Urash was in agony. He struggled to decide the worst of it; the pain in his knee had become excruciating, but he also struggled to breathe with his broken ribs pinching his lungs. The few limbs that didn't torment him had long gone numb, and his movements became uncoordinated and stiff. His bad eye was now completely blind, and the left side of his face sunk at an odd angle. He was in too much pain to sleep or eat, and he begrudgingly accepted he would likely starve to death before the pain did him in.
At the very least, Urash was outside. The guards granted enough mercy to prop him against a log near the fire pit, but he had fallen to his side and now lay flat on his back. Once there, he refused to move. He’d let someone else bother with him, anything to avoid the pain.
But even the embers of the firepit overwhelmed Urash's senses. It wasn’t long before he missed the comfort of his master suite.
“If only they knew how flammable this Manor truly was,” pondered Urash, watching the flames fizzle overhead, “they’d think twice about this pit.” He attempted to laugh, but the pain in his chest was too much for even that.
Two of Urash’s mercenaries joined him around the pit, tied and bound to the surrounding logs. Most had already taken the chance to kill themselves, ingesting some sort of poison they carried on their persons. He had long heard rumors that his mercenaries carried it, but he had never been in a situation to see them follow through. Either from a lack of understanding or willful ignorance, they had never realized how dire the situation was until now. The ones left were too cowardly to have followed through.
But then there was the scarred woman. Boah had called her Eevi, so she must’ve stowed away in one of the mercenary’s outfits. He recalled Kirashi frequenting a place called “Eevi’s Tavern.” Either way, she was why he remained alive.
Urash hated her. More than Boah or Juddken or even the fat bastard that nearly crushed his skull.
Eevi sat at the end of the log, closer to Urash than the other mercenaries. She stared at the flames in silence, her eyebrows furrowed in frustration. She stayed completely still until a group of two young guards interrupted her. Urash doubted they were even part of the Corps; they could have been hooligans or outsiders, based on how they carried themselves. They hovered behind Eevi, smiling wicked smiles. Urash knew immediately what they would do once the others went to sleep.
“I keep telling her how pretty she is, but she won’t listen,” said one guard, looking deep into Eevi’s good side. “Cheer up, lass. Thought you’d know how to take a compliment. It’s a scary place here, didn’tcha know?”
The other guard ran his fingers through Eevi’s coarse hair. “They’re plannin’ a big sacrifice for ya’ tomorra. Wouldn’t wanta leave ya alone. I’ll protect ya, make sure to keep ya all nice'n pretty!”
“Oh yeah, always wanted to lay with a raider. It’d be like riding a yak!”
“Ow ‘bout this: you take the girly side, and I’ll take the scars. Always liked my meat well done!”
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The two guards laughed and nudged closer to Eevi. As they did, Urash watched her flash a smile, biting her lower lip and side-eying both of them. “Oh, you boys want to make love the steppefolk way? Ride me like one of your beasts of burden?”
The guards hadn't expected such a candid response. It halted their encroachment.
“You sweet, sweet boys. You have much to learn. In the desert, we begin with tongues. We don’t wait. I chew before I swallow. Real men have the skin to handle it. But when they don’t, I take it with me.”
The guards were with her until her last bit. “The fuck you on about?” one of them asked.
“You want to make love to an animal? I’ll give you an animal. You’ll get it all. Scratching, clawing, biting, ripping, gnashing! Believe me, you show me that shriveled shaft and I’ll leave you a eunuch. If you want sex you could only dream of, it’ll be the last thing you ever experience.”
The guards stood away in a mixture of arousal and fear. One of them pressed forward, trying to play with Eevi’s hair again. Before he could reach, Eevi hissed at him and reached for his groin with her bound hands. The guard yelped as he bounced away, and Eevi did the same for the other. The noise was enough to attract the attention of the other guards, who yelled across the firepit.
“Oy! Get the fuck away from the sacrifices!” A voice shouted. The guards, either from embarrassment or terror, slumped away back into the dark. Urash had to repress a laugh. He'd never seen men so well played by a woman.
“Feral,” Urash slurred. “Effective.”
Eevi grunted. “Bet they’ve never even slept with a woman. Blew their chance, poor things.”
A laugh escaped Urash, sending him into waves of pain.
“Sorry. Guess I shouldn’t be funny.”
“No,” Urash whispered. “No, no… Why didn’t you just let the oaf finish the job?” Urash wheezed, trying to reposition himself but failing. “Why blow your cover on me?”
“It wasn’t from the kindness of my heart. You dying wasn’t good for me.”
“Still a stupid thing. You being here at all. You were asking for trouble.”
Eevi sighed. “I’m stupid? Why’d you do it, anyway? Why piss them off? You had a good thing going, a bed and food and an escape plan and everything! All you had to do was not give them any reason to care! You had to fuck up my plan.”
“Whatever plan had you sneaking into the Manor was a shit-fucking-plan.”
Eevi shook her head, adjusting closer to her log. Urash saw the pity in her eyes. She knew how broken he looked. He hated pity. He’d rather be exiled than pitied.
“They’re in my home,” said Urash, defiant of pain. “If I want to turn off the water, I’ll do that. If I want to burn the Manor to the fucking ground, it’s my right.”
“And how did you do it?” asked Eevi. “Turn off the water?”
“If I had to guess, it probably had something to do with who you’ve been searching for.”
“Jere’s alive?” Eevi said suddenly, unable to hide the excitement in her voice. “Where are they?”
“They were under the bed, you dumb bitch.” Urash spat, his frustration overcoming his pain. “I told them there was a tunnel that led out to the outside, around the screamers. They all ate it up. Little did they know they were digging into the fountain mechanism. Told them all they just needed to turn a lever and that they would be free… People are so disgustingly predictable. They’ll tear each other apart the first chance they get. They crave it, and will stop at nothing to get it.”
Urash, amid his rant, kicked his knee so the pain could push him through to the end. “Except you, for some fucking reason! You saved me! Miserable old me, who has craved nothing but death and gets everything but! Fuck you!”
Urash fell back to the ground, clutching his chest. His lungs were on fire, and the pain was overcoming him. Eevi said nothing. In fact, he could see it in her eyes that she still pitied him. She just watched him rolling next to the log as his whines turned to moans.
“Ugh,” Urash huffed, his eyes glazing over. “It matters not… Soon… it’ll all go up in flame.”
“What?”
Urash mumbled some more. Mercifully, his consciousness lapsed, relieving him of pain for at least one more night.