Captivity (8 page)

Reynaldo reached to pull me up and hit me
again, but Dominic got to him first. The bandit shrieked like a
whole pack of furies, clutching his head and falling to his knees.
Dominic was
thinking
pain to him, stimulating the areas of
the brain that receive pain messages, sending the same information
that the nerves would have transmitted if Reynaldo’s head were
being squeezed in a vise or his eyes put out with skewers. Dominic
could not actually inflict physical damage, but Reynaldo suffered
the same agony. It is the brain that tells us we are in pain, by
interpreting messages it gets from the nerves. Dominic simply sent
the messages directly, bypassing the body’s pathways, from his mind
to Reynaldo’s.

It is something most telepaths can do at
close range. Reynaldo himself had done it earlier, crudely but
effectively, to Michaela and the disobedient bandit on the trail,
making them feel as if they had been punched in the stomach. Over
such a span of miles, it is rarely possible without the aid of a
strong telepathic bond, like the one I share with Dominic. I could
only suppose Dominic managed it because of Reynaldo’s intrusion on
our intimacy. My husband and I were already in communion; it was an
easy step for Dominic to the mind of the man who had laid hands on
me.

After a long minute or two of screaming
Reynaldo collapsed on his back, his limbs twitching, eyes rolling
up in his head. Dominic sensed the man was losing consciousness,
had no intention of easing his suffering, and slackened the torture
minimally. Sentient again, Reynaldo began begging for mercy, his
voice bleating out in jagged sobs while his heels drummed on the
floor and his fingers raked the dirt. He stared wildly with a
crazed animal terror, looking from me to Jana to Val, unable to
tell where the pain was coming from. The sounds brought many of the
others, men and women, a few brave children, to crowd the doorway,
where they stood in a frozen lump, afraid to enter where they might
also be attacked by the little woman who sat crumpled on the
ground, her arms around her young daughter and son.

Now you have a taste of what awaits
you
, Dominic thought to Reynaldo.
Anything you do to my wife
or my children will be done to you tenfold. Do you
understand?

Reynaldo was unable to speak, could barely
form words in his agonized brain.

Dominic prodded him with a jab of
crypta
until the man whined like a beaten dog.
Tell me
you understand
, Dominic said, his voice calm and steady. I
could imagine his face, the mouth a narrow straight line, the
silver eyelids turning clear as glass now that prey had been
sighted.

Reynaldo answered Dominic in speech, his mind
too fragile to attempt telepathic communication. “I understand,
Margrave,” he said, his voice a strangled croak. The man still did
not realize that it was not I who was responsible for his torment.
“Make him go away,” he said to me. “I won’t touch you again.”

I shook my head. “I have no power over my
lord husband,” I said aloud, to let all the gawkers know what had
happened. “It is Margrave Aranyi who chastises you: telepath,
swordsman, Commander General of the ‘Graven Coalition.” I sat up
straighter, tried to compose my face and my voice. “I am his wife
and these are his true-born children. You will have only yourselves
to blame when Margrave Aranyi’s retribution falls on you for the
offense you have committed.”

I felt Dominic in the background applauding
my efforts. To Reynaldo he said,
‘Gravina Aranyi speaks truly.
Now get out and keep your mind to yourself, unless you would like
more of my attentions.
He waited until Reynaldo picked himself
up and locked the door, shooing his people out of the doorway.

When we were alone again, our minds shielded,
Dominic spoke honestly.
By all the gods, Amalie, how have you
managed? Lady Ladakh’s message mentioned something about his eyes,
but that part was all so garbled I couldn’t credit it. And because
everybody was distraught I thought– I hoped– they had imagined…
His thoughts subsided from speech into a worried, wordless
gloom.

I did not try to answer Dominic’s question
directly.
He said his mother was ‘Gravina,
I said, hoping
Dominic might know something of Reynaldo’s background, information
that might be of use.
But surely no family would allow their
daughter to be stolen like that and left to bear a bandit’s
child?

There was a moment of delay as Dominic
absorbed this piece of news. I sensed something like
demoralization, an emotion so toxic it must be hidden, even from
me.
I don’t know
, he said at last.
But you must try to be
strong until I can reach you.
His consciousness wavered
slightly as I received it, unlike his usual firm control.
Know
that I love you. I will get you out of there. Never doubt it. Only
you must hold on until then.

I know it
, I said.
I will
. I
stumbled back to the straw pallet and lay down as before, settling
the children on either side.

Without any conscious decision, my husband
and I permitted ourselves an interlude of affection. I lay in
Dominic’s mental embrace while he sent his thoughts of love to me.
Just as Dominic had made Reynaldo suffer torment, he gave me
feelings of pleasure. My mind received the same messages as if
Dominic kissed me, on my lips and on my neck, as if his arms
encircled me, as if his hands massaged my back and stroked my hair.
He had come to me like this before our marriage, while I was
cloistered in the seminary of La Sapienza, had made love to me
across the miles that separated us then, and had roused me to
pleasure as if we had lain in the same bed.

Weak as I was, I could not respond to
Dominic’s telepathic caresses in kind. Like a virgin bride on her
wedding night, I lay supine, urging my husband on with words alone.
Hold me
, I said.
Kiss me again
. It was the only scrap
of comfort I had enjoyed in so long, I wanted to make it last as
long as possible.

Dominic was as reluctant to leave me as I was
to let him go.
Beloved
, he said, his deep voice as
electrifying in thought as in speech.
My lady wife
. He knew
I needed solace and encouragement, not passionate lovemaking, and
concentrated on simulating the sensation of his long arms wrapped
tightly around me.

After a short interval, Dominic loosened the
embrace. We could not stay long in communion: not with the added
strain of maintaining the protective shield against Reynaldo’s
eavesdropping; not while Dominic must marshal his troops and make
preparations for the long journey back north. He used his mental
projection to touch my bruised cheek.
I will heal your wound
myself
, he said.
I will break that criminal’s body in a
thousand places
.

“
Yes, my love
,” I said, thinking and
speaking simultaneously, trying to ignore the thought that my skin
would have plenty of time to heal on its own before Dominic could
rescue us.

Jana’s voice broke in. “Papa!” She had seen
Reynaldo writhing, had heard the words I had spoken aloud. “I love
you, Papa,” she cried, looking into my eyes.

Tell Jana I love her
.
Tell her she
is my own little soldier
, he said, a long-standing joke between
them.
And you must be my master sergeant
, he added, finding
a suitable rank for me in this highly irregular Aranyi troop. I
felt his last thought to me, the soft kiss he laid on my lips.

I gave Jana part of her father’s message.
“Papa says he loves you, too,” I said, and left it at that. She had
been strong enough, I felt, and did not need any more martial
inspiration.

Val lay beside me in the straw, still
sniveling from the latest upset, his pudgy arms grasping me where
Dominic’s imagined touch had so recently rested. I scooped him into
my lap to rock him. “Papa loves his brave boy too,” I said, cooing
in the third-person baby talk Val hates. “Yes he does.”

“Papa says Val was a surprise,” Jana said,
what sounded like a fragment of a long-ago conversation. “Papa
doesn’t like surprises.”

Dominic’s visit had left me in a warm glow of
contentment, too brief to spoil it with jealousy. “Your papa loves
both his children,” I said, “however surprising they may be.”

Val touched my face with sticky fingers. “I
desire to return home,” he said in formal speech, enunciating
precisely, his habitual defense against the infantile prattle. His
inner and outer eyelids drooped and he was asleep before I had to
answer. I sank back into the dirty straw, covered us up again in my
cloak and waited for morning.

The sound of animals bleating as they were led out to
pasture woke me before it seemed I had fully shut my eyes, the same
noise I can hear at Aranyi at the start of each day, on those rare
mornings when I am not deep in the last, best sleep of the long
Eclipsian night. For one aching moment I was convinced the past day
and night had all been an elaborately-detailed nightmare, brought
on by anger and jealousy, and from sleeping in the wrong
position.

Dominic will say I told you so
, I
thought, my lips curving in a fond smile. He always warns me not to
lie on my back, not unless he is there beside me to kiss away the
screams trapped in my sleep-paralyzed throat, to caress my body,
rigid with fear, into relaxation. I rarely have to ask; Dominic
usually knows, from our communion, when I have a bad dream and am
in need of comfort. I reached a lazy hand for him.

It was unlike him, I thought, to pass up a
chance for some morning lovemaking. Dominic, amorous on awakening
like most men, would gladly have made a habit of what I had been
careful to preserve as a rare privilege.
Niall
, I thought,
amused at my slowness.
He’s with Niall, of course
. Niall,
while displaying a typical adolescent morning languor, never
declines Dominic’s romantic overtures. I sent my mind toward my
husband and his companion, attempting a quiet insinuation of
communion to confirm my theory.

My searching hand, arm pinned down beneath a
drowsy child’s warm body, encountered scratchy straw. My mind
explored a void, flailing about, finding neither Dominic nor Niall
in the vicinity. I had to force myself to open my eyes and accept
the grim reality. Only the faint daylight from the grate that
looked into the hall convinced me I had slept since Dominic’s
visit. I was as tired as if I had been up all night.

Isis and Astarte help me
. I had missed
the first eclipse of the day. On Crescent Day, the day of two
eclipses, the first one comes as soon as the sun is above the
horizon. If it was light enough to see interior daylight through
the window grate, it was over. I was like a Terran cube with a low
battery, and no way to recharge.

Human voices, rougher and louder than any
Aranyi people would use at such an early hour, replaced the
animals’ cries, intruding on my despairing thoughts. The bandits,
having seen to the needs of their animals, were arguing over their
human possessions. After last night’s demonstration of ‘Graven
power there was no rush of volunteers to bring us food and water.
Reynaldo claimed that it was beneath him to perform menial chores,
that someone else should go down to the storeroom. The other men
shook their heads, muttered excuses. Women went about the business
of finding food for their own men and children, and ignored the
debate as much as possible.

I rose and used the pot, then helped Val, who
had wet into the straw during the night. He was the only one of us
who didn’t mind using the pot, which was like his training potty at
home. Jana, who had risen and relieved herself while I had been
tantalizing myself with wishful thinking, stayed as far away from
her brother as the close room would allow. She watched in silence
while I guided Val’s sticky legs back into his stained breeches,
now stiff and dry with their overnight airing, and buttoned his
fly.

There was the slap of bare feet coming down
the stairs. Someone brave enough to face a tired woman and two
children opened the lock. Michaela entered just far enough to peer
into the darkness. “Stand up,” she said. “Keep the children with
you, and stand in front of the door where I can see you.”

I did as she asked. If the woman was afraid
of me, perhaps we could get food and water, a new candle, and the
chamber pot emptied, with less trouble than Reynaldo would give us.
Maybe I could get a diaper for Val.

Michaela edged carefully into the room. As
her eyes adjusted to the twilight, she looked me over, then flashed
her predatory smile with the missing teeth. “Not so fine this
morning,” she said, “my lady.” Her thoughts, with their vivid
images, reached my mind unsolicited, and I saw myself as I appeared
to her uncharitable appraisal, the bruise and broken skin on my
cheek, the deep circles under my eyes, my skin pale and sweaty from
hunger and fatigue, my hair already growing greasy on top, frizzy
and unkempt below, straggling out of its clasp.

The woman decided she had little to fear. She
set down a skin of water and held a bowl of food at Val’s level.
“Here you are.” She clucked at the children as if calling chickens.
“I made a nice hot breakfast for you, you little buggers.” There
were nut-meal cakes—I could smell the rancid oil they had been
fried in—but the meal they were made from seemed fresher than last
night’s fermented glue. A precious strip of mutton with a
glistening layer of fat had been placed over the cakes.

Val’s life so far had taught him to associate
women with warmth and kindness. He saw Michaela as a friend, a
household woman bringing food, and smiled engagingly. “Did you make
oatmeal?” he asked. “I eat oatmeal every day, with cloudberries.”
He was too young to know that cloudberries grow only in season,
which was coming to an end soon, or to remember the time before
berry season. When there was no reply, Val thought of something
interesting to enliven the conversation. “I pooped in my pants
yesterday. But today I went in the pot.” He pointed with pride.