Well of the Damned (5 page)

“Couldn’t
you have cleaned her up before bringing her into my office?”
the lordover asked. He wiped the dark ink from the tip of his quill
and set the pen on a wooden plate as he looked Cirang over.

Dashel
Celónd was a lean redhead with light-blue eyes under
highly-arched brows. His finely chiseled features made him a handsome
man by any standard, but his age showed plainly in the deep-set
squint lines, the worry lines on his forehead, and frown lines
framing his chin. He had an admirable set of square shoulders that
added to the determined look of him. Cirang wondered whether he could
be seduced.

The
notion of willingly lying with a man shocked her. As the Nilmarion
man Sithral Tyr, she’d never thought of men in an intimate way,
yet as Cirang, the thought had come naturally. She didn’t know
whether she could bring herself to lie with one now.

“I
did, my lord,” the guard said. “She refused to wear the
dress, and so the stink in her clothes follows her.”

Then
again, seducing him could give her the advantage of extortion to win
back her freedom. It was an idea worth considering further, though
now she wished she’d worn the dress. He was apparently one of
those men who believed a woman had no business in men’s
clothing or carrying a sword, and so, regardless of her smell, he’d
surely find her entirely unappealing dressed as she was.

The
lordover scrunched his face in disgust. “Next time, put it on
her yourself or bring her naked.” He leaned back in his chair
and folded his hands over his belly. “So the mighty Viragon
Sister falls from grace. I remember you. You’re the
sharp-tongued shrew who wanted my guard towers for free. You should
have let your companion do the talking.”

Cirang
remembered it differently. She and fellow Sister JiNese had tried to
negotiate a lease on behalf of the Sisterhood for the guard towers at
the city gate, which he wasn’t even using at the time. He’d
been rude and arrogant, refusing to hear their proposal. She’d
lost her temper, it was true, but by then, he wasn’t going to
listen to reason anyway. An apology now would sound disingenuous.

“Now,
Cirang,” he said, “it’s to your advantage to tell
the truth. I’ve brought in someone who can discern your lies.”
Celónd gestured to a man standing behind her.

He
was a wisp of a fellow without a single hair on his head or face, not
even eyebrows or lashes. Drab beige clothes hung on his frame like
rags over a line. Even from where she stood a full two paces away,
she could smell the man’s foul breath. She didn’t know
any diseases that caused loss of hair and flesh or sour breath, but
she inched closer to the lordover’s desk, not wanting to chance
catching it.

“If
you lie, I’ll tell the king,” Celónd said, “and
that will only serve to harshen your sentence.”

Cirang
was unconcerned. She had two sets of memories, and both were real and
accurate. She considered using only Cirang’s memory because she
was in Cirang’s body, but those recollections were just as
false for Sithral Tyr as his were for Cirang, and, in truth, she
wasn’t Cirang Deathsblade, despite appearances. The best
approach, she reasoned, was to choose the truth that made her look
less culpable for whatever crime he accused her of committing. No
matter which she chose, the shadow reader shouldn’t take her
words for a lie because they would be true. Cirang spread her hands.
“Ask your questions. I’ll tell the truth. With the help
of your shadow reader, you’ll see I’m innocent of the
charges against me. Before we begin, however, I have a complaint.”

The
lordover sighed. “What is your complaint?”

“Your
warden tried to ravish me,” she said. “I want charges
brought against him and his puppet there. The two of them attacked me
while I was asleep and overpowered me. If they were real men, they
would take me on one at a time and see how well they managed against
a woman in a fair fight.”

Celónd looked at
black-beard. “Is this true?”

The
warden feigned shock. “No, my lord. I would never. She’s
either mad or a liar.”

“It’s
the truth.” She raised her shackled hands and pointed at the
man behind her. “Ask your shadow reader.”

The
scowl on the lordover’s face deepened, and a red flush entered
his cheeks. “Do not presume to instruct me on how to
investigate my own men. I’ll look into the matter. Now mind
your tongue or I’ll send you back to the gaol.”

“It’s
the truth,” Cirang said again under her breath, shooting the
warden a dark glare. “If you dare touch me again, don’t
doubt you’ll be the one to pay.” He couldn’t very
well do his job if he were blinded. If she were to be taken, it would
be on her own terms and by the man of her choosing.

“Don’t
threaten me, wench,” the black-beard said with a growl in his
voice.

“Now,”
the lordover said, “we’ll start with a simple question.”
Celónd deftly rolled a gold coin over the tops of his fingers
back and forth across his hand as he studied Cirang with his icy blue
eyes. “Who are you?”

Cirang
scrunched her brow for a moment while she thought. The answer to his
question was more complicated than he expected, and she didn’t
care to explain. “I’m Cirang Deathsblade, of the—
formerly of the Viragon Sisterhood.”

She
expected to feel a prickling sensation on the back of her neck, but
she felt nothing. As Tyr, she’d had the ability to sense when a
mage was reading her shadow. Apparently, as Cirang she didn’t —
yet another inconvenience of living in this female body.

“State
your real name, not your epithet.”

Cirang
sighed. “Cirana Delusiol.” She’d changed her given
name when she joined the Sisterhood because it sounded too girlish to
her ear.

The
lordover’s eyes darted to the man behind her. He knitted his
brow momentarily and flicked his eyes back to her. “What part
did you play in the murder of Rogan Kinshield?”

“Pardon,
who?”

“King
Gavin’s brother.”

Although
the original Cirang had been present for the beheading, she hadn’t
helped kill him. In fact, she’d tried to reason with Ravenkind
to spare the man’s life. Still, she chanced telling Tyr’s
tale so as not to be implicated at all. “I wasn’t
present, and therefore I didn’t witness the murder.”

When
Celónd’s eyes went to the shadow reader, Cirang started
to turn in order to see him, curious whether he sensed a lie.

“Ah-ah!”
Celónd said. “Face forward and don’t look back.
When did you first meet Brodas Ravenkind?”

Because
both Tyr and Cirang had known Ravenkind, she thought it best to
relate the story of Tyr’s first meeting because it occurred
first. “It was seven years ago when I sought a cure for the
illness to save my son and the other children of my village.”

“Which
village is that?”

Inwardly,
she cringed, wishing she could take back her previous answer. If
Celónd was going to dig that far into her past, he might find
out Cirang had no children, but to name a Nilmarion village would be
confusing and suspicious. Instead, she named Cirang’s
birthplace of Ivarr Ness and hoped he left it at that.

“I’m
not familiar with Ivarr Ness. Where’s it located?”

“It’s
a paltry, fetid fishing village on the coast south of Delam. Is that
what you wanted to talk about? Where I was born? If that’s so,
I’d rather rot in my cell. Gnawing my own arm off would be more
interesting.”

“What
was that you just did?” Celónd asked.

“Hmm?”

“The
accent with which you’d been speaking just vanished. How do you
explain that?”

Cirang’s
mouth dropped open. It hadn’t occurred to her she’d been
using Tyr’s accent and speech habits when answering questions
from his perspective, and Cirang’s when answering from hers.
She supposed it would be wiser to speak like a swordswoman of
Thendylath rather than a carver from Nilmaria. “I’ve been
trying to sound more highbrow like your daughter, Daia— oh,
sorry. Dashielle, is it?” In the Nilmarion accent, she added,
“Am I not doing it properly?”

His face turned redder than his
hair. “You’re a contemptible, common-born wench with no
understanding of noble society. Keep to what you know.”

“The
king’s a commoner,” Cirang said. “Maybe he’d
understand me better. Because I’m his prisoner, shouldn’t
I be answering his questions and not yours?”

“The
king has better things to do than to listen to you prattle. Mind your
tongue, or I’ll conclude this hearing now and recommend you be
kept in gaol indefinitely. Let’s talk about the kidnappings.
You brought Liera Kinshield and her three sons as well as Feanna
Kinshield and her three daughters, and two Viragon Sisters against
their will to...” He referred back to the paper on his desk.
“...be fed to a demon. How do you justify that?”

Cirang
was, indeed, guilty of those kidnappings, and all of them would speak
against her if she denied it. Well, all but the two Sisters who were
slain by Ravenkind’s henchman and fed to the demon. “Brodas
Ravenkind had given magical necklaces to the Viragon Sisters under
his control. They compelled us to obey him. To remove them was to
commit suicide. If he commanded me to do something, I was powerless
against him.”

“I
understand King Gavin severed the magical tie that held your will
captive, yet you still followed Ravenkind. Why?”

Cirang
knew she was on unsteady ground here, but when she’d first
awoken in this body, she was wearing the necklace that had bound her
to him. “I don’t understand it, but I believed the tie to
my necklace was somehow still intact. All I can tell you is the
compulsion to obey Ravenkind was too strong to resist. Every day, I
tried to sever my ties with him and get away.” While that
wasn’t true for Cirang, it was true for Tyr. During the years
Ravenkind had kept Tyr’s soulcele token, the porcelain cat
figurine housing his soul, Tyr had worked tirelessly as the wizard’s
indentured servant, trying to earn his freedom back through thefts,
murders, kidnappings, and anything else Ravenkind asked of him. If
his soul hadn’t already been irreparably fouled by the first
murder he’d committed at Ravenkind’s behest, the one that
rewarded him with the cure for his son’s illness, it surely
would have been by all the other crimes.

Celónd
looked past her at the shadow reader. His face reddened again, and
his eyes narrowed. “How did Ravenkind die?” He went
around to the front of his desk, leaned against it with his backside
and crossed his arms.

She
had to draw upon Cirang’s memories of the day, as Tyr had none.
“I knew he had a secret and a plan, but I didn’t know
what it was until that day. Ravenkind used some kind of rune to
summon a demon. When the demon killed Red, it became clear he didn’t
have it under control as he pretended to. He yelled at it, tried to
command it, but it turned on him. I tried to escape, but it caught
me...” Her throat swelled with the memory of Cirang’s
horrible death, choking off her words. The muscles in her back
cramped in response, and the pain in her hip and shoulder flared. She
coughed. “I must have got knocked out. The next thing I knew,
King Gavin was squatting beside me, healing my injuries.”

What
she didn’t mention was the smashed soulcele token on the floor,
the only explanation for why Sithral Tyr’s spirit now occupied
Cirang Deathsblade’s body.

Celónd
looked back at the shadow reader. Every muscle in his face and neck
tensed. “How in the hell can you not know if she’s
lying?” he hollered. “What kind of worthless mage are
you, anyway?”

Unable
to resist, Cirang turned to look at the little man. On his face was
an apologetic wariness. “I’m sorry, Your Grace. Her
shadow is... different from any other I’ve seen. I cannot read
it for good or bad. It’s just dark. I’m sorry.”

Cirang
smirked. How interesting. All this time, she could have said
anything, and he wouldn’t have been able to discern a lie. If
only the lordover had tipped his hand earlier.

“You,”
Celónd said, pointing to the shadow reader. “Out.”

“My
fee—”

“You’ll
receive no payment for no work. Out.” Celónd returned to
his desk chair, picked up a quill and opened a jar of ink.

“What
about my complaint?” Cirang asked. “You have to ask him
about the warden attacking me.”

“I
don’t take orders from prisoners,” Celónd spat. He
made a brushing-off gesture in Cirang’s direction. “Get
her out of here. Take her back to the cell.”

“Let me go before the king
now,” she said. “I have the right to face my accuser.”

The
warden latched his iron grip onto her upper arm and started to pull
her towards the door.

Celónd
didn’t even look up from his writing. “I have every
confidence he’ll impose a fair sentence based on my findings.
I’ll communicate it to you after he makes a decision.”

She
started to argue and struggle, to stay and convince him to set her
free, but the guard held fast. “Wait,” she cried at the
door. It swung shut, and the only sounds remaining were her boots
dragging across the polished floor as the guard hauled her back
outside. Back to the wet, lonely cell and those terrible nightmares
of claws and pain.

Chapter 7