35. Thirty-Two

The march was brutal, mostly because of how Nessir liked to yank on my leash. Partly, also, because of how he gloated the whole way.

"Thought you were so clever, worming your way in with him, didn't you, pet? Teasing him and never letting him sample your delights. Oh, don't worry. I know you're not so fond of cock, but there are so many you haven't met yet." And then, leaning down, yanking me closer, "I'll introduce you to a hundred tonight. Surely, you'll find one you like. And if not, I have a few fresh stallions, given to me as a freedom present. It will take some doing to get them to mount you, but not as much as you'd think."

He laughed.

I pulled on the chain, thinking I might be able to yank him out of his saddle. Nessir's delicate, sandaled foot snapped out and caught my chin hard enough that the world went black. My body sagged, unresponsive. He didn't stop his horse, dragging me along until I somehow found the strength to get my feet back under me.

No one said or did anything to help me.

With every step, I was tempted to say something myself, to insult him, remind him that he himself was nothing but a whore, but it would've done me little good, so I kept my mouth closed and my words to myself. I'd save my voice for someone more deserving.

Near dusk, we came upon a city of tents camped on the banks of a wide river. Unlike the camp at Godsfel, this one had some permanent structures, clear lines, and a wall around it. It was also nearly four times the size of Ruith's camp, with at least three times as many soldiers. My heart sank at the sight of it.

Some part of me had secretly hoped against all odds that there might be a rescue, but now I saw that any force falling on Tarathiel's camp would quickly be destroyed.

When I went with Nessir and Tarathiel, I had thought it was an opportunity. There might be the chance to run. Maybe I could get Nessir off his horse and ride away. I knew, roughly, where the coast was. Crossing would be awful—even more awful if I was alone—but perhaps I could find someone to take me across, or maybe I could wait for the weather to be better and go then. I could hide on one of the farms. Maybe I would even get lucky and happen across someone sympathetic to my situation. There had to be elves somewhere who were sympathetic to the plight of slaves. Now that I had my voice back, I might even be able to convince them of who I was.

They were false hopes. There wasn't a single elf on the isle who cared that I was Elindir, bastard prince of Ostovan. There would be no kindly farmers willing to row me across an ocean, no comfortable barns to pass the winter in. I realized quickly that if I did escape, I would only hasten my death.

If I thought Ruith's punishments for insubordination were bad, Tarathiel's were unbearable. He had ordered the slaves into two columns to be bound together, randomly pulling some out of line to be beaten as an example. When the slaves realized they were being beaten even if they complied, a few got brave enough to resist. Luthar had been among them, and he had his head cut off for it.

I thought, grimly, that I had made a mistake in going willingly, then realized it didn't matter if I'd resisted or not. I would have been killed if I had, and no one—Ruith included—would have come forward to save me. Even now, I knew that my fantasies of him riding to my rescue were just that. I had been traded away without resistance, with barely any protest. The royal tailor had haggled more with merchants over bolts of cloth than Ruith had for me. He wasn't coming. If there was to be any sort of daring escape, I would have to do it on my own.

Yet there was nowhere to escape to except, perhaps, death. I hadn't yet decided if that was preferable to being passed around the army camp and potentially raped by horses, but then it was only the first night. Things might only get worse for me if I gave Nessir time to use his small, uncreative brain. I had to act now, tonight.

Distantly, it registered that meant it was my last night alive, and then, absurdly, that I had spent my second to last night alive in the arms of my enemy. I had let Ruith fuck me, let him inside of me in ways no man had ever been. When we lay together on the dirt floor of that alcove, it wasn't just his body seeking release in mine. It was a coming together of minds, of possibilities. I had seen even then how it could be.

I could've loved him in a different life. Maybe not in the way lovers loved each other. Even in an ideal world, we would never have tender kisses in the dark, lingering gazes full of longing. We could never have courted with sweet words and dances. But I could've loved him the way one man loves another, with clasped hands and arms slung over shoulders, deep draughts of ale and conversation late into the night. It might've been the love a young man has for his betters, a knight for his king, full of reverence and service given freely.

I didn't know why I thought that, but it felt true. I had, however begrudgingly, come to respect him. It was easy to understand why men would pledge to die for him. He might be someone worth dying for.

As soon as Nessir's feet touched the ground, he was pulling me toward a tent. New terror filled me that I wasn't going to get the chance to make a move, that he was going to take me immediately. Instead, I was relieved when I was shoved roughly into a tent much like the first elf tent I had ever been in. It was floorless, the ground just dirt and flattened grass. Barrels of water and oil waited alongside a slave boy who was perhaps twenty, attractive, and fair-haired.

"Prepare him," Nessir demanded. "And then report to my tent."

The slave said nothing, hurrying forward to do his work. I was hooked to the post by the chains that kept my wrists together. His hands were careful, almost gentle, as he stripped me. He said nothing, but carried out the work dutifully and thoroughly, scrubbing me from hair to heels with his soapy rag.

"What's your name?" My voice was raspy, and speaking in my own tongue was somehow strange after so many days of not doing it.

He didn't answer, so I tried again in Savarran. I knew he recognized the language when his hand paused between my shoulder blades. His answer was the tiniest whisper. "You shouldn't speak. Or cry."

My chains jingled loudly as I turned my head. "Because they don't like it?"

His jaw feathered, his eyes seeming haunted. "Because Nessir likes tears." He came around in front of me, washing my shoulders without looking at me. "He'll hurt you. Worse than what's on your back. He likes it to hurt."

"What's your name?" I asked again, this time gentler.

"Dionte."

"My name is Elindir."

Dionte frowned. "I wish you hadn't told me that."

"Why not?"

"Because now I'll have a name to mourn when he kills you."

I was washed and oiled, perfumed like a palace whore. Dionte meticulously combed out my hair and beard, brushing more oil into both. With oiled fingers, Dionte opened my body with efficient, practiced movements. There was no enjoyment in the task, not for either of us, and I couldn't fault him for it. It was Nessir who was at fault. It was Tarathiel. Ruith. Michail. So many other men with so much more power brought me there to be treated like less than an animal.

"Remember, he was once a slave," Dionte advised. "Everything he does to you, someone did to him first. Don't hate him for it. He's only known pain."

But that wasn't true, couldn't have been true. Perhaps I didn't know Ieduin as well as I could have, but they weren't cruel. Maybe Nessir had other masters who were abusive, but Ieduin had never raised a hand to him, only doted on him. Given him freedoms Ruith wouldn't even give me. And then Nessir betrayed Ieduin.

I was brought into a lavish tent with an ornate rug flooring. There was a spread of food to one side, and a massive pile of soft pillows and silk sheets. Everything was sweet and soft, made for someone who had probably never fought a true battle all his life.

Dionte threaded the chain connected to my wrists through an eyelet in a post near all the pillows. There was enough room for me to move, but not much. He gave me one last sympathetic glance before going to the rug in the corner and kneeling, assuming the posture of a slave ready to serve at his master's bidding.

Nessir arrived a short time later, his dark hair damp from a bath and his riding clothes gone, replaced by a simple dark blue chiton bound at the waist with a gold cord. He wore a gold band in his hair. It felt like a mockery of the gold collar around my neck.

He went first to nibble on some of the cakes before coming to stand over me. "Marvelous creature, aren't you? You look like your body was carved from stone. It makes me wonder just how many men it took to subdue you and get you into that cage? Was it three? Five? Or just one. The right one." He tipped my chin up.

Nessir's smile was deceptively saccharine.

"How did you know who I was?"

His smile became a smirk. "Do you think it's coincidence that I speak Savarran? I know something of your country, human, and of your birth. For example, I know King Zygfried had many sons, and most of them are dead now."

"Illegitimate sons," I said coldly. "Bastard princes like me."

His smirk widened. "Is that what you think? And I suppose you believe the story that you were sent to be Tarathiel's bed slave, too. That it was chance that brought you halfway across the world? If you do, you're even more stupid than I thought."

I jerked forward, straining against the chains. "Tell me what you know!"

He laughed, just out of reach, and stood. "Tell me," he said, loosening the gold cord around his waist, "about your mother."

I frowned. I had no memory of my mother. I was told she was a castle serving girl, a handmaiden to the queen. Since she was so beloved to the late queen, I was given much more attention than the other bastards, whose mothers received only the standard annual allowances of gold and bread. My mother was a highborn girl, young and beautiful, whom attracted the attention of the king. It was unfortunate, they said, that she didn't survive the birth to raise me. That was why I had been raised in such proximity to the prince and the king, why he doted on me. It was the guilt over her death in the birthing bed.

"Why does a Savarran elf give a damn about some castle serving girl the former king of Ostovan bedded?" I spat.

"Is that what they told you?" He tipped my chin up with two fingers. "Have you ever considered it might be a lie? That you might be someone else, dear bastard prince? Someone important enough that the Primarch of the elves himself negotiated to have as his prisoner?"

I stared at him stupidly. If that were true, then everyone had been lying to me my entire life. And besides, what would make me so damn important? I was no one, nothing. At my height, I had been the captain of the palace guard at Ostovan. Certainly, no captive worth all the trouble Tarathiel had gone through to get me.

"What happened to the collar they had you in?" Nessir asked, letting my chin fall.

"Why do you care?"

"Because it contained a lot of magic. Magic that the new king of Ostovan will be missing right about now." He turned away. "Soon, a letter will come from him, accusing the Primarch of going back on their deal. He'll make threats. They might even go to war over it, so it's rather unfortunate you had it removed. Lots of people will die because of it."

I narrowed my eyes. "How do you know any of this?"

He laughed. "I have been Tarathiel's spy for quite some time. I'm very good at it and the men in Ruith's camp had loose lips, especially after I was done sucking them off."

I glared up at him, wishing I had drowned him in the river the first time he spoke to me.

He glanced over his shoulder. "Oh, don't look at me like that," Nessir said, rolling his eyes. "You want to judge me for trading Ieduin for Tarathiel? Please. Ieduin is weak. They all are. Tarathiel will squash their rebellion in weeks. And then, when the north is won and all elvenkind are united under his banner, we will usher in a new golden age for our people."

"You mean Taratheil will," I corrected. "You're just an underling."

Nessir's eyes flared with rage at the insinuation that he wasn't important enough to warrant my attention. He grabbed a handful of my hair and wrenched my head back. "Whoever and whatever you were before, you're nothing now but my plaything, and I'm going to enjoy breaking my new toy."

Nessir yanked his chiton over his head. He was naked underneath except for the dozens and dozens of scars all over his body. I stared in horror at the faded marks, trying to imagine what awful things must've been done to leave them. No torture I knew of could have carved such deep canyons in such tender skin, not without killing. Yet here he was, having survived whatever it was that'd been done to him, and meaner for it.

Fingers like claws curled around the chain holding me in place. He lifted it from the hook and dragged me forward, shoving my head toward his groin with surprising strength. "Suck my cock, slave."

He didn't give me a choice.

I gagged, the instinct to fight taking over. With hands bound, I tried to shove him back, but he held me firm, pulling so hard on my hair that my whole scalp ached. I couldn't breathe, couldn't think of anything except getting free, except that I didn't want this.

So, I did the only thing that came naturally to me.

I bit down.

Hard.

Nessir cursed and tried to free himself from the tight grip of my teeth. I should've let him go, but I'd had enough. Enough of being threatened, enough of being used, enough of being treated like an animal. They wanted me to be a wild beast? Then so be it.

Blood poured into my mouth, down my chin, over my chest. I gagged and then chewed through.

Nessir stumbled back, his limbs trembling, blood spreading in a dark pool between his legs while I spat the wad of flesh I'd taken on the floor. It'd happened so fast, so violently, he hadn't yet screamed. Wide eyes, fast breath… He would bleed out eventually, but I didn't have that long before he found his voice. A scream would call the guards, and I'd be dead in seconds.

I threw myself at him, wrapping my chains around his throat and pulling tight. He made a sound like a frog squeezed too tight. Pale legs kicked in the low light. Blood pumped out of a well-made body and onto the floor, soaking the earth. He pulled, fighting to free himself, but it was no use. Even if he hadn't been bleeding out, he couldn't match my strength.

I held him with my chains wrapped around his throat until his kicking slowed, then stopped, and kept holding on until he was the color of a bruised plum. The bleeding had slowed to almost nothing.

Nessir was dead.

I shoved his body away from me with a grunt and my eyes fell on the next problem to solve: Dionte, staring at me with wide eyes. He was a witness. Was he on my side, or theirs?

I had one chance to appeal to him. "Help me," I whispered.

He swallowed, breathing fast, glancing from Nessir's body to me twice before asking, "How?"

Wrapped tightly in stolen cloaks, Dionte and I crept through the shadows. I should have gone to the edge of camp and fled into the night. Instead, loud screaming drew me to the slave encampment.

I didn't know yet what was being done to Tarathiel's new captives, but I wasn't about to leave them to their fate. Many of them were my countrymen, my people, even if they didn't know me. I had a responsibility to save as many as I could. Getting out of the camp with a dozen was riskier than leaving alone, but maybe, if I could get them out of their bindings, they could find their own way out.

Approaching the commotion, however, all hope of intervening left me.

The slaves were being arranged in one long line of men, women, and children. Whole families of them stood together, shivering in the dark. Elven soldiers stood across from them, armed with swords and torches. Tarathiel, on horseback, rode down the line of slaves, looking each one in the face as if he were weighing something. Then he rode back to the far end, positioning his horse between the line of slaves and soldiers. A subtle gesture and the soldiers stepped forward, jerking slaves out of the line at random.

No, not at random. They were pulling out every one in ten, not caring whether the tenth was a man, woman, or child, whether they were young or old.

Dionte's hand closed around my arm. "Don't look."

"What are they doing?" I hissed in a hoarse whisper.

"It's a decimation. A punishment for when slaves are unruly. One in ten is killed as a warning to the other nine."

A ripple of shock went through me. Ruith had spoken of the practice once before with the other commanders, but to witness it happening, and be helpless to stop it… My stomach turned over. I had to do something.

The soldiers grabbed hold of a young boy, barely old enough to walk, pulling him from his mother's arms. She screamed and scrambled to hold him, her cry of, "Take me instead! Leave my baby alone!" tore open the night.

Tell me about your mother.

Would my mother have held me like that? Offered her life in place of mine? What if she yet lived somewhere and everything I had been told was a cruel lie?

It was that thought that pulled me from my hiding place. My own freedom forgotten, covered in Nessir's drying blood, I stepped out of the shadows and into the light.

The first elf to notice me must not have seen the blood at first. He saw only a human in cuffs and a collar, another slave to put in line. He didn't even sound the alarm.

The soldier sighed in irritation. "Back in line!" He pointed with his spear. It was his last mistake.

I grabbed the spear and pulled, wrenching it easily from his unsuspecting hands. His eyes widened, and he stumbled back, clearly not expecting to be disarmed. Before he could recover, I spun the spear, and with a cry, I thrust it forward, finding the weak point in his armor at his throat. Blood spouted from his mouth. He grabbed for his throat like he'd been stung instead of stabbed. I yanked the spear out and he fell.

Everything happened quickly after that. The elves realized almost immediately that there was an armed slave and rushed from their positions in line to subdue me.

But so did the slaves.

They saw me overpower and kill an armed elf, and perhaps for the first time, it occurred to some of them that they might do the same. There was a sudden, ear-splitting war cry and the line of slaves surged. The elves, caught halfway, turned to meet them, but they were outnumbered, and the slaves were angry. Unarmed men pounced armed elves, taking them to the ground. They smashed helmets with fists, with rocks, with other helmets if they could get their hands on them. Slave hands found swords, knives, spears. If there were no weapons, they clawed with their fingers, tore with their teeth.

The elves fought back. Armored and armed, they had the upper hand, even outnumbered. Swords cleaved through unprotected skulls. Spears stabbed through two, three at a time. Legs and arms were separated from torsos.

Children screamed in terror.

Men screamed for freedom.

Elves screamed for the alarm.

All in the space of seconds.

Hands came down on my shoulders, forcing me to my knees. A blade kissed my throat. I looked to the end of the line where Tarathiel had been only moments ago, but he was riding away, flanked on either side by armed guards.

The sword at my neck lifted, but before it could come down, an arrow found the elf soldier's chest. He looked down at the arrow sticking out of him as if he were just as surprised to see it there as I was.

I heard it as he staggered back, the familiar wild shout of elves riding into battle. It was distant, hidden behind a rolling white mist barreling full speed into camp. Everyone saw the mist, and the fighting slowed, all eyes on it as it approached.

A fireball careened past, and the mist followed. In it, the thundering of hooves and screaming of a trumpet made of bone. I caught sight of faces painted white, heads wearing horns and skulls, clubs made of bone and teeth. Bare-breasted women smashed them into the skulls of Tarathiel's soldiers, letting the bodies fall. Slaves came behind, gathering the weapons of the fallen and rushing off to meet the rest of Tarathiel's army as the alarm bells finally began to ring. Scattered amongst all the madness in the mist were elves in black armor.

I staggered to my feet, turning a circle in a daze. Everywhere I looked, there was death. Bodies. Blood. Battle. Armored soldiers were being torn apart by slaves with their bare hands. Soldiers threw down their weapons and fled rather than fight the warriors from the Spine Tribes. Taps gleamed. Lightning, fire, and great spouts of water swept through the camp, destroying everything.

So much was happening, I couldn't comprehend it.

"Elindir!"

I turned.

Ruith rode out of the mist like the Reaper himself, seated on a white horse, black braids flowing like a shroud behind him. Face speckled with blood, sword drawn, he pulled his horse to a halt.

I looked up at Ruith, a flutter of warmth beating like wings in my chest. "You came."

"Of course I did. You're mine. I protect what's mine." Ruith swung down from his horse, coming straight to lift my head, his eyes full of concern. "You're hurt."

I shook my head. "It's not my blood."

Ruith seemed to realize at the same time as me that he was holding up my chin, and that our eyes had met without the usual unspoken battle for dominance and control. He released me and took a step back, clearing his throat. "Where is Tarathiel?"

"He fled."

A beat of silence before he asked quietly, "Will you fight for me?"

I shook my head and knelt, trading the spear for a more familiar sword. "No, but I will fight beside you."