Chapter 3 #2
On the other side of the gateway, in the bowels of the Frostvault Keep, Lykor pitched the elf forward into a darkened tunnel, steering her toward a set of stairs.
He would’ve portaled to the interrogation chamber directly, but the extinct druids—the former masters of the wraith’s volcano fortress—had enough foresight to lace the brig’s stonework with gold.
Traveling in or out by rifts was impossible. An inconvenience now.
Essence unraveled wherever gold touched—one of the curses the druids condemned on the Aelfyn before their downfall.
But the wraith’s gold-firing crossbows hadn’t been a tide-turning advantage during the assault like Lykor had hoped, despite piercing through the elves’ magical shields.
But if the wraith had a power like the druids—
The rider charged at Lykor with daggers flashing, yanking his attention back to the hallway.
The silver blades reflected flames from the spiked iron sconces.
Spurred by irritation, Lykor flicked his gauntlet, a blast of force spinning the knives out of her fingers.
The weapons struck the stone walls, clattering to the floor.
Fueled by retribution, he shoved her down the winding earthen steps with a burst of power.
The warrior went tumbling. Her screech morphed into a piercing scream as she crashed to the bottom of the stairwell. Lykor strolled unhurriedly, descending with heavy, booted footsteps that echoed against the stark surroundings.
Strangled by heat collected from the Slag and spewed through the labyrinth of vents, he yanked off his fur cloak, discarding it on a step.
When Lykor reached the dimmed halls of the dungeon, the warrior struggled to stand, stifling a whimper of pain.
Twisted unnaturally, one of her legs bowed out like a broken branch, incapable of supporting weight.
One of the rider’s blood-soaked arms dangled uselessly, white bone jutting through flesh.
After all these years, Lykor had finally captured an elven prisoner, and he was ravenous for revenge.
He’d balance the scales, destroying one elf’s life at a time, repaying the debt for what the king had inflicted upon him.
To purge one of the king’s soldiers before her power could harm the wraith, to extinguish her Essence before the king could siphon it and augment his own.
Lykor would pry words from her lips and uncover the elves’ immediate plans.
Baring his fangs, Lykor stalked to the elf sprawled on the ground. The warrior’s boots scraped against the stone floor in her meager attempt to shuffle away, her mangled leg preventing escape.
Reaching down, Lykor seized her auburn hair, the darker color leading him to believe she was one of those half-elf spawn. Not that the difference in blood mattered—they were all elves to him and would bleed all the same.
Leaving the cell-lined hallway, Lykor dragged her to an empty chamber set up for questioning captives. He’d collected a plethora of tools for this purpose, lining the chamber with every variety of weapon the wraith could craft, plated with gold. All for show and intimidation—he wouldn’t need them.
With an eruption of force, he slammed the elf against a wall. She sucked in a labored breath as her back collided with stone.
Lykor snatched the golden chains swinging from the ceiling, shoving the warrior’s broken arm into a manacle, drawing out a hiss. Shackling her wrists and neck, Lykor left the knife tethering her power in her shoulder.
He prowled to the center of the chamber, pivoting on his heel to study her.
To think. Swept away in capturing the elf, he’d put no thought into what questions he’d ask of a prisoner.
Lykor supposed he should begin by gouging out her knowledge of the king’s intentions, to bridge the gaps a century had hollowed in his.
He had no doubts the elves were doing the same to those Aesar had abandoned on the island.
Lykor’s fangs drew blood from his gums, dwelling on the wraith left behind.
All those lives lost. Deserted. His people would break under torture.
Reveal the location of their fortress. Lykor’s objective became clear—he needed to learn how much time remained until the elves confronted them in force.
“What do you know of the wraith?” Lykor demanded.
The warrior dragged in breath through her nose before spitting at him, the spittle hardly landing halfway across the room.
Lykor’s lip curled away from his teeth. In one step, he warped, materializing in front of her. With his gauntlet, he snatched the elf by the throat, lifting her to her toes. He wrenched her neck to make the restraints cut into her collarbones, flashing his fangs at her insolence.
“I will ask one more time,” Lykor clipped, rage boiling beneath his ribs. Shadows whipped around him in a tempest, fury evoking rending. “Answer unsatisfactorily and I won’t hesitate to plait your entrails after I peel the flesh from your bones.”
The warrior whimpered, eyes rolling with fear, but remained silent.
Lykor struck out with a sliver of darkness. Cutting like a blade, he channeled the rending, splitting the female’s skin under his gauntlet. She swore as he withdrew the metal from her throat. The flesh from her neck sloughed away, stuck to the steel like sap dripping off a pine.
The way she stubbornly set her jaw had Lykor snarling. Eyes flicking to her broken arm, he detected the next key to try to unlock her secrets. He grabbed the exposed bone, twisting it farther in the wrong direction.
The female shrieked through her teeth as she panted. Eyes glazing over, she slumped in the chains, passing out.
Lykor growled in disgust. With a flick of force, he wiped away the sticky mess sullying his armor. He crushed his claw into a fist, letting the squeal of the steel soothe him as he started pacing the room.
Like a bolt of lightning, a violent thought collided with him. His head whipped back to the elf. During his imprisonment, he’d learned of dark magic that the king and his general had meddled with. Lykor had no reservations about exploiting those same techniques against their own.
He could take her power.
Like the king had done to him—to all the wraith—pilfering Essence from the elves they used to be.
Not anticipating an escape, Galaeryn had returned a handful of talents to Lykor to see if he’d retain strength over his abilities.
The wraith wouldn’t have survived this long without the Essence Lykor possessed, but he was far from the arch elf that Aesar used to be.
Ripping off his gauntlet and flinging it aside, Lykor exposed his dominant right hand, the claw that belonged to some beast. Skin to skin contact worked best. How many times had Galaeryn extracted and inserted abilities while experimenting on him?
Hundreds? Half hadn’t survived the siphoning process, perishing from the unbearable agony of talents cleaved from the Well.
Dissolving the horrors of the past, Lykor prowled forward as shadows spilled from his claw like noxious fog.
He yanked the golden blade out of the elf’s shoulder, sheathing it back at his side before shredding her leathers with a slash of rending.
Lykor plunged his talons into the slumped warrior’s chest.
And pillaged everything.