“You’re enjoying this,” Harruq said, feeling sick. “How?”
“Because I want a king, not a god. You told Ahaesarus if he didn’t stop this, you’d stop it yourself. It’s the smartest thing I’ve heard you say since taking over Antonil’s role. For all our sakes, I hope you meant it.”
Kevin fixed his shirt, then gave him a low, exaggerated bow. As he walked off, the image of plunging Condemnation through the lord’s back flashed through Harruq’s mind. He forced it away. The man’s words haunted him, and he retreated back to the balcony, wanting one more breath of fresh air. As he leaned against the railing, his hand touched the broken section Ahaesarus had struck. He stared at the stone, then looked to the slumbering city. Throughout he saw the angels flying, the faint white of their robes seemingly a lie.
“What are you to us?” Harruq whispered. “And what are we to you?”
To that, he had no answer. Not anymore.
19
In such a crowded ravine, solitude should have been a near impossibility, or at least that’s whatJessilynn initially thought. It turned out not to be true. Near the wolf-men encampment there was a deep crack in the side of the cliff, forming a thin cave. Not more than a few feet in it turned completely dark, lacking torch or fire. It was into that darkness the female took her, shoving her to the ground. Even with her age she still had impressive strength.
“Your bow,” she said. “Hand it to me.”
Jessilynn hesitated. So far they’d yet to take it from her, and it remained slung across her back along with her quiver of arrows. She debated drawing one. Surely she could kill an old wolf. But what would she do after? She thought of the creatures as they’d gathered below Dieredon, waiting for him to fall. She thought of the way they’d torn into the butchered cattle, or even other members of their own race. The fear paralyzed her.
“The bow. Hand it to me. Now.”
She did as she was told, giving over the quiver as well. The female held them to her chest, nodding.
“My name is Silver-Ear,” she said. “Though I let you live, I am not your friend. Remain here. If you leave the cave, you will die.”
With that she left Jessilynn to the darkness. She sat on her rear, arms curled across her knees, and shivered. What did the beasts plan to do to her? Was there something worse than being eaten alive? The other boys at the Citadel had often joked of the crude things wolf-men did, always to innocent maidens of course, but she’d never taken them seriously. It’d been easy to dismiss back then, but now she was so afraid it made every single outlandish story contain grains of truth. They’d rape her. They’d mutilate her. They’d feast on her flesh, then let her recover so they might eat again and again, until she was nothing but a sobbing stump. They’d force her to kneel before the moon and renounce Ashhur, lest the pack have their way with her.
Stop it, she told herself. Just stop it.
Rumors, jokes, stupid things that meant nothing. She knew that. Again she prayed to Ashhur, but in that deep darkness, it seemed he was so far away. Halfway through her first prayer she broke down. What had she been thinking, accepting a role beside Dieredon? He was one of the legendary heroes, and she was just…well…
She was just an exhausted, frightened little girl in a cave surrounded by monsters.
Movement from the cave entrance pulled her attention away from herself. Yellow eyes glinted, and despite her best efforts not to, she let out a gasp. It was the two identical wolf-men. She could tell just from their size. The cave was deep enough that they could stand side by side, and they loomed before her, peering down like she were an alien thing.
The one with the white around his eyes kneeled lower, then began to ask questions.
“What do you know of the towers beyond the river?” he asked.
Jessilynn felt a momentary panic as she struggled to understand what he asked of. The Wall of Towers, she realized. It did little to calm her panic.
“Nothing,” she said, forcing herself not to stammer. “I’ve never been there.”
“What of the boats, the patrols?”
Her silence was answer enough.
“The lands beyond the river, they have great armies. How many wear metal armor like you?”
Why did they think she knew these things? She thought to guess, but decided otherwise. She would not lie to them, no matter the convenience.
“I don’t know,” she said. The look the two wolf-men gave her was chilling, and it was clear their patience was nearing an end.
“Your armor. You are a paladin, yes?”
Jessilynn nodded, then realized the creatures might not fully understand such human gestures.
“Yes,” she said. “I am.”
“Where is the one they call Jerico? Does he still live?”
She did her best to hide her surprise. They knew of Jerico? Earlier they’d mentioned someone like her humiliating their father. Their father…
She let out a gasp, realizing exactly who it was that stood before her. One of her favorite stories at the Citadel had been Jerico telling of how he and Darius withstood an onslaught of wolf-men crossing the river to attack the small village of Durham. They’d been led by a vicious wolf-man named Redclaw. In the stories Jerico never told of what happened to the beast. Now, it seemed she knew. The hatred in their eyes grew all the more frightening.
“Jerico lives,” she said. “At the Citadel to the south, training more like me.”
“How many of your kind wait for us when we cross?”
Waiting? They had a few boats patrolling the Rigon, barely covering a few dozen miles of land. Ever since the Citadel fell, they’d relied on the elves to fill in the gaps, but with the orcs’ conquering of the east, even that had ceased.
“There’s no one waiting,” she said. “I promise, no one else knows of…of…all this.”
Other than Dieredon, of course, but she didn’t need to say that. They’d all seen him escape on Sonowin’s back.
“You lie,” the wolf with the white around his eyes said. His lips pulled back in a growl, exposing enormous yellow teeth.
“No,” she insisted, fear clutching her throat. “No, please, I don’t!”
“Then what good are you to us? You know nothing of man, nothing of his armies, nothing of what awaits us.”
His claws were reaching for her when Silver-Ear called for him to stop.
“Hold your temper, Moonslayer,” the female said from the slender cave entrance. The pair turned, and the white-eyed one sniffed her way.
“It is no temper, shaman,” he said. “I only seek a meal. This human is worth nothing to us.”
“You are wrong,” Silver-Ear said, shuffling closer. “She is everything. The other races lose their patience, and worse, their trust.”
“What do we need of their trust?” asked the other. “I am Manfeaster, son of Redclaw. Let them fear me instead. We have already slaughtered many to cow their spirits. Should the goblins or birds grumble, we will remind them of their fear.”
“You keep them here with fear, but even fear will not be enough when we cross the river into the land beyond. We must have something to make them listen, something to make them trust you long enough for us to secure a strip of land.”
“And that is her?” Moonslayer asked, gesturing to Jessilynn. “What does this runt know to help us? She is but a child, and lacks wisdom because of it.”
It was so terrible sitting there, listening to them describe her in such a way. These were the beasts they’d been taught about in the Citadel, led to believe they were just vicious, brutal eating machines. To be thought of as lesser by these creatures, as lacking any wisdom, was humiliating.