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Authors: Fiona McIntosh

Tags: #Fiction, #Fantasy, #General

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BOOK: Myrren's Gift
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Wyl, helpless to stop this terror unfolding, saw the confessor step forward. There was a sparkle in Lymbert’s eyes. “Myrren, may I introduce you to the Dark Angel. It’s my favorite instrument. I’d like to take a few moments to explain how it works, if you please.” He was all graciousness now, enjoying the chance to show off his latest contraption of pain. “Your hands are tied behind you for a reason and now my assistant is attaching the Ansel to your bound hands. When I give the word, those three men over there,” he said, pointing, but Wyl cheered silently that she refused to look, “will use that pulley to hoist you aloft so you will fly like an angel, your arms outstretched backward like wings.” he said, enjoying himself. “Now, Myrren, it’s at that point we’ll all enjoy hearing your arms dislocating. My favorite sound.” He all but shivered with delighted anticipation. “And did you notice the hundred-pound weights, my dear? Well, as you can see—if you would only look—they are attached to your feet now and they, of course, will do their best to fight the Angel to prevent your body leaving the ground, thereby assisting us in dislocating your hip joints. Oh, glorious agony! Incidentally, we have decided to bypass the somewhat tedious second degree and go straight to the third to save time and a great deal of pointless screaming. I hope that’s agreeable to you?” He laughed jovially and everyone except Wyl joined him.

Myrren turned her face away.

“Oh, and, Myrren,” he added, “I nearly forgot—how careless of me. I thought I’d throw in what I like to call Dark Angel Swoops for good measure. Perhaps you don’t know what that is? It’s the most exquisite suffering I think I could possibly inflict without actually drawing blood. This is when we will let go of the Angel’s ropes—just momentarily—and you, of course, my dear, will fall from the sky. But oh—and this is the good bit—my men will suddenly halt that swoop to the ground by grabbing the rope and you just can’t imagine what torment that’s going to mean for those suffering sockets and limbs, long past their pain barriers. Now, do be a good girl and confess after the first flight and drop because you should know that by law I have another three times to inflict it. It will hurt a great deal more by the fourth and I do think it’s more noble to die by the flames than hanging dead and broken on the ropes, don’t you?” This time Wyl wanted to applaud loudly when she spat at him. but he held his composure watching her turn her back to her tormentor in a last show of defiance. It was but a momentary triumph.

“Hoist the witch—let’s watch the Dark Angel fly,” he said viciously and his henchmen obeyed, hauling on the rope attached to a pulley.

Wyl felt his stomach contents lurch into his throat as he heard the inevitable and sickening sound of Myrren’s shoulders capitulating almost immediately. As the first of her limb sockets popped, Wyl’s midday meal burst onto his boots but few paid him any attention, except Celimus, who pushed him aside to avoid being splattered.

The Prince was laughing, though, and Wyl knew Celimus was revelling in Wyl’s obvious squeamishness at watching a woman suffer.

“Trust you’re enjoying my surprise. General,” he growled for Wyl’s hearing only.

This was what he had wanted, Wyl knew, to finally unsettle his Champion-to-be into humiliating himself.

It was true that plenty of other watchers looked away or retched at the hideous sound of her shoulders releasing their arms but only Wyl’s discomfort counted for Celimus.

No one in that room heard Myrren utter a sound.

They dropped Myrren time and again that afternoon, all the while demanding she confess herself a witch and failing. For several periods she appeared unconscious, presumably from the torturous pain. Wyl could not comprehend how she resisted, for he felt weak from her trauma. He felt sure many were quietly in awe of the courage it took to repel such an assault, for none would be able to imagine the level of punishment her body withstood.

Lymbert, coolly detached, expertly revived Myrren on each occasion with strong smelling salts and a dousing of freezing water. Still her mouth was firmly closed to any sound, although every other opening of her body slackened with the shock of her trauma, and if she were able, Wyl thought she might have even derived some satisfaction from the effect her loosened muscles had. Initially the chamber had smelled of men’s sweat and lust. Now it smelled like a cesspit and a few experienced trial attendees held perfumed linens to their noses.

Knowing this was a test of his own nerves but also frozen with fear at what this young woman endured, Wyl remained as still now as one of the statues of Stoneheart. He had conquered the second wave of nausea and panic, fighting back the sour bile. Now he would conquer his fear and be like her; he would not capitulate.

Wyl understood why Celimus had brought him. It was to show7 him up as a child, a pretender to his father’s title. Well, he would not permit Celimus to succeed in this humiliation. Ignoring the stench of his own soiled boots, he lifted his chin and stared at the closed eyes of Myrren, his own new bedrock of determination derived from her refusal to succumb to their demands.

Lymbert had his victim pulled higher so that the weights attached to Myrren’s already distended legs and arms could stretch them further. He was satisfied to hear her ankles and elbows give up their resistance.

Now every major joint was loosened from its socket and several inches were added to her height, some wit acknowledged.

Naked, broken, and surely dying, she was still true to herself, Wyl realized. He now would prove himself to be just as true to the name of Thirsk. He was no coward and, although this was a shocking, intensely barbaric scene, he would not let himself down again.

As her eyes opened once more at the dousing of chilled water, they seemed to search for his, and in that moment he felt connected to Myrren. Together, united by their personal despair, they would get each other past this torment. It might be a childish view, he thought, but he was somehow convinced she knew he was staying strong for her. Her time was short—that much was obvious—and he promised himself he would see her through to her end without turning his head again.

Look at me only, Myrren
, he willed. But she closed her strange and exhausted eyes once again. He wished she was dead but knew otherwise as she retched for the umpteenth time from her agonies, her thin framework of delicate bones in stark relief beneath stretched skin.

She had endured the four mighty drops. Lymbert had begun to scream at her to confess, seemingly demented with his desire to overpower and win this admission from her. Realizing she had somehow, impossibly, won, he looked around wildly and then ran toward one of the braziers, surprising the man tending it. It was obvious that the Confessor could not afford to fail in wringing a confession from the girl, particularly with the Prince in attendance. Wyl could tell that Lymbert had been unprepared for the royal presence; perhaps he had not experienced such an important audience in his work, and having sensed the cruelty smoldering in his regal guest, the Confessor intended to display the full breadth of his skills.

Wyl watched with horror as the man grabbed a nearby glove and picked up a pair of white-hot pincers from the coals. Tearing the flesh from victims’ bones was surely not Lymbert’s favorite practice but all present could see that there was no other way he might prevail in this battle of wills. Lymbert had already explained that no one resisted the Dark Angel or her swoops yet here was brave Myrren, her fourth drop completed and still adamant.

Wyl’s pride surged as did his anger. He had status here, no matter how young he was.
Do something
, he silently screamed at himself.

Reaching for the pale flesh of Myrren, who was hanging unconscious once again, Lymbert was stopped by a loud command into the now brittle atmosphere of the torture chamber. The crazed Confessor turned around, scanning for its owner, his face a mask of fury.

“You will put those down.” Wyl repeated. “She has suffered enough punishment by your hand, sir, and she has survived the four legal drops.”

“And who in Shar’s Name are you to give me orders?” Lymbert sneered, gathering his wits.

Wyl felt his rage focus on this cruel man. And the white flash of anger coursing through him suddenly made him feel stronger, bigger than he knew he was. Even his voice suddenly sounded deeper as he faced down the torturer.

“I am Wyl Thirsk. You’d do well to remember that name, Confessor. It belongs to someone with the ear of our King and I will recount all that I have witnessed here today and the law you are about to break if you do not end this procedure now. Our King would not permit you to step beyond the legal boundaries.

The trial is over. Let her die.”

Celimus stepped in, the ever-present grin across his mouth, and was about to take charge of proceedings when something dangerous in Wyl’s glare stopped him.

“Your highness,” Wyl said. “With respect, I believe it undermines your status to witness these proceedings any further. As your protector I insist we get you away from this place.” Celimus was shocked as Wyl knew he would be. All eyes were on the Prince now. If he remained he would certainly appear the sadistic royal voyeur—as Wyl had cleverly insinuated. He could not risk that.

“Of course, you are right, thank you, Thirsk. I had no idea it would be so ugly,” he lied, a murderous look in his eyes. “Lymbert, do as he says: bring her down. Incidentally, let me introduce General Thirsk of Morgravia.”

“But…but he is a mere lad, sire,” Lymbert spat.

“Young, yes,” Wyl countered, not allowing Celimus to answer on his behalf. “But my name carries weight where yours never will unless you consider ‘traveling butcher’ a memorable title. Do as your Prince commands. Lower her!”

It was an audacious order coming from the red-headed youth. Watchers muttered to one another but none challenged him outwardly as it was obvious the lad was with the Prince.

As Myrren was lowered, Celimus shouldered his way through the onlookers but not before whispering to Wyl: “There will be a reckoning for this.”

It was as he expected and Wyl sighed, pushing the Prince’s threat from his mind, for the woman needed him. Wyl watched the Prince leave and then to Lymbert’s disgust he demanded a cup of water be poured from a pitcher. He knelt by Myrren and after gently lifting her head he dribbled a trickle of it into her throat. Her lids fluttered open and somehow she mustered a smile that touched her oddly colored eyes.

“I’m Wyl” was all he could say.

“I know.” she croaked through her cracked lips, bleeding from where she had bitten them. “I shall return your kindness with a gift, Wyl. It will avenge me.” Her voice was no more than a whisper.

What could you possibly give me
? he thought as her eyes closed once again.

“She’s for the flames now, Thirsk,” one of the dungeoners growled.

He had no choice but to let them drag her limp body away.

“When?” Wyl demanded of Lymbert. He had decided the man deserved no courtesies.

“No time like the present,” the Confessor replied and rediscovered his thin smile.

Chapter 4

The column of people scrambled out of the city to get a good view of the Witch Post on the hillock where they held the burnings. Some remembered the last burning, but most of the youngsters had no idea of the horror they would witness. Public executions in Morgravia were usually swift. This was a people forged from a tough, warring background and they had no need for theatrics. Any noble sentenced to death had head and body separated by a quick-falling sword; those of lower caste fell to the axe.

Criminals convicted of a crime lesser than murder or treason were hung, and in such cases the King favored the drop method. It was brutal but merciful. He did not believe in death as an entertainment.

Unfortunately, the very rarity of a witch-burning turned it into a public spectacle.

Traditionally, the Zerques had promoted a festival atmosphere for a burning and although the open celebration of death had long been wiped out there remained a strong sense of theater. Lymbert’s Witch Stalkers deliberately played off the harmless superstitions of the people, making warding signs as they led the procession up the hill. Many onlookers were bemused to realize that gestures they often performed without thinking—such as crossing their index and third finger should they inadvertently pass someone on a flight of stairs—were rooted in the ancient belief that such a sign in the vicinity of a witch would prevent the devil entering your body.

For the majority of Morgravians, their interest in viewing a proven witch stemmed from plain curiosity, but there were still those in Pearlis —wealthy older folk—whose fear and loathing of magic was very real. Lymbert was counting on this to convince his audience that this woman was a danger. He would fan the flames of those fears and watch them erupt into a desire to see the witch suffer as she burned.

Wyl’s mood was as bleak as he could ever remember. With his mother’s death and more recently his father’s passing, his deep sorrow had been like a darkness over him and he had never felt more alone.

But this turn of events involving the young woman called Myrren provoked in him a pure and seething rage… an anger he never thought he was capable of. And as always Celimus was at the root of his problems. If not for the Prince, Wyl might be none the wiser about Myrren.

Alyd caught up with him. The news of Wyl’s stand-off in the torture chamber had obviously traveled fast.

“Is this wise?” he asked carefully, knowing how determined his friend could be.

Wyl stopped short. “You needed to be there to know why I do this.” Alyd’s gaze narrowed. “Do what exactly?”

“You wouldn’t understand.”

“Why not?”

Wyl shrugged, the rage cooling to a hard determination. Gueryn had always warned him to harness wrath and unleash it only when he had it under control. He felt it was his to use now. His voice was brittle. “It’s too hard to explain.”

People jostled past them and in the distance Wyl could see Gueryn striding purposefully toward where they stood. Alyd noticed him too. Time was now very short, for he knew Wyl would say nothing more in front of his mentor.

BOOK: Myrren's Gift
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