She tasted blood.
Her own, and the boy's.
Crimson cruor bespattered both ground, wall and adolescent, instructing a gruesome telling of desperate travail. It was all made the more glaring by gift of the noontide sun, casting a coppery sheen over the carnage.
Her left arm screamed from the break in both humerus and radius, leaving the appendage as little more than a weighted, agonising vine adjoined to her shoulder. Holes and gashes riddled the rest of her. Black ichor mingled with the blood seeping from her midsection, telling of a likely ruptured liver. Her breath felt trapped within her lungs, locked in an itinerant loop in her esophagus; yet for the ragged suffering in her flesh and bones—perhaps miraculously—she had not succumb to unconsciousness.
By her guess, Llymlaen would soon part the shores to welcome a new guest.
The boy fared less well, a wide-eyed testimony of a soul departed, a body ravaged by unbridled violence. His jack had been torn from the shoulder, exposing the many perforations on his back. His left arm was but a ruin of mashed meat and shattered bone, the remains of his hand laid upon a blood-soaked dagger. His skull fared little better, now reduced to a sopping crater by the iron sphere yet gripped in the girl’s one functioning hand.Â
Shadows claimed the scene, blotting out the glory of the sun, so malapropos for the madness that roosted here.Â
She welcomed the darkness, her strength all but spent. With no small effort she raised her head from its weighted loll, to stare into the coming eclipse as her mentors had instructed her in the eight years since her joining. Smile into the face of oblivion, show her the glim of your mettle, and know nothing of fear.
Voices clamoured about her, distorted by the relentless ringing in her ears, exponentially worsened by the effort of lifting her head. As her bleary gaze met the coming stygian, two hands reached for her.Â
She tasted blood.
Her own, and the Lalafell’s.
Two of his diminutive fingers were caught within the staunch vise of her teeth. Blood was pooling into her mouth, the Lalafell screaming like a child set ablaze as he repeatedly—frantically—slammed a tiny fist into her cheek, temple, and neck. Yet she refused to release him, the delectable sound of bones snapping at the proximal phalanx as her head whipped about violently, like a jackal wrestling the life out of a hare.
“Aetius!!!†the little coward screamed, already wide eyes turned owlish by the horror of what was happening—about to happen.Â
Knowing the arrival of the now-named Gentleman would deprive her of satisfactory end to her bloody work, her jaw clamped as hard as she could manage and she thrashed. Blood struck her face, but the resistance suddenly ceased as the two extremities were ripped from their moorings.Â
She held her prize behind the wall of her teeth, staring down at the shock-stricken face of her tormentor. Then the Gentleman rushed in, blade drawn. He paused to survey the scene: her battered form still fettered, one eye swollen shut and once-long hair chopped wholesale, yet a savage grin present on that marred and bloodied visage; Zazuka’s collapsed form, gone silent as he clutched at his now maimed hand. Promptly Aetius sheathed his sword, appearing amused and annoyed.
“Lackwit,†he began as he stooped beside the Lalafell, casually pulling free his froofy neck-thing in order to bind up the ruined hand. A chuckle dappled his work as he glanced over to Qaeli, who winked. “I once heard you bit off a man’s pride. Chewed it up and fed him the pulp.†The young woman’s feral smile persisted as she slowly tilted her head back, drew in a short breath via her nostrils, and spat out the two hewn digits, one of which nearly struck Aetius in the brow, the other tumbling onto Zazuka’s stomach.
Glimpsing the flight of his lost fingers, the Lalafell gasped before his head lolled to the side, lapsing from consciousness.
Qaeli spat once more to the side, the hoarse aspect of her voice lifting for the first time in days, “S… S’all i’ took t’shut ‘im up?†A scarce, coughing chuckle followed, her one good eye floating from the passed-out Monetarist to the hyur responsible for her capture. “Shoulda done tha’ days ago.â€
Aetius absently brushed the back of his hand along his shoulder, where the finger had skipped before becoming lost amidst the detritus of the chamber. Standing, he reached down to pluck the unconscious Lalafell from the ground, as though he were no more than a satchel. He began to turn away from the girl, only to be halted by brazen words unbefitting the precariousness of her situation.
“Mayhap nex’ time… ye wipe th’cowardice offa ye face an’ dae ye own dirt.â€
The rage bloomed inside the man once more. To be labeled a coward by this filth was more than he could accept. Like lead Zazuka’s body hit the ground, Aetius turned to face his accuser. “’Cowardice’? From the lips of the fiend that murdered non-combatants  for no—“
“Oh, nip i’, Ashes. ‘Non-combatant’ me perky tits.â€
“She never bid anyone harm!â€
“She were a scientis’ workin’ cereleum deposits, ye manky git. Which means she refined fuel fer ye magitek monsters.â€
Aetius formed fists as he stepped toward the girl, bones crunching and clattering beneath his feet.
“Ye used those monsters t’turn women an’ children t’ash wiv impunity, an’ ye’ve th’cheek t’call ‘er a non-combatan’?†Her tongue clicked to the roof of her mouth, her fingers flexing in her bindings. “She an’ othahs like ‘er killed by th’thousands.†She leaned forward then, her ragged tone dripping with as much acrimony as her grinning lips dripped blood and saliva, “Ye said this were ‘bout justice? Sulpicia earned ‘er red smile many times o’er, ye lonely, impotent, pathetic fuck.â€Â
When that name—the name held more sacred in his heart than any other—passed from those irreverent lips, Aetius’ world deliquesced to red wrath. He bridged the remaining distance in two quick strides, roaring his fury while winding back a fist with aim for her already bruised face.
Only as his fist neared her face did he notice the sliver of bone that she had tucked inside her iron wristlets, which were now falling away from their prisoners.Â
Dipping beneath the fist’s destination, both of Qaeli’s hands shot up to grip Aetius’ collar, implementing his own forward motion and her own downward slide to send his forehead crashing into the stone wall. His frame bunched like a hyur accordion before he collapsed atop her, already unconscious.Â
Though it took several moments to regain her breath, she soon regained herself enough to shove him aside and join his wrists to the bindings that had recently held her. Quickly she searched his person for items of import: keys being tantamount among what she found, along with a small parchment that had been embroidered with what she guessed to be Sulpicia’s likeness.Â
For a moment she looked to the unconscious face of this man who had been so decimated by the loss of his bride, briefly unable to decide if she hated or pitied him. Settling on the likelihood of straddling both sides, she kept the keys, claimed his sword and dropped the parchment on the ground beneath him and rushed to her feet.
The mistake in such sudden motion was immediate, and she nearly lost consciousness as the chamber spun laps around her. Tremulously her hand found the wall, and taking a few breaths to compose herself, she followed the wall—metal screeching over stone as she practically dragged the sword—around the chamber until she found the gate, where Zazuka laid.
Her grip tightened upon the hilt of the sword, her body briefly remembering its torment. Her face and unknown toes throbbed from the ballpeen smith’s hammer. The tips of her fingers screamed from the loss of fingernails, her chest, legs, arms, shoulders and stomach were all afire from the various tools that had cut and drilled into her flesh. Â
Subconsciously, the tip of the blade had moved to the unconscious Lalafell’s throat, where blood had already begun to pool. Every grieved part of her body cried out for a simple push and twist of the blade.Â
‘Too quick,’ she resolved before she turned away from him. She would revisit the matter later. Presently, it was a miracle that she was able to move at all.Â
Her stumbling in the lowlight of the torch-lined corridor seemed to carry on for hours, though the reality might have been a mere few minutes. She soon found the end of the ascending hallway around a corner, where only a cellar door separated her from the scant light that peeked through the cracks in the wood.Â
So shaky was her hand that it took several passes with each key until she found the one that would grant her freedom. As the lock gave way and she used the pommel of the sword to steadily push the door up, she gasped as the blinding light of the morning poured in. Clinching her eyes, she forced the door open until it finally slammed deafeningly to the side.
Feeling her way up the steps, she soon found stony ground, slowly blinking her eyes open in order to filter the light and acclimate herself to the gloomy morn. Once she could bear to prop one eye open, she saw to the closing and locking of the door, and flung the keys into a well a few yalms away.
A cursory glance suggested that she was likely in the outcrop of a farmstead, though she would retain little of the information she took in for the next several dozen steps; until at last whatever was spurring her forward expended its final drop of strength. She collapsed face-first into a stretch of tall, dew-crested grass, quickly fading from consciousness with naught but the sound of gulls, sheep and laughing children serenading in the distance.
Her own, and the boy's.
Crimson cruor bespattered both ground, wall and adolescent, instructing a gruesome telling of desperate travail. It was all made the more glaring by gift of the noontide sun, casting a coppery sheen over the carnage.
Her left arm screamed from the break in both humerus and radius, leaving the appendage as little more than a weighted, agonising vine adjoined to her shoulder. Holes and gashes riddled the rest of her. Black ichor mingled with the blood seeping from her midsection, telling of a likely ruptured liver. Her breath felt trapped within her lungs, locked in an itinerant loop in her esophagus; yet for the ragged suffering in her flesh and bones—perhaps miraculously—she had not succumb to unconsciousness.
By her guess, Llymlaen would soon part the shores to welcome a new guest.
The boy fared less well, a wide-eyed testimony of a soul departed, a body ravaged by unbridled violence. His jack had been torn from the shoulder, exposing the many perforations on his back. His left arm was but a ruin of mashed meat and shattered bone, the remains of his hand laid upon a blood-soaked dagger. His skull fared little better, now reduced to a sopping crater by the iron sphere yet gripped in the girl’s one functioning hand.Â
Shadows claimed the scene, blotting out the glory of the sun, so malapropos for the madness that roosted here.Â
She welcomed the darkness, her strength all but spent. With no small effort she raised her head from its weighted loll, to stare into the coming eclipse as her mentors had instructed her in the eight years since her joining. Smile into the face of oblivion, show her the glim of your mettle, and know nothing of fear.
Voices clamoured about her, distorted by the relentless ringing in her ears, exponentially worsened by the effort of lifting her head. As her bleary gaze met the coming stygian, two hands reached for her.Â
She tasted blood.
Her own, and the Lalafell’s.
Two of his diminutive fingers were caught within the staunch vise of her teeth. Blood was pooling into her mouth, the Lalafell screaming like a child set ablaze as he repeatedly—frantically—slammed a tiny fist into her cheek, temple, and neck. Yet she refused to release him, the delectable sound of bones snapping at the proximal phalanx as her head whipped about violently, like a jackal wrestling the life out of a hare.
“Aetius!!!†the little coward screamed, already wide eyes turned owlish by the horror of what was happening—about to happen.Â
Knowing the arrival of the now-named Gentleman would deprive her of satisfactory end to her bloody work, her jaw clamped as hard as she could manage and she thrashed. Blood struck her face, but the resistance suddenly ceased as the two extremities were ripped from their moorings.Â
She held her prize behind the wall of her teeth, staring down at the shock-stricken face of her tormentor. Then the Gentleman rushed in, blade drawn. He paused to survey the scene: her battered form still fettered, one eye swollen shut and once-long hair chopped wholesale, yet a savage grin present on that marred and bloodied visage; Zazuka’s collapsed form, gone silent as he clutched at his now maimed hand. Promptly Aetius sheathed his sword, appearing amused and annoyed.
“Lackwit,†he began as he stooped beside the Lalafell, casually pulling free his froofy neck-thing in order to bind up the ruined hand. A chuckle dappled his work as he glanced over to Qaeli, who winked. “I once heard you bit off a man’s pride. Chewed it up and fed him the pulp.†The young woman’s feral smile persisted as she slowly tilted her head back, drew in a short breath via her nostrils, and spat out the two hewn digits, one of which nearly struck Aetius in the brow, the other tumbling onto Zazuka’s stomach.
Glimpsing the flight of his lost fingers, the Lalafell gasped before his head lolled to the side, lapsing from consciousness.
Qaeli spat once more to the side, the hoarse aspect of her voice lifting for the first time in days, “S… S’all i’ took t’shut ‘im up?†A scarce, coughing chuckle followed, her one good eye floating from the passed-out Monetarist to the hyur responsible for her capture. “Shoulda done tha’ days ago.â€
Aetius absently brushed the back of his hand along his shoulder, where the finger had skipped before becoming lost amidst the detritus of the chamber. Standing, he reached down to pluck the unconscious Lalafell from the ground, as though he were no more than a satchel. He began to turn away from the girl, only to be halted by brazen words unbefitting the precariousness of her situation.
“Mayhap nex’ time… ye wipe th’cowardice offa ye face an’ dae ye own dirt.â€
The rage bloomed inside the man once more. To be labeled a coward by this filth was more than he could accept. Like lead Zazuka’s body hit the ground, Aetius turned to face his accuser. “’Cowardice’? From the lips of the fiend that murdered non-combatants  for no—“
“Oh, nip i’, Ashes. ‘Non-combatant’ me perky tits.â€
“She never bid anyone harm!â€
“She were a scientis’ workin’ cereleum deposits, ye manky git. Which means she refined fuel fer ye magitek monsters.â€
Aetius formed fists as he stepped toward the girl, bones crunching and clattering beneath his feet.
“Ye used those monsters t’turn women an’ children t’ash wiv impunity, an’ ye’ve th’cheek t’call ‘er a non-combatan’?†Her tongue clicked to the roof of her mouth, her fingers flexing in her bindings. “She an’ othahs like ‘er killed by th’thousands.†She leaned forward then, her ragged tone dripping with as much acrimony as her grinning lips dripped blood and saliva, “Ye said this were ‘bout justice? Sulpicia earned ‘er red smile many times o’er, ye lonely, impotent, pathetic fuck.â€Â
When that name—the name held more sacred in his heart than any other—passed from those irreverent lips, Aetius’ world deliquesced to red wrath. He bridged the remaining distance in two quick strides, roaring his fury while winding back a fist with aim for her already bruised face.
Only as his fist neared her face did he notice the sliver of bone that she had tucked inside her iron wristlets, which were now falling away from their prisoners.Â
Dipping beneath the fist’s destination, both of Qaeli’s hands shot up to grip Aetius’ collar, implementing his own forward motion and her own downward slide to send his forehead crashing into the stone wall. His frame bunched like a hyur accordion before he collapsed atop her, already unconscious.Â
Though it took several moments to regain her breath, she soon regained herself enough to shove him aside and join his wrists to the bindings that had recently held her. Quickly she searched his person for items of import: keys being tantamount among what she found, along with a small parchment that had been embroidered with what she guessed to be Sulpicia’s likeness.Â
For a moment she looked to the unconscious face of this man who had been so decimated by the loss of his bride, briefly unable to decide if she hated or pitied him. Settling on the likelihood of straddling both sides, she kept the keys, claimed his sword and dropped the parchment on the ground beneath him and rushed to her feet.
The mistake in such sudden motion was immediate, and she nearly lost consciousness as the chamber spun laps around her. Tremulously her hand found the wall, and taking a few breaths to compose herself, she followed the wall—metal screeching over stone as she practically dragged the sword—around the chamber until she found the gate, where Zazuka laid.
Her grip tightened upon the hilt of the sword, her body briefly remembering its torment. Her face and unknown toes throbbed from the ballpeen smith’s hammer. The tips of her fingers screamed from the loss of fingernails, her chest, legs, arms, shoulders and stomach were all afire from the various tools that had cut and drilled into her flesh. Â
Subconsciously, the tip of the blade had moved to the unconscious Lalafell’s throat, where blood had already begun to pool. Every grieved part of her body cried out for a simple push and twist of the blade.Â
‘Too quick,’ she resolved before she turned away from him. She would revisit the matter later. Presently, it was a miracle that she was able to move at all.Â
Her stumbling in the lowlight of the torch-lined corridor seemed to carry on for hours, though the reality might have been a mere few minutes. She soon found the end of the ascending hallway around a corner, where only a cellar door separated her from the scant light that peeked through the cracks in the wood.Â
So shaky was her hand that it took several passes with each key until she found the one that would grant her freedom. As the lock gave way and she used the pommel of the sword to steadily push the door up, she gasped as the blinding light of the morning poured in. Clinching her eyes, she forced the door open until it finally slammed deafeningly to the side.
Feeling her way up the steps, she soon found stony ground, slowly blinking her eyes open in order to filter the light and acclimate herself to the gloomy morn. Once she could bear to prop one eye open, she saw to the closing and locking of the door, and flung the keys into a well a few yalms away.
A cursory glance suggested that she was likely in the outcrop of a farmstead, though she would retain little of the information she took in for the next several dozen steps; until at last whatever was spurring her forward expended its final drop of strength. She collapsed face-first into a stretch of tall, dew-crested grass, quickly fading from consciousness with naught but the sound of gulls, sheep and laughing children serenading in the distance.
