“Pick up the pace.” Nua said sharply, and spurred her horse a little further.
‘Will you kill the survivors?’ Yersin asked hopefully.
‘Maybe, but there’s enough that need to die regardless, and I might have a use for them. But… I doubt there are any survivors.’ Nua replied to the voice of the death loving gem. Though in her private thoughts beyond his reach she wondered…
‘Am I hoping that’s the case, for my own sake?’
The question only made her angrier and angrier as it went unanswered until they reached the ruin. The stilt houses were husks of black charred wood and tumbled wreckage. In the center, a pile of corpses heaped one atop another loomed like a warning beacon, smoke still rose from it, but in traces, wisps alone. Nua was about to speak, when she heard a piercing scream.
She heard her slaves almost jump at the sound, but she herself did not move, and neither did her Teacher. The sound came again, this time, when her ears twitched, she caught the location, and her nose caught the scent. Her Teacher, predictably, sat smugly on her horse having already worked out the location.
“Drag them out.” Nua said, drawing her long knife and pointing to one place that still stood on the far side of what ‘was’ a village.
“Hold the bitch!” A voice yelled loud enough that his voice reached Nua’s ears.
“No-ff” A feminine voice cried out in agony before the word was cut off, only the most sensitive ears worked out the details, including Nua’s. Her slaves moved to obey her orders, surrounding the small ruin of a home. Outside of the elevated house stood a simple sturdy board that served as a ramp for those who lived in such homes, the cord it normally hung by was clearly broken, and the notch that it normally would have hung from, was broken.
A tiny part of Nua’s brain wondered, while the struggle was going on inside the home between her people and those she’d found, whether that damage was the result of the fight against bandits, which they’d lost. Or… was it a struggle against their fight with poverty, that they had also clearly lost.
She dismissed the question as her people filed out, dragging three men and one woman who, seeing the band in front of her, immediately collapsed into sobbing. Nua read her thoughts. ‘Not that many! I can’t take that many!’
‘At least… I can spare her that.’ Nua groused, and got a better look at the woman when she was brought closer and her soldiers stood aside. Nua’s mouth clenched tight, a wood elf, like herself, with bedraggled blonde hair, blue eyes, even a figure like her own.
Nua ignored her for the moment and went to where several of her soldiers had cast the captured men to the ground and put their swords to the middle of their spines.
She crouched down in front of the first one, a scrawny, pathetic, weak looking individual with a malshaved beard and beady eyes, his voice as he cried out was high pitched and as repulsive as the rest of him.
‘Kill him.’ Yersin demanded.
‘I plan to. But I’ll question him first.’ Nua replied to her new colleague.
“Hi there.” Nua said conversationally as she drew her knife from out of her belt. “Do you know who I am, who we are?”
“City militia!” He spat, his snarl cut off when Nua’s silvery peel of laughter hit him.
“No, no, god no, not that rabble. We’re better equipped than that. It’s alright though.” She tapped his face condescendingly. “The important part is that we know who you are. You’re Bracer’s animals.” The three struggled, but when the tips of the swords at their spines went in just a little, they stopped.
“Why aren’t you with him?” Nua asked, scanning the three faces. “Did he kick you out?” She did her best to ignore the sobbing elf, and kept her eyes on her captives.
“Or did he leave you behind? Or did you just get so caught up with your plaything that you chose to stick around here a little longer? Where is Bracer now? What route is he taking North? What route will he take coming back? How does he like to fight? How much food does he have?” Question after question poured from Nua’s lips, and few were answered.
“Fucking bitch.” Was not one of those things she counted as an answer.
When she’d finally run through all her questions, and had no more, save one, she asked it. “Why aren’t you talking? You’re bandits. Smugglers. Surely you’re not ‘loyal’ to Bracer?”
Fear swept over their faces. “Nobody crosses Bracer.”
“Again, why? Even you can tell me that much.” Nua crossed her arms and stared down at the three as she stood up in annoyance and tapped her foot.
“He’s got an in with a couple cities. Rich folk who he kicks back stuff too. It idn just coin, like, protection, case someone ‘portant gets sent as tribute, the Tlalmok get word from Bracer that its a ‘claborator an the person gets sent home again. Means he can get to us anywhere, an Bracer… he knows how to hurt folks…” The middle one, a lumpy man covered with tattoos, but whose bulk of muscle was covered by a layer of fat, replied with a shudder. “None of us going to talk. Better just kill us or tho us in jail.”
“When I get my questions answered.” Nua replied. “Five seconds, then I get unpleasant.”
Stony silence greeted her.
“One.” She said sharply. “Go grab some stakes.” She ordered with a look over her shoulder.
“Two.” She added, and waited as her slave soldiers scrounged their packs for the things they would need.. Still there were no words. “Stake them out, spread out their arms and legs.”
“Three.” She said as she eyed them like meat, golden light began to fill her eyes and drive away the blue. They trembled. But said nothing, flailing in futility as six of her soldiers each worked to pin, bind, and stake them.
“Four.” She added another number. “We can’t!” The lumpy middle figure exclaimed.
“Cut away their clothing. Then bring me something hard to drink.” She ordered the soldiers who had fallen back behind her. She stuck her hand out a few times and moved to the middle man. She stood over him, he tugged on the ropes, and a moment later a small bottle was shoved into Nua’s hands.
“I’ve known a lot of men like you over the years. Never met a single one of you I didn’t want to do this to.” Nua said with a quiet, chill voice.
“Five.” She said the last number, and holding the bottle in front of her, she popped the cork and tasted a sharp, bitter whiskey flavor. She sprayed it from her lips, spitting it over his bare flesh, then she tilted the bottle and shook it vigorously over his belly and down to his legs.
“You can’t!” He cried.
The other two on either side were looking on in horror.
“I can do anything I’m willing to live with. And of all the things on my list, this will be among the easiest.” Nua said, then took out flint from her pocket, she stood over the staked out, alcohol soaked smuggler, and struck.
He blew desperately, inhaling and exhaling deeply to try to stop the spark from hitting him. It went out before it touched his body. A deep sigh of relief came out and the start of a laugh.
Nua laughed with him, and looking down at his head from where she stood, she asked, “Are you stupid? You think this makes you safe? Here, have another, we’ll get it right… we’ve just got to keep trying.”
His eyes widened with horror and he cried out when the flint pieces struck, “I’ll talk!”
But it was too late, a spark lept away and fell still living, onto his belly where it roared to life.
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Nua stepped away, grinning happily as the rapist smuggler burned alive from belly to below his groin.
He thrashed like mad for a full minute, trying to roll away, but held fast by the stakes, there was no help for it. The fat beneath his flesh heated and popped still inside the dark scorched skin, his vocal chords ripped from screaming, and it went on, until the spread of the flames inevitably ended his life.
“Turns out pigs burn pretty well.” Nua said bluntly, then turned to the horrified remaining pair.
“One of you gets a merciful death. The other gets a slow one. Which one is which? Oh and by the way, your smokey comrade there… he was the warning for you two. Make up your minds.” Nua replied, and waited patiently while each one tried to answer more, faster, until Nua knew everything.
“Well, I guess it’s a tie.” Nua shrugged, “Quick deaths for both of you.”
She then approached, grabbed their favorite toys, still stained from the sport they’d made with the woman, and severed those parts away, tossing the now severed parts onto their chests when she took it from their bodies.
“You’ll bleed out quick, you’re welcome.” She said to the wailing figures as they arched their backs.
Finally, she came to the elf woman, who still lay sobbing in the dirt. She crouched beside her, the woman had lost the nails on her hands, her body was soaked with blood and purple from beatings, broken bones, other than her legs, were more common than unbroken ones.
“They’re dead, they can’t hurt you anymore.” Nua reached out to touch the woman’s cheek. Her practiced eye told her plenty, and her memories of her own life told her plenty more. ‘She’s torn up inside and out, jaw dislocated, no teeth left, probably bit somebody and was punished for it. Nose has blood backing up behind it, without a healer or a good potion, she’ll die in a few days, but even if she lives, what then?’
“Is there someone I can take you to, somewhere you can go?” Nua asked, she heard Solution’s horse approaching behind her.
The elf woman shook her head, ‘Death is mercy.’ Nua recalled the lesson well, and why it was so often true.
Nua stood, and crouched over the elf whose body was twitching in involuntary spasms of agony. Cursing herself, she thrust her knife into the dirt beside the woman and removed her gloves. She put her right hand in the woman’s own and whispered down to her with deeply pitying blue.
“I’m sorry, but, it’s alright now, you’re safe, completely… totally… safe.” Nua whispered, and the hands moved only a little, and then before the woman even knew what was happening, Nua’s left hand formed a fist, came up, and crashed down on the woman’s head, bone, blood, and brain splattered about, and the twitching stopped.
She yanked her knife out of the dirt and wiped it on a stray cloth she saw nearby and walked past Solution without a word, back to her horse, and mounting it, she began to ride forward.
“Get moving!” She shouted roughly over her shoulder, “There’s somewhere I want to be.”
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Priceless tried to keep her smile up all the way through the rest of the day, Kaiji was certainly working hard to keep her positive, smiling broadly from ear to ear, she kept her hand moving up and down the delicate human hand. They gathered information on plots of land, more slave rosters, and more. So much was accomplished, yet Priceless felt herself to be a spectator in this part of her life.
Kaiji handled every bargain, every sale, but in between, they spoke. Or rather, she tried to get Priceless herself to speak, by asking questions about the differences between Komestra and Pas’en.
“Well, biggest difference I know is that Pas’en has better drainage, maybe because of the hills, but a long time ago some smart Prince built these big collection points in the lower district, takes awhile to drain but… even when the districts here flood, it gets taken care of. I don’t think I need to tell you about Komestra’s problem.”
Kaiji nodded vigorously. “Before she died, Lady Kaiji would often berate Prince Sado about his disinterest in infrastructure. He was… a very stubborn man.” She snickered, “I remember one time when he was little, a noble’s child punched him in the face and knocked him to the ground. He smiled, stood up, and knocked the other boy’s teeth in. He was never one to give the other person the satisfaction. He broke three fingers and we had to call for a healer for both of them. But… well I knew then he was going to be a handful… I mean, I mean ‘Lady Kaiji’, knew he was going to be a handful.”
She stopped walking at that moment, her hand went up and traced her horns, “Yes, quite a handful that Prince was. Strong, bull headed, but he could also be gentle, he had a weakness for dogs. He said they were the only servants who we collared, that never needed the collar to keep them loyal.” She wiped her nose, “Excuse me, just memories of a dead girl.” She said, then stopped short just as Priceless was going to speak.
“Let’s go back, we’ve done enough for now…” Kaiji said, preempting her companion, and as they were about to turn around, Kaiji stopped cold as she found herself looking at a face she thought she’d never see again. He was still rather fit looking, but… he was without a collar. He had a rough face, and when Priceless saw him, she felt her fear well up instinctively. Dark eyes, dark hair, and the tanned skin of someone out in the sun a great deal.
“Lady Kaiji… is… it is you.” He said in a gruff voice, and Kaiji looked down. “No, no, look up at me… slave.”
She slowly raised her face so that she was looking up at him. “Nice collar, bronze one, I guess you kind of landed on your feet, didn’t you… slave?”
Kaiji nodded slowly. “I… wasn’t sure you were alive, Mordren, sir.” She said as the hairs on her skin started to stand on end.
“Sure am, and the Pas’enian army even set me free. No surprise when you think about it, after all… who do you think told them where your augment stones were? Didn’t you think it strange you ran out of mana so quickly fighting at the throne room entrance?” He had a smug look on his face and looked down his nose at her.
His thick muscles, always strong, now seemed far more frightening as Kaiji was forced to look up at him. Priceless came close beside her, and clutched the back of her shirt, whether to comfort her, or comfort her own fear, neither woman knew. But his statement had Kaiji’s eyes wide as saucers.
“Y-You sir? Y-Yes, I wondered, after I ran out of mana, I thought it must have been just that I had lost track in the fighting but… so that’s why?” Kaiji stammered.
“Yup, so, what happened after, sadly I couldn’t be there to watch, I’ll bet you still got some of them, how’d the rest of them make you pay? They use you? Did ‘Lady Kaiji’ find her place on her back?” He laughed a cruel, cruel laugh and Kaiji began to lower her expression. “They sell you to a brothel now, what brothel are you at, I may pay a visit. Wouldn’t that be fun, the slave of Lady Kaiji, now a free man, getting to pound the mistress that thought slaves were too dirty to screw.” He laughed at the sky, and said to her again, “Raise your head to your betters, dirty slave, and answer me.”
She struggled to obey, to look at him and absorb the vendetta of his hate. “Y-Yes sir, they did. All the ones I failed to kill because of you, got to break Lady Kaiji’s body, and now she’s dead, and only slave Kaiji remains. Your revenge is complete. But they didn’t sell slave Kaiji to a brothel, the… the body of your former mistress was s-sold to a rich woman newly come into the city. Her mistress is Nua Calen Aiwenor, if anything I say displeased you today, she can be found there to discipline me. But… I beg your forgiveness, sir.” Her eyes welled up and her body shivered despite the relative warmth.
Unable to think of anything else to say to her, he looked at her with hate pouring out like burning acid, “I hope she beats you often, slave.” He then snorted long, loud, and spat into Kaiji’s unmoving face, and walked away.
Priceless tugged at her shirt and watched him walk away while Kaiji stood still as a statue, not even noticing the pull until Priceless pulled her into a tight embrace from behind, and reached up and wiped the spit away herself.
It pulled Kaiji out of her reverie, but she didn’t make to move away from the embrace. “I… suppose I had that coming but… so you don’t think… whatever you think, Priceless. I lied to him.”
“Lied to him about what?” Priceless asked gingerly.
Kaiji let her head rest against her companion’s cheek for a moment before she spoke, and folded her hands over those of Priceless. “The last day… the day my city fell, it’s true all my augment stones were gone, and it’s true I fought till I ran out of mana, and after that the fight was over quickly. But… while I was beaten into unconsciousness, I wasn’t violated. I probably would have been, but someone there must have recognized me, or who I was, or thought I might be more valuable… without that experience. So, I woke up in a leather collar and secured and being carted off here with the first load of plunder. You know most of the rest.”
They walked in silence all the way back to the hotel and their owner’s room before Priceless asked, “Why did you lie to him?”
“Because… because if he thought that happened, the thought of all those soldiers doing that to Lady Kaiji, made him happy. He liked it… he’ll probably think about that happening to me for years, with who knows how many whores he’ll buy with money or objects stolen from Lady Kaiji’s home. It’s… disgusting. But I thought it better to tell that lie, than wait to see what else he might say, or do. And you were there, and scared and I didn’t want him to say anything to you that… that might hurt or scare you. You’ve been through enough, and this was just my due.” Kaiji replied calmly as she pulled the cord to request water for their washtub, and Priceless brought it out.
“Your due?” Priceless asked as she went to the drawer with the washing implements, rag, brush, and bucket.
“For owning him, I… wasn’t cruel, I didn’t think at the time. Remember the story I told you about the wine stealing slave… that… that was him. I guess he disagrees. Now he’s free, and I will never be again.”
“Do you… if you could be, do you want to be?” Priceless asked curiously as she recalled the things Anders had said to her.
A hint of her own nervousness must have entered Priceless’s voice, because Kaiji approached and took her hands, “I’m not going anywhere. If the Mistress returned tomorrow and said to me, ‘Kaiji you may go free, but I am keeping Priceless…’ then I would stay with bronze around my neck. You, after all, are Priceless.”
Priceless banished all thoughts that had been building in her mind, ‘No, I don’t need to tell her, it’s better if she never knows that she tried to buy me once, but didn’t want to go beyond ten silvers.’
It was a comforting silence for them both.
‘That must have been hard for her… Kaiji must have been so scared… she’s such a proud woman, even in a collar, she has that dignity and poise… and he spat on it. I don’t believe, I won’t believe, she was ever cruel enough to deserve that. Tonight… after she’s asleep, I’ll take my last two rolls and put it into her bag, and just tell her I ate more of mine.’ Priceless resolved, not without a pang, but resolved nonetheless.
‘Maybe if I’d not been a bad mistress, or… never been one… well, whatever the reason, poor Priceless must have been so scared today, and all because I had to own that one once. Lady Kaiji is always going to be a curse… well, I suppose I can at least give her my last two rolls, I’ll just tell her that I ate mine.’ So resolved, Kaiji waited until they lay together in the bed of their mistress.
The seconds passed, the minutes passed.
Finally Kaiji felt confident that Priceless was deep in her slumber.
She slid easily out of bed, sure she was not disturbing her companion, the sheets rustled only slightly as she eased herself onto the floor. She crept to her little stash of rolls, the closest thing to a sweet they had, and something she knew Priceless loved.
She took the rolls from her little sack, and made her way over to where she knew Priceless kept hers. She looked within, and found it empty. ‘She’ll be so happy to know she ‘missed’ a few…’ The thought brought tears for a moment to Kaiji’s eyes.
So focused was she on what she was doing, that it came as a total shock to her when she was creeping back to bed, when she found herself face to face with Priceless.
“Wait… were you taking…” They said in unison, and Kaiji rushed to her little sack, while Priceless looked in hers. Their hands imitated one another, staring down into the bags illuminated by the light of the moon, and seeing two rolls within.
“You… it was you… it wasn’t the stars hearing my prayers…” Priceless stared at her companion in incomprehensible, unrepressed joy.
“I thought… since I had the memory of plenty… and you’d… you’d done so much to comfort, to guide me… to protect me… I wanted to give you something to make you happy… but this was all I had anymore. I don’t have any money, or land, I don’t even have my own hands but… but I had rolls I know you liked, and… I wanted to make your days a little better. It’s… it was the only way I could say the things I wanted to.”
Priceless lept into her arms and wrapped her arms around Kaiji’s body, pressing her forehead to the demon-elf slave. “I… I wanted the same. You were so brave for this little coward, you gave up years of your life to protect me from the Mistress’s anger… I… I’ve never in all my life… seen something like that. All I had were these so…”
Kaiji’s face fractured into laughter and tears at once… “I meant what I said… I would rather be a slave beside you, even under the wielder of that hand, than ever be free and apart from you… you and that gentle heart…” Her hand covered Priceless’s breast, the beating seemed so loud, like war drums, and it took a moment to understand, hers was doing the same, and so was the hand of her companion.
“I know… the woman who you left behind, thought this with a slave was beneath her but…” Priceless whispered somewhat shyly, cutting off her words by laying a kiss upon the place where the earlier unexpected encounter had left spit before.
“But I’m not her… I’m ‘your’ Kaiji… and maybe… maybe we can find a little more happiness in this… this life we find ourselves in, for as long as we can.” Kaiji answered breathlessly, and hand closing into hand so that they formed an endless loop from one to another, they came together in the bed of their mistress, to do as Kaiji said, and take what happiness they could, certain it was more than even most of those who lived free around them.