roasts, the giant gripped Richard’s left forearm in bark. Gritting his teeth, Richard knew what was coming and waited for the inevitable.
“My Fomorian is deaf as any good torturer should be. And more effective for it,” Arawn said darkly.
The Fomorian snapped both hands in opposite directions.
Searing pain lanced up Richard’s entire arm and into his body, the broken bones grinding against splintered ends. The agony was excruciating as black dots danced in his vision. It was only the beginning, he knew.
When the giant stepped back, the knight’s arm hung at a crooked, unnatural angle, the momentary shock wearing down to a full-body throbbing ache.
Arawn stepped forward with the bag. Water suddenly danced against Richard’s face, cold and inviting. The droplets infiltrated his mouth, wetting his tongue and lips. Swallowing, he fought through the haze of pain. But as he did so, the crooked arm knitted itself, straightening by a power unseen by the world for more than fifteen hundred years. The other wounds he had received while in Annwn also healed. The memory of what had been done to him remained, but after a few seconds, no pain existed in his body.
“It will get much worse,” Arawn said with an evil smile.
“Kill me and be done with it.”
“I do not think so, knight,” the burned figure countered. “I, with the aid of the water in that basin, can keep you alive forever—and visit excruciating pain upon you the entire time. It will drive you mad, like this body has driven me mad. Bequeath the Dark Thorn to me, and I will end you quickly.”
Richard snorted. “Then bring your worst, you asshole.” Arawn lost his smile. He nodded to the giant, who then pulled free a hot iron poker from the stoked red coals of the fire and approached Richard with a malicious look.
Richard tightened, snarling with rage.
The first scream made him hoarse for those that followed.
Bran fought free of nightmares trying to anchor him forever to the darkness, feverishly sweating, his left hand throbbing fire.
He came groggily awake. He lay sprawled in a cell not much larger than his bedroom in Seattle, the stone floor leaching what warmth he still had and a lone torch offering none. The straw beneath him presented little cushion. As he sluggishly moved to push himself up off his moldy makeshift bed with both hands, he immediately fell back to the cell stone, pain the likes of which he had never known shooting up his left arm.
He realized an icy cuff bound his right wrist to the wall behind him. His other arm needed no such manacle.
Bran had lost his hand.
The memory of the strike cut through him like a razor blade. He sat up and nearly passed out. The Templar Knight had severed the hand at the wrist. He had no way of knowing how long he had been unconscious but the stump still oozed blood. The hand felt as though it were there, being stung by hundreds of fiery bees.
Weakness washed over him. He fought it. He knew if he did not get medical attention for his arm soon, he would bleed to death or die slowly from an infection.
Wrapping his arm in his shirt, Bran closed his eyes to think.
Richard had been right.
Bran should not have trusted Merle.
The realization maddened him. As he fought the darkness threatening to overwhelm him, he took a deep, steadying breath. The Cailleach and her Templar Knights had caught Richard and Bran with magic. Somehow the warriors, with the bag contents they had carried on their backs, had been invincible against the power of the two knights. Bran had been arrogant to believe he could handle Arondight and anything Annwn sent at him.
Richard had warned him.
And Bran had paid a steep price.
He wondered suddenly what had become of Richard and what would become of him if he didn’t try to escape.
Not wanting to wait and find out, Bran tried calling Arondight.
Nothing happened.
He reached across the space he had become familiar with, seeking the sword and its power. Nothing again. Fear filled his soul. Arondight had come so easily before. He probed the void that connected him to the magic, knowing something must have been done to him. He encountered it immediately. It was as if there was a wedge between him and the sword, a thick iron plate preventing him from drawing Arondight. He fought it, forcing what will he had left to break through or get around it, to call the power and escape.