched past, down the spiraling staircase. They were going ahead, to scout and kill. Perhaps, if they were outmatched, they’d even retreat. This thought was shaken from Lysa’s head by Brass-crown’s low, gravelly voice.

“Tell me what you know, would you? You’ve been chained here long, I assume. What have you heard in the halls? And who was in this cell before you? Do you know of any deception that has taken place here?”

“Better not to ask, Lord,” said Houndskull, flipping his visor up to reveal a scarred, beard-ridden face, “See not her bronze skin? She is of the south, lord, and southerners all have viper tongues.”

Lysa knew better than to retort. Her limbs were trapped, and even if they weren’t, she would be too weak to flee, and far too weak to work her art. She’d be the eagle, coasting along the wind these men so enjoyed blowing. Brass-crown blew it next, giving Houndskull a glare.

“And what of your tongue, Alonso? For whom does it wag? Your thinking mind, or the mind of old Mistress Hate, that wretched dancer who found you in the south? The crusade has passed. The gold horns do not blare. We kill men of our own blood, now, under our own gods.”

“Aye, Lord. You speak truly. You follow that, woman. Tell us your name, and what you know of the Princess of House Velenzi.”

She eyed the pair carefully, surmising that which should be told and that which should not be. Five years ago, her mind was quick and bright with all of the intelligence her mother had provided her. Now it was darkened by five years of slumber. Lysa had retreated from the waking world, suffered the whip and the pain and no other thought, and only just now woken, struggled to scheme so quickly. After a little while, she spoke the words, and told them what she had learned.

“Your hunchback told no lie, and your foe - my wardens - played no little trick. Aye, the Princess of House Velenzi was in this cell. She is the one with red hair, yes?” 

Brass-crown nodded, and Lysa continued her lie.

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“They brought her down, yea, shrieking down the steps. That must have been months ago. She fought them, but she was armed with slippers and they were all warriors. Your Princess had a fancy for words, though. She used many of them, in creative ways, to describe her captors. This annoyed them greatly, so they tossed her in here with me.”

Houndskull (who was called Alonso) motioned, with his mace, to the room, which was filled with nothing but dark implements and the voices of the living, “She is not here, strange woman.”

“You’re right. They told me to curse her, but I told them I could not curse an innocent, so they ravaged her and told me again to curse her, but I was too weak and too sorry to make the sorcery. They took her lower down, then, and punished me with a cut thigh. If you’re so pressed about southern women, Sir Alonso, you may place your head ‘tween my legs and see the scar - just be careful with your visor.”

Alonso scoffed, stepped forward with his mace to crush Lysa, but Brass-crown held him back with a single disciplined arm. Brass-crown’s face was grave and pale, his shoulders low, burdened newly by the news of the Princess. Lysa had only told him part of the truth; the Princess had been delivered to the chamber, sure, but only for a quick lashing. There were only so many torturers to pass around, after all. There had been no curse in demand, no innocence was plundered, and no thigh was cut. The scar was older than her stay here.

“You speak lies,” said Alonso.

“Yes, she speaks lies,” Brass-crown pretended to agree, but did not move his arm. The hound wouldn't bite without the word of his master, “You are a woman of curses? A sorceress?”

She answered, “I am Lysa of Carel. ‘Twas I cast the First Army of Faith into the sandy pits, and it is my master, Baphosarex, who raised them again, who made them march to the tune of the Low One, and who led the death crusade. After that affair was brought to end, he bid me to hide beneath the sunsets of Loscancia. I was caught crossin’ the south sea, though, and I was delivered here to be punished forever.”

Alonso lurched forward again, but still wouldn't strike, “The wicked bitch herself! Gabriel, my Lord, loose your arm so I may loose my mace. Baphosarex was the worst man to ever live, and you let me slay him, now let me slay his daughter!”

Lysa would have reacted quick, but she had not known Baphosarex was dead. Brass-crown (or rather, Gabriel), did not fill the silence, and so she had the moment to do it herself.

“My father was white, but I never met him,” she spoke, then paused, “Baphosarex was my teacher, but I held no love for him. The men were the same, but were different men.”

A silence followed her voice. Sweat beaded on her forehead, and the screams in the distance were growing both quieter and less frequent. The fight was closing, the dungeon almost taken in full. Soon, they would find the Princess. Gabriel spoke, his voice darker than before, her words still stirring ‘neath his eyes.

“You are an enemy of the temple. Through my rebellion against my brother, so too am I. In this sense, Lysa, we share a foe. They will use holy magicks against me, so I will arrange unholy magicks against them. These days, you can’t win a war with steel and faith alone. Sorcery is always needed, and I happen to be lacking a sorcerer. And besides, I said I would find use for all the prisoners, no?”

“My Lord, think of-”

“Of the gods? They have offered me no boon. They gave me a war and ten thousand enemies. They handed my throne to a usurper. They fill my enemies with vigor and their weapons with light. Alonso, you are my greatest friend, my loyal sword-hand, and so your faith is of no issue with me. Will my apostasy be an issue with you?”

“The gods have not betrayed you, lord, it is their speaker, a mortal, who betrayed you-”

“Will you swear to be loyal, Alonso?”

Alonso set his jaw, averted his gaze. A breathless moment passed, and seemed as though Gabriel would strike him, but the knight nodded and the oath was sworn again.

“Good. Lysa of Carel, will you agree to serve me, to enact my wishes, and to work your evil art to further my cause?”

“If it’d free me of these chains, Lord, I’d be a dancer and a baker too,” she said, her voice dripping with the gratitude that northern lords so often expected of a woman who breathed their air.

“Then Alonso will smash them loose.”

And that was his first mistake. He would make many in the weeks to come, but for now, Alonso was making them for him. The knight smashed the chains apart like they were twigs on a tree branch - Lysa winced whenever his arm rose and squeaked whenever it fell. She would criticize the method, but held her tongue. A few moments of anxiety was restitution enough for her freedom. When they were destroyed, she fell forward as she had been balancing on a fence - the stake through her feet saw to that. She cried out, fell onto her face, and then a sympathetic Gabriel pulled the thing out. Lysa shut her eyes. On her face or not, ‘twas nice to lay down a moment - even if she could sense the eyes on her bare back. She was glad to have never been vain; a few dozen scars was nothing to a woman who didn't need to look fair, she thought.

Vanity aside, a matter of greater import was quickly brought into the audience of her mind: Her arms, her legs, were motionless, and not even her great will could compel them into action. With a sigh, she requested aid, and Alonso set her against a wall so that she could see the room and the corpse of the inflictor. Already did the crushed head fester. A dozen crawlies crawled about the ruined aspect; here was the feast of kings, who now were gathering ‘round the table of the skull fragments. The torturer had been a fat man, with a strong grip. He had the breath of a pig and the tongue of a dog. But what was he like underneath all of that? Lysa found herself wondering about his bones. About the individual notches on his spinal column. About the joints ‘twixt his arm and forearm. About the bits on the ground. She only remembered her company when Lord Gabriel kneeled beside her.

“You’re a necromancer,” he stated plainly.

“As any student of Baphosarex would be. You’ve unbound me, though my limbs are of a different want. If it’s me you need risen, you’ll best call a physician, but the dead will rise for me with but a word and a twist of my spirits - alongside some practical material, if you’d grant me it.”

“When they find my daughter at the bottom of this place, she will be dead. You will rise her, else you’ll join her. What materials need you?”

Lysa told him what she needed - the life of a woman. There would be others in The Crypt, and it would be no issue. When Gabriel turned around, Lysa let her face speak truth, and so she grinned.