The Girl Born of Smoke (23 page)

Djerr shot a glance toward Tarana, who
stared intently at Roxanne. “I'm the- I'm just worried about Djerr,
Roxanne,” she finally said. “I don't know what's going on, but I'm
certain he isn't the wizard and I don't want him to be stuck in
this stupid room.”

Looking extremely displeased, Roxanne
abruptly turned away from them both. “I've done all I can by
bringing you here, Tarana,” she said in a low voice. “I'm risking
my job to let you talk to each other and you're wasting the
opportunity to do anything of value. I'll give you one last chance.
Level with me before you make a huge mistake.”

Tarana took a deep breath and slowly shook
her head. “I told you Roxanne, I don't know anything. That's all I
have to say.” She felt Djerr's hand rest reassuringly on her back
as she stared at the back of Roxanne's head.

“Fine,” Roxanne said sharply. “Then we're
wasting our time here,” she opened the door and left the room,
calling to the soldiers down the hall.

Djerr took the opportunity to quickly step
forward, directly next to Tarana. “You need to be careful,” he
hissed in her ear.

She rolled her eyes. “I'm not the one locked
in a room. Look, I'll try and get you out of here.”

He grabbed her shoulder and turned her
toward him. “I think you should leave this place,” he said
hurriedly as they heard footsteps nearing the room.

Shrugging out of his grasp, she stepped
back. “Stop overreacting. Nobody here knows. Roxanne's suspicious,
but she'll never say a word. I'll get you out, don't worry.” She
turned away from his pleading look and dashed out of the room to
catch up with Roxanne. As she slipped out the door, she tried not
to meet the gaze of the three soldiers who studied her intently as
they re-entered the room.

Roxanne ignored her during the entire walk
back to Tarana's room. When they finally arrived, Roxanne paused
and glanced at her. Before she could say anything, Tarana slipped
into her room and stared at Roxanne through the open door. “If
you're going to start interrogating me again, I'll tell you right
now I don't know anything so you can stop asking.”

But Roxanne simply shook her head. “I wish
you the best, Tarana. You're on your own now.” With that, she
turned and walked away, down the dark and silent hallway. Feeling
terribly alone, Tarana sat down on her bed, wondering how she could
ever rescue Djerr when she couldn't even find her way back to his
room without Roxanne.

Kicking off her boots and slowly unbuckling
her armor, she stripped off her clothes and walked over to her
window, the stone floor cold beneath her bare feet. A breeze
carried with it the roar of the crowd and the hair raised on her
arms. Leaning her head out the open window, Tarana watched the mobs
of people who had no idea what they were celebrating.

By the time she got to sleep, the sun had
begun to rise. The celebrations had finally quieted down when she
woke up to an overcast sky and rain pattering through her open
window. Still feeling exhausted, she rolled out of bed and tiredly
closed the window. More than a few soldiers had collapsed in the
streets below.

Hoping the rain might help wake her up, she
slowly dressed and headed downstairs, finding more soldiers slumped
over in the hallways, none of them conscious. In the courtyard, she
found considerably fewer injured soldiers in the soggy grass, but
whether that meant they had died or recovered, she wasn’t sure and
tried not to think about.

As she walked down the street, the rain
quickly increased to a downpour. Water streamed down her face,
dripping from her nose and chin. She passed several groups of
soldiers still drinking in groups, huddled under the overhang of
the buildings, but they seemed much more solemn than the previous
night. Wiping the rain from her eyes, she saw townspeople on the
edge of town crouched underneath the tarps that had been strung
out, a few feet off the ground.

The mud grew thick as she left town, sucking
and clinging to her boots and slowing her steps. She paused just
outside the town, feeling herself slowly sink downward. The valley
before her was blanketed in rain and she squinted, trying to see
farther. Unable to make anything out through the rain, she let out
a slow sigh as she wondered if Kirian was out there somewhere.

Wiping away the wet strands of hair
plastered to her forehead, she cocked her head when she heard
someone walking quickly up behind her, barely audible over the roar
of the rain. She started to turn, trying to free her boots from the
mud, but suddenly felt something crash against her head. Stunned,
the force knocked her down and she fell to the ground, the cold mud
oozing between her fingers. She turned her head to see what had hit
her and didn't even feel the second blow as she collapsed,
unconscious.

When she opened her eyes again, her head was
throbbing and she felt sick. She gradually became aware of each of
her limbs again, and found that she was lying on her side. The
ground beneath her was painfully hard and she felt rocks jabbing
her side, even through her clothes. As her eyes began to focus, she
heard a man speak from behind her and she quickly shut them again,
trying to keep her breathing steady.

“This is the one. We think,” he said.

“You think?” another man replied, sounding
displeased. “Is she the one or not?”

There was a shuffling sound and she suddenly
felt her shoulder being shaken roughly. “Tarana?” the second man
asked.

“What do you want?” she mumbled, curling
into a tighter ball. “My head hurts. Why are you bothering me?”

“You're Tarana, right?”

“Yes, I'm Tarana.” She opened her eyes and
sat up, blinking blearily as she turned to face the two men.
Neither of them were wearing armor, but they were armed with
swords. Contrary to how they sounded, they didn't have the scruffy,
tattered look of thieves or bandits, but instead looked
clean-shaven and muscular. She narrowed her eyes. “Who are
you?”

The men shared a celebratory look and the
taller one nodded. “Alright, let's get to work then.” He reached
down and yanked Tarana to her feet. Stumbling to catch her footing,
she tried to whirl out of his grasp, but he had a firm hold on the
back of her shirt. Her annoyance quickly changed to fear. “Who are
you guys?” she repeated.

The other man grabbed her wrists and she
twisted one hand away and turning, kicked the other man. Catching
both off guard, she managed to free her other hand, and wrench
herself away. She dashed to the other side of the room she found
herself in and spotted the door. Yanking the handle, she realized
it was locked just as one of the men tackled her, smashing her head
against the wall.

Stunned again, she weakly tried to resist
them, but they firmly tied her hands behind her back and hauled her
to her feet again. Stumbling as they shoved her toward the door,
one of the men unlocked the door and opened it. She was pushed out
into the dimly lit hallway, where she saw several more men standing
around. They grinned when they saw her, but said nothing. At the
end of the hallway, she was shoved into another room, this one
twice the size of the first. “What are you doing?” she asked, not
really expecting an answer.

“Alright,” the second man said and Tarana
heard the click of the door locking. “Let's do this.” She was
whirled around to face the men and was instantly met with the thick
sound of a fist on soft skin. Collapsing to the ground with her
head buzzing, it took her a moment to realize that she had been
punched. The pain flooded over her face and she tasted blood in her
mouth.

“What are you doing?” she choked. “Is this
an interrogation? Because it might help if you asked me a question
first.”

One of the men kicked her in the side and
she curled into a ball, unable to breathe for several seconds. The
beating went on for several moments, most of it spent on the ground
for Tarana, except when they pulled her to her feet. For such
muscular men, she mused while she lay on the floor waiting for the
next blow, they didn't seem to be hitting her as hard as they
could. As she lay, trying to catch her breath, she realized she
hadn't been hit for longer than usual. Rolling her head back to
peer at the two men, she saw they were simply watching her. “Are
you done?” she wheezed.

With one last half-hearted kick to her side,
the men then set her on her feet and half-shoved, half-carried her
back to the first room, where she was thrown to the ground and her
hands untied. As she tried to feel the damage to her face, the men
left the room and she heard the door lock once again. “Well that
unusually strange,” she muttered.

She sat alone in the room for a long time.
She tried to listen through the door, but could hear nothing. When
the door opened again, it was only to throw a chunk of stale bread
into the room for her to eat. A long time after she felt hungry
again, another piece of bread was tossed into the room, along with
a canteen of water.

With no windows in the room and the only
light coming from a lamp burning high above her reach, she had no
sense of time. By the deepening of the bruises on her body, she
guessed that a couple days had passed when the door opened again
and another person was hurled into the room. The door clicked shut
behind him and Tarana scrambled over to inspect the unconscious
body. Turning him over to see his face, she saw that it was
Djerr.

Grinning happily, she tried to shake him
awake. “Djerr! Hey, Djerr!” He groaned and put a hand to the side
of his head, where Tarana saw a small lump. “Djerr, you have no
idea how happy I am to see you.”

Djerr opened his eyes and stared at Tarana
for a moment. “Tara...?” he finally ventured.

“Has it really been so long that you forgot
me?” She tried to hide her smile.

“Tarana,” he sounded horrified, “you look
awful.”

She laughed. “It's good to see you too,
Djerr.”

Sitting up, he shook his head. “No
seriously, what did they do to you?”

“Do I really look that awful?” Tarana made a
face. “They kind of beat me up a day or two ago, but nothing that
serious. It must look a lot worse than it feels. Do you have any
idea where we are?”

Djerr shook his head again. “No, I was
hoping you knew.”

The door clicked again, and they both looked
over expectantly. The two men from earlier both stepped into the
room and closed the door behind them. One of the men stepped
forward, his hands clasped behind his back. “Djerr, Wizard Reborn,
you are commanded to use your magic or watch your friend suffer. It
would be to both of your benefit if you decided to take control of
your magic as is prophesied.” He spoke as if he had rehearsed the
lines several times.

Tarana raised an eyebrow at the man who
spoke. “So wait, what's stopping Djerr from killing you all if he
decides to use his magic?”

The man shook his head. “Nothing. If he
chooses to do so, there is nothing stopping him from using his
magic however he desires. We only wish for him to take advantage of
this gift as is his purpose. You have one day to think on this
before we begin our business.” The men turned sharply and left the
room again.

“Hm,” Tarana said, turning to Djerr, “well
that's certainly something to think on.”

“Would you stop joking around?” Djerr
hissed. “This is serious. I'm not letting them torture you. You've
got to get us out of here.”

Sighing, she shrugged. “Even if I knew how
to get us out of here, I wouldn't do it, Djerr. I'm not the wizard
these people want. This isn't magic I control, it's a curse.”

“Well, I think it's time to set them
straight,” he replied. “This has gone far enough.”

“Djerr, they're not going to believe you,”
she said tiredly. “Even if you told them it was me, you'd only be
putting me in more danger. Besides,” she lowered her voice, “I'm
probably the best candidate for being tortured. I'm not sure if I
can die.”

He looked taken aback. “What are you talking
about?”

She quickly told him about the fight with
Prisca, where she had been reported dead and somehow found herself
back alive again, but left out the part about the old man she had
seen.

“And that's why you think you can't die.” He
sounded skeptical. “The misdiagnosis of some random Wizard's
soldier. Great.”

Shrugging, she smiled slightly. “At least
it's something.”

Djerr scooted back until his back rested
against the wall, and put his hands behind his head. “I told you
you needed to be more careful.”

She laughed and crawled over to sit next to
him. “Well, it seems you weren't too careful yourself. Did anyone
miss me? How'd you end up here?”

“I went looking for you,” he replied,
glaring over at her. “When you didn't show up to rescue me, I
realized I'd have to find you myself, but as I was wandering around
that building, I think someone must have hit me from behind.”

“They actually let you out of that room?”
she asked him, surprised.

He shrugged. “Well, they
didn't
let
me
out,” he explained. “But I have experience sneaking out when I
really want to, remember?”

She still looked at him skeptically. “That
room seemed a tad bit secure to be sneaking out of so easily.”

“Well, it was actually kind of weird.” He
wrinkled his forehead. “They started getting more and more lax with
the security until it was almost ridiculously easy to sneak out of
there while they were distracted.”

“That's pretty weird.” She yawned and closed
her eyes, lying down on the hard floor. “Is it nighttime?”

Nodding, he slid down the wall until he was
lying on the ground with just his head propped up. “Was when I
left, anyway. Do you think the Wizard's soldiers will track us
down?”

Tarana hesitated for a moment, opening her
eyes and looking down at Djerr. “I...don't think so,” she finally
said.