The Exodus Sagas: Book III - Of Ghosts And Mountains (3 page)

“Not the whites or browns?” Tychaeus leaned against the cragged stone wall of the lonesome quarters he had known as home since he could recall. His bovine head and horns scratched the wall gently.

“No, your cousins care more for meat and killing than anything to believe in. Never trust the shaggy haired ones or the browns, son. They would kill their own kin for a meal.” The aged gladiator of Unlinn whispered. He heard footsteps approaching. Arms folded on his chest, he watched as four armored ogre marched a blood covered red minotaur past his cell. The ogre were three feet taller and armed with spears and bone swords, yet the red looked fearless as he returned from the arena. Tathlyn watched the hand and the eyes of his cousin, Morgivian. Three fingers displayed, then three blinks as he walked past. Nine, Tathlyn knew there were now nine that would stand together with him to riot and escape Unlinn. Not enough, he thought, for certain they would need twenty or more to have any chance of survival.

“Your eldest, Saberrak, fought well gray one.” Morgivian the red spoke loudly, in the Agarian tongue, which was forbidden outside the cells unless ordered. The shafts of wooden spears thudded into the bare hide on his back, knocking him to a knee. His growl echoed in the dank caverns as the ogre prodded him up forcefully and threw him into the bars of his cell.

The grays heard it, but could not see the beating that Morgivian took for speaking Agarian. All the cells faced the same way, making it impossible to converse with one another. Signs upon passing, whispers passed from neighboring cells when ogre guards had them on lockdown, and quick exchanges in the arena barracks before or after matches were all they had to rely upon. Dwarves enslaved kept to themselves, yet there were a few that would join a revolt. Humans captured from above ground did not live long here, yet they band together well enough, Tathlyn thought. To get past the ogre, troll scavengers in outer tunnels, and the personal gladiators and pets of the ogre slavemasters and King Avegarne, they would need more than nine. Racially, no one trusted one another enough to attempt escape, and no one returned to their cell armed or armored. The estimated ogre were over five hundred, and though slaves doubled that number, the gray knew that certain death would be waiting if they failed. That fear, or certainty as it was, had held him captive for eight years now, and some had been here even longer.

“Father, why do we have to fight in the arena? Are there bad people in there we have to kill? Why don’t they just let us leave and find mother?” Tychaeus was nervous, hearing the beating a few cells down made the young bull fearful in his innocence.

“We fight because we have no choice, yet. You must pretend that anyone there is your enemy, your life will depend upon it. We cannot find your mother here son, she is dead. She died bringing you into this world, so you will have to listen to everything I teach you and speak to her in your dreams.”

The young minotaur breathed deep, not moving a muscle to stop the tears that escaped his attempts at discipline and manhood. He knew that Saberrak and he had the same mother, a mother he had never met and asked his older brother about many times over. He felt that swelling pain in his throat and chest, but fought it back with sheer willpower.

“No crying son, your mother cries for us, I am sure. I can tell you what she---“ Tathlyn stepped up to the bars, hearing the low roar of the crowd down the cavernous hallway, then the silence as the arena doors were closed. The glimmer of torchlight was gone as fast as it had appeared. His breathing stopped, his eyes wide, not knowing if the ogre would be bringing news of his eldest, calling for him to fight next, or bringing a bloody horn as reminder of his son. The madness and fear gripped him, hearing the sound of armed ogre approaching, he tried to count the steps and prepare himself.

Bloody, cut across the shoulder and forearm, yet standing tall and silent, Saberrak waited before the bars with his horns dripping red. His gray flesh was soaked in sweat and the blood of others, his eyes did not blink, he looked calm as a lifeless pond in winter. The cage opened after Tathlyn and Tychaeus stepped back from the bars. Chains rattled, ogre murmured to one another smiling, four of them opening the bars and letting Saberrak walk in without a single word, order, or shove. The clang of bars settled and echoed, and the looming ogre guards locked the chains once more, two of them nodding to Tathlyn. He had never seen them show respect before, not until now.

“Come, get cleaned up. Those wounds will need rinsing and moss to heal.” Tathlyn turned away, guilt pushing him almost to the ground seeing his son in shock from a gladiatorial battle in which he had obviously killed, his first kill.

“Father, I can wash myself fine enough.” his voice was not his own, deeper, solemn, and strong after killing before thousands likely cheering his name.

“I did not ask, I told. Victorious or not, I am your father until Annar takes me.”

“Who did you fight, Saberrak? Did you win?” Tychaeus looked at the cuts from below, admiring his older brother and nervous the same.

“A troll named Gestri one-fang, Bril and Jorpus the whites, and Oxerian Kalaza the brown.” He looked down at the stone, the moss fell from his fathers’ hand and his little brothers’ jaw fell open.

“Alone?”

“No, Morgivian the red was with me. Two on four, a match we were not supposed to survive I would imagine.”

“Who did you kill, son?” his voice a quiver, a whisper of fear that his son had done something atrocious to gain the respect of the ogre guard upon his return. He hoped it was not the brown belonging to the Kalaza’s. Tathlyn knew some of them were being freed into service to the ogre king, and more animosity from the browns would only hinder his plans at escape. More enemies in Unlinn was the last thing anyone needed.

“Does it matter, father?” Saberrak the gray wiped some blood from his horns, hair too from an enemy tangled in the crimson morass.

The stare was one of concern more than intimidation, yet Tathlyn needed to know what he had done, what they made him do, all of it. The stone shrunk away, the air did not exist, the old minotaur felt weak. The silence was choking.

“Morgivian was tied up horn to horn with Jorpus the white, their blades locked against the wall of the arena. I did what I had to.” Saberrak looked to the moss on his forearm, the blood soaking into it well now.

“How many?”

“All of them. Gestri the troll first, through the spine like you told me. Then Bril easy enough. I tripped the shaggy minotaur with the chain and cleaved his neck with an axe. Oxerian Kalaza was mighty, but slow. I lured him in close and cut him apart after we locked horns. Finally, I removed the head of Jorpus the white as he was atop Morgivian the red. I threw the heads to the crowd as they wished. I did as you instructed father, playing the part of a gladiator to those gathered. I was alone without help, I was quick, and I took no pleasure in it.” His voice was ice, yet his conscience was there still. “I did what had to be done, it was me or them. What should I have done different?”

The old gray minotaur much preferred the silence to what he had just heard. Now they would want him to fight more. Zeress, their ogre master and owner, he would command it as to regain twisted ogre honor in the city. And Avegarne the Rotted would be most interested in who killed four of his own and won the crowd so easily. Not only would the ogre be watching, but now the browns and whites would be waiting for young Saberrak to make one false step, in or out of the arena. “Nothing. Yet, it is just happening too fast for your old bull of a father is all.”

All three of the grays stiffened and silenced their speech at the sound of more footsteps. Saberrak walked toward the bars, cave moss held on his wounds. Tychaeus helped his father Tathlyn rinse their only cloth in the water bucket. The injured minotaur heard two scrapes of horn on stone. One meant ogre, two meant many, three meant the king of Unlinn, and four meant fresh slaves from the outside world. He had heard two scrapes from the cells to the right. Saberrak leaned his long horns through the bars and peered as best he could. “Ogre approaching, likely Zeress. Stay back.”

“Sooner than expected.”

“Is he going to set us free father?”

“Doubtful Tychaeus, very doubtful.”

“Hush, they’re here.”

“The son follows the father I see, bloody and bestial,
yes
.” Zeress the Black, was named for the poxy marks and warts that darkened his face and the scars to match. His whip curled at his side, a curved and serrated blade opposite, he stood well over eleven feet tall had he not been hunched. He reached up and grabbed one of Saberraks horns. “All four, did he tell you Tathlyn? Four heads to the crowd in his first fight. The Kalaza’s are not happy, but I am,
yes
.”

Tathlyn kept rinsing the rag over and over with Tychaeus staring at the ogre slavemaster. “He told me. What of it?”

Seven or eight large ogre filled in behind their leader, armed heavily yet more interested in seeing Saberrak than in keeping an eye on the cells. “You should be proud, old gray one, he may be better than you someday. Good thing I own you both, and now the prices have gone up for certain.” Greasy black hair curled from his shoulders as he craned his neck toward the bars.

Tathlyn stewed on every dribbled word in the ogre tongue he heard growl out of his owners mouth through the crooked yellow teeth he would love to smash in. There lived a breed of ogre far more intelligent, noble, and cunning than the rest, supposedly Zeress, like king Avegarne, had come from that stock. Tathlyn rarely could tell the difference. He closed his eyes, resisting the urge to ram the bars and reach for Zeress. “Should I thank you then? For keeping us as slaves? I believe I have your thanks in the arena should you yourself be willing…”

“Father!
Enough
.” Saberrak snorted over his shoulder. “What do you want, ogre?”

“You will call me
master
! Or I will have your horns and skull as a helmet for my little bastards to play with!”

“I am worth too much now, but keep yelling, it amuses me.”

Ogre parted as Zeress tugged on Saberraks horn in vain. All eyes turned behind them, toward three ogre of King Avegarne and a brown minotaur armed with a greatsword and armored in plate in front of them. His eyes glared at the cell of the grays and his hand fondled the hilt of his blade.

“You are not worth much to me, Saberrak the gray. But my master bids me send you a message, well, to your owner anyway.” The chilling voice of Chalas Kalaza could not be ignored, hollow as stone, even the ogre gave him berth as he approached the cell.

Zeress looked at the brown minotaur, famed for killing so many that he won his freedom from the ogre king, and met his gaze square at eight feet hunched. “What word would that be, undefeated one?”

“The king requests to buy Saberrak and the little one for a chest of gold, each. I suggest you take it, Zeress.”

“Not the father as well?”

“Too old said Avegarne, besides, he would like to see them fight each other.
As would I
.”

The silence was thicker than stone, the moments seemed like eternities, the grays held their breath, the ogre stared back and forth, and Zeress pondered. Chalas merely stared at Saberrak as if he meant to burn holes through him.

“I will gore your eyes out if you don’t take them off me, Kalaza.”

“I hope your owner says no, then I will cover the arena with your blood.” Chalas approached, Tathlyn moved to the bars, and Tychaeus backed up.

“My owner knows I would cut you in two, kinslayer, besides, are you not too busy delivering messages? Perhaps you and your cousin, the one who lost his head just recently, could discuss some new strategies should you face me.”

The horns clashed with only iron bars to keep the feud from becoming bloody. Ogre joined in, trying to separate the brown one from the grays in the cell and to protect Zeress.

“Enough!
No deal
!”

“You are truly turning down an offer from the rotted king of Unlinn? You are mad Zeress, mad.” Chalas stepped back, shaking his horned head. “Then King Avegarne expects to see your gladiators in the arena tomorrow. Four on four he said, for double what he lost today.”

“Done.”

“Pray he does not let me fight, or you will be two grays less by midday.”

“I hope to see you there, I have yet to face a messenger, let alone a talking pet.” Saberrak grinned as the kings’ ogre and Chalas strode back out of view toward the arena.

Zeress said nothing, just looked at the cell with the gray minotaurs inside, like he was looking upon chests of gold with horns. He and his retinue walked off to the left, likely to inspect who they would be paired up with for the morrow.

“So are you both going to fight tomorrow? I will be alone in here then?” Tychaeus seemed confused as he was scared.

“Only for a little while son, just a short time is all.” Tathlyn put one hand on his little one, and one his eldest. “I will do some talking in the barracks as we prepare. Take your time getting ready, I do not care how, but delay. I can see our escape will have to move ahead a bit faster.”

“You talk all you want father. All I need is an axe in each hand again, they will speak for me.” Saberrak huffed.

“And that will do fine for the arena, until you have too many victories and can never leave.” Tathlyn huffed and went to the pail of water to rinse more moss.