Betrayals (56 page)

“If he can’t find any more, he’ll probably manufacture one or two,” Bron said dryly. “Howser’s airs of superiority have always annoyed me, so I don’t intend to let him get away with something like that. And simply having hostages won’t be enough when those five finally do come back here. What else can we do?”

“There should be quite a lot, but we’ll have to discuss it and make a list,” Kambil said, deciding against sitting in his chair again. “We were supposed to have done this before, but something always came up to delay it. We’ll go to my wing to do the discussing, and have a meal at the same time. I don’t want us wasting any time in making these preparations, not when I have the distinct feeling that we don’t have much time. We have to make sure that when those people come back here, they don’t survive setting foot within city limits.”

The others all said something to assure him that they’d find a way to do that, all of them, of course, but Delin. Their fifth wasn’t looking terribly good, but he was certain to survive long enough for Kambil to find a replacement for him. As soon as they made their preparations against their greatest threat, there would be time to start interviewing potential Highs in Earth magic….

Delin, having been dismissed from joining the others in Kambil’s wing, returned to his own as he’d been ordered to do. It became harder and harder for him to bear up under the oppression and humiliation of the situation which had been forced on him, but somehow he kept from going completely insane. Only the thought of escape and eventual retribution had made it possible, but the longer it took, the less possible the idea became….

Walking into the small sitting room, the only room Delin was permitted to occupy in his wing, nearly sent him into a fit of suffocation. It had been a cozy room to begin with, and now, with the hard, narrow cot which had been brought in for him to sleep on, there was barely enough room to turn around. But the place was spotlessly clean, thanks to the efforts of the servants he wasn’t even permitted to order about.

“Excellency?” a voice said, and Delin turned around to see the servant he’d been hoping for, the one he hadn’t been able to expressly request. Gella was an older woman, the kind of woman who usually found him extremely attractive, and who had struck Delin as the sort who was concerned about others to the point of softheadedness. At least she’d shown concern for him , and that could possibly be the key to his freedom.

“Excellency, are you all right?” Gella now asked, coming slowly and hesitantly into the room. “Forgive me for saying so, but you look worse than you did the last time I was on duty. May I get you something, like something to eat? The cook would like to make you something marvelous, not what you have been eating. Please, may I fetch it?”

It wasn’t difficult for Delin to let tears come to his eyes as he slowly sat in the hard wooden chair which had been supplied just for him. Hunger had become his constant companion, and he often dreamed of eating the way he’d always done in the past. The tasteless gruel kept him alive, but there was a very great difference between living and existing.

“By my word, you poor thing!” Gella exclaimed, seeing the tears and quickly coming over to pat his arm. “Something is wrong without doubt, but you aren’t saying what it is! Won’t you tell me about it so that I can help?”

Delin began to sob just a little, and as he did so he slowly shook his head. He needed the peasant to understand his meaning without hearing the words, but chances were excellent that she just wasn’t bright enough.

“You won’t tell me what’s wrong?” she said, naturally giving his actions the wrong interpretation. “I don’t understand why not, unless … unless you can’t tell me, rather than won’t. Can that be it, that you aren’t able to tell me?”

His nodding encouragement must have been pathetic, but that was exactly what Delin wanted it to be. Without someone’s help, he would continue to be as much of a slave as that peasant who’d been brought by Howser. Gella brightened at seeing his nod, and took one of his hands before kneeling in front of him.

“So you aren’t able to tell me what’s wrong,” she repeated, probably just to get it straight in her head. “That must mean you’ve been ordered by someone not to speak, which is a vile thing to do to someone. Is there any chance that they’ll change their minds and give you permission to speak after all?”

Once again Delin shook his head slowly, then pointed to her . This was the crucial part of his plan, the part that had to be understood completely, otherwise he was doomed. She’d done surprisingly well so far, but this time …

“Please don’t cry even harder,” she begged, tears appearing in her own eyes. “You’re saying they won’t change their minds, and you want me to do something about it. Does that mean you want me to talk to them, to try to get them to change their minds? We’re discussing the other Excellencies, of course, and you think they’ll listen to me?”

Delin shook his head again but this time almost violently, panic fleeting across his mind. If this woman let Kambil know he was trying to escape, he was completely done for. Only that one small corner of his mind, the corner that wasn’t being controlled by the drug and the orders, had let him do even as much as he’d done. Kambil would find out about it and remove it, and then he would be lost forever. …

“No, no, of course they would never listen to me,” Gella said quickly, clearly trying to soothe him. “You know that even better than I do, so you must have meant something else. What can that something else possibly be?”

The woman began to wrack her brain, which increased the acid currently consuming Delin’s entire stomach. His fate lay in the hands of an overweight, middle-aged, graying commoner, and everyone knew how stupid commoners were. How could he have ever expected that she would understand what was necessary and free him? He must have been insane to think—

“I know, you want me to give you the order to speak!”

Gella suddenly exclaimed, startling Delin nearly out of his shoes. “Is that what you want? Is it really likely to work?”

Delin nodded so hard that his head almost fell off, but he refused to allow relief to touch him. Not until he was back in possession of himself would relief be appropriate. And then there would be other emotions even more appropriate than that….

“All right, then I order you to talk to me,” Gella said, sounding odd using so commanding a tone. “I want you to tell me exactly what’s troubling you.”

“The others all hate me, and this is their idea of a joke,” Delin croaked, the first words he’d uttered in too long a time. “I’ve been given no choice but to obey them, and have even been humiliated to the point of needing to obey everyone else as well. But if you were to order me to forget all previous orders and from now on obey only myself… Would you do that for me? Even though it might get you in trouble?”

“You poor, dear man, of course I would,” she responded immediately, tightening her grip on the hand she held. “Doing something like that to someone is cruel, not a joke, and I’m not worried about getting into trouble. I now order you to forget all the other orders you’ve been given, and from now on take orders only from yourself. There. Does that do it?”

“It does indeed, my very dear,” Delin said, giving the woman his best smile. “I intend to see you rewarded beyond your wildest dreams, but not immediately, of course. It would never do if my groupmates found out that I’d escaped from their cruelty, so we’ll have to pretend that everything remains the same. Or almost everything. Would you do me the very great favor of quietly bringing the marvelous meal you said the cook is ready to prepare? I’m positively famished, and after I’ve eaten I’ll be able to give you something of your reward. But please remember: not a word to anyone about this. Tell the cook that you mean to try to talk me into eating the meal, but you don’t expect to succeed.”

“I’ll return as quickly as I can,” she promised, giving his hand a last squeeze before releasing it and rising awkwardly to her feet. “And since I haven’t really done all that much, don’t worry about rewarding me. Seeing you smile is reward enough.”

The look she gave him was ludicrous, trying as it was to be coquettish and sexual. So that was what she wanted, to be considered for his bed so that she might be kept in appropriately high style. He nodded his thanks and hinted at agreement, but the woman really was a fool. Once she’d brought him the meal he needed so desperately, he would send her back to the kitchen on one pretext or another and then cause her to have a fatal heart attack. No one but himself could be trusted to keep this particular secret, and that one meal, which he would claim she ate, would have to do him for a while.

“Because, my very dear groupmates, you will not know that I’m free again until I want you to know,” he whispered aloud after getting to his feet. “And when that time comes…”

Yes, it would be absolutely marvelous….

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

It didn’t take long to reach the place on the far side of the village where Pagin Holter and the others waited, and Jovvi made sure to be right up front with those who rode into the makeshift camp first. The small group of nobles—who were dressed up in uniforms to show how high their rank was— were in the midst of giving some sort of instructions to their cadre of guardsmen-equivalents, and when they saw the newcomers, the one wearing commandant tabs on his collar exploded.

“Who in the name of chaos are those peasants?” the man demanded, interrupting his second-in-command’s speech to the others. “Never mind, I don’t care who they are. Have the link-groups destroy them, but not the horses. We can use whatever supplies they have, and the horses themselves will do for remounts for us.”

“Link-groups, attention!” one member of the cadre with smaller collar tabs bellowed in a voice that carried easily.

“Destroy the intruders, but not their mounts. That’s an order!”

Then the commandant and his friends and followers stood there waiting to be obeyed, smirks of pleased expectation on their faces. It took a moment or two before they realized that the order which had been given wasn’t being obeyed, and by then Valiant had reined up in front of them.

“Don’t waste your breath or our time repeatin’ that order,” he drawled as he looked down at the group. “You don’t have a bunch of slaves to do your dirty work for you anymore, but don’t let that keep you from tryin’ us yourselves. Go ahead, try us.”

A number of the nobles including the commandant seemed to reach out to the power, then they gasped and went pale along with those of the cadre who also had clearly decided to flex their ability.

“You really are a pretty talentless bunch, aren’t you?” Tamma said then with a laugh. “I don’t know about the other aspects, but as far as Fire magic is concerned none of you could light a stove with a match.”

“Or handle more than three grains of dirt,” Lorand put in after her with a nod of agreement. “With that in mind, why don’t those of you with knives and cudgels and things stack them over there, out of easy reach of your group, and then go back and sit down where you’re now standing. We’ll get to you after we say hello to some old friends of ours.”

Jovvi knew that Lorand meant to search for his friend Hat, although the entity would certainly have found the man if he had been there. But Lorand needed to search, so Jovvi simply exchanged a glance with Tamma then dismounted, to help convince their new prisoners not to make a fuss.

“You can’t possibly expect to get away with this!” the commandant was sputtering out while his fury raged. “You’re a group of peasant nothings, and this section of the army is mine!”

“Correction,” Valiant said as he, too, dismounted and moved forward to face the commandant. “Nothin’ here is yours any longer, except the blame for what’s been destroyed. And as far as ownin’ things goes, you and the rest of the leeches like you won’t be doin’ that for much longer either. Now sit down, or you won’t like the way I make you do it.”

The fool of a noble had to look up at Valiant, and that was one of the man’s pet hatreds. Jovvi knew he detested people who were taller than he, but that included most of the human race. He snarled something obscene and actually tried to backhand Valiant as he would have done to one of his servants, but Valiant blocked the blow and took the man by the front of his once-fine uniform. A hard shake rattled the noble’s teeth in his head, a shove threw him to the ground, and then bedlam of sorts erupted when the former captive Highs all laughed and cheered.

“That applaudin’ should tell you who’s on which side,” Valiant said then to the rest of the officers and their minions. “This is the last time I’ll be usin’ words: get rid of anythin’ that might be considered a weapon, then sit down and do as you’re told.”

The officers were furious and those of lower rank sullen, but everyone obeyed the order without further argument. Potential weapons were thrown down out of easy reach, and then they all sat on the ground around their thoroughly humiliated leader.

“All right, people, keep an eye on them, please,” Lorand said to their own companions, still anxious to get started with his search. “We’re going to have a few words with the newest members of our group, but if you need us, don’t hesitate to call. And while you’re watching those lowlifes, think about what we can do with them.”

That made their own people chuckle and grin, especially when they looked down at the captives. Jovvi checked the captives herself, to be certain that none of them intended immediate attack, but apparently none of them did. Later on would be another story, of course, but for the moment it was possible to give full attention to the people they had actually managed to rescue.

“… don’t know where you come from, but we’re mighty glad you did,” Pagin Holter was saying happily to Rion as Jovvi walked over to join them. “Thought I was dreamin’ when thet there entity a yourn talked to me, but then, when it started workin’, I could feel it was real. Don’t know how much longer we coulda lasted here ’thout this kinda help.”

“Why not?” Jovvi asked as Rion waved away the man’s thanks with a smile. “If you and your group were free of the Puredan, and you should have been, why was there a problem? And why are you here in the first place? Couldn’t you have done something to escape when you were in the stockade?”