The world rocked again, accompanied by a loud, painful thump. Hadrian opened his eyes. His cheek — pressed against rough, vibrating wood — throbbed along with the rest of his head. Sunlight, bright and harsh, entered a barred window and stung his eyes. His wrists hurt and were tied — no, manacled behind his back. He tried to swallow. Yes, his tongue, throat, and mouth were dry, but the real problem was the wide iron collar. Metal links connecting his wrists to the neckband dug into his back.
He lay inside an enclosed wagon. Three barred windows — small ones on either side and a large one in the door at the back — showed they traveled a two-track road across flat, open ground. Another hard jolt and pain bloomed in Hadrian’s right side. Having his arms wrenched up toward the middle of his back wasn’t helping. After one more painful bump, a hard hammering blow that made him clench his teeth, Hadrian sat up — not an easy thing to do, trussed up as he was.
The sun between the bars indicated either the lateness of the day or a dawn newly born. Hadrian wasn’t alone. Royce sat across from him, knees up, head down, chained in the same way as Hadrian.
“Thought you’d never wake up,” Royce said.
“How long have I been out?”
Royce shrugged. “Day and a half, maybe.”
Hadrian’s mouth hung open. “Are you serious? That can’t be right. Last time it was only a few hours. And I drank less this time.”
Again Royce shrugged.
Hadrian dragged his pasty tongue across his teeth. “That would explain the taste in my mouth. I’m never drinking anything again.”
Outside, three men rode escort — one on each side, another at the rear. They wore the same black uniforms as the men who had broken into their room at Caldwell House. The sun was on the right side of the wagon. If it was evening, they were traveling south; if morning, north.
“What happened?” Hadrian asked.
“They put the drug in the cups on the shelf before we arrived.”
“Yeah, I gathered that much. I meant after.”
“You passed out, and we had uninvited company. They were very rude. I can’t believe you drank.”
“I didn’t expect everyone in Dulgath to be alchemists.”
“Not everyone, just her.”
“Her?”
“Feldspar,” Royce said bitterly.
“You think Scarlett was involved?”
“Same place. Same drug. Everyone conveniently absent. Doesn’t take a genius.” Royce nodded. “She’s working for Fawkes and Payne.”
“You’re not serious?”
Royce rolled not only his eyes but his head as well. “Let me guess. You’re in love with her.”
“No!” he said loud enough to anger the throbbing in his head. The wagon and the rough road were torturing him just fine; he didn’t need to help. “I like her, that’s all. She seems nice, sweet, and protective of her friends.” He looked out at the soldier trailing behind them. “Are you sure? I mean . . . I can’t believe I could misjudge a person so badly.”
“You’re not exactly known for your judgment of character, but don’t feel too bad. The woman is a professional. Most Diamond girls are trained at manipulation, and seduction — two of their best tools.”
Hadrian did feel bad. Not because he had been taken in by Scarlett, but at the thought that she could do such a thing. He really had liked her. Worse — he had believed her. Hadrian had bought that whole story about her escaping Colnora and finding a better life in the dale. Such a thing was easy to believe. He wanted it to be true, still did. “Any idea where we are?”
“The Old Mine Road.”
“The Old — ?” Hadrian lifted his chin. His side screamed again. Once more, he clamped his teeth in pain. For his effort, he saw mountains, the little green range separating Dulgath from Greater Maranon. “We’re not in Dulgath anymore. This is that road — the one you paused at on the way in — the one that went south.”
Which makes it late afternoon, coming on evening.
He looked again at the soldier behind them. He had his helm off and his chain coif thrown back. “Where are we going?”
“Manzant.”
The name was vaguely familiar, and not in a good way.
Royce assumed he didn’t know and added, “A salt mine on the rocky thumb of Maranon. It’s also a prison — sort of. You’re not going to like it.”
A salt mine prison? “Can you unlock these?” He jingled the chain holding his wrists.
“No.”
Royce let his head hang forward as if it weighed more that day. His hood was off, thrown back. So was his cloak, disheveled and torn, but his hair did a good job of hiding his face.
“Seriously?” Hadrian asked.
Royce took the effort to tilt his head and glare at him. “Hands are locked just like yours. I can’t reach my tools.”
“Well, maybe I can reach them.” Hadrian shoved to his knees, making a rattling sound as chains clattered on wood, then gasped as the sharp pain stabbed his side again.
“Won’t help,” Royce told him, lowering his face once more.
“Why not?”
“My right hand is broken. So is the middle finger of my left. Besides, I doubt they missed them when searching us.”
“Oh.” Hadrian sighed, then let himself slide back down. He moved slowly, bracing for more pain.
“What about you?” Royce asked.
“Cracked rib, I think.”
“That all?”
Hadrian nodded. “Pretty sure.”
Royce had his head up again and studied Hadrian’s face. “You look terrible.”
“Really?” Hadrian shifted his jaw and moved his cheek muscles, searching for bruises. “My face doesn’t even hurt.”
Royce shook his head. “Just in general, I mean. I don’t think I’ve ever just sat and stared at you before.”
Hadrian frowned. Getting back to a sitting position, he let his head rest on the wall behind him. “Why is it you always find your sense of humor when we’re about to die?”
Royce shrugged. “I suppose because that’s when life is at its most absurd.”
“We are going to die, right? I don’t want to get my hopes up unnecessarily.”
“If we’re lucky,” Royce replied without any hint of humor this time. “Manzant is a place where people go to disappear. A long, deep, narrow shaft. Dwarves built the mine centuries ago, a hideous achievement of incarceration. Inmates mine salt in the dark in return for food and fresh water. No tools, no protection, you either find a way to get salt or you die trying. In time, the salt leaches the very soul out of a man, or so I’ve heard.”
“Well, you’re in luck. Can’t squeeze wine from a stone, right?” Hadrian pulled on the manacles again. Now he remembered the name Manzant, the place Scarlett had told him about. She’d gotten away by escaping her chains, but that was probably a lie like everything else. “If we’re going to prison, what do you suppose the charges are? We haven’t done anything wrong.”
“You don’t have to do anything wrong to end up in Manzant. Like I said, it’s a mine as well as a prison. Ambrose Moor — he’s the administrator — doesn’t care where he gets workers. Criminals are fine, but he’ll pay decent money for slaves, too.”
“But we aren’t slaves.”
“We are now.”
Hadrian scanned the wagon and found it empty except for some rotting straw and extra chains that had turned a dark-rust color. They added to the loud jangle accompanying each hard bump. “You still have Alverstone?”
Royce shook his head. “Manzant slavers are excellent at their job. Not done yet. They’ll strip us naked when we get to the prison. Shave our heads, too.”
“Quit talking it up. You’re ruining all the surprises.”
The wagon hit another bump, a big one. They both groaned as the fixed axle hammered the road. Then the movement stopped. “What now? Are we there?”
Royce shook his head. He peered out the side window, head cocked, listening. “Water.” Royce paused. “Must be at Mercator Creek.” He nodded. “They’re watering the horses. We’re farther south than I thought.”
Hadrian heard a laugh. Two men talked, but their voices were too distant and muffled to understand.
“How far to Manzant?” Hadrian asked.
“Mercator Creek is less than ten miles from the prison, but in a wagon traveling up that twisting mountain road . . .” He looked out the window at the sky. “Be there tomorrow, I guess.”
“So we have a whole night to figure a way out.”
Royce gave him a pitiful smirk. “I really love the way you think things will all turn out fine. How did Feldspar put it? It’s so — cute.”
Hadrian frowned and tried to feel for the lock on his wrists, but his fingers were numb from being pinched.
Royce said, “Arcadius was right about you. It’s like you’re color-blind. Except it’s not colors you can’t see, it’s reality. Your problem is you expect too much from people.”
“I’m not the blind one here,” Hadrian replied. “I’ve seen the lows people can reach, believe me. But I’ve also witnessed heroic, even ridiculous levels of kindness. You have, too, but you ignore them. That’s blindness, my friend.”
Royce shook his head slowly and made a hissing sound — condescending laughter — a Royce Melborn trademark. “Water flows downhill,” he explained. “Cats eat mice. And sure, there’s the odd cold day in summer, or the freak warm spell in winter, but as a rule that doesn’t happen. In fact, it’s so not the rule it’s not worth mentioning. What you don’t understand, or choose to ignore, is that people care only about themselves. They wouldn’t risk money, much less their lives, for someone else. The only reason anyone would gamble their own neck for another person is if that other person’s life is important to their own welfare, and even then . . .” He shook his head and let out the same wispy laugh. “Fear drives most people. Acts of bravery are most often the result of ignorance or impulse. Given even a moment to think, to realize and reflect on the possible dangers, your would-be hero always gets cold feet.”
“I didn’t,” Hadrian said. “And you’re alive because of it.”
Royce smiled as if he’d expected this comment. “You’re right, and you know what? That’s bothered me for three years, but I’ve finally figured it out.”
Something banged hard against the side of the wagon. “You two still alive in there?” a harsh voice called. A face grinned in the window over Royce’s head.
“They’re fine. Both of ’em sittin’ up like this is their lucky day. You two just relax. We’ll be moving again soon enough, and by tomorrow, you’ll be home. Enjoy the sun, boys; it’s the last you’ll ever see of her.” The man laughed and then moved away, chuckling as he went.
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
“Nice fella,” Royce said. “Maybe he’ll help us.”
“Funny. So, what’s this thing you’ve figured out?” Hadrian asked.
“Oh, right. I determined the only reason you came back around the tower instead of climbing down and getting away was because you wanted to die.”
Hadrian’s eyes widened.
“Still do, in a way, I think. When you came back from Calis all disillusioned and lacking direction, you felt life had no point or purpose. You can’t stand to live in a world where people feed off others. You’d rather die in protest then accept the truth that life is misery and your fellow men are vicious animals who’ll jump at any opportunity to get ahead by stepping on their neighbor’s neck.”
“Okay.” Hadrian nodded. “Sounds like you’ve got me nailed down, but what about —”
“Gwen? She might just be that strange warm spell in winter. I don’t know.”
“No, not her. I was going to say, what about you?”
“Me?”
“The first time we entered Medford, you risked your life for me. More than that, you actually begged in the street for my sake. Why’d you do that?”
“Okay.” Royce nodded. “You can add one more condition to the list. Acts which run contrary to one’s own self interest are due to ignorance, impulse, and delirium.”
Hadrian laughed. “That’s a fine fortress you’ve built there, although none too comfortable, I suspect.”
“And that cloud you live on is going to disappear in Manzant. People don’t help others unless there’s something in it for them, and since we’re of no use to anyone, no one is going to help us.”
Out the rear window, between the vertical bars of iron, Hadrian spotted another traveler on the road. A wagon was coming their way.
----------------------------------------
Hadrian couldn’t believe his eyes.
He glanced at Royce for validation and found his partner staring out the back of the wagon, his mouth open, brows twisted in confused knots. “What’s she doing here?”
Scarlett Dodge was driving a buckboard pulled by a pair of mismatched horses. She’d traded her patchwork gown for a loose shirt and men’s trousers. She’d tucked her vibrant hair under a wide-brimmed straw hat. Hadrian hoped she wasn’t trying to pass for a man; she still looked every bit a woman despite the attire. As she neared, Scarlett steered her wagon to the left of the road, bringing it up alongside them. The bed of the buckboard was filled with six barrels: four marked beer, the other two ale.
“Hello there!” one of the black-uniformed men called to her.
“Hello,” she replied, her voice soft, meek, wary.
Hadrian and Royce both shifted to peer out the left-side window.
“What’s your name?” someone asked, too far past the corner of the window for them to see.
“I’m just stopping to water my horses. I’ll be on my way in a —”
“Didn’t ask you about your horses. I asked your name, sweetie. What is it?”
“Ruby.” Scarlett was too far to one side for Hadrian to see her face. His view consisted entirely of the wagon, barrels, and the hind ends of the horses.
“See, she knows better than to give her real name,” Royce said.
“She’s here to help us,” Hadrian told him.
“All by herself? Against six Manzant slavers?”
Hadrian looked out the rear window, searching for others. The road, flat and straight, was empty for miles.
Royce shook his head. “She’s the one who put us here.”
“What’s with the boy’s clothes, Ruby?” one of the slavers asked.
“Brother’s clothes. Easier to work in.”
“Where you taking all that beer and ale?”
One of them came to the wagon and jostled a barrel, then another. “They’re full.”
“They’re, ah — old. Going bad. Has a real rank taste. I’m taking them to Manzant to sell. Guards are grateful for whatever they can get.”
Hadrian leaned against the wall of the wagon.
She’s lying — but why?
Fawkes could have sent her to ensure they were locked away.
Do you understand the meaning of the word thorough?
His brain knew it was possible, even probable, but his heart didn’t want to believe.
She’s here to help, he reasoned. Maybe she tried to get others, too, but they refused. She’s stubborn and foolish and chased after us alone.
“You’re in luck, little lady. We’re from Manzant. You can give it to us.”
“Wasn’t planning on giving it to no one. I’m selling it, but sure, I can sell it to you. Let’s see, for all six kegs it’ll cost you . . . five yellow tenents or twelve with King Vincent’s profile.”
“Naw, I’m thinking these are donations.”
“Then you’d be thinking wrong.”
Two of the men lifted a barrel from the wagon and hauled it out of sight.
“Leave that alone!”
“Just taking a taste, honeysweet.”
“Stop it!”
“Looks like we’ve got ourselves a party, boys.”
“By Mar! We got beer, ale, and a pretty little thing to entertain us.”
“And you didn’t want to come.”
“I know, right? I would’ve been kicking myself.”
“We’re spending the night here, aren’t we? I mean, no sense in going any farther today, am I right?”
“Absolutely. Hey, Owen, why don’t you make a fire?”
“And just leave the whoring and drinking to you? Screw that.”
“I said stop it!” Scarlett’s voice cut a note higher. She was scared. The horses didn’t like it. The two on Scarlett’s wagon shuffled, making their tack jingle, and the lorry shifted forward and back.
Hadrian jerked on his chains; they rewarded him by cutting into his abused flesh. He pressed his face to the bars of the window, but he couldn’t see anything beyond Scarlett’s barrel-laden wagon.
“Why don’t you sit down?” a voice growled.
Startled by something, both sets of horses jerked. The wagon Royce and Hadrian were in lurched, slamming Hadrian’s face against the window. At the same time, Scarlett gasped. Not quite a scream, but close.
Hadrian jerked on the manacles again, and blood dripped around his wrists.
“Ain’t nothing wrong with this, is there?”
“Tastes fine to me.”
“It’s even a little cold.”
“I think she’s lying to us, don’t you?”
“Lying to us about more than the beer, I’ll bet. Those clothes are lying, too. They say you’re frumpy, but I’ll wager you’ve got quite a figure underneath.”
“No!” Scarlett shouted.
Running feet slapped dirt, and a moment later Scarlett appeared back in Hadrian’s vision. She stared through the little window, eyes wide with fear. “Help!” she screamed.
One of the men caught her by the arm. Scarlett jerked back and slammed against the side of their wagon. She screamed again. Another man grabbed her around the waist and lifted her up. Her hat came off, and that long red hair cascaded out. The men exclaimed in pleasure at the sight.
“Told you them clothes were hiding something special!”
Hadrian threw himself at the wooden wall. The boards, thick and solid, didn’t even shudder. The impact only served to jar his ribs, and a fresh bolt of pain stole his breath.
“Settle down in there!” one of the slavers shouted, banging on the wall of the wagon.
“They’re jealous of our good fortune,” another said.
With arms and feet thrashing, Scarlett was carried out of sight. Hadrian continued to press his face hard to the corner of the little opening in the wall, struggling to see what they were doing. All he saw were Scarlett’s horses standing, hoofing the ground and lifting their heads to watch what Hadrian couldn’t see. On the ground just outside, Scarlett’s hat lay in a rut, long red hairs caught in the brim.
Scarlett screamed. The sound was different this time, and Hadrian was surprised to discover that screams had their own language. Before she’d cried out in fear; now she shrieked in panic. Fear of the possible had become the terror of reality. She wailed until her cries were muffled. Things went quiet for a few seconds, and then she screeched again. After a minute or so, the screams stopped, and Scarlett settled into a whimpering ongoing sob.
Hadrian couldn’t help himself. He began to thrash, trying to find a way out of the chains, out of the iron manacles that had him helpless — a way that didn’t exist.
“Hold her!”
“Get her ankles! Get her goddamn ankles!”
Hadrian pulled on the iron, feeling the brackets cutting deeper, neither giving at all.
“Easy,” Royce whispered.
“I have to do something! I can’t just sit here and listen to this.”
“Nothing you can do. Relax.”
“I can’t relax!” he yelled. “She wasn’t involved, Royce. She’s here to help and now . . .” Hadrian put his face back to the window but still couldn’t see.
“You can’t do anything else,” Royce said in his all-too-cold, all-too-complacent, all-too-callous way. Times like this Hadrian hated his partner, hated his ruthless indifference. This side of Royce was devoid of compassion, of empathy. He could sit content while just outside —
Scarlett shrieked again, this time louder. The slavers replied with laughter.
Once more, Hadrian put his face against the bars of the window. The cool metal pressed against his cheek. “You sons of bitches!” Hadrian shouted. “Leave her alone!”
More laughter.
Royce did nothing. He sat on the floor of the wagon, his back against the wall. No struggling, no effort to squirm out of the manacles — he just sat there, head back, looking at his boots. At least he wasn’t smiling. That was something.
Scarlett wailed louder, and then fell back once more to sobs. After that came a good deal of grunting and some sounds of gagging and spitting. Then slowly, bit by bit, the noises faded. The horses still jangled their tack and stomped their hooves, but he couldn’t hear Scarlett anymore.
Did they kill her? The idea grew in his head.
At first, he didn’t want to believe it, but as the silence continued, he grew steadily more certain of the possibility. They’d killed her and were sitting around her body, drinking and recovering.
Hadrian stayed by the window, straining to hear. Wind brushed grass, making a sound as light as rain. A single cricket trilled a lonely note. Somewhere, a swallow chirped. So quiet.
Why is it so very quiet?
Footsteps.
Hadrian heard them shuffle on dirt. They paused, then grew louder as they approached Royce’s side of the wagon.
Feeling sick, furious, and drained, Hadrian turned toward the rear door, hoping someone would be stupid enough to open it. With his wrists bound up, there wasn’t much he could do, but he was pretty sure he could kill at least one.
Hadrian was good at killing — that was his skill, his one true talent. Once upon a time, he had actually been proud of that ability. He’d since outgrown his pride and sobered up from an addiction to blood, but at twenty years old he’d come too late to the simple wisdom that killing wasn’t something to take pride in. And yet there were times, moments like this, when he realized that even terrible talents had a use.
To his amazement, he heard a key enter the door’s lock.
They’re opening it!
Hadrian glanced at Royce with wide-eyed anticipation. His partner shifted to a crouch. His nimble, cat-smooth movement announced his agreement to an unspoken plan.
If the man opening the wagon door also has the key to our chains . . .
The door swung open. Both Royce and Hadrian started, then stopped short, confounded by the sight of red hair.
“Hang on, I have to find the right one,” Scarlett Dodge said, holding up a large metal hoop filled with a dozen keys. A bit of dirt smeared her shirt, and she had a grass stain on one knee of her trousers. Other than that, she looked fine. “Here, turn around,” she told Hadrian.
“You’re . . . you’re all right?”
“Yeah,” she said with a little puff of air — an almost-laugh that said, Why wouldn’t I be? “Turn around.”
He did as she instructed, sending Royce a baffled look. Royce didn’t look surprised, but his face was covered with suspicion.
Hadrian felt a tug on the manacles at his wrist.
“What did you do? Your skin is all torn up and bloody.” She loosened one; then both popped open, and his arms were free. The relief in his shoulders was immediate. A surge of blood reached his fingertips, igniting a burst of pins and needles. The ache in his side — while not gone — eased a bit.
“Hold steady,” she complained, starting to work on his collar.
“Are you sure you’re all right?” he asked.
“Me? Of course I’m sure.”
The heavy metal collar made a loud hollow clunk! as it hit the wagon’s bed. Hadrian rubbed at his raw neck and swallowed several times, enjoying the simple pleasure.
Scarlett paused before Royce, holding up the key. “If I unlock you, are you going to be nice?”
Royce said nothing. He stared at her with an unfathomable expression: anger, suspicion, but also something else.
Scarlett let out a frustrated sigh and went to work on Royce’s locks. As she did, Hadrian climbed out. A cool breeze chilled the sweat on his skin as he cautiously moved around between the two wagons. He headed toward the river, which proved to be no more than a pathetic trickle running over the road. High banks told tales of spring floods, but at that moment Mercator Creek wasn’t impressive. There was no bridge; the two-track road just plowed through a shallow section where rocks refused to wash away. The team of horses that had pulled the prison wagon drank from the rippling water. Scarlett’s pair were held by a hand brake, too far back to join the other horses. The two animals were slick with sweat, their hair soaked flat and dark beneath the leather straps and collar. She’d driven them hard — too hard to let them drink until they cooled down.
Around the front, a keg marked beer sat upright in the road. It looked exactly like a miniature rain barrel; its lid had been broken into two parts. The dirt around the base was dark and wet. A few inches away, he spotted a tin cup in the dirt. Next to it lay a slaver. He wasn’t alone. Hadrian counted the men and came up with all six. They were lying on the road or in the grass — although one was partially in the creek, the fingers of his left hand shifting in the current.
Royce came out of the wagon and pushed past. He descended on the nearest guard, his torn cloak spreading out like the wings of a vulture with the movement.
“You don’t have to —”
Before Scarlett could finish, Royce had pulled a dagger from the soldier’s belt and stabbed the man in the throat.
Royce moved to the next one.
“He doesn’t have to do that,” Scarlett said, moving to stand beside Hadrian.
“Don’t bother trying to stop him. There’s no way he’ll let them live.”
“No, it’s not that,” Scarlett said. “I didn’t drug them.”
Royce paused, looking first at her, then down at the man he straddled. He placed a hand to the slaver’s throat. He nodded in a sort of grim approval and rose. Still holding the dagger, he returned to Scarlett, who took three quick steps backward.
“Royce!” Hadrian shouted, but the thief ignored him.
He caught her by the throat with his left hand. His middle finger being broken, he used his thumb to hook under her chin, forcing her head back against the side of the prison wagon. The dagger was clutched awkwardly, painfully, in his other hand, which still bore the boot mark where someone had stepped on it. “Why’d you do it?”
“Royce — let her go!”
“I want to know why.”
“Because unlike you, she cares about people. We got to be friends the other day. She did it for me.”
“No,” Scarlett said. “I did it for him.” She managed a shallow nod at Royce.
The thief stared. “Explain why you’d risk your life for me. Explain fast.”
“Royce!” Hadrian yanked a sword from the belt of a black-uniformed man.
“I did it because you were drugged with my herbs. Someone took them from my place while I was out with Hadrian, but I knew you wouldn’t believe that. I knew you’d blame me, and that Manzant can’t hold you. And I heard what happened the last time you got out — what happened to those who helped put you there.”
“Royce!” Hadrian shouted, coming at him with the naked sword.
Royce let go of her and gingerly shifted the knife to his other hand, wincing as he did. He moved away from her.
Hadrian slowed down as he stepped through the grisly scene, ignoring the gathering flies. “This was stupid. What if they didn’t drink right away? What if they’d waited to celebrate their good fortune?”
“Riding in the hot sun all day?” Scarlett replied. “Pretty much a sure thing.”
“So they didn’t . . .” Hadrian looked at her but not directly in her eyes. It felt like too much of an intrusion. “They didn’t — you know?”
“No.” Scarlett gave her head a curt shake. She wore a little smile while narrowing her eyes, as if he both amused and bewildered her. Then she shrugged. “They were a little grabby near the end.” She pulled out the side of her shirt and peered beneath it with a scowl. “I’ll have a nasty bruise.”
“What if they had drunk from another barrel?” Hadrian asked.
“They’re all poisoned,” Royce answered for her. “But what if not all of them drank? What if the first one dropped dead before the others got around to it?”
Scarlett exposed a knife beneath the long tails of her shirt and shrugged.
“Might have killed one — maybe. These were Manzant slavers. They don’t go down easy.” Royce shook his head. “That was way too dangerous.”
“Glad you noticed,” she said. “And you should also note that this is Wagner’s entire supply of beer and ale — ruined to save you. So the two of you can go on back to wherever you came from, right? Hadrian’s swords are in the box up where the driver rests his feet. Wag says he saw them load up. That pretty white dagger and your coin, you’ll find on the bodies. Just take the horses, leave, and forget about Dulgath. Okay? Just leave.”
Hadrian saw the way Royce was clutching his broken hand.
Royce looked back at him with a familiar expression that was easy to read.
“Sorry,” Hadrian said. “We aren’t leaving.”