Chapter One #5
Cole and Addax lifted the pleading man to his feet, dragging him over to the only table in the tent, the one that Jax had eaten his meal from.
As the man cried and begged for his life, they slammed him down onto the chair and extended his right arm onto the table, holding it down.
When everything was in position, Jax turned to Alpin.
“I am going to ask you a question,” he said.
“And for every question you refuse to answer, your cousin is going to lose a finger. When all of his fingers are gone, he’ll lose a hand.
When the hands are gone, he’ll lose the lower part of an arm.
When those are gone, I will start on his toes and repeat the process.
You will slowly watch him hacked to death and when I am finished with him, I will do the same thing to your wife.
Do you understand what I am telling you so far? ”
Alpin was pale with terror. “Ye wouldna do such a thing,” he said. “’Tis barbaric and un-Christian. Ye canna do such a thing tae a man!”
“I can and I will.”
“’Tis uncivilized!”
“It is the way of things,” Jax said simply. “Now, I asked you a question earlier, one you refused to answer. I shall ask you again, just once. If you do not answer me, your cousin shall have one less finger. Is this in any way unclear?”
“I –!”
“When does William and Orkney expect to execute their intentions?”
Alpin’s mouth worked as if he were going to answer swiftly but, ultimately, he groaned and squeezed his eyes shut. “Ye dunna know… I… why would ye ask me such a question?” he stammered. “Do ye think the king himself takes me intae his confidence? I’m no’ a great laird!”
Jax looked over at Cole, who took the hint.
He gave a short nod to Addax, who produced an enormous dagger with a serrated edge.
It was a beautiful weapon, made from Damascus steel.
Quicker than the blink of an eye, Addax cut off the captive’s smallest finger on his right hand.
As the man screamed in agony, Addax picked up the digit and walked it over to Alpin, taking the freshly cut side of it and smearing it on the side of his cheek.
Alpin vomited all down the front of his tunic.
Addax tossed the finger onto his lap.
Between the screaming of the cousin, the shrieking of the wife, and Alpin’s gasps of terror, the tent had quickly become a chaotic place. Jax, completely unruffled in the face of such upheaval, continued to face Alpin.
“When do William and Orkney expect to execute their intentions?” he asked again.
Alpin was beginning to grow hysterical as his cousin screamed and wept, his arm still stretched out on the table and bleeding profusely. No one was making any attempt to stop the blood flow.
“I dunna know!” Alpin cried.
Jax looked at Addax, who immediately hacked off the next finger.
Alpin’s wife began screaming at the top of her lungs, wildly, as Alpin’s cousin bellowed in agony and begged for mercy.
Addax picked up the finger he’d just cut off and dropped it down Alpin’s tunic.
The man gagged again as the finger got caught up in the folds of his tunic, holding it against the flesh of his belly.
“Their intentions, Canmore,” Jax said quite emotionlessly. “I want to know what they are planning. Your cousin only has eight fingers left.”
“Tell him!” the wife screamed. “For the love of God, Alpin, tell him!”
Jax looked at Cole and then to the wife, silently relaying the command. Cole went over to the old woman with the red hair and unsheathed his dagger. The wife screamed at the top of her lungs, knowing her death was at hand, and Alpin began to scream as well.
“No more!” he cried. “Dunna touch her! I’ll tell ye, ye Sassenach bastards, but dunna touch her. Cut her and I’ll take everything ye want tae know tae my grave!”
Jax called off Cole, who immediately moved away from the woman as she collapsed in a dead faint. He then collected a chair and pulled it up in front of Alpin, looking at the man seriously.
“Excellent,” he said. “That was a wise decision. When is William planning to execute his plans?”
Alpin glared him, a look of pure hatred, but his hatred was tempered by his sense of self-preservation. “What assurances do I have that ye’ll no’ kill my wife after I’ve told ye want ye want tae know?”
Jax shook his head. “You have none,” he said. “But I will give you my word. Answer my questions and I will spare you and your wife and your cousin.”
“And his hand? Someone needs tae tend his hand.”
“Answer my question and I will make sure he is adequately tended.”
Alpin looked at his wife, and his cousin, and it was as if all of his bones suddenly disappeared. He seemed to fold in on himself, his chin dropping to his chest, as if every last piece of defiance and courage slipped quietly away along with the bones.
He was a shell.
Pride held out only so long when faced with such destruction.
“Yer question has many answers,” he mumbled. “Ask me something specific and I’ll tell ye what I can. But if I tell ye I dunna know, then it’s the truth. The Rough doesna take me intae his confidence. I know what I do because I’m a border laird and nothing more.”
The Rough was another name used for the King of Scotland, a name that reflected his general methodology and manners, and Jax pondered his next question.
He had Alpin where he wanted him in a relatively short amount of time.
He thought it would take longer, but given the man’s wife was under threat, the resistance ended fairly quickly.
And to his advantage.
As he pondered his next move, Cole stepped forward. He’d been privy to some of the more general gatherings purely by virtue of his relationship with the royal court, so he knew some of the information, things he told his father.
As he’d said, it was the smaller details that had escaped him, and one detail in particular.
“When is the invasion coming?” he asked. “When do the Scots plan to move south?”
In the end, Jax got his information.
By morning, the cousin with the missing fingers had been released with a message to take to William the Rough.
Jax let Alpin languish for a couple of days with little food and even less sleep before sending Cole, Addax, and Essien to escort the man south to the mighty de Bourne stronghold known as The Keld for further interrogation.
A naturally suspicious man, Jax suspected that the worst was yet to come.
And they had to be ready.