Chapter Ten #5
When neither man obeyed her command to leave, she raised her voice and screeched, “Fanette!”
“Silence, umagi.” The tall one spoke, his voice a cold commanding hiss that slapped her like a brisk, hard hand across the face.
Jiarine froze and fell silent. Every drop of blood drained from her face as the skin above her left breast turned cold as
ice. Streams of glacial cold spread quickly through her body. Oh, gods. Something had happened to Vale. Her lips trembled. Her fingers clenched tight around the pillow. The question burst out before she could
censor it. “Where is Ser Vale—Master Manza?”
“I said be silent,” the tall Mage snapped. “You may speak only when I give you leave.”
She flinched and clamped her jaw shut. She’d come to know Mages well enough to have learned that obedience, instant and unquestioning,
was the best tool of survival.
“Sulimage Manza will not be returning. I am Primage Nour, the new holder of your leash. Now get on your knees and show me the proper
respect.”
The pillow fell from her hands. She dropped to her knees and bent forward, touching her forehead to the floor near his feet.
Her breasts swung free, the rouged tips rubbing the carpet, but she didn’t dare move to tuck them back into the confines of
her corset.
The hard leather sole of the Mage’s boot pressed against the back of her neck, driving her face into the carpet until she
could hardly breathe. Fighting the instinctive urge to stiffen her spine and push back against the pressure, she forced her
body to go limp.
The submission seemed to please her new master. After a moment, the foot on her neck lifted.
She stayed where she was, not daring to do more than take short, shallow breaths. He had not told her to move.
For nearly a chime she stayed there, prone and silent, waiting. Then, at last, the cold command: “You may rise.”
She pushed herself up on her palms and rose to her feet, keeping her arms at her sides, her eyes downcast.
“Raise your eyes, umagi.”
She lifted her lashes, fixing her gaze straight ahead as Vale had taught her four years ago, when she was an ambitious seventeen-year-old girl willfully making her Dark bargain.
She’d not realized the true price, but he’d taught her.
For six months, he’d led her farther into the shadows of his service, each week claiming a little more than she’d originally thought to give, coaxing her into surrendering the next bit of her soul.
Slowly, methodically, he’d seduced her, broken her, subjugated her to his will.
He’d trained her to obey him without question and serve him in any capacity he desired.
And she’d come to do so willingly, even eagerly at times.
Now he was gone, but the invisible collar of enslavement he’d settled around her neck remained firmly clasped in place. She
had a feeling its weight under Nour’s hand would not be half so light as it had been under Master Manza’s.
Master Nour lifted her chin and inspected her face with cold eyes. She was careful not to let her eyes meet his. Master Manza
had allowed her certain liberties, but Master Nour did not seem so accommodating. From the corner of her eye, she saw the
barrel-chested man staring at her exposed breasts. Master Nour didn’t even glance at them.
The Primage’s expression gave no hint of his thoughts, and when he concluded his inspection all he said was, “Manza always
did have an eye for the pretty ones.”
Master Nour turned away, and Jiarine allowed herself one deep breath. The movement made the stocky man lick his thick lips.
She knew right then, he was no Mage. He could not possess the rigorous discipline Master Manza had told her was required for
Magecraft yet still be so easily distracted by a pair of plump tits. An umagi, then, like her. She flashed him a glare and knew she’d guessed right when all he did was curl up the corner of his mouth
in a leering grin.
“Manza claimed you were quite useful to him,” Master Nour said, and both Jiarine and the stocky umagi snapped back into expressionless statues.
“I hope I will find you so. Your first task is to arrange an entrée for me into the queen’s court.
I will be Lord Geris Bolor, from a small estate near Sebourne’s lands in the north. ”
Jiarine took a breath. “Master, may I speak?”
“What is it, umagi?”
“Great Lord Sebourne is a regular at court. Your identity will be too easily discredited.” The words came in a rush. She wasn’t
certain how this new Mage would react to an umagi daring to give him advice, but if she didn’t speak and his plans failed, he would blame her. She would rather take the punishment
for impertinence than the punishment for failure. “A landless Ser or bastard son of a nobleman would be a better choice, less
likely to be questioned by the members of the court.”
“But I will not be a Ser, umagi. Manza went that route and it did not serve him nearly well enough. Lords have opportunities and influences mere Sers do
not. Beside, though the news has not yet had time to reach the court, the real Lord Bolor has just met an untimely end, and
I am his long-lost son and heir from a secret elopement. I have brought the marriage certificate and birth records and, if
necessary, can produce the witnessing priest to prove it.”
The current diBolor was a lord whom Jiarine had met before. He had a wife and two small children. If all that happened to
him was disinheritance and reclassification in the Book of Lords as a bastard rather than a legitimate son of title, both
he and his young family would be lucky. Somehow, she doubted that would be the case. Most obstacles in a Mage’s path had a
way of ending up dead or vanished. She dismissed the innocent man and his family’s fate without a qualm. Better them than
her.
“As you will, my Lord Bolor. But if I may be so bold, while you may pass for a lord of title, your umagi here will not.” She cast a haughty glance at the stocky man. “He does not have the look of nobility about him. The wharf
seems more likely.”
The shorter man’s brows drew together in a scowl. Master Nour just glanced back at him and then, surprisingly, laughed. “The wharf, eh? I suppose he does look a bit of the roustabout.”
“I suggest you garb him as your servant. But keep him close by. The lords will assume he is your bully boy, and those fists
are large enough that they might think twice before challenging your presence.”
Nour’s lips pursed, and he eyed her with new interest. “Perhaps you are more than just another of Manza’s pretty faces after
all, Jiarine.”
“Thank you, my lord.” Relief made her spine start to wilt. She squared her shoulders quickly. “Will there be anything else,
Master Nour?”
“Yes, there will.” Over his shoulder he barked, “Brodson, leave us. Close the door behind you. Have the maid send word to
the queen that Lady Montevero is feeling indisposed this morning.”
The click of the door latch falling into place rang like the toll of doom in the silent chamber.
The Primage took a step closer. “I think, pet, I should like you to show me how well my friend Kolis trained you to serve
him.”
Jiarine risked a glance at the Mage’s face. Then she wished she hadn’t.
For the first time since entering her room, Gethen Nour was smiling, and the sight shot terror through her heart.
Eld ~ Boura Fell
Pain enveloped Shan like a blanket. Every nerve ending burned and throbbed. Elfeya huddled on the periphery of his consciousness,
singing his favorite Feyan and Elvish tunes from their long-ago life in the Fading Lands. Her voice helped keep the worst
of the pain at bay as they waited for Maur to finish toying with them and let Elfeya heal him.
A sound at the door of his cell drew his attention. Elfeya stopped singing.
?He returns?? There was such dread in her voice. If Maur were back, they both knew the last thousand years of captivity would soon be at
an end. In his current condition, there was no way Shan could survive more torture.
Voices murmured in the hall outside, too muffled for him to make out the words. The cell door swung open. Shan started to
tense, then hissed as the tug of tightening muscles shifted the fragments of shattered bone in his flesh. He could not move
except to tilt his head back in an attempt to see who came in.
There was another low murmur of voices; then the broad shape of the guard stepped outside. Shan caught a hazy glimpse of the
newcomer—a slight figure whose face was still cloaked in shadow. The scent of food teased his nostrils, and Shan closed his
eyes. Not Maur but an umagi, with food for the High Mage’s favorite toy. The end of his torment wasn’t near after all.
Soft footsteps carried the umagi towards the barbed sel’dor bars of Shan’s cage. Cloth whispered against stone, followed by the scrape of metal as the umagi set a platter on the floor.
“I cannot move to feed myself,” Shan told his visitor. “Your master enjoyed his work too well.”
To his surprise, a morsel of food touched his lips. He opened his eyes, saw the thin arm stretched through the bars of the
cage, holding the food to his mouth.
“Eat,” a soft voice commanded. A female voice. Young. A child’s voice. “Even the strongest Fey needs food.”
Warm, flavorful liquid touched the tip of his tongue. Juice from the small piece of cooked meat. How long since he’d had cooked
meat? Shan licked his lips. The taste was extraordinary. It occurred to him that the meat could be poisoned or drugged in
some manner, but he was beyond caring. The smell of the food was making him ravenous. He opened his mouth and took the bit
of meat, forcing himself to chew slowly to savor its flavor and warmth and texture. Another piece brushed his lips before
he was finished with the first, and he ate that too.
“Why do you still live?” the child whispered as he ate. “He shatters your bones, peels the flesh from your body, yet still you cling to life. Why?”
Shan just closed his eyes and kept chewing without answer. Apparently the food did not contain any drugs to loosen his tongue,
because silence was all too easy.
The child held the next morsel of food away from his mouth, then sighed and gave it to him. “You are wary. I understand. They
say you have been here a thousand years.”
So long . . . half his years with Elfeya had been spent here, in darkness and torment. ?Ah, shei’tani, sieks’ta. Our bond has been more curse than gift.?
?Nei,? she answered instantly. Love, deep and endless, poured across the unbreakable threads of their truemate bond, and with the
love came her unshakable certainty, her pure and shining truth. Long ago she’d made her choice and bound her soul wholly and
without reservation to his, and nothing—not even the living hell of their last thousand years—would make her regret it. ?I would not trade even these centuries of torment if it meant one less day with you. You are all the joy I need. So long
as we live, we have hope.?
“They say he’s never broken you in all that time,” the child said. “You must be very strong . . . and how your defiance must
vex him.” Dark glee curled like an invisible smile in the girl’s voice. “They all fear you, you know. Even him. I can smell
it on them when they set foot down here.”
Despite himself, Shan’s curiosity was roused. Who was this child? Why was she here?
He took a slow, deep breath and embraced the burn of broken ribs as his lungs expanded. “What do you want?” he growled.
“Your help.”
“My help?” He gave a soft, hoarse laugh. “Have you looked at me, girl? What help could I give in this state?”
“You will heal,” she answered. “They say you always do, no matter what he does to you. What’s important is you are not Marked. You can do what none of the rest of us can.”
“And what’s that?”
The child leaned forward, pressing her face to the sel’dor bars and lowering her voice to a whisper so soft he had to strain his ears to hear it.
“Kill him.”