Swords & Dark Magic - By Jonathan Strahan Page 0,100

several slices at the rope to cut it through. As the last strands strain and part, she steps back quickly. He falls into the large bowl and tips it over, spilling the disgusting mess across the stone floor. Jan Ray wrinkles her nose in revulsion.

“Look at you,” she says. “The big revolutionary, the idealist, the heathen.”

“I’m no heathen,” he says. He manages to sit up, though his hands are still tied, and she can see that he’s woozy. She wonders how long Trivner has had him hanging upside down. His face is red beneath the streaks of muck. There’s blood all over his body, dried and still running. He appears unabashed at his nakedness, and Jan Ray glances away uncomfortably. From the corner of her eye she sees him shifting one leg aside.

“I’ll have Scrivner cut it off,” she says. “He’s done it to others, many times.”

Bamore chuckles and brings his knees up to rest his chin. He groans, but looks almost contemplative as he stares past her into the shadows.

“Give yourself to Hanharan,” she says. “It’ll make everything easier on you.”

“This is where we have a problem,” he says. He spits blood, closes his eyes, breathing heavily. He’s almost passing out, she thinks. We’ve almost broken him, and—

But he is not broken. Far from it. And as he starts talking, Jan Ray realizes that he has spent these last three days growing stronger.

“And the problem is need. You want me to give myself to Hanharan, because that will satisfy this curious need you Marcellans have to gather everyone to your flock. You need to hear acceptance from my mouth, because the idea that I don’t require Hanharan to make my life worthwhile scares you.”

“No,” Jan Ray says.

“It terrifies you. And I don’t need any of that at all.”

“If it means so little to you, accept Him and have done with it.”

“And then you win.”

“We win anyway. Tomorrow we take you to Gaol Ten. Three days later you go on trial for heresy, for which you will be sentenced to death. You’ll be taken to the Wall, nails hammered into your wrists and ankles. We’ll pierce you with thirteen mepple shoots to attract the lizards, and leave you to die. And after you die you rot, in sight of anyone who cares to look. I’ve heard of people staying up there for thirty days before they decay enough to rip free of the nails and fall.”

“I’ll be dead. It doesn’t matter.”

“If you accept Him, I can arrange for the executioner to stick you with a poisoned knife. You’ll be dead before he descends the ladder.”

“Where’s the fun in that?” He grins at her. It is a grotesque expression, his startling white teeth glaring from a mask of blood and excrement.

Jan Ray turns and walks to the far end of the chamber. Trivner has his tools of torture set out here, an array of metal, stone, leather, paper, wood, bone, and jars containing living creatures, that is in itself enough to give anyone nightmares for life. The tools are exquisitely clean, the insects well-kept, and the thought of someone tending lovingly to such things is horrific. She wonders if Trivner has a wife and children, and hopes not.

“So why you?” she asks, picking up a long, pointed bone. It’s hollow, and dozens of small holes give it barbs.

“Why me what?”

“Why have the Wreckers become organized under you?”

“Have they?” he asks, and for the first time she hears doubt. She remains facing away from him, putting down the hollowed bone in favor of a clawed glove. Each flapping finger is tipped with a razor-sharp hook. She can barely imagine the damage this would do to a human body.

She slips her hand inside and grimaces at the slick, oiled feel.

“Of course they have. And they’re little more than gangsters calling themselves terrorists. The name they choose for themselves says it all. They want anarchy, but for their own ends. They spout secularism, but only if it means they line their pockets, get all the slash they want. They claim to shun false gods—”

“All gods are false,” Bamore says, “and the Wreckers—”

“No!” Jan Ray shouts. She turns and advances on the bloodied man, and as she swings her gloved hand she sees something in his eyes that confuses her. The hooks bite in and she uses her weight to tear them through his skin. He screams—

He screams but he’s laughing at me.

—and the hooks open him across the chest. Blood flows. Dal Bamore falls