Dolor and Shadow (27 page)

“The only reason why you still breathe,” he said, “is because we can’t find it. Cooperate. Blainn can only be controlled for a short time, before even I lose status.”

Kallan shifted a swollen eye to Blainn, who hungrily waited for the go-ahead to continue kicking.

“I say again,” he repeated. “Where is the pouch?”

I don’t have it
, she tried to say, but her voice failed to obey. She tried something else, something easier.

“Tak’n,” Kallan croaked and coughed.

Fire shook her body, and a tear slipped from her eye.

“Who?” The firelight caught his scar.

Kallan thought to answer, but choked on the fear that they would hunt Rune next. The voice in her head screamed in objection, but only a whisper reached her. She could not speak. She could not move and, instead, waited for Blainn’s judgment. Within that suspended moment, her mind passed in and out of worry. She thought of Rune and wondered if he had taken Astrid and ridden on without her.

He would be in Gunir by now,
she pondered, then wondered if he lived.

The cloud from the bowl seemed to thicken as it settled down closer, heavier, determined to bury her alive in its bitter tang. It was growing harder to think again. Memory vanished with the voice in her head. Blainn roared, and she stopped caring again.

Another explosion erupted in her side.

Gasping, Kallan rolled, clutching her torso. Her heartbeat drummed, pushing the blood through her as if desperately pumping the life back into her. Each beat made her acutely aware of every ache, every bruise, every break.

The room spun. Her stomach violently leapt in time to the pulsing of her blood. She convulsed and vomited, closing her eyes against the spasms that returned again and again.

A sudden, searing chill burned her back, following the length of her spine, and splitting her skin in two. She gasped, holding back a violent scream. Her hand flew to her back and she sobbed, relieved to feel that her skin had not really split in two.

Nerves.
She remembered her lessons with Gudrun in the Southeastern Deserts.
Just nerves. The skin hadn’t split at all.

Kallan touched something hot and wet and recognized her own vomit. Another wave of nausea rose. Shuddering, she fell back to her side, hoping to ease the vertigo. A fire crackled in the distance, filling her with a desire, a need, to look upon the light in the darkness.

She winced and shifted her gaze to the light, fixing her eyes on the lively fire that roared in the center of the cave. Blainn was gone, but the Scarred One now stood beside the fire with a third.

This one was different. With a smaller frame, he was slightly shorter, and thinner. He looked younger. Considerably younger. They spoke in the Common Tongue. She strained to hear over the incessant pulse as her heart worked to move the blood through every cut and bruise.

“Did you find him, Nordri?”

“We found the trail several paces off where we think he landed. From there, he headed north. We tracked him to the main road of Gunir, but didn’t follow further. Any closer and we’d have the Ljosalfar war-men on us.”

“And the pouch?” the Scarred One asked.

Nordri shook his head.

“No sign of it anywhere. She may have stashed it somewhere. Durin thinks she left it back in Lorlenalin.”

“Durin would think that,” the Scarred One said. His eyes glazed over with thought as the clod of a boot, heavier than Blainn’s, resonated through the cave. Another Dvergr as wide as Blainn and almost identical in stature joined Nordri and the Scarred One beside the fire. His eyes were significantly smaller, appearing beady, and were set deeper than what seemed natural. Kallan could only assume this was Durin.

“Report,” came the Scarred One’s order.

Durin took his cue from the commander and answered in Common Tongue.

“Their current state has left them vulnerable. An attack now would assure a win.” His voice carried as if he wanted Kallan to hear. “Wipe them out, I say. Extinct.”

The bowl’s cloud muted any protests she would have had, so she lay submissively instead, listening to the discussion.

The Scarred One silently mulled over the proposition. There was a long silence before anyone spoke again.

“Motsognir?” Nordri pressed.

Motsognir,
Kallan mused.

A forgotten name surfaced from the depths of her ancient memory then fizzled, failing to push through.

“Bring her.”

The words rang through like a death sentence and the last of her worry fell numb. Throwing a spiteful look to the broken heap that was Kallan, Motsognir stepped into obscurity beyond the light. The plod of heavy boots returned and, just as Blainn came into view, everything went dark.

CHAPTER 37

A bowl struck the ground with a clang like a poorly tuned bell, waking Kallan with a startled jerk. Her pulse pounded her temple with a merciless hammer that twisted its way into her writhing stomach.

Pulling her legs to her chest, Kallan hugged herself against the pain that flipped between nausea and indifference. The bitter tang in the air lingered along with the dull throbbing, the sharp stabbing, and the hot, searing bursts that ripped her body apart. Her chains scraped the floor with every miniscule movement. She tried to move, but cringed instead, then groaned.

The monotonous drip was gone. Through the corner of her eye, Kallan caught the faint light of the Dvergar’s fire. A bit of cave wall jutted out a ways between her and the fire, blocking most of the Dvergar from view. It was enough to outline a pillar of limestone that had not been there before and, at once, she saw it and understood. While she slept, they had relocated.

It didn’t take long for her to decide she didn’t care, and her head slumped to the side.

Boot,
she thought as she stared at a large, square-ish boot, coated with mud. She made an effort to lift her head, following the brown trousers up to the tunic worn loosely over a pair of shoulders beneath a long, black overcoat.

It was a fine overcoat, beautifully made with black leather and lined with thick, black rabbit fur. It was an overcoat only one of importance would wear. She twitched at the face peering down at her. She was half expecting Motsognir, with his regal commands and the mannerisms taught only to those of the king’s high court.

This Dvergr, like the others, was as tall as the Alfar, as tall as the tallest of Men and just as burly as his comrades. They all had beards, wild, black, scruffy things, the way some men let grow where nature takes it.

His beard was shorter, tamer, and calmer than the rest. His clothes were a bit cleaner. He had the build and strength honed by the mines, but the astuteness of a scholar. A cold, silent shadow lingered in his eye somewhere between pensive and calculative. Kallan wasn’t sure if it was his well-groomed appearance or the lack of cruelty in his round, black eyes. Regardless, something about this Dvergr eased her.

He held her gaze as easily as she held his and they studied each other in turn, each of them captivated, neither of them moving, until a grim voice called from the fire.

“Ori.”

Ori didn’t move at the sound of his name.

The shuffle of a boot and a heavy plod soon followed. Still, Ori kept his eyes locked on hers. A heavy hand fell onto Ori’s shoulder, pulling him out of his trance, and, without a word, he walked back to the fire, leaving the other Dvergr there with her.

Kallan diverted her attention to the new guard and her heart fell, catching Nordri’s eerie gaze. He crouched down until his face was a breath away.

“Eat or don’t.” Nordri brushed a too-gentle hand against her cheek. Her stomach churned and she gave a startled jerk, but failed to pull away, keeping his pale hand on her face.

“Truth is, if we were going to kill you, we wouldn’t have waited until now to do it.” He grinned with a wide, malicious look to his eye. “And we wouldn’t have used poison.”

Kallan jerked away too weak and too wounded to throw him a glower.

Nordri flashed a smile that upturned her nerves, and, slowly, he scraped her body with his eyes. After ensuring he had a good long stare at her exposed flesh, he returned to the fire. There, he settled and shifted himself into place, and flourished another grin that seemed to linger there in the dark long after it was gone.

Kallan glanced at the bowl Ori had left her. It didn’t take her long to muster up the nerve to eat the unidentifiable slop. It hit her stomach like a hammer and stirred up her nausea again. When she was done, she fell back to the floor, letting her head strike the stone.

In the dark, she lay awake, straining to hear a familiar word among them. Within minutes, on a less-than-empty belly, the gruff voices and guttural sounds lulled her into a deadened sleep.

* * *

Five Dvergar dragged her to the depths of the caves. Motsognir, Nordri, Ori, Durin, and Blainn. Blainn was the muscle. He was first to kick and last to think and had a talent for cruelty. Kallan decided she liked him the least.

It didn’t take long to realize Durin was his older brother. Having the advantage of being a few years older, he also had the advantage of having a few years more sense. It added up to nothing really, though it did make him less reckless, which meant he was less likely to kick, but more creative when he did.

In other ways, Nordri’s cruelty far exceeded Blainn and Durin put together in ways that neither dared go. His specialty was mental. He wondered aloud why they fed her, why they took her, why they clothed her, and made too many hints and gestures that set her into a quelled panic every time.

It didn’t take her long to realize Motsognir was there to keep them all in check. Being the leader of their assorted assembly, he was usually successful, but only when he was around to step in.

Ori, on the other hand, eluded her. She couldn’t determine if he was there to learn, or there to record the events. He spoke less than she did and, seemed to disappear altogether for hours at a time. When he was around, she often caught him staring, watching her, engrossed so deeply it took a jab from Motsognir to bring him out of it. There was only one thing she was able to determine about Ori. Of all of them, he was the least of her worries.

Blainn’s boot regularly woke her and she frequently passed into sleep with Durin’s fist. Aside from the beatings and the occasional bowl of slop, they kept their distance. They always spoke Dvergar unless there was something specific they wanted her to hear, which always involved a slew of suggestions from Nordri that ended with a sickening glint in his eye.

* * *

Day and night didn’t exist in the caves. Time blended into one long, endless night where there was only the darkness, the Dvergar, and nothing. The haze and the bitter tang always wafted nearby with displays of red and orange, keeping Kallan drugged, dizzy, and daft. When she thought anything at all, she thought of Lorlenalin and Daggon, of Eilif and Aaric, and of Gudrun and the children. Once, she thought of Rune and of how she would gut him first chance she had to take Astrid back. But mostly, she didn’t think.

She slept often, said nothing, and never cried. She was too numb to cry. Too frequently, she passed between sleep and awake. There were times she entered dreams she was awake for, and woke to nightmares she knew were real. Every time she woke, she lay, silently willing herself to sleep.

She wanted to sleep. She longed for it. Sleep was her sanctuary, an invisible hole where she could crawl into and vanish for stretches at a time. Only in sleep could Kallan avoid the beatings, the darkness, and Nordri’s tawdry stares.

When she was awake, she longed for sleep, and when she slept, she welcomed it, desiring nothing more than to curl back up to sleep so that she might return to the world of dreaming where the pain was non-existent. She rarely woke on her own.

Kallan rolled onto her back, taking note of every new bruise and break and the level of stiffness the old ones had developed. It took her awhile to realize the unidentified concoction of slop they’d doled out was an assortment of medicines and herbs combined with something, she could only assume, that was nutritious enough to keep her alive, along with something for the fever, something for infection, and something to keep her daft and her Seidr out of reach of her consciousness. It was the only explanation she could find as to why she wasn’t dead yet. It also allowed them to exercise little restraint in their beatings.

A fresh new assortment of rock and stone accompanied a new collection of cuts and bruises that covered her from head to heel. The dizziness was stronger than usual, and the orange blaze that had cast the images in an outline of black had returned.

She studied the ceiling. The majority of jagged stalactites hung overhead like countless knives at the ready if she dared attempt anything. Her throat was dry and she suddenly found herself wishing she had more of the slop-deemed-food to wet her lips.

Kallan sighed as she tried to sort through her disconnected and jumbled thoughts. Her movements were stiff and jerky. She rolled her head to the side and gazed at the bowl that always wafted with red and orange, but all that was there was a cold, damp sick that plunged down her throat at Nordri’s leering eyes.

The usual campfire and muffled chatter were gone. Fear gripped her around the throat, inside the chest, and twisted her belly, wriggling and writhing in worry. There are things done only when alone, and the hollow silence of the cave confirmed they were very much alone.

Slouching, and hungry, as still as a bird fixed on its kill, Nordri sat on a chair-sized boulder. Beatings she could take. This was something else. His eyes gawked with a silence that spoke much more than words.

In a single glimpse, Kallan saw his thoughts played out in detail. Her heart pounded in her chest as she forced her broken body to move, to obey. The floor sliced her back, but Kallan continued to move.

With a careless thud, Nordri dropped a foot and stood, holding the lever used to pry up her chains. He swaggered to the spike that secured her bonds and pried it up from the floor. It was not until then that Kallan realized exactly how much chain bound her.

Five paces of elding chain scraped the floor as Nordri bundled it affectionately into his hands, cradling it lovingly like a leash. With a wide grin, he crouched to the floor, holding his eyes even to hers. His breath reeked of a bitter, root brew known only to the Dvergar.

He was too close. Even in the poor light, she could see every crevice and dip of his face as smooth and white as wax.

“I’ve had Dvergar and Svartálfar,” he said with a grin. “Lots of Svartálfar. I’ve had my fair share of Man—their women are quite an unusual breed—even Ljosalfr once. But I’ve never had Dokkalfr.” He shrugged. “They remember too much. Can’t get close enough.”

He dropped his voice even lower.

“But to have Drui…” There was his sick smile again. “…now that is a rare privilege.”

Kallan didn’t dare move. Silent and still, she lay as if any movement would encourage him to leap. He raised a large, white hand and lightly grazed her face.

Her skin burned where he touched her and her stomach flipped as a cold crawled up her back like a giant spider, and Kallan shuddered. The motion was enough to ignite his excitement.

“Go on.” Nordri nodded. “Get!”

He opened his hands, released the weight that pulled the chains through his grip, and relinquished Kallan’s bonds.

She didn’t have to be told twice.

In a breath, Kallan was off, scrambling to stand and run on a swollen leg. The floor sliced the bottoms of her bare feet. Kallan stumbled, but scrambled, battling to keep her body moving.

The chain clawed the floor behind her, sending a deafening scream through the cave. Surely, someone would hear, someone was there, somewhere.

Nordri moved.

Quicker than a fox, he was on her, letting her run and standing a stride behind her as he watched her stumble. The race was ludicrous, no match at all. Still he let the wounded rabbit run. After a moment, he opened his voice and chatted in time to a ditty of his own making.

“Pretty ‘ole thing can have your tart,

But cruel as is, she’ll eat your heart.”

Kallan clambered through the dark, pulling the chain over the stones of the cave floor, desperate to find the door. The deafening clank of elding on stone ended when Nordri stomped the end of the chain and stopped Kallan short. She fell to the ground, splitting her elbow open and making it run hot with blood.

“Pretty ‘ole thing. She wants to run,

But cruel as is, you won’t be done.”

His sickening grin revealed his teeth in the dark as he took up the chain, pulling Kallan with it, reeling her in like a fish. Kallan grabbed her end of the chain and pulled back, but she was too weak, the drugs too deep.

“Pretty ‘ole thing you’ll want to bed,

But cruel as is, she’ll want you dead.”

Nordri yanked the chain. With nothing to brace her, she fell, face forward, tripping foot over stone, but he was ready for her.

Into his chest, she landed and, as if he had practiced a dozen times, Nordri shifted and slithered behind her. His massive arms wrapped around her waist and he held her, possessed her, crushing her into him, and he grinned, relishing the struggle.

A cruel, wretched heat, like that of a violent fever you know will take your life after the delirium hits, rolled off his body. As he chanted the next couplet, his hot breath burned her ear.

“Pretty ‘ole thing can hear my sighs,

But cruel as is, I’ll want her thighs.”

Kallan fought, digging her bloody fingers into his arm. Amused, he held up his hand in offering and, desperate, she sank her teeth into it. And when she tasted blood, she bit harder. When he chuckled, she bit deeper, and he groaned with pleasure.

“Pretty ‘ole thing could make you moan,

But cruel as is, she’ll make you groan.”

He licked the side of her neck as she bucked, holding her with the same vile grin still frozen on his face.

“Nordri.”

Ori’s voice cut through the cave, ending the limerick immediately. Like warm sap, Ori’s voice ignited a flicker of hope in Kallan, but she didn’t dare release her teeth from Nordri’s hand.

“Let her go.”

There was calm in the order, but it wasn’t without urgency or threat. Nordri grinned wider and began a new couplet.

“Easy leave her, love her, want her,

Sleazy lover, let her wander,” he chided.

“Nordri,” Ori said, but Nordri chuckled.

The taste of his blood had reached her nerve and Kallan released his hand. Too weak to spit the blood from her mouth, she hung limp in Nordri’s clutches.

“She has that look about her.” Nordri nodded slightly. “The same look they all get. They want it. I’ll hold her if you’d like a turn.” And as quick as that he began again.

“Calling, crying, cursing canter,

Screaming Scryer, can’t deflow—”

“Nordri!”

Ori’s voice boomed through the black cavern. He fell silent as if Ori’s voice had swallowed his song. Kallan heaved against Nordri, panting, desperate for breath. A tear slipped from her eye and fell down her nose to the tip.

“I see,” Nordri’s slimy voice hissed. Kallan could hear that wretched grin in his words, but it was fading. “You want her for yourself. Just yourself,” he yipped. “The king’s son always wants for himself!”

His grip tightened, refusing to give her up. Any tighter and he would crush her.

“The giants are about,” Ori said darkly, “and we’re a long way behind the others.”

Nordri froze, holding onto each word expectantly.

“There are worse things than sunlight and snow out here,” Ori continued in a heavy voice dripping with boredom. “If someone were to get lost…” He let the word echo. “Damn near impossible for anyone to go back for him.” Ori shrugged. “I’m just saying…Damn near impossible.”

And as quietly as he had appeared, Ori turned his back, and left Kallan to Nordri’s judgment, taking the light with him.