Condemned (Death Planet Book 1) (31 page)

The closer he came to the light, the more noise he could hear. People were still shouting up above in the castle. They knew he’d escaped, and the King wouldn’t just let him go, would he? They’d be following, soon enough.

Something squeaked behind him. He glanced back. Light reflected from Rat-Girl’s eyes as she dangled her head through the hole where Daniel had fallen. Her hand cast a shadow on the wall behind as she waved for him to go to her. His tooth swung on the end of the cord around her neck.

He stumbled back toward her, pushing against the flow of water. It splashed against the wall as he dragged himself slowly onward. And rose higher as the bed of the stream descended.

She squeaked repeatedly as she dangled there. She was the only decent person he'd met since he arrived on Hades. And he couldn't even understand what she was trying to say.

But there was no way to climb back into the hole. By the time he got there, the water would be too deep for him to reach the roof, and she couldn’t lift him. Even if he could handle the claustrophobic tunnel, he couldn’t reach it from the stream.

“I'll be back,” he said. Then turned away. She squeaked at him, then pulled herself back up into the hole.

Now what? He had to get out of there. Far from the city. Somewhere he could find time to stop and think about what he’d done, and what he should do now.

If only Guy was there. He’d know what to do.

He crept toward the light, and paused as he approached it. A low arch crossed the stream at the base of the castle wall, and, beyond it, the stream ran between grassy banks, behind some of Kingston’s scrappy wooden buildings. Then on, toward the river. It had to leave the city somehow, didn’t it?

He was naked. Every Guard in the city would be looking for him. He’d never learned to swim. The water was damn cold, and his balls were already freezing. Great.

What choice did he have? Night was hours away, and he couldn’t wait that long. They’d find him if he did. His heart thudded as he imagined himself drowning out in the middle of the river, the water filling his lungs as he tried to scream.

He had to try. The water was running out of the city. He just had to keep calm, and let it take him with it.

He leaned forward until his chest was floating on the water, and pushed off with his feet. He bobbed up and down on the ripples and waves as the water carried him toward the light. His eyes had grown so accustomed to the darkness in the tunnel, and in this cavern beneath the walls, that they burned with pain as the bright daylight flooded in.

He closed them for a few seconds. He could hear the yells, rattles and curses of the city, and see a red glow through his eyelids. He opened them again.

Something flew through the air toward him. A man stood on a balcony at the back of one of the buildings, with a wooden bucket in his hands. Yellow liquid and dark blobs flew from the bucket as the man swung it into the air. Daniel closed his eyes as the piss and shit fell toward him, and splashed into the water just ahead. But he couldn’t close his nose to the stench.

He floated on. The stream meandered along a zigzag path behind the buildings, until it approached the log wall.

Head down, as the stream passed beneath. He winced as one of the logs scraped his shoulder on the way through, leaving a long, red scratch on his skin. Just another one to add to the many he’d already accumulated. At least the cool water soothed his wounds, and gave his ribs a chance to relax.

Then he was through. Out of Kingston. On his way to... wherever the river would take him. His eyelids drooped for a second. Now that no-one was actively trying to kill him, his body wanted to sleep for a week.

Days of getting little sleep as he waited for his tribunal, months of suspension in the pod, and two nights on Hades with little rest. Perhaps death would be a relief. He could forget all the things he’d done, all the dead back in the castle because of him, the failed Revolution that was all his fault.

A drone buzzed above his ass, then along the side of his body, and hovered over his head. No, he couldn’t do that. What if his comrades back at the barracks saw this? What a failure he’d look. He was going to do something with his life to make amends for the destruction he’d caused. He’d free the people of Hades, somehow.

Where was he now? He lifted his head. Crap. He still had at least ten metres to go, and Guards stood outside the wall, near the gates. The stream passed beneath a narrow, wooden bridge, and emerged only a metre or two from their feet.

Andy was speaking to a pair of Guards beside the bridge, but Daniel couldn’t make out his words over the noise of the stream and city. Andy leaned closer to one of the Guards, who leaned back, then turned his face away. Andy thumped the Guard’s chest, then turned. He strode over the bridge, heading toward the city, with half a dozen more Guards following close behind. The bridge shook beneath them as their boots thumped down on the logs.

Daniel gulped. If just one of them looked his way...

W
ell, that was a Royal fucking disaster. So much for catching the little shit’s accomplices. Should have tortured the fucker after all. It would have been more fun than this mess. Of all the things the King had learned since arriving on Hades, he should have known his lousy excuses for Guards would fuck up.

He sat, slumped over, in the wreckage of the grandstand. The steam belching from his back had finally died away, and, as the pressure in the boiler decreased from the red zone on the gauge in his helmet, he could move his arms and legs again. Just not very much. Every time he tried to stand, his legs wobbled until they gave way beneath him.

“Sir,” Pig-Face said. His face was still bruised from where he’d smacked into the ground when that shitty bear-thing kicked him. That would be the least of the creature’s worries, when the King was done with her.

“What, you worthless maggot?”

“The Princess, sir...”

“What about...?”

Pig-Face nodded toward the edge of the pile of planks, cushions, and dead bodies around them. The King climbed to his feet. This time, he stayed upright, with only a slight wobble. Steam hissed from the holes the nails had made in the pipes on his back. The Brain better fix those fuckers.

Bones crunched beneath his feet as he stepped through the debris, following Pig-Face to where two more Guards crouched beside a small body, lying face-up on the ground.

A small body wrapped in a silky dress, with long white hair around its head.

He stomped across the debris as fast as his legs could still move, ignoring the moans from the spectators trapped beneath.

Bianca’s eyes opened wide, bulging from her skull as she twisted on the ground. Blood oozed out around the nails that protruded from her head. Her arms and legs jerked, and her mouth moved, but only hissing came out.

Smoke puffed from the engine as he turned to Pig-Face. “Take her to the tower. And find the doctor. Now.”

Pig-Face grabbed two planks, and pulled the flag from the flagpole. He lay the planks beside each other on top of the torn flag, and wrapped the cloth around them. He tied it around the wood, then grabbed Bianca’s shoulders and gently lifted her from the ground. The other Guards took her legs, and slid her onto the makeshift stretcher.

Bianca moaned as they lifted the stretcher, and carried her toward the arch. The King’s little girl was fucked up. Well, mentally, she’d always been fucked up, but now it was physical, too. The one girl he might have been able to marry off when she was old enough, to cement a deal with the Sultan Of The Sands, for mutual protection from Over The Sea. The Sultan’s head wife would bitch, but she was a shrewy little cow, who only deserved to be strangled and tossed to the hounds.

If the girl died...

Fuck it. Whether or not she died, that asshole was going to pay. He should have tortured the fucker to death when he had the chance. Now... now, when he caught the murderous little bastard, he was going to wish he’d been buggered to death by the Royal Hounds, instead of whatever they came up with. And Bianca was going to get her fun, too. The boy’s skin would look good stretched out on the castle wall.

Oh, yes. There was something else.

“Where’s the other one?”

“Princess Furball is safe, sir.” Liam nodded toward the far side of the courtyard. She sat beside the remains of the food stall, chatting to Kevin. He laughed, and she leaned closer, to whisper into his ear. The top of her dress fell aside, and a furry breast flopped out through a tear in the front. She let him stare for a moment, before she reached down and covered it again.

“I’m not sure I’d call that safe.” Not that the bitch was good for much. Who’d want to marry her? But he didn’t need any unexpected royal bastards running around the castle. “Take her back to her room, and keep an eye on her.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And if I hear you touched her, you’ll pay with your balls.”

Liam’s red, sweaty head nodded rapidly. He strode across the courtyard, and muttered to Kevin. Kevin glanced at the King, then stood and brushed the dirt from his uniform. Furball shook her head, and scowled as Liam pointed at the King. Then Liam lead her away, toward the tower.

The King turned on the spot. Some of the spectators were leaving. More were tending their wounds. Others were splattered across the courtyard in a pile of their own blood and guts. On the plus side, this was a Brawl no-one would forget. They’d be talking about it in the bars of Kingston for decades.

“What are you fuckers doing?” the King yelled. “This is the fucking Brawl. If you can’t have fun here, where can you?”

A couple of men raised their arms and gave halfhearted cheers. The rest did nothing.

“Isn’t this the best fucking Brawl ever?”

Two more men yelled.

The King pointed at the closest two. “You. And you. In the fucking arena now, or I’ll rip your heads off myself.”

One of the men rubbed the small of his back. “I pulled a muscle, sir.”

“A hundred silver shinies, and a week in the
Cat House
, to whoever comes out alive.”

They glanced at each other. The sick man suddenly forgot his wound, and pulled out his sword. The crowd began to turn and yell as the pair strode into the arena.

The King pointed to another of the men. Short, stubby, with a dirty little moustache. “Can you cook?”

“I can roast a rabbit.”

“Then you're the new cook. Get that barbie going.” The King pointed at the bodies scattered around the courtyard. “We feast tonight.”

That finally got the crowd cheering. Ten years ago, he could still inspire the people of Kingston with one of his loud tirades about protecting their glorious homeland against the assholes from Over The Sea. Now they’d grown fat and soft. All they cared about was money, girls, and stuffing their bellies.

Though, if he was to be honest, so had he. The blacksmiths had adjusted the exoskeleton twice in the last year so it fit better after his middle-aged stomach had expanded from too much of the good life in his tower. He wasn’t as young as he used to be.

He had to find something to make Kingston great again. Make him great again. Give his people something more to worry about than who’d be next on the barbie.

He should see the Brain. Convince him to get started on the invasion force. When the people of the Borderlands saw what he was taking to capture Over The Sea, they’d be lining up to join him. Maybe they’d crush the Sultan while they were at it, and there’d be no need for that wedding after all.

Cheers rose from the arena, as the clang of metal on metal echoed around the courtyard. That was more like it. The two men he’d picked dodged around the dirt, swinging sword and axe at each other like professional fighters, as they fought for their prize. If money couldn’t motivate a man, his dick would.

The King pulled some broken planks of into a pile tall enough to sit on. He pulled another, but a lung and some bloodstained organs he couldn’t identify clung to the end, so he tossed it aside. The planks creaked as he sat on them. Probably lucky the steam engine was belching so much smoke that he could barely smell the stench of blood and guts around him.

Though that brought back pleasant memories of the old days, tearing his enemies limb from limb, stealing their shinies, raping their women, and taking the best for his harem.

Ah, to live like that again...

Kevin coughed. That sneaky little shit must have been standing there for a minute or two, while the King mused about better times. If the fucker had touched his daughters again, they'd have his balls for supper. No way was his rotten cock popping royal cherry.

A short, baby-faced Guard stood beside Kevin, staring at the dirt. Kevin nodded toward him. “Sir, Short-Ass has something to tell you.”

The Guard stared resolutely at the ground, his gaze not moving a millimetre toward the King. His face was covered with sweat, and his wet hair was stuck to his scalp. Did he think the King had time to waste?

“Get on with it, man.”

“Sir... the Brain...”

“What about that bastard? Has he finally come around to his senses? Ready to start working for me again? Ready to make Kingston the envy of the world? Or did that fucking spider just eat him at last?”

Short-Ass glanced at the other Guards who were watching nearby. Kevin nudged him. Short-Ass looked down, bit his lip, then looked up at the King. Then he leaned forward and spoke in a whisper, as though he was afraid for anyone to hear.

“He’s... escaped.”

D
aniel took a deep breath, then lowered his face to the stream. The water cooled his wounded skin, and filled his broken nose. The suns beat down on his bare back and ass, above the water. How long could he hold his breath? Better be long enough to float past the Guards. He couldn’t risk letting them see his face, and alerting the King. Once past them, he’d be... safer.

The stream carried him on, as he fought against the urge to gulp down more air. The world grew darker as the oxygen left his brain. His chest twitched, his lungs wanted to breathe, his cheeks bulged, eager for fresh air. How far had he gone?