The Darkslayer: Book 01 - Wrath of the Royals (14 page)

The match was taking longer than he had anticipated. What started out as a simple skim was now a full-fledged battle. He could feel the man’s labored breaths on his neck, while his own lungs were beginning to burn. He short stepped the man back and forth, and Tonio was weakening, about to give.

The Royals forehead walloped him in the nose. Blood trickled down Venir’s face, its redness covering his chin and dripping to the floor. His eyes watered from the pain. The sight of blood drove the men and women into such frenzy that the head barkeep stood atop the bar waving a large oaken club in his hand.

Venir growled and snarled; half-man, half-bull, and all warrior. Enough was enough. With arms locked on Tonio like a vice, he drew the young man in close.

“Down you go!”

He crossed his exhausted opponent’s arms and pulled him in tight, turned his hip under the man and lifted Tonio’s entire body over his own head. He slammed the Royal into the hard oaken floor.

CRACK!

The air exploded from Tonio’s mouth and he laid out cold.

Silence filled the room.

The crowd looked at him, the man who executed a move none had seen before. It was a contest that would be remembered for a long time in the Chimera.

Tonio was limp, yet breathing. As they lifted Tonio from the floor, Venir noticed it was the busted planks on the floor that had cracked, not the warrior’s back.

Too bad.

Venir watched them go, holding a rag to his nose that a patron handed him. He was exhausted and had a headache. He sat back down and watched his friend retrieve their winnings from many hapless faces. The crumpled heap of his opponent and his companions disappeared out of the back of the Chimera. For some reason he wished he would have killed the man.

Venir pinched is hands over his nose and with a nasty
crunch
he shoved it back into place. Tears were streaking down his eyes.

“Is it straight?”

“Straight enough … like it matters.”

It was well into the morning now as he sat in the tavern which had begun to clear out. A couple of ladies had made their way back to the table and Venir was beginning to feel better.

“Gee Venir,” the rogue said, “it almost looked like you weren’t in control of that whole bout. It could have cost us.”

He felt those sharp eyes on him, but knew his friend would be okay now that some ladies were in the nooks of his arms.

“That kid surprised me is all I can say. I have a broken nose to show for it. But don’t worry, Me, I won’t be so careless next time.”

The heavy rains washed the stagnant filth back into the sewers of the city. People filled the streets with buckets and soap, storing fresh water and washing off weeks of the sandy grime that caked them. Rain was a rare blessing in the city centered in the Outlands as baths were not a commodity of the impoverished.

Sheets of the warm drops drenched a man whose pride had cost him a broken nose a few nights ago. Dark, wet and drunk he sloshed through the flooding streets singing a warriors song. People shuffled away as the belching man bustled past them, telling them to get out of the way.

Venir was on his own, doing what he wanted, escaping the pursuits of the Outland world. He wanted to live another night like his last. Women, song, drink and dance—the best his remaining coin could buy. He smiled as rain dripped over the hard lines of his face. There was more fun to be had.

His friend Melegal had opted out of the return to the Chimera. The rogue had little influence in talking him out of it. His mind was set and he would go back, win the crowd and share his tales of glory. Have at it, the thief said as he slid away.
Pah!
He didn’t need a baby sitter if he were only among the city bred children.

He whistled a tune he had heard somewhere earlier in the dreary day. He hoped to bump into some of those people he thought he’d impressed a few nights earlier. He no longer wore the special hooded smock from the City of Three. The significance of that never entered his alcohol influenced mind. He looked like nothing more than an oversized commoner in the garb of a layman. His mind was on more of that premium dark grog, and maybe a bottle for the road. His dry mouth began to water despite the soaking rain. Maybe someone would want to buy him a bottle, he thought, laughing out loud. He wouldn’t stay too long. He would shake some hands and soon be out of there, without any trouble. It was the least he could do.

Dripping wet, in a tattered brown cloak and muddied boots he stomped inside, oblivious to the glares. He couldn’t have been more out of place if he had a dead cat strapped to his head. It was early, the tavern quiet and only a handful of commendable types and others filled room. Frowns looked up from their food, then down again, muttering amongst themselves.

He went up to the bar and barked out an order for some of that
dandy
grog.

“Good evening!”

The same pock-marked barkeep from nights earlier nodded, pouring the grog in a polished rock cut tumbler that he placed on the bar. Venir took it in his hand, sipped it, nodded at the smoking barkeep, and drained it.

“Ah!” he said, clonking the empty tumbler back on the surface.

Behind him another patron scurried into the back, head looking back and forth. The barkeep nodded as the patron slipped away. Venir didn’t notice, only watching the man’s meaty forearms pour more dark amber fluid into his cup.

“Thanks, Sam,” he muttered, tossing the man a large silver coin that more than covered his tab.

“No problem, Mister,” the barkeep replied, sweat beading his brow.

He stared at the man’s smoky eyes, sniffed the intoxicating liquor, pausing before he drained it. He licked his teeth and smacked his lips. Something didn’t seem quite right, but the grog tasted fine.

“That was good,” he said, grinning. “How about another? Make it two!”

It wasn’t long before he was feeling at home and more rain soaked patrons sauntered in, leaving burning looks on his back. He sat at the bar, hunched like a yeti on a stool. A fine red-head struck up a conversation at his side. She was voluptuous, smelling like a dozen different flowers, with the mouth of an ornery troubadour. He captivated her with his story from the night before. Her painted eyes were inviting as she twirled a lock of his hair and straddled one long leg over his.

He turned to the other patrons and toasted her, roaring his drunken thanks and describing her comely body in a booming voice that all could hear. Then he shot back the grog and slammed the tumbler down. There was a low, wicked chuckle from somewhere in the room.

The grog had tasted different this time, he noticed—more bitter and intoxicating. The face of the captivating woman before him began to stretch in many directions. His body began to shiver and the floor wobbled. He heard her voice, but couldn’t understand her words. He thought he heard laughter coming from her perfect red lips. His brows buckled as he growled, clutching at the bar, hanging on for his life. Then floor smashed him full in the face. He didn’t feel a thing.

A single candle-lit lantern illuminated a damp dungeon cell below the restless City of Bone. Rats the size of cats scurried about on the moldy stone floors, feasting on any leftover scraps or excrement that would fill them. The leftover bones of long past occupants were crunched and consumed with rabid jaws.

A lone man chained to the wall of the cell was snoring, his deep rumblings keeping the hungry rats at bay from his dangling toes. Long, stringy locks of sweaty blonde hair hung over his battered face. Dirty, ragged clothes still covered most of his beaten body. He had slept through every blow, disturbing the dungeon guards. They decided to hang him in his cell until he came around while assuring one another that he had felt something.

The guards did not realize the significance of this man, nor did they care. The slumbering man seemed at peace, as if his conscience was clear, oblivious of any crimes he had committed. He was not some upstart citizen that crossed the wrong path, instead a killer. Not of the common sort that struck the blind in the night, or kidnapped women and babes. He was more than that. He was a killer that had survived endless years with cold deference. Peril was his bedfellow. Venir was his name.

He didn’t realize he had been serving the greater good of Bish for quite some time. He was the one the underlings called the scourge of their kind. He had decimated their ranks, time and again. They wanted dead him, a kingdom for his head. Now the outland butcher was shackled by another set of enemies for other reasons. The underlings did not realize their thorn was little more than a common man who hung helpless at the mercy of softer opponents. No, the name of Venir meant nothing to the underlings, for they called this human by a different name. With great hatred and reverence, they called him the Darkslayer.

He awoke disoriented, chained, and hanging from a wall in a small, smelly cell. An angry grunt aggravated the throbbing in his head. His hands were numb as they bled within the tight shackles on his thick wrists. His sudden snort jostled an unkempt, heavyset guard that was leaning against the wall, asleep in his chair. The young guard rubbed his eyes and tilted all four legs back to the stony floor. The guard scratched his unshaven chin and looked through the bars at him.

“Finally got yer hide didn’t they, tough guy?” the guard said, spitting tobacco through the cell bars falling short of his swelling feet.

Venir uttered a faint laugh, drawing a perturbed look from the guard’s pimply face. The guard unlocked the cell, swung back its barred door, strode up to him and spat thick dark tobacco juice full in his face.

The guard winced, shaking his wrist. The guard gave him an uncertain look, stepped out of the cell, and locked it shut. Holding his wrist, the man skittered out of sight where a heavy door opened and closed in the distance.

Venir checked out his dreary surroundings.
Bone!
Dungeon floors were like a second home to him. They were all the same no matter where you were. They were foul, and slick with centuries old muck and grime. It was not something he ever got used to, but he had been in worse. The chubby city guard was the same as the rest. The young rookie was fresh meat and he had no desire to kill him, just punish him.

As black juice ran down his chin, onto his chest, he tugged at his chains. He inspected the chains that bound him. They were rusted, made for a lesser man. The cell door looked like its better days passed decades ago. A solid kick would take it from the hinges. He had barreled through thicker steel when he had too.

Why was he here? He traced the last steps he recalled.
The Chimera.
A cherry headed woman with an unrivaled plunging neckline and soft milky thighs was there. A faint smile crossed his cracked lips. The grog, syrupy, biting and divine had turned his belly sour.
Drugged? Poisoned?
He wanted to figure it out. He thought to wrench the chains from the wall and walk out. He was drained and sluggish and his eyes ached as they opened and closed. It wasn’t in him.

Patience was the better plan, but he had doubts. One could never trust the City Watch, controlled by the Royal brethren. They would slit a woman’s throat with little more than a word, he had seen it before. If he was drugged, he wanted to know who and why. He was ticked off and embarrassed to have been duped by himself at the tavern.

To make matters worse, his nose was aching and the rest of his body throbbed under his skin. But it could have been worse: nothing felt broken, not even a rib. He was lucky all he had was a headache and not a cracked skull. He had tasted steel toed boots before. Who would have gone to all this the trouble over him? It must have been the Royals and he had crossed their turf once too often.

He drifted into sleep only to awaken to biting pain and discomfort as he shifted in his shackles. The next few hours were agonizing as they passed. He dozed off, heavy in dreams when the sound several footsteps disturbed his sleep. His mind seemed to trudge through the mud, eyes cracking open to see what was about to befall him.

Four figures strode into full view at the cell door: the chubby guard that spat on him, a rugged-faced man marked as a warden, a tall familiar brown-haired man, and an older, elegant and powerful-looking man.
Royals.
His blood began to stir.