Chapter 1 #2
“You…are the Reaper,” she whispered. Rayner said nothing. “I did not think you were real. I thought…” She trailed off, but Rayner was already focusing on the males in the room.
“Did you do this?” Rayner asked.
She hesitated before answering. “…yes.”
“Are you hurt?”
“No.”
Rayner nodded, advancing farther into the room. “Get out of here. All the way out if you can. There is a merchant ship leaving in an hour that will take you to the continent if you can make it to the ship in time. Take others with you if you can. The guards are about to be preoccupied.”
He hadn’t looked at her again, his attention fixed on the still whimpering overseer, but he felt her make her way across the room, felt her pause beside him.
“They have made preparations for your return,” she said softly.
“Close the door behind you.”
When it thudded shut, he moved to stand next to the overseer. His attention shifted to the other two sentries. “Do not try to run.”
They both nodded, and he heard one audibly gulp as he lowered to a crouch beside the overseer. His hands were still on his face, smearing blood across his brow and cheeks.
Rayner reached for the arrow, but the male shrieked, “No!”
He paused, fingers an inch from the arrow shaft. “Were you not just screaming at your companions to remove it?”
The male blubbered, incoherent mumblings coming from his lips, and before he could sense the movement, Rayner snatched the arrow, tugging it from the man’s eye socket. The organ itself was attached to the arrowhead, and the sound of it popping free had one of the sentries behind him retching.
And the other one running.
Moving through the smoke from the lit torches on either side of the doorway, Rayner materialized in front of the sentry.
He tried to backtrack, his boots slipping across the floor.
Before the male could beg, Rayner’s hand was nothing but ashes, reaching into the man’s leg.
Fingers of ash closed around bone, and the male’s screams filled the room when Rayner tore it from his limb.
He tossed it to the side. It clattered on the stone, blood and sinew splattering.
The male was already on the floor, and Rayner lowered down in front of him to peer at his face.
Tears were tracking down pale cheeks, spittle dripping from his chin as he clutched at his leg.
“I told you not to run,” Rayner said, his tone low and icy. “If you try to drag yourself out of this room, I will remove every bone from your body and make sure you feel it all.”
The male nodded emphatically, trying and failing to quiet himself. Still holding the arrow in his other hand, Rayner moved back to the overseer, crouching beside him once more.
“Were you going to be the first to rape her?” Rayner asked, twirling the arrow between his thumb and forefinger after he removed the now useless organ from the end of it. The man only whimpered. “Tell you what. You answer a riddle; I let you keep your other eye.”
A puddle slowly formed beneath the male, the smell of piss mingling with the raw terror in the air.
“What is a dreamer’s lie?” he asked casually, placing the tip of the arrow over the male’s heart. He could hear it beating too rapidly. The male whimpered again, trembling violently now. “Quickly. I have others to tend to.”
The male’s mouth opened and closed, gaping like a fish out of water. “I— I don’t… I don’t know,” he gasped as Rayner slid the arrow up his chest and along his throat.
Rayner leaned in close, whispering into his ear as the arrow pressed along his cheekbone just enough to draw a thin line of blood. “A dreamer’s lie is that all nightmares have an end.” Another strangled cry. “The truth is, some nightmares go on forever, and yours is just beginning.”
The sound of more retching mingled with the screams when he brought the arrow down again, taking the male’s other eye.
Rayner was doing him a favor really. He wouldn’t be able to see all the ways he was about to make him bleed.
Then again, without his sight, the sensations would be intensified. Maybe it wasn’t a favor after all.
By the time his attention shifted to the one sentry who wasn’t bleeding, the two other males were no longer breathing.
He stood from dealing with the one now missing not only a leg bone, but a couple ribs, and a few vital organs.
The remaining sentry had sunk to the floor, piles of vomit off to one side.
He was pale and trembling, staring up at Rayner when he moved to stand in front of him.
The male closed his eyes, seeming to brace for the agony he’d witnessed his companions go through.
“I have some questions for you,” Rayner said.
“I will answer them,” he gasped out. “I will do whatever you ask in order to live.”
“Who said anything about you living?” Rayner asked, pulling a dagger from beneath his cloak.
“Answer my questions, and I will give you a quicker death than your companions received. But keeping your life is not on the table.” Rayner thought the male might be sick yet again judging by the way he somehow paled even more.
“Feris. Are his rooms still on the upper level?”
“The Captain? Yes. Two levels below the Baroness.”
“These preparations the female mentioned. What are they?”
“I don’t know.”
Rayner struck, snapping one of the male’s fingers back. The male howled, clutching his hand to his chest. “That was not the answer I was looking for,” Rayner growled.
Tears were leaking from the male’s eyes, beads of sweat forming on his brow. “I don’t know,” he sobbed. “I am not high-ranking enough to know such details.”
“But high-ranking enough to take from the females? Somehow I doubt that.”
“I swear it,” he cried, trying to press back from him more.
“Lie to me again, and I take a kneecap,” Rayner snarled, lifting a hand and letting it fade into ashes.
“I don’t know!” the male cried again. “I don’t know what they have planned for you! I oversee the younglings! That’s my job!”
Rayner paused. “Explain.”
“The Baroness is moving them. Taking them off the islands. My job is to ready the young on transport days,” the sentry said.
“Transport them were?”
“I’m not told that. I take them to a transporting room on the main level.”
Transporting room? That was new. There had never been such a thing when Rayner had resided here.
“Aravis. Do you know who she is?” Rayner demanded.
“I do not know that name,” the sentry said, shaking his head.
“She has been here for over a century. Black hair. Grey eyes. Fire gifts,” Rayner said. “The Baroness would keep her close by.”
“Her most guarded are hidden away. Only a few know where,” the sentry replied, his trembling seeming to have lessened as they spoke.
“Who else would know besides Feris?”
Dread filled the male’s pale blue eyes. “I don’t know,” he whispered.
“Then you are no longer of use to me.”
Rayner’s dagger slashed across the male’s throat. He left him there, choking on his own blood. A quicker death than his companions had received, as promised.
He stepped from the room, moving up a few more levels to the housing block where Feris’s quarters would be. Ashes flitted from his fingertips, drifting along the floor, seeking life or death. He passed what was once his quarters, continuing on to the other end of the level.
And when his ashes started buzzing in anticipation, a cold smile formed on Rayner’s lips.
He had a favorite memory to make.