Chapter 43
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
FRID
The man pushed me up another set of stairs, then shoved me sideways just to make himself feel like he was in charge.
I bit down hard. It would be so satisfying to kick his teeth in.
I only needed to wait a little bit. I could barely see where we were going because I dropped the tin cup with the candle.
But my captor knew exactly where to go, and obviously judged that it was better to hold on to me rather than a candle.
My foot kicked something in the dark and I nearly lost my balance.
The man behind me steadied me by wrapping his hand around the back of my neck.
The suffocating scent of the unwashed body lingered in my nose and soon everything smelled like him.
Finally, he released his hold on me to open a door. Then he shoved me forward.
For a moment, I was blinded by multiple candles.
The combination of stale smoke and alcohol fumes hit my face.
Slowly, my eyes adjusted. I was in a long rectangular room with elaborately decorated chairs, that looked so out of place against the barren brick walls.
All around me were men, probably the ones who ran the settlement.
My eyes moved from one figure to the other.
All of them appeared sickly and sun beaten, in poorly fitting clothes; nothing like the healthy and well groomed males of the sisters’ commune.
“What is it?”
“Say . . . Veramorr. You said if I do my job . . . you said . . .I can stay.” The man behind me stuttered.
“Who’s she?” A voice came from the darkened corner.
I squinted my eyes, trying to see beyond the veil of smoke.
“A spy, I think.”
“You think?” The leader’s voice sounded raspy and forced.
“She has a suit!” someone else shouted.
The man behind me immediately yanked off my robe. I straightened my shoulders. Even a room full of men could not lower the odds for a dragonborn in a fight against humans. It was almost unfair how much more power I had. I could transform and turn everyone to ash. They had to know that.
“Show yourself!” I raised my voice.
The silence that stretched from wall to wall was short lived, broken by the sound of movement. Someone was walking straight toward me, and the man who stepped into the light was nothing like what I expected.
Veramorr appeared almost sickly thin, with hair that was sparse but long.
His skin was sallow, and stretched so tightly over his face that he resembled a skull.
He looked like a skeleton who clawed his way out from the grave.
He wore a set of enforced leather similar to what dragonborns wore, but not a flying suit.
Probably leathers taken from a dragonborn's dead body and then adjusted to fit his shape.
“Mahin sent me her greetings?” He chuckled, but there was no humor behind his voice.
“What do you know about her?” I asked.
“She already has control of all temples, but she wants more. She never knew when to stop. And you know what they say about the human gods? They hate greed. But she doesn’t believe in them, she listens only to the voices in her head.”
“What about the women you took from the sisters?”
He nodded, the next moment, his eyes peered right at me.
“What women? Ah . . . yeah, right. Women.” He chuckled. “We are the ones living in the shells of buildings, eating rats and roaches, but somehow we have the force, the power, to overwhelm their guards and get past the steel doors.”
My head started to spin. That was exactly what Victor had said. There was something about Mahin’s story that simply did not add up.
“What about you fighting them and being pushed out from the caves?”
“What? Ah . . . She told you about that too? She probably forgot to mention that all of us who didn’t believe her stories about meeting the goddess were exiled.
Everyone: men, women, children, even mothers with infants.
Many of us died on the surface, eaten by dragons and crawlers.
Then many died from hunger and diseases.
Back then they didn’t allow us in the temples.
Divine water is only for the ones who believe in the mother goddess.
Sorry, girl. You got played, like many before you. ”
I felt an icy chill rush down my back. Stupid, so stupid. I was an idiot. She did nothing but lie every time we spoke. And I listened. Mahin said that she could open up to me because I was a woman. I bet it was because she could see that I was a trusting fool, easy to manipulate.
“Why would she lie to me?” My voice broke.
“Who knows. Maybe she has plans to use our buildings. Maybe she wants full control of the surface or maybe she went a little too far listening to the voices.” He took out a pipe and carefully filled it. One of the men stepped forward offering him a light.
I looked up. The hair stood on the back of my neck. Every feeling in my bones screamed that I was in great danger. His calm, deeply focused eyes appeared more terrifying than the gaze of an apex predator.
“I can go back to the compound, and tell her that I couldn’t get in,” I offered, already knowing that it was fruitless.
“Sorry, girl. I can’t let you go. Dragons living with our enemy is too much of a risk. Just one of you could destroy an entire city. I can’t let that happen.” He lifted his eyes to me.
I glanced at the men stepping closer, surrounding me, but careful not to get within my reach.
“You don’t want to do this.” I shifted my shoulder ready to transform.
Sudden movement triggered my change and the familiar ripple rolled through my body like a shock wave.
“Now!” one of them shouted.
Metal pressed tight at my throat, searing my flesh, not with heat, but with pain.
I yelped in blinding agony. Something went horribly wrong.
I could not finish my transformation. The final breath died in my lungs, and I was left choking on nothing as the chain tightened around my neck.
My fingernails bent and broke as I tried to grab the metal links.
“Victor!” I choked out as my vision blurred.
Voices boomed in my head. My back hit the hard surface and I was dragged on the floor.
“You shouldn’t have come.” A single voice pierced the darkness.
I struggled against the chain they kept tightening around my arms and neck.
“You people only have one weakness. Can’t transform when your body can’t expand.” The leader crouched beside me.
He took another pull from his pipe and blew the smoke in my face.
I tried to break free, but could no longer move.
“Sorry, girl. I have nothing against you, but I can’t let you go.” He glanced up, giving a signal to one of his men.
When I was a girl, I used to dream about adventure, the new lands I was going to explore.
I never thought I would take my last breath of stale sweat and tobacco filled air in a filthy room, on a dirty floor.
That the last face I would ever see in this world would have eerily empty eyes.
In my last moments, I thought about Victor waiting for me back in the sisters’ compound.
Will he ever know what happened to me? Was it a mistake, not giving us a chance to be together?
My eyelids grew heavy. The will to keep fighting was weakening.
From the corner of my eye, I saw a hand with a dagger moving toward me as if in slow motion.
I braced for the pain. It exploded on the left side of my body, my shoulder ached as if a million knives had plunged into my skin.
The metal against my neck loosened and I blinked as the thick layer of dust on the floor came into focus.
I was on my side, the window in front of me was shattered.
The air moved the strips of thick black cloth that remained on the wall.
Veramorr was standing artificially still, looking straight ahead.
Someone’s arm was wrapped around his neck.
A moment later, light hair that stuck straight up in an oddly familiar way, appeared right behind the leader.
“Don’t fucking move,” Victor hissed.
“Do as he says,” the leader managed to say.
“Let her go.” Victor pressed his knife against the man’s side, right between his ribs.
“I’m sure we can talk this over.”
“Shut the fuck up!”
Someone released the chain and it rattled against the floor. I scrambled to get to my feet.
“You have your girl, just leave.” Veramorr swallowed.
“Were you going to let her go?” Victor lowered his mouth to his ear, not taking his eyes off the other men.
Blood covered his face. His cheeks had multiple scratches, blood seeped from a gash below his eye, sliding down his chin. His one good eye was wide, unhinged with deadly intent, lethally focused.
“You’re making a mistake.”
“Were you going to let her go?” Victor repeated, pushing the blade tighter against the man’s side.
“Yes.” Veramorr reached for one of his pockets.
“Fucking liar.” In one swift move, Victor opened the man’s throat from ear to ear.
The whole room erupted into motion and sound.
“Shift!” Victor shouted and I forced my body to assume my beastly form.
Victor had already changed, he spit fire, avoiding the blade that swung just inches away from his head. With all the strength I had left, I lifted myself up toward the broken window. Behind me the room erupted in flames.