Chapter Thirty-Two The Lies of Desil Demothi #3
It was an ugly sight, and Lythlet understood for the first time why Desil loathed his brawling days as much as he did—because he was frighteningly good at it. Good at the thing he despised the most.
As much as she loathed the governor, as much as he deserved to suffer, a strange fear grew in her then that Desil would not know how to stop before it was too late. If he crossed the line and brought a man to death, she knew he would never forgive himself.
She staggered to her feet and stumbled forward, weak and dizzy, but desperate to reach him as he battered the governor mercilessly. Governor Matheranos was barely conscious now, lying beneath Desil limply; he had no more in him to fight with.
“Desil,” she called.
He did not respond, too lost in his rage.
She shrank back momentarily, alarmed at what she saw in his face.
She had seen it before, many time s— too many times.
In Valanti Winaro, when he despaired that his expertise had yet to be rewarded by him moving upwards in society, and thus felt it was only fair he took out a little rage on a timid bookkeeper.
In Master Dothilos, when he’d received four penalizing whiplashes from the Eza instead of the unfettered praise he’d hoped for, and thus felt it was only fair he passed on a little wrath to a na?ve slumdog.
It was the reckless, unyielding anger of a man tired of feeling small in a world yet to recognize his self-perceived greatness—a rage incandescent Lythlet knew full well to be the hardest for a man to free himself from because if she dug down deep enough, she’d find an identical one within herself.
Shaken, but wanting more than anything to doubt her instinct, she called again, keeping herself in his clear sight. She did not want to approach him from behind. The fear of not knowing whether he’d recognize her as a friend sat heavily on her shoulders.
“Desil, that’s enough. You need not hurt him anymore. You’ve already won the battle.”
Desil didn’t seem to hear her. He went on with bloody, balled-up fists descending over and over again into the governor.
She reached out and pressed a shaking hand gently to his head, where brow met unruly hair.
He tensed beneath her, and she trembled, wondering if he would listen.
Somehow, he seemed inhuman then, more like a wolf set upon feasting on its prey than someone who could comprehend her words.
But he slowed, his hands coming to rest in a tight, blood-stained grip together. He breathed, in and out, entire body shaking from the effort.
She drew a silent breath of relief. He was still here. She could still reach him.
“We need to tie him up just in case,” she said in a shaky voice. It was hard to keep her thoughts straight when her skull throbbed so much. “There’s rope back in the room where they tied us.”
Desil nodded and hoisted the governor over his shoulder. He made no eye contact with her, and Lythlet watched him concernedly as they lurched down the halls, returning to the room.
The barely conscious governor was soon tossed on the floor, mouth gagged, hands and feet bound.
At last, with a moment to rest, Desil collapsed on the grand throne the Eza had been seated upon. Lythlet went to him, clutching his face worriedly, even as the crushing pain in her head overwhelmed her.
But he cradled her to his chest, hands stroking her head gently. “They hurt you.” His voice shook. He brushed her forehead, sweeping her fringe from her sweaty, flushed face, and kissed it with pity.
She shut her eyes, mind fading to white as he rocked her back and forth. His touch comforted her, a faint light lingering beyond her eyelids. Seconds passed and she opened them once more.
“You look much worse off than me,” she murmured after a moment, pulling back to worriedly wipe the blood smeared all over his face. One of his eyes was alarmingly red where Governor Matheranos had jabbed. They were both bruised and battered, in dire need of a physic.
“I don’t feel good,” he murmured, head drooping down.
Alarmed, she held his hands, wincing at his swelling knuckles.
Dried blood was sprawled over his bloated joints.
His rosaries were missing. She glanced around, wondering where they’d gone.
Stray beads were scattered across the floor, some crushed into a fine powder, and they led to the back of the room where the two barrel-chested crossbowmen Desil had fought were heaped.
Lythlet blanched at the sight, bile rising in her.
One lay on his back, blood smeared over his face, slack lips revealing missing teeth, a freakish dent in the dome of his head.
His chest heaved minutely with a struggle for air.
Not too far away was the second, unmoving on the ground.
She turned ill at the sight of his mangled face, bloodied and already starting to swell.
His front teeth were broken, their jagged ends like rocky crags.
But it wasn’t his teeth alone contributing to the image—the skin of his mouth had been punctured by a broken jawbone at a painful angle.
She stared, horrified. These were not wounds they could possibly recover from.
She turned back to Desil, uncertain what to say.
“I’ve damned myself, Lythlet,” he murmured.
“No,” she comforted, holding his face in her hands. “You haven’t. You did this in self-defense. Surely the divine will have mercy on you.”
“Perhaps they will spare mercy for the death of these two,” he said quietly, “but will they for the first man I killed?”
Her blood turned cold. “What?”
He did not answer for long moments, his consciousness seeming to slip temporarily. She shook him, afraid of losing him.
After a moment, he raised his head, looking wearily at her.
“I haven’t been truthful with you, Lythlet,” he said.
“I didn’t quit brawling because I couldn’t stomach the violence.
I quit because I realized too late I was enjoying the blood-spill.
In the brawling square, I had finally found something I was outrageously good at—and I let it overcome me.
I sent man after man to the health ward, week after week, always to a cheering crowd.
I never knew how to hold back in the square, and I never bothered to learn how. ”
She stared at him, wide-eyed as her consciousness struggled to stay intact. “But you were only doing it for the coin.”
“I only told you that because I couldn’t bear the shame of the truth: I loved the fights, and only regretted it when it was too late.
I went beyond what was necessary every time.
The spectators praised me for it. They reveled in the beast I became.
For the first time after years of going nowhere and being worthless, I finally felt powerful, competent, strong.
That’s why I never wanted you to spectate.
The last thing I wanted was for you to find out I was anything but the boy you grew up with. ”
“But you quit,” she said. “You quit because you knew better.”
“I quit,” he said quietly, “because at my last brawl, I sent a man to his grave.”
She paled.
His words grew rushed, panicked, and his throat visibly tightened above her, veins cording a violent cobalt on pale skin.
“His name was Joshir Vethina. I pinned him down, and I beat him, blow after blow. I felt like I was possessed by a spirit. The crowd cheered and cheered. I turned him black and blue and red. Even after he surrendered, I didn’t stop, not until I was dragged off him, declared the champion, and sent on my way with my bag of coins.
I was leaving the square, coming home to you, when I saw a few of the attendants lugging out a body through the back. He’d bled out. I’d done that to him.”
Memories of that night reeled through her failing mind, bright flashes of what had seemed like a mundane night.
He had come home, thrown the bag of coins on the floor.
She’d congratulated him, he’d turned away.
She thought he was simply tired, worn out and detached as he often was after a brawl, and he left for the communal well for a drink and to splash his face with water.
But when he came back up to the kataka flat, he had caught her in the spare moments before she turned over to sleep.
He cried in front of her, tears flowing freely, and all she had gotten out of his incoherent rush of words was that he wanted to end his brawls.
All she had imagined was that at last his soul had been worn out by fighting.
She had never imagined what he’d been keeping from her.
“You’ve killed a man,” she said, stunned, “and you pretended nothing had happened.” Her mind was being torn into too many pieces for her to say more than that.
He bent to touch his forehead against her hand. “I’ve broken one of the high commandments, to take not what cannot be returned by mine own hand. And I did it for pleasure, for vanity. There’s something wrong with me.”
He stopped talking for some time, or perhaps his consciousness slipped. But she heard him resume.
“And yet,” he whispered, “even knowing what I was, what I had done, and vowing to myself to never take on violence once again, I could not resist. When you brought home that handbill, I thought I had an opportunity to once again partake in something greater than myself.”
She felt ill. “The conquessor handbill?”
He wept over her, his tears falling hot upon her cheek.
“I acted like I was joining only because I wanted to keep you out of trouble, but in truth I couldn’t have been happier to have the chance to fight again.
I thought of being loved once more, of winning the praise and love of spectators by my own might, and the temptation was too much.
You have always thought me honorable, Lythlet.
Do you think I’ve never taken advantage of your faith in me?
Do you think I don’t know you see me ever-honest, ever-pure, and that only made it easier for me to lie to you? ”
Her voice sank into a trembling whisper, overrun by emotions.
“I just forfeited a fortune for you. A fortune that would’ve ensured the comfort and care of my family, one I’ll never see again in my life.
All because I believed you would never be able to handle a brawl.
When all this time, you’ve been lying to me.
” A singular notion then pricked her, and the possibility of it enraged her. “Does Master Dothilos know?”
Her question surprised him. “I suspect he does. There’s a glint in his eyes whenever he talks about my brawling days. I wouldn’t be surprised if he sent his servants digging around the square and learned that.”
“So,” she said, fury tinging her words, “when we were holding that funeral for the bugbear cub and you told me to stay away from the match-master, was that because you were worried for my safety, or were you simply worried he’d tell me the truth one day?”
The guilt on Desil’s face told her all she needed to know.
She stared at his face, her vision splitting him into two, into four, into a million smashed fragments.
Her mouth was dry; no reply sprang from her lips.
Every thought seemed vapid, worthless. She looked at him and felt the keen horror of seeing someone she loved unveiled as someone she did not know at all.
He slumped forward then, flesh failing him at last, and she caught him, panicking. She shouted his name, and he made no response.
The door behind them banged hard, someone throwing their weight against it.
Her heart lifted. The Coalition—they’d found this network of hallways; they’d come to rescue them.
“We’re in here!” She raced to the door. She lifted the bolts and pulled the metal handle with both hands, heaving it open.
“You’re behind this, aren’t you?” Master Dothilos spat in her face, barging into the room. “Did you think you could defy me and ruin me in one day? Is that why you had the gall to say no to me?”
She paled.
Without a second to think, he had gripped her by the collar, yanking her into the air and shaking her by the neck. She slung a blow into his cheekbone, but he continued unfettered, rage blinding him to pain.
“All I ever wanted was to grant you the chance to become all you’ve ever wanted in your pathetic little life—and what have you done?
You stupid, stupid girl! I’ve given you more coin than you’ve ever had, I’ve given you a story to be proud of.
I’ve given you all this and only asked for a few favors in return.
And yet here I behold a serpent coiled in the grass, quick to betray me. ”
He came in with both hands, tightening them around her neck. She gagged, reddening. She turned lightheaded, her mind being torn in four directions at once as a grayish-green darkness descended upon her, the sensation making her stomach swirl nauseously.
Footsteps were coming, heavy footsteps, a jangle of metal rattling with their approach.
Perhaps the match-master’s servants were coming to assist him.
Her conjecture faded into the recesses of reality as all at once, the pain in her skull blossomed into red sparks, and she passed out, hand falling limp by her side.
The Golden Thorn knew no more.