Escana (47 page)

'You are weary from the journey,'
he said to her.

Her body found itself agreeing
with him entirely.

'Rest. I will watch over you.'

She should have been concerned at
the prospect, yet all she wished for now was the peace of sleep.

S
he pressed
down on it firmly with a nail to hear it gurgle at her once again.
She didn't know the name of it but apparently it was a delicacy
harvested from underground pools beneath the deserts of the north.
All she knew was they were absolutely delicious, if somewhat viscous
to the touch.

There was something delightfully
cruel in torturing such a pathetic creature, brought such an immense
distance at great expense into a world it had no conception of simply
to die a feeble death for her pleasure alone. Through the toying with
the thing she had surmised that they were blind in this light and
completely oblivious of their fate unless made painfully aware.

She honestly didn't know if their
taste was improved through application of fear or if her imagination
was trying to justify her methods. She didn't care really, the means
to the end were unimportant, the results were what mattered most.

The gurgling increased in both
volume and pitch as she let her hot breath settle upon it before
smearing it around her lips. There was no satisfying crunch as she
bit into the head, it lacked a conventional skeletal system, the rush
of flavour was gloriously intoxicating.

She needed to be slightly drugged
for what she was preparing to do, there was simply no other way of
tracking him. She'd be exhausted for the rest of the week from her
labours but she couldn't stand not knowing what was happening.

Slowly rising from the divan, she
dug her toes into the exquisite fabric of the carpet and let a small
shiver climb up her back. Eli was busy running errands and she had
checked that the privacy of her room had not been disturbed multiple
times during the day in preparation for this.

She walked over to the far wall
and placed her hand on the cool marble, then she quickly extended her
fingers with spider-like grace across the surface in a peculiar
pattern. A casual observer would think her hand had seized as she
keyed the final intricate movement into the stone and waited.

A grinding noise from beneath the
floor came and went in the space of a few short seconds, a single
clicking sound caused a previously unseen separation to appear in the
marble floor.

Alissandra waddled over and
brushed the left corner of the tile gently with the toe of her foot.
It sprung open at the touch, hurling a carpet several feet over the
divan. She muttered to herself, cursing the servant who had placed it
so inconveniently before proceeding down the stairs into darkness.

Or at least, it would have been
darkness for any other person. Instead everything had a luminous
green tinge to it, one of her many capabilities that frightened the
common man. She had no lighting in her room whatsoever and at night
it would remain pitch black to all that entered.

Let them think of her as some
monstrous creature that surrounded herself in darkness, let the tales
of her sanctum grow, she would use them to her advantage in due time.

She brushed carefully past the
tables stacked with a series of books and alchemical creations and on
to the end of the chamber. There stood a single concave shape with a
large sheet thrown over the top for protection.

She approached it warily,
flinching in anticipation as she grabbed the loose end of the sheet
and tore it away in one sudden movement.

She knew what she as going to see
before the familiar green tinge of her sight evaporated. The mirror
spoke directly into her thoughts, so powerful were they that her eyes
were tricked into believing she actually saw them, dispelling her
previous night sight entirely.

It was the image of a bald man,
he was talking jovially to a number of disgruntled looking men who
were demanding that he reveal the location of someone.

She wasn't here to see the trials
of Harold Gooseman though, now her hardest task was at hand.

She strained her thought toward
the mirror, urging it to reveal to her that which she wanted to see
even more than this strange man it fixated upon. That mystery could
be left for another time.

Her head felt as if caught in a
vice as the mirror continued to resist her commands, she was spurred
on by the flickering image playing across her eyes. It was changing
into a familiar pale white glow, it would appear that he was in
Levanin itself.

She stifled her excitement,
reminding herself that the image she was about to inflict upon
herself may well be one that broke her concentration on the mirror
entirely.

The vision solidified in her
mind's eye and projected itself out onto her strained corneas.
El-Vador lay in silence watching the girl slumber. It had happened so
soon, she had doubted it even possible yet it had happened.
Alissandra pushed forward with increasing urgency, she needed to see
his face.

It was timeless as always, as
blank as a slate and in its peculiar stasis. She longed silently to
reach out and touch it one last time, yet she knew to do so would be
folly. She had tried inadvertently many times before.

With a gasp she finally broke
contact with the mirror, scrambling for the white sheet and hurling
it over the image of the innkeeper.

She had tried to watch him once,
much as she had tried to watch El-Vador for extended periods of time.
Yet in doing so the sensation of creeping death grew steadily more
pervasive. Alissandra was no fool. When using an item such as this
the slightest warning of imminent catastrophe was reason not to
continue. That it had been spelt out so boldly by its creators
brooked no arguments on her part.

She staggered up the steps,
reflecting on how bitter-sweet what little she had learnt truly was.
El-Vador had finally returned to Levanin, but the girl was with him.

T
he dreams
had become increasingly vivid as life in the endless darkness drew
onward. His communication with Re'tak had been sparing over the
course of their captivity. Apparently the link was a drain upon both
their energies.

The cave was cool and there was a
moistness about the air as he crawled out from the sticky goo. A
coarse tongue descended in front of his bleary eyes and licked him
clean. A brightness took him then and a sense of weightlessness was
imposed upon him.

Now he was running, a pounding
sense of exhilaration flowing through his veins as a startled canyon
rat bounded for the cover of the rocks. He had caught it out in the
open and there was no escaping his grasp now. Everything went light
and his head ached.

Another cave now, all was dark
around him. A stinging rebuke lingered in his ears as he was educated
in no uncertain terms not to kill the rats.

Now there was resentment, not at
the punishment but at how uncontrollable it felt. Was there really
that much that separated him from the animals?

He didn't pull his weight in the
hunts now and was shunned by his kin, he took to searching alone as
the others didn't feel he was worthy of sharing in their kill.

It was then he learnt finesse and
control. How to push the limits of what his instincts willed him to
do by creeping inexorably closer to his targets rather than dash
outright.

Hern woke with a start, leaping
into readiness and remembering where he was an instant later.

You
were in my head, yellowskin. Why do you choose to trespass?

He shook his own head, being hit
with a mental communication was a strange enough experience, having
to endure it upon waking was less the preferable. Was it his
imagination or did it seem more amplified than usual?

I
was dreaming, were my dreams of your own past?

The snorting noise Re'tak let out
seemed to indicate that they were and that he seemed less than
impressed about it. Hern did the bulk of the talking in their
conversations, he had been mentally violated by masters of his order
before and thought he could guess at what his new friend must be
feeling.

That
I saw visions from your head was entirely unintentional on my part.
The link we have appears to be stronger than we suspected. You have
my most profound apologies.

He waited patiently for Re'tak to
reply, finally the beast spoke again, if you could call the
communication speaking.

Did
you dream of canyons?

Hern searched back into his
memory, the dreams were fading with great rapidity, it felt like
snatching at feathers in a dust storm.

I
vaguely recall a large rock face that you were chasing a desert rat
down. Were those the canyons you speak of?

The
response
was
almost
immediate
this
time.
Yes,
those
were
the
canyons.
To
my
knowledge
you
are
the
first
not
of
our
kin
to
see
such
a
thing.
They
are
a
proving
ground
of
sorts,
many
of
our
young
are
sent
there
to
fend
for
themselves.

Why
are you telling me this?

Re'tak
snorted.
If
you
cannot
control
the
dreams
that
we
have,
then
it
is
better
that
you
understand
them.

Hern didn't mention how shaken
the whole ordeal had left him. He amongst many others had been
trained to control their dreams from a very young age. To be at the
peak of his powers and be hit by a dream without lucidity was
simultaneously terrifying and intriguing to him.

It was all about control. A man
who had control of his situation was better prepared for variables
outside of that. If he could not control his dreams how could he be
mentally prepared for any other activities that required great focus?
The dreams could be a bi-product of his contact or indeed the alien
nature of Re'tak's mind but he couldn't allow himself to make that
assumption. The other possibilities were disheartening to say the
least.

If Re'tak seemed put out by the
lack of response or acknowledgement he didn't show it. Hern welcomed
the silence, it gave him more time to formulate a potential escape
route for both of them before they wasted away into nothing.

It had been an odd experience the
first time Re'tak had regurgitated a lump of meat. He had placed his
back against the wall in alarm at the sound and then his fear had
turned into concern. He had explained to the beast that there was no
way he could eat the scraps without sickening and dying.

Re'tak's solution to this was to
use his own juices to cleanse the meat. It was raw and dripping and
almost inedible but it gave him enough sustenance to keep him alive.

While Hern required water once
every few days Re'tak was a true creature of the desert and the lack
of any moisture didn't bother him in the slightest. The juices he
spat up over the meat were painful to swallow but given the choice
between ulcers and death, Hern could live with ulcers.

It had been several weeks of
captivity now and there had been no further fights beyond a faint and
muffled clang of weapons in the arena beyond. Apparently this
Corporal Dyson wasn't going to feed any more men to the slaughter.
Hern could only assume that he was vaguely satisfied with the few he
had kept alive upon their arrival. He had no idea how long they would
have to wait for more to arrive and the gates of their cell to open
once again. Their cramped existence seemed interminable but like all
things Hern knew there had to be an ending, Dyson may well think Hern
dead but he wouldn't let Re'tak rot in this cell.

All he knew was when the doors
finally creaked open, together they would be ready.

J
immy had
reached breaking point.

The constant grinding noise of
the wheels, the various bumps and bruises he had accrued from holes
in the road, the horrid stale sweat that permeated the air. He had
just about had enough of it.

It was an intolerable atmosphere.
When they weren't sitting silently and eyeing the people in their
midst with distrust they were goaded into fighting to the death for
food by the guards, who had started taking bets on who would be the
next fatality.

Throughout all this, the one
thought that lingered in Jimmy's mind was of how easily The Hermit
had overcome greater odds before. How his complete lack of action in
the face of such danger seemed life-threateningly irresponsible.