No Reprieve (2 page)

“Enter.” Commander Prokief's deep voice was flat and cold. The guards shoved Blaine and Piran into the sentencing chamber, then forced them to their knees. Prokief was a bear of a man with the manner of a brawler, tall and broad shouldered with a cloud of unruly dark hair and a full dark beard. He was known for his brutality on the battlefield as much as for his effectiveness. Prokief had been useful to the king up to a point, but he had long ago crossed the threshold that made him an embarrassment.

“McFadden. Rowse. Again. I am not patient.” Prokief glowered at them. “You fought a guard. Struck a soldier. Caused him bodily harm. Disobeyed direct commands. Do you deny this? There are witnesses,” Prokief said.

“Your attack dog savaged a young boy for the fun of it,” Blaine snapped, at the end of his patience. “We're convicts, not monsters.”

Prokief's laughter was a low rumble. “No? So…righteous…considering the crimes that brought you here.” He looked to the well-armed guards. “Remove their shackles,” he ordered. “Then restrain them on the floor.” He jerked his head toward the cuffs and manacles set into the stone. “And bring me the whip.”

Prokief removed his uniform jacket and slowly turned up the sleeves of his shirt. The look in his eyes gave Blaine a sick feeling, as he recognized that Prokief relished delivering the punishment. He drew a pair of black leather gloves from his belt and slowly fitted them onto his beefy hands. Then he reached out to take the whip from the guard who had retrieved it from where it hung on the wall, among many instruments of Prokief's ‘discipline.'

“Bind them.”

Guards pushed Blaine and Piran toward the iron restraints. They were stripped of their clothing and spread-eagled facedown on the cold stone, bound at the wrists and ankles. The ropes stretched the skin on their backs tight, in preparation for the lash. Blaine worked at keeping his face impassive. Even Piran stopped wisecracking.

Rough rope bit into Blaine's wrists. The cold stone floor leeched the heat from his body, and Blaine knew that the restraints would tear at his flesh when he began to shiver. Prokief swished the knotted leather whip through the air so that Blaine and Piran would hear it. He cracked it, chuckling when they flinched, although this time, he did not strike them. He was enjoying their fear, just like he would relish their pain.

Showing them the whip had been part of the performance. The whip sang through the air, and its first strike slashed across Blaine's back. He gritted his teeth, refusing to give Prokief the satisfaction of hearing him cry out. The second strike lanced open Piran's skin shoulder to hip. Piran cursed, jaw set, eyes narrowed.

“One.”

Prokief was no novice when it came to administering the lash. He was skilled in making every blow count, opening new skin with each strike, cutting across muscle and sinew in a way calculated to make the victim's every movement exquisitely painful.

Blaine forced himself to breathe and closed his eyes. Prokief did not know that Blaine's father had long ago taught him how to take a beating, had trained him to hide his pain and force down his killing rage. And while Blaine's father had not whipped him, he had laid into Blaine often enough with his fists or walking cane that Blaine knew how to go far away in his mind, to his own imaginary fortress, where he would wait out the assault.

“Two.” The lash fell twice, once on each of them.

“Three.” Blood spattered as Prokief raised the thin, merciless leather cord and snapped it once again, spraying them with droplets. Forty lashes would kill most men, Blaine knew. On occasion, the flayed body of a prisoner had been tossed out in the snow of the parade ground until it froze solid, where it remained until the thaw, a warning for the rest of them. Blaine wondered how far Prokief would take their punishment, whether he and Piran would become Prokief's next cautionary tale.

“Four.”

After ten lashes, Blaine's vision swam. His body cramped from the unnatural positions in which the manacles stretched him, but every twitch and shiver tore at his bonds or pained his bloodied back. Piran stopped cursing, and his face had paled. Blaine's jaw clenched so tightly against the pain that he feared he might crack a tooth.

“Fifteen.” Blaine grunted and bit into his lip. The lash fell again and again, each time striking in a new spot. He lost count, slipping in and out of consciousness.

Blaine gritted his teeth. His silence enraged Prokief, who brought the lash down harder as the guard counted. “Sixteen…Seventeen…Eighteen…Nineteen…Twenty.”

When the last lash fell, Blaine lay still, lost in pain and shock.

“Douse them with salt water,” Prokief commanded.

A guard went to grab a bucket from near the wall. The weight of the water hurt as much as the salt that stung in the fresh, raw wounds, and Blaine barely bit back a cry.

“Take them to the Holes. No food or water. Three days.” He paused. “Ejnar, come here.”

Dimly, Blaine heard the swish of the warden-mage's gray robes as the man's soft boots stepped around the rivulets of blood on the tile floor. “Commander?”

“Use your magic to keep him from dying. I want him alive when he leaves here, even if he's barely breathing.”

“Done, Commander.”

Blaine could hear the satisfaction in Prokief's tone. “Give him something to remember me by while he's down there. Fever and cramps, eh? It would be pleasant to hear him beg for death.”

“As you wish, Commander.” Ejnar paused. “And Rowse?”

“The same.”

“With pleasure.” Ejnar had no sooner spoken than Blaine felt a wave of fire building inside his body. A moment earlier, soaked to the skin and spread-eagled on the ice-cold floor, Blaine had shivered uncontrollably. Now, he felt sweat breaking out on his temples, only to subside a moment later with the onset of shuddering chills. His gut clenched, and the pain would have doubled him over had the ropes not kept him flat against the floor. Blaine's breath came in shallow gasps as the pain hit again. He writhed, twisting against the ropes that held him until the skin at his wrists and ankles were raw. After only a few moments, the scream Prokief coveted tore from Blaine's lips.

“Make sure he remains conscious.” Prokief turned from Ejnar to the guards. “When his time's up, drag him out when the prisoners are in the yard. Let them see the price of insolence.

“Unlock the cuffs,” Prokief ordered. The commander made no effort to hide the gloating tone in his voice. “Get them dressed and give them each a woolen cloak. Then throw them in the Holes.”

Blaine forced himself onto his knees, refusing to give in to the pain of every movement. Pulling the rough-spun cloth of his shirt over his savaged back hurt enough to make him pale.

“Three days in the Hole,” Prokief repeated, settling his gaze on Blaine with satisfaction. ”Perhaps you'll remember who's in charge.”

The Hole. Prokief's oubliette. Blaine felt his hopes, briefly raised from surviving the whipping, plummet. Deep holes cut into Edgeland's ice held prisoners Prokief wanted to make sure never forgot the ‘lesson' he wanted them to learn. Usually, the prisoners were beaten first, or whipped, before being dropped into the icy, solitary darkness until Prokief remembered to send someone to get them out. Some survived. Many did not.

One of the guards shoved Blaine, intentionally placing his hand to press against the fresh wounds that seeped blood through Blaine's homespun shirt.

Blaine bit back a curse. He had no desire to go into the Hole with broken bones, something a vengeful guard could easily arrange. Even Piran restrained himself to a murderous glare.

The snow crunched beneath his feet as the guards dragged Blaine and Piran to the oubliettes. Blaine saw an unbroken expanse of white that stretched into the gray horizon, and more snow falling from slate-colored skies. He shivered as the snow fell on bare skin where his ragged prison uniform did not protect him from the cold.

A soldier on either side dragged him, one on each arm, with Blaine between them as deadweight, too injured to stand. Blood dripped from Blaine's mouth into the snow, leaving a crimson path of droplets. Red stains trailed behind him. The gritty ice burned against his raw wounds until his skin grew numb from cold.

Blaine and Piran exchanged a glance that spoke volumes. Solidarity. Shared suffering. Acknowledgment that it might be the last time they saw freedom. And above all, an unspoken vow that someday, somehow, they would be avenged against Prokief and their attackers.

One guard removed the lid from the Hole; then the two guards heaved Blaine into the darkness. Blaine tumbled down, deep into the ice, as they replaced the lid and left him in blackness. He landed hard.

Blaine lay where he had fallen, gasping from the pain, alone in the darkness.
Will Ejnar really meddle to keep us from dying down here? It would be like that bastard Prokief to want the chance to torture us longer. Gods know, Piran and I have earned his ire a dozen times over.

After he caught his breath, Blaine forced himself to his knees, and began to feel around the ice to discover the bounds of his prison. To his relief, Prokief's sadistic humor had not included tossing in a wolf or some other predator to finish Blaine off.

Of course not,
Blaine thought.
That would be too easy. Merciful, by his standards. And if he had intended a blood fight, he would have left the lid off, so the soldiers could watch.

It would not have surprised Blaine to find the frozen corpse of one of the oubliette's prior occupants. Then again, Prokief liked to make sure all of Velant's inmates saw the evidence of his brutality to remind them that their lives and deaths were wholly under his control and subject to his whims.

Blaine permitted himself a grunt of pain. The fall had winded him. His back hurt badly enough to bring tears to his eyes, but he swallowed down his pain and forced himself to pace the circumference of the oubliette.

He could stretch out his arms and reach both sides. That meant his prison was barely wide enough for him to lie down. On the other hand, cold as it was deep in the ice, he was out of the wind and snow. Still, freezing to death was a real possibility. Prisoners found it difficult enough not to die from ice sickness in the normal course of their work, when they could retreat to the relative warmth of the barracks and the heat they could coax from the scant rations of firewood.

The oubliette contained no food, and certainly no means to build a fire, and no draft to vent one. Once again, the dubious mercy of Prokief's punishment was clear.

Blaine eased down to sit, tucking his cloak around himself to conserve as much body heat as he could. His gut still clenched spasmodically and he alternated between chills and fever.

I never really expected to survive Velant,
Blaine thought.
No matter what Prokief told his mage this time. And none of us will ever return to Donderath. Piran's right; the chance of living long enough to get out of this damned prison and become a colonist is slim. A sucker's bet.

And yet the colony of Skalgerston Bay was populated by the Velant colonists who had survived the hardships of Prokief's prison. Those who earned their Tickets of Leave received  small amounts of acreage and pittances of coin to build cabins for themselves and start over as colonists. Most returned to the kind of work they had done in Donderath, coopers and blacksmiths, whores and tradesmen. The herring boat fleet made fishermen of all able-bodied colonists, and sometimes if the food ran short, some of the convicts as well. Everyone did some farming, since the shipments from back home did not come as often or as regularly as needed to keep people fed.

How much life can change in just a short period of time,
Blaine thought.
I managed to trade father's brutality for Prokief's. At least back at Glenreith I had a bed to sleep in and hot meals most of the time.

Still, he knew that given the choice he would not change the course of action that brought him to Velant.
Not if it meant that Father continued to beat Carr and abuse Mari. If I hadn't killed Father, he would have had to kill me. So perhaps death was looking for me either way, though I cheated King Merrill's noose.

Three days, Prokief said. Do I believe him? If I fall asleep, I'll likely die down here in the cold—unless Ejnar can actually keep me alive and torture me at the same time. Freezing to death isn't that bad of a way to go, considering the options. No more pain, or hunger, no more being the guards' target. I can fight to stay awake. Maybe I'll even manage to last that long. But did he mean it? Will he really haul us out then, or did he just say that to raise false hopes? What's to say he won't change his mind?

Cramps bent him over from time to time. Fever raised a sweat; then chills shook him to his core. But after a time, Blaine felt some strength return. He did not trust Prokief's word or Ejnar's magic to assure his survival. The cold, not his wounds, was the biggest threat. He resolved to keep moving as long as he could.

Blaine struggled to his feet and forced himself to pace the oubliette, then reverse course and pace again. He rested, leaning against the icy wall, and traced the path once more. The pit was cold, dark, and silent except for the scrape of his boots against the ice. Blaine felt jumpy, as if energy tingled through the darkness and the ice, catching him in its flow
. Just my imagination,
he thought. But he had heard whispered rumors, back in the barracks, that magic coursed beneath Edgeland's snow and rock, out through the bay to Estendall, the volcano that sometimes rumbled and sent plumes of steam into the cold air. Rivers of magic flowed through certain places, some of the hedge witches said, things they called ‘meridians.' Legends and wives' tales, Blaine thought. But in the darkness, he wondered.

Most people in Donderath had at least a flicker of small magic, and they used their talent for everyday tasks—healing a sick cow, making crops grow faster, finding out where to drill a well. Blaine found his own talent of limited usefulness. In a fight, he had a second of forewarning of where his opponent would strike, sensed even earlier than signaled by the movements or expression of the other fighter. It was a secret Blaine had long guarded, since it gave him his only edge against his father. Here, it had enabled him to best other convicts who had tried to put him in his place. But against the ice and cold, it was useless.