15. Rescue

What really made him take a decision was his tiredness rather than logical reasoning: he headed for the column closest to the dragon, and he sat down, leaning back on the cold marble. He immediately saw, from the priest’s expression, that his behavior wasn’t standard, but he decided not to get alarmed. An annoying sting had begun to spin through his wound, and he judged that the calming effects of the poultice were probably starting to wear off. He assumed the most comfortable position he could while the two lookouts were whispering at the opposite side of the hall.

I hope I haven’t committed a sacrilege by sitting down this way, because if they call the guard now, I’m lost, he pondered.

He set a focused and serene expression, and he risked a glimpse to his sides. Zaadma had said the entrance to the catacombs was in the Main Chapel. The good point was that this one was the most lighted, thanks to the dome and the candles. But this detail, in the long run, was also likely to become a bad point.

He used his time to study the place. The hall was slightly circular, and the columns were bluish. These were engraved with endless artistic characters, which surely formed sentences extracted from some holy book. Despite the dark, Dashvara was pretty sure to recognize the Sagipse script, the common writing.

His gaze lowered to the corners of the hall, looking for some opening. He couldn’t stop thinking that everything inside the temple oozed the splendor of the Dragon Brotherhood. After a long time searching for an entrance, he realized that the two lookouts were still whispering at each other. They wouldn’t have been chatting so calmly if they had wanted to wake some dragon or some guard. Then, the whispers stopped, and there was the noise of a grating opening. Dashvara saw the tall man disappear into an adjacent hall. He was not a human, he thought. He looked like an elf, but his skin was golden. An elfocan, perhaps, he supposed.

He kept shooting inquisitive glances to the dark corners whenever he saw that the lookout near the entrance wasn’t looking in his direction. On both sides of the dragon’s huge head, there was a grating leading to a small chapel plunged into darkness. In front of him was a wooden, thick table with some receptacles that were reflecting the soft light of the three lit candles… Suddenly, an infernal noise resounded in the whole temple, and Dashvara, paralyzed, believed for an instant that the White Dragon itself had woken up from its long sleep. The banging occurred again, twice. Dashvara was shivering. He had no idea what all that could mean.

He heard some footsteps approaching, and he lifted his eyes again. The lookout emerged from the shadows and stopped before him.

“It’s the hour of the Blind Eye,” he announced. “The dragons of Rocavita are processing to the temple, and they should arrive any time now. Please, brother, I have to ask you to go to a minor chapel if you haven’t finished with your solitary prays.”

Dashvara nodded, swallowing his consternation. Apparently, at night, everybody went to the Temples of the Dragon. Even the slave-traders, he thought bitterly. He stood up, and he noticed that his muscles had become totally numb. Instinctively, he held up his forearm to his ribs, and the lookout made a concerned face.

“Are you ill?” he worried.

Dashvara scowled at him, but he regained his composure. If the lookout thought he was ill, perhaps he would suspect him less.

He didn’t answer, and he headed for the nearest open chapel walking proudly as someone who doesn’t want to let know his weaknesses. He nearly asked the lookout how much time these dragons of Rocavita would be praying, but he held his tongue. The less he talked to him, the better.

He also nearly lunged at him to give him a good punch on the head. He hesitated, and he tried to guess whether what was holding him back was his common sense or simple apprehension. He sighed, and he sat down in a corner of the chapel, in front of a stone pedestal upon where there was a big, silver cup. He pretended to be lost in thought, and the lookout moved away as soon as psalms began to raise outside. Dashvara got up abruptly. If he managed to find the door before the arrival of the prayers, he could disappear without being seen. They would notice his absence, of course, but how could he prevent it?

I should have gone in with those prayers, he thought, biting his lower lip.

Then, he saw the elfocan, who was descending some inner stairs, and he realized that he himself had just walked out of the minor chapel. He gave a sharp nod, and the elfocan responded quietly before heading toward the big stone dragon. There was a metallic sound of chains, and the prayers overran the temple. Dashvara felt even kind of happy about such an invasion. They were more than forty. A ten was wearing white tunics, and a purple belt around the waist. The others wore festive and proper clothes, and Dashvara guessed that they were inhabitants of Rocavita who accompanied the procession.

And do they do this every night, or do they do it just today to provoke me? the Xalya grumbled.

Sitting down again in the corner of the chapel from where he could see part of the Main Chapel, he saw all the faithful kneeling down before the dragon’s head without ceasing to chant. He had to admit that the scene was quite surprising. But exactly how much time they had planned to stay?

“Owrikasteir!” one of the prayers suddenly exclaimed, making Dashvara jerk up. A half-dwarf-half-another-thing had just got up to his feet in front of the dragon, and he joined both hands cloaked under the large sleeves of his tunic. “White Dragon of Goodness! You who saved us from hatred and death, you who showed us the way of knowledge and who placated the fears of our ancestors! My brethren and I bring you our souls tonight for you to purify them from the lethal breath of the Black Dragon. Receive, in return, our mortal devotion.”

The psalms were by now extinguished, and a deep silence of respect and adoration reigned over the vast hall. Dashvara suppressed a sigh of impatience, and he leaned back again on the wall, caressing with a fingertip the long, thin body of a red snake painted on the floor. Be patient, he told himself.

He was so patient that, when he heard voices, he opened his eyes realizing he had fallen asleep. This simple observation filled him with disbelief and irritation, but it was on seeing a figure dressed in dark blue clothes sitting down beside him when he became fully awake. He made a motion to grasp his sabers, but he stopped halfway through, remembering where he was. And then he remembered that he hadn’t any saber anyway. His eyes narrowed then widened.

“Aydin?”

The ternian smiled slightly.

“I see that my recommendations as a healer have failed badly,” he murmured.

The prayers were now dispersed among the distinct minor chapels, Dashvara noticed. How long had he slept? Surely no more than one hour, he deemed. He held back an ironic grimace. With such efficiency, anyone would think he had decided to rescue his sister by waiting until the time knocked down the temple.

“Can I ask you what a pagan does here, praying to a divinity he doesn’t believe in?” Aydin asked.

Dashvara’s mouth contorted.

“You can. Actually, I could ask you too why you pray to a dragon that is supposed to have a good heart, and at the same time, you allow a man to buy the life of ten people without even denouncing him.”

Aydin’s pale skin lost the little color it had.

“What are you talking about?”

“You know it full well,” Dashvara whispered. “You have been there, in Nanda’s village. You saw how ten young Xalyas were sold to that scoundrel. You know they are in Republic’s territory, in Rocavita. And you don’t denounce it… because of cowardice?”

A trace of pain showed in Aydin’s face; however, unexpectedly, this one smiled.

“I’ve never denied I was a coward.”

The glare that Dashvara cast him didn’t wither him.

“I have a wife and children,” the ternian whispered. “My act of bravery is to accept my cowardice. My selfishness would be not to accept it. Boy,” he sighed, “please tell me you won’t denounce Arviyag.”

Dashvara did not even hear the question. He had half straightened, and he was trying to give some sense to that merchant’s words.

“You have a wife and children,” he echoed back at him. “Is that an excuse to behave like a scoundrel? What kind of education can the children receive when their father helps such a miscreants’ trade?” Suddenly, all the scorn he felt towards that man vanished, and he blew out, amused. “I envy you, republican. My father would have rather killed all his children with his own hands than renounce his honor. But, all in all, who knows what the honor really is?”

Aydin’s expression was startled.

“You’ve called me miscreant and scoundrel, and then you say you envy me?” He wiped a hand across his forehead, and Dashvara noticed he had the claws out. He continued: “I do wonder if the life of those unfortunate women won’t be more fortunate now than in your village full of savages. I didn’t come here to argue, man of the steppe,” he added when he saw Dashvara frowning. “This is a holy place. If I came up to talk to you it was only because I was curious to know what you were doing here. Now, for my family’s sake, I prefer to know nothing more,” he affirmed, rising to his feet. “May the Dragon guide you.”

Dashvara watched him bowing down respectfully before the silver cup. He didn’t answer, and he waited for him to move away before standing up and glancing at the main hall. The prayers were leaving the prayer rooms, and they were gathering by the entrance, silently; the elfocan was putting out the candles lit up in the minor chapels. As for the lookout, Dashvara saw him walking toward the gates with a bunch of keys.

The moment was ideal.

Dashvara dashed for the Main Chapel, where only a candle was burning now, just in front of the marble mouth of the dragon. He drew away from the light furtively, went around the chapel behind the columns, frantically searching for an opening or some stairs… He heard a grating of chains. The lookout was opening the gates. Dashvara breathed in deeply, and he stopped in his tracks when, on arriving at the back of the hall, he saw something he hadn’t noticed before: the Dragon White’s head was hacked. A small corridor about one step and half wide separated it from a wall richly adorned. Zaadma hadn’t said that the entrance was situated in the Main Chapel. She had said it was in the dragon. In its head.

With a sudden shiver, he glanced at the exit. The prayers were leaving in an orderly way. The lookout would probably think he had left with them. The elfocan was emerging from a chapel, and Dashvara knew that, if he had moved then, the elfocan would have seen him in all likelihood. He waited, motionless as a statue, until the priest turned his back toward him. Then, he rushed forward. He reached the small corridor and found the door, plunged into darkness.

He was surely the man who thanked the White Dragon of Rocavita the most and the best that night. He touched the old wood, and he tried not to demoralize when he discovered there wasn’t a latch. A big lock was locking the two leaves.

No time to be sophisticated, he thought. He seized the metal bar from his boot and glanced cautiously out of the corridor. The last prayer was already crossing the doorway, and the lookout was about to close the door…

Just when the temple entrance shut, Dashvara, gripping the bar with both hands, blindly smashed down on the lock. He didn’t wait to check whether this one had gotten broken, and when the lookout began to move the chains, Dashvara hit again with all his strength. There was such a bang that, for a second, he wasn’t able to move. The lock had fallen to the floor, destroyed.

He stretched a hand, yanked at the chain links, and shoved. Before the lookout had finished setting the chains, he jumped down to the first step, turned around, and quickly shut the door.

This time I sure am totally in the dark, he thought.

He rubbed Zaadma’s metal disk hopefully, and he sighed in relief when he saw light. It barely lit the next steps, but at least it lit a bit. Without stopping to wonder how this strange object did work, he put his metal bar back in one boot, and he started to go down.

The stairs were made of white marble, and as he descended, Dashvara noticed that the disk light was getting brighter. Up in the vaulted ceiling, there were carved characters written in an elegant calligraphy, as well as finely engraved sculptures. Dashvara just took a casual glance at it, without stopping. When he arrived downstairs, he could make out, beyond the light halo, big cavities in the rock. And in each one, there was a coffin.

My mother would have loved this place, he thought.

The Dungeon of Xalya had catacombs too, and to tell the truth, they were much more stifling and gloomier than these. Instead of black rock, the catacombs of Rocavita were covered with white and golden paintings, as if the dead could care.

Just where the stairs ended, there was a wide, perpendicular corridor. Uncertain, Dashvara looked left, and then right. He sharpened his ears. There was no sound.

If you don’t know where to hit, feint and test the water, captain Zorvun had advised him once.

Dashvara shrugged, and he chose the right-hand path. Soon, he found stairs again, also wide and white, but shorter. The next corridor led to a squared room, and then to stairs again. For a moment, passing by coffins and more coffins, he asked himself who those people were. The dead of Rocavita? Sure, they did not look as old as most of the coffins that were lying under the dungeon. Dashvara would have never imagined that catacombs could be so large.

At some point, the white marble was replaced by gray rock, and Dashvara suddenly thought he had just woken up from a dream. Walking among the dead was not one of his most favorite activities. But at least he didn’t need to fight them.

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The corridor he was crossing now looked pretty much as if nobody had visited it for decades. He was casting curious glances to both sides when, suddenly, he came across a grating. Furrowing his eyebrows, he noticed that the iron, though old, was very solid. He tried hopelessly to open it, but it didn’t even slightly move. He held out the lantern between the iron bars, attempting to see what there was on the other side. Perhaps it was only a sort of grotto, he reasoned. The light of the disk was fading away. Sighing, he rubbed it vigorously, and the object gleamed intensely.

From the shadows, a skull face popped up, smiling at him sinisterly.

Dashvara promptly jerked backwards, shivering.

“It’s okay,” he whispered to calm down. “It’s dead. Full dead.”

He moistened his cold lips with his tongue, and he turned around. He had to choose another way. He was returning to one of the crossings when he heard a loud, grating noise that made him turn deathly pale.

At this rate, you will have a heart attack before finding your people, o great steppe lord, he upbraided himself.

There was another banging, and Dashvara tried to control his trembling limbs. In the catacombs, the only living beings were the visitants, he repeated inside.

And stop raving about walking dead men.

He heard voices, and he narrowed his eyes. Perhaps it was the Xalyas? No, he thought. They were men’s voices. And they were growing louder.

He glanced at his metal bar, and his mouth twisted. He had no way to know who those men were. Maybe they were just some lookouts. Deep down, he knew they weren’t, but that didn’t prevent him from crouching down on the ground and rolling into one of the lower cavities that didn’t have coffins. At least he thought they didn’t until his hands touched wood. He lifted his disk and noted that the lower cavities were tunnels about two feet and half in height where coffins were forming a long row—so long that the shadows engulfed them.

He heard a laugh and footsteps. He gave a dismayed look at the disk, which was shining like a full Moon. How to put it out? He supposed that it would get extinguished if he could cool it but… With a grimace, he pushed the cover of the first coffin, and without looking at it, he flung the disk into it and shut it again.

Soon, Dashvara perceived the trembling light of a torch, accompanied by footsteps. They weren’t more than two, he calculated.

“Don’t be ridiculous, Stim,” a sarcastic voice said. “Dead men tell no tales. How could they denounce us?”

“I dunno,” that Stim answered, wavering, “but… Vand, there are holly tombs here.”

“All of them are, in theory,” Vand snorted. “Come on, let’s hurry up before we are relieved. That’s the opportunity of our lifetime, buddy. Are you going to waste it?” There was a chuckle. “Rings with precious stones. Beauties as you have never seen, Stim. Come on. Let’s split us up. If you see one of those individual crypts, give me a shout. Those are made for the governors and the wealthy people. We see us in this crossing, okay?”

“Okay, but, Vand…” Stim cleared his throat as if to conceal his quivering voice. “They can’t arrive before we return. If they see we have forced the grating, and if they find out we have left the prisoners alone—”

“Go back if you’re such a coward, boy,” the other replied bitingly. “See you later.”

Some footsteps went away, along another corridor. Stim kept immobile for a while. And then he chose the corridor where Dashvara was hiding.

So these were the efficient prison guards of Arviyag. Dashvara hardly suppressed a sarcastic laugh. He saw leather boots passing by his cavity, and he guessed that, as soon as that Stim found the grating, he would hasten to join his partner. He drew a deep breath, veiled his face, and came out of hiding. Swiftly, he sprung to his feet, and he was already lifting his metal bar when Stim stopped short. He had not even time to turn around. Dashvara gave him a rough blow strong enough to knock him to the ground and make him out cold. The torch fell down onto the floor with a dull sound, and the Xalya held the unconscious body before laying it down kindly.

Why haven’t I killed him?

However hard Dashvara sought a precise answer, he couldn’t find it. This boy, who must be his age, worked for a slave-trader. But Dashvara doubted this was a sufficient reason to dispatch him.

He picked up the torch and looked over the prison guard’s belt and pockets, searching for the keys. He found nothing. He shrugged and took a dagger from the boy’s strap before making him roll into one of the cavities. When he woke up, he sure would be frightened to the bone, he thought, with a macabre smile.

He returned to his hiding place, and he got his disk back. He shoved it in his pocket, and then he began to go along the corridor where the slavers had come from. He had the impression that he was very close to his aim.

The walls became rougher, and then there were no more cavities with tombs. About fifty steps away, he found another grating, and he noticed it was slightly open. He crossed to the other side, and pretty soon, he began to hear voices, as well as an unremitting metal creak. He stepped forward cautiously, and he passed by some stairs that led somewhere up. The secret way out, perhaps? He could not be totally sure, but the noise did not come from there.

“They will kill us all,” a girl’s voice was whimpering. “There’s no way, Fayrah. Even if you manage to open the grating, we don’t know where we are. Who knows, perhaps we’re locked in the dark dungeons of Dazbon. Or in the—”

“Enough, Lessi,” another whispering voice admonished her.

Dashvara felt a wave of happiness when he recognized his sister’s voice. Without hurrying, he kept moving along the corridor. He didn’t bother to be stealthy.

“They’re coming!” one of the Xalyas hissed.

The metallic creaks stopped instantly. He went into a room plunged in a total dark. Thanks to his torch, he discerned some immobile silhouettes behind a large grating. Almost all the prisoners were sitting on the floor. Two of them had a bench, and one was near the grating with an expression of pure horror on her face. Dashvara had just enough time to see the piece of metal his sister was holding before she hid it out of his sight. This simple fleeting sight filled him with hope. Fayrah hadn’t renounced freedom, he understood gladly. He approached the iron bars, and he gazed at their faces for some seconds before focusing on the iron door. This one was locked with a thick chain and a lock. It wouldn’t be easy to open it, he deemed. Even though, he couldn’t get discouraged now that the Xalyas were just in front of him. He placed the torch on a candelabra fixed to a wall, he closed the door of the room, and he went back to the grating, lowering his veil upon his face. He smiled at them all.

“Hello, princesses. I’ve come to rescue you all,” he announced.

The silence lasted, and Dashvara was startled to see that Fayrah didn’t recognize him at once. He made use of it by giving instructions:

“Don’t be scared. I will get you out of here. It’s likely that someone will hear me, so when I open this door, don’t get out until I ask you to, okay?”

Fayrah stammered:

“Dashvara? It can’t be. I saw you die.”

Dashvara got troubled. Could it be that Fayrah was starting to have hallucinations?

“Everything will be all right, Fayrah,” he affirmed. He took out his metal bar, and he drew closer to inspect the lock. This one seemed as if it came from the best Akinoa smithy, he complained.

He was considering the possibility of attacking a link when Fayrah stretched a hand between the iron bars and touched his arm.

“You’re alive,” she whispered. Fear was still showing in her beautiful face as if she expected her brother to change into a prison guard at any moment.

Dashvara swallowed, and he set an appeasing face.

“Everything will be all right,” he repeated. “And now, if you please, keep an eye on the door entrance while I’m working, and warn me if someone comes in.” He took Fayrah’s hand and squeezed it tenderly to inspire her with courage before adding: “Step away from the grating, sister.”

Fayrah stepped away, tottering backwards, and Lessi, her best friend, held her with an anxious expression that would have inspired the best artists. Who would have thought she was the daughter of the brave captain Zorvun…

Dashvara didn’t allow himself to nourish any fatal thought, and he fell to work. Praying for the door to muffle the noise, he calculated the best angle, and he gave a strong blow on one of the links. The metal was barely damaged. He hissed.

“Damned chain.”

Some blows later, noise no longer bothered him. He would wake up all the people of Rocavita if he had to! He wasn’t going to leave without his sister.

After a while that seemed endless to him, he managed, at last, to make the chain burst. An axe would have been more effective, but the metal bar worked marvelously well too.

“Fayrah, help me remove it,” he rushed her.

They both started turning the chain as quickly as possible.

The shadow on the floor warned Dashvara before Lessi gave a high-pitched shriek. He whirled around just to see the hem of a cloak fleeing away across the open door.

He didn’t think twice. He abandoned the chain, and he dashed after the prison guard. This silly fool was carrying a chest, and as he didn’t want to drop it, Dashvara reached him in a few strides. He hit him on the neck, and the slaver slumped onto the floor letting out a stifled shout. He didn’t fall unconscious, and Dashvara had to give him another blow for him to stop crying.

“Eternal Bird,” he panted. He noticed that the prison guard was still grasping his beautiful chest, surely belonging to some governor of Rocavita. He shook his head. “You fool.”

Getting hold of Vand’s saber, he kept the bar and went back to the room just when Fayrah was pushing the grating.

Immediately, the Xalyas rushed out, forgetting Dashvara’s order. He glowered at them, irritated.

“Don’t panic!” he barked. “You are Xalyas. Behave as such.”

Instantly, they all calmed down. Fayrah lunged forward to embrace him.

“Dashvara!” she sobbed. “I… I thought all of you had died.”

Dashvara drew her away tenderly and stretched a hand to lift her chin. There was such a pure innocence in Fayrah’s eyes!

“Please, sister. Now you have to be strong. Follow me to the corridor, you all. Make sure the prison guard doesn’t wake up, and if he does” —he drew out his bar again and handed it to Fayrah— “give him a good blow.”

His sister widened her eyes, but she nodded without complaining.

“I’ll find a way out,” Dashvara added. “If you hear more than one person going down these stairs, run to this corridor. You will find other stairs that lead to the temple. There, there is a lookout who has the keys of the entrance.”

He seized the torch, and he was going to give it to Lessi, but when he saw her trembling like a leaf, he decided to give it to another girl. He laid a boot on the first step, and he realized that the ten Xalyas were staring at him, expectantly. He looked pointedly at them all, setting a determined face.

“Don’t forget we are children of the Eternal Bird. Don’t let fear overwhelm your minds. You still have a people and a life to defend.”

His words lit up their faces, and Dashvara started to go upstairs, wondering how many miracles and how many disasters a few words were capable of causing.

The stairs were short, and he took out Zaadma’s disk again when the shadows began to engulf him. He rubbed it just a bit, praying for it not to light too much. A soft light, like that of a lightning bug, awoke.

And a foul odor slapped him. His face screwed up, and he arrived in something that seemed to be the bottom of a huge, bricked well. He made the light stronger, and for a moment, he stood fascinated. He was in a circular room about thirty feet in diameter. A narrow corridor crossed it, fringed by thick horizontal gratings, which opened onto emptiness. The evil-smelling air was almost choking. Seemingly, just below, the sewers passed there, with all the sewage.

He lifted his eyes, and what he saw at the back cheered him up. There was a door.

Knowing full well that he was exposing himself, Dashvara crossed the room and extended a hand to the door. It was made of wood. He sharpened his ears. He heard nothing more than the distant flow of the pipes water. He thrust the disk into his pocket, and he unsheathed the saber.

It’s now or never.

He turned the door handle, and he almost jumped in surprise when this one opened effortlessly. A soft, fresh breeze bit his face. He went out, crouching down, searching for signs of any Arviyag’s man standing guard outdoors. He saw nothing. Only a long, dry earthy corridor fringed by a high wall. The Gem’s light scarcely managed to illuminate the alley.

He went back inside and hurried back to the Xalyas. Leaving them behind had only been a waste of time, he realized. He found them in the same place, but on hearing his footsteps a few had risen like some awkward hares. It hurt Dashvara’s heart to think that, if instead of him it had been prison guards, the Xalyas wouldn’t have remained free for more than ten minutes.

“Follow me.”

“And what about this man?” one asked.

Dashvara remembered that her name was Aligra and that she was a good friend of his brother Showag. She was sixteen, was an orphan, and if he remembered well, she was known for being a lunatic. Her weird question proved it. Dashvara took a glance over the avaricious prison guard, and he checked without any surprise that he was still unconscious. He didn’t answer Aligra’s silly question, and he grunted:

“Let’s go.”

All the women started to go upstairs. Dashvara went ahead, and they were already crossing the stinking room when the outside door burst open. Dashvara cursed under his breath.

“Get back!” he roared.

The Xalyas were immediately overcome by panic, and they backed in disorder. For some seconds, the two figures standing in the doorway stayed as if petrified. It wasn’t hard for Dashvara to understand that they were the next watch relief. Fearing that they would warn more companions, he thrust at them. He underestimated the courage of Arviyag’s men, for these, without even an exclamation, went in and unsheathed their sabers. They had recovered from the surprise in an impressively short time. And, seemingly, they knew how to fight.

They are warriors, what did you expect?

Gripping the saber and the dagger, Dashvara took one step back toward the corridor. At least he could take advantage of the room arrangement: they could only fight in turn. Unless they were reckless enough to fight on the gratings, at the risk of stamping some foot in a hole, but…

All his thoughts vanished at once when he noticed that one of them was drawing a gadget from a purse fastened to his belt. A dart. Dashvara had no sooner dodged the projectile than the man threw another one at him. The second got hammered in his right shoulder, but the third never reached its target. He jumped almost literally into the other attacker, hiding from the ranger.

The Xalyas were so silent that Dashvara felt the temptation to look backwards to make sure they were still alive, but obviously, he didn’t.

Never lose sight of your enemy.

This time, he didn’t have to conceal his Xalya attacks: the main objective was to survive. He disarmed the slaver, and he was just about to give him a fatal strike when the man, stepping backwards, took out a dagger using his available hand. His lips twisted in a terrible grimace.

“You’re good, but not enough.”

He let out a stupid laugh, and Dashvara paused, startled. Anyone would have thought he was still holding his saber, the way he behaved. Or was there some trick he had not noticed?

“Don’t attack!” his companion advised him. “Just make sure he doesn’t approach. The poison is starting to affect him.”

Indeed, Dashvara felt that his shoulder was burning like a fire. His right hand was becoming numb. He let his dagger fall and shifted the saber to the freed hand before attacking without allowing his adversary enough time to adapt himself. With a quick slash, he left him bleeding, lying down facing the grating, and he lunged at the poisoner.

Something, in his head, burst like a flame. What if the poison was fatal? He had no way to know. He was aware that the most reasonable thing to do would have been to neutralize the man and interrogate him about the matter, but… he didn’t want to die in the meantime and let the Xalyas at the mercy of the slave-traders once more.

He disarmed him more easily than the other, and the man, widening his eyes, reeled backwards, toward the grating.

“I have the antidote. Don’t kill me or else you will die. I have the—”

Dashvara slit his throat. Immediately, he thought that the hell itself had just exploded inside him. He dropped to his knees, with his body writhing around with convulsions. He mustered his last energies to shout:

“Xalyas, your steppe lord orders you to escape! Now!”

He did not fall unconscious yet. He pulled the dart out of his shoulder, and he dragged himself to the corpse while hearing hurried footsteps and whimpers full of tension. One of the purses was empty, the one with the darts. Another one contained a small box. He opened it with trembling hands, and he blinked, trying to see the contents clearly. There were powders ordered in cells. Maybe antidotes. Or maybe not. Probably not. It was clear that, the way the slaver had formulated it, the poison of that dart was lethal, so Dashvara didn’t think twice before lifting the small box, throwing back his head, and pouring everything he could into his throat.

“Dash!” Fayrah yelled. She grasped him by the arm. She was crying in tears. “Dash, tell me you’re not going to die.”

Dashvara stared at her, swallowed the last mouthful of powders, and suddenly, he burst into laughter like a madman.

Tears welled up in his eyes; his laughter resounded noisily in that stinky room. Fayrah was gaping at him, open-mouthed. The other Xalyas seemed to have escaped, all of them, except two. One of these was lying on the floor, unconscious.

“Aligra, wake Lessi and run away,” Fayrah pronounced in a quivering voice, her eyes fastened on Dashvara. “I think my brother can’t help you more.”

Dashvara had cracked up uncontrollably.

“Eternal Bird, I sure can’t!” he howled, writhing about on the floor. “But I’m not going to die, little sisthahaha…!”

He choked, and he began to cough. He felt as if his whole mind were about to burst. A beam of hope lit Fayrah’s eyes.

“Truly?”

“It’s what you asked me to say,” Dashvara teased, trying to sit up. Each breathing gave him the impression that he had stakes hammered into his whole body, but a strange euphoria engulfed him. His throat croaked. “Hehe. I don’t know whether that poison was fatal, but with all that stuff I’ve just gulped, no doubt I’m going to meet our parents and siblings very soon!” He guffawed, and despite the fact this way the pain was getting worse, he kept laughing loudly, flopping down slowly onto the floor while the light was being devoured by the shadows.

And then, his dulled ears perceived Fayrah’s exclamation of surprise.

“Wh-who are you?”

“We have no choice,” whispered a voice that sounded to Dashvara as if coming from beyond the grave. “Come with us. We’ll get this fool out of here.”

Before being swallowed by the darkness, Dashvara could see the face of a woman with lovely eyes and thin and pressed lips. Her expression seemed so funny to him that he burst into laughter, and the pain knocked him out.