“Did something happen to Sandra?” he asked as they returned to where the woman had been kept.
“Just be quiet,” Kaide insisted. He pulled the band from his hair, releasing the ponytail. Shaking his hair free, he sighed and put a hand on the door. “Behave yourself, and respond kindly. Sandra has woken, and she wishes to thank you.”
He pushed it open, then gestured for Jerico to enter. As he did, Kaide followed and shut the door behind them.
Already Sandra looked worlds better. Her arm was bandaged, its linen clean. She smiled at their entrance, confirming Jerico’s earlier suspicion about her beauty. Her room was lit by a fireplace, but it had dwindled down, allowing a chill to enter. Kaide took to tending it, as if he wanted no part of the proceedings.
“Are you the paladin?” Sandra asked. Her voice was thick with the northern accent, and it masked how tired she clearly was. Jerico nodded, trying to make sense of things. He’d been dragged from a windowless prison to be thanked? Would he be sent back afterward? Hardly seemed an appropriate reward, but Kaide had further plans for him, that was obvious. Would Sandra know any of it? No, of course not. She’d been out at the time of his capture, and he had a feeling her brother had not filled her in.
“I am,” Jerico said, bowing.
“Thank you,” she said, smiling. She sat up, tugging her blanket so it remained wrapped tight about her. “I doubt I’m worthy of such a noble gesture, though.”
“I bow to all beautiful women,” Jerico said, glancing at Kaide. Sure enough, he was glaring death, which made it all worthwhile.
If Sandra was flattered, she kept it in check.
“If you say. Please, sit by my bed. None of the men here, my brother included, are much use for conversation. Too dull, too focused. They haven’t seen the world. Have you?”
“I think you should get some rest,” Kaide interrupted. “The hour’s late, and-”
“I have slept for days,” Sandra said, glaring. “Please, give us our privacy. Or do you think a paladin of Ashhur will murder me in cold blood the same day he saved my life?”
Jerico found himself liking the woman more and more.
“So be it,” Kaide said, nearly growling with rage. He flung another log into the fire, not caring that he scattered it. Jerico waited until he left, chuckled, and then took Kaide’s place at getting it roaring.
“Don’t judge him too harshly,” she said. “He has a temper is all.”
“I don’t think that’s all,” Jerico said, gently pushing the errant log aside so he could layer on more kindling.
“I take it he blindfolded you before bringing you here?”
Jerico laughed.
“If you consider being dragged here unconscious in a net as blindfolded, then yes, I was.”
Sandra fell silent, and Jerico berated himself for his sharp tongue. It certainly wasn’t her fault. The fire finally going strong, he stood and closed his eyes, enjoying the warmth. His room had felt like ice when he’d been awoken. Dread filled his stomach as he thought of the coming night, without blankets or a fire.
“He’s keeping you in the windowless room, isn’t he?” she asked quietly.
“He is.”
“No fire, no blankets, and no bed?”
Jerico looked her in the eye.
“You seem familiar with your brother’s accommodations. I hope those who came before me all deserved the same treatment.”
Her neck flushed red.
“That was uncalled for,” she said. “I wished to thank you, and hear of the Citadel, the waters of the Gihon, and the peoples in the lands beyond Mordan. Yet you’d call me a jailor, instead?”
Jerico felt petty, but he was tired, grumpy, and unable to stop himself.
“You’re sister to one. And forgive my lack of tales, for my prison’s not as comfortable as yours, Sandra.”
She sat erect in her bed, her jaw trembling with anger.
“Get out,” she said.
Jerico rolled his eyes. There were a million ways he could have handled the situation better, but of course, he’d screwed them all up.
“Please, I’m sorry, it’s just…”
“I said out. Kaide!”
The door opened so fast Jerico wondered if the man had been pressing his ear against the other side. He held his dirks in hand, and seemed disappointed that he had no reason to use them.
“Let’s go,” he said, grabbing Jerico’s arm and pulling. “Back to your room.”
Jerico bowed once more to Sandra and then allowed himself to be led back to his prison. When inside, he shivered against the wall, enveloped once more in darkness. He tried to sleep, but could not. Even with how slow time crawled, it was not long before the door burst open.
“Yes?” Jerico asked.
“Off your ass,” Adam said. “Come on, now, hurry!”
With a blade pressed against his back, Jerico was pushed back into the night and toward another building. The door was opened, and they shoved him inside. Within was a bed, a fireplace, and a slender window too small for him to crawl through.
“Courtesy of the woman,” Adam said, shutting the door. He heard the sound of locking, then whistling as Adam wandered away. Jerico checked the bed for lice or fleas, and found none. Impressive.
“Well, Jerico,” the paladin said, finding it disturbingly easy to talk to himself given his lack of company. “It looks like you’re not that terrible at talking to women after all.”
He knew that was false, of course, but it was nice to pretend otherwise.
*
The following day passed full of tedium and boredom. Jerico ate his meals when they were brought to him, and filled the rest of his hours with exercise and prayer. He wanted both his muscles and his faith sharp should any chance at escape present itself. So far his captors didn’t seem to have any intention to kill him, so he remained patient. It wasn’t like he had anywhere else to go, not with dark priests and paladins scouring the North.
“There’s a disturbing thought,” Jerico muttered, thinking of Kaide selling him to someone from the Stronghold for a nice sack of gold. Or would he be worth only silver? Questions he’d never get adequate answers to. His personal pride wanted Karak’s servants hurling entire treasuries at people to bring him down, but that seemed unreasonable. Maybe just a few thousand gold. That’d at least be something worth bragging about.
Not that he had anyone to brag to. Adam and Griff alternated guard duty, broken up by the occasional third man named Barry. An impatient and ill-tempered man, Barry was actually the worst of the three. The twins, as he’d discovered, would at least joke around, however poorly, when he spoke to them through the hole in his door. Barry only shouted for him to shut up.
“Must you always be talking in there?” the man once asked around midday.
“I’m praying,” Jerico replied.
“Then pray into a pillow or something. Tired of hearing it!”
Jerico spent the next hour praying directly in front of the door, and his lamentations were loud and heartfelt. He even prayed for Barry’s soul, and only the iron will of a paladin kept him from breaking into laughter at the angry shouting that caused.
Come nightfall, he heard only silence. He wondered if they’d left him without a guard. No one answered his occasional question. Through the window, he saw the occasional person milling about, nearly all of them male. He wondered if Kaide recruited only unmarried men, or if they kept their families somewhere else, presumably safer. Jerico added that to the list of other questions he expected to never receive an answer to. The best information he could get out of Adam and Griff was their last name: Irons.
When the stars were at their fullest, the door opened without a single knock for warning. Sandra stepped inside, then closed the door behind her. Jerico sat on his bed, feeling ragged and dirty. It’d been days since he bathed, and despite the moderately improved living conditions, he was still not the cleanest. Brushing a hand through his hair, he smiled, then remembered to bow.