Alisiyad Chapter 26 ~ The Ricallyn (Part 2)

At the bottom they came to a large circular room.  The line of light circled the walls, but it was only dim.  Square grates patterned the floor.  The leader talked to some of the guards for a moment or two, then one bent to unlock a grate and lift it up.  The man waved to the two holding Russ, and they walked him to the edge.  He looked down, fear expecting to see a black abyss or pit with monsters waiting for him.  But it was just an empty pit with straw on the bottom.

The leader withdrew his sword as the two men let go of Russ’s arm and removed his chains.  One of the guards unraveled a rope ladder into the pit, and the leader pointed at Russ with his sword, then down at the ladder.  He spoke in a commanding voice.

“Why am I a prisoner?” Russ stalled, not wanting to be in a cell again.  “I didn’t do anything.  I’m just—”

The leader impatiently repeated his motions and words, and the other men grabbed his arms again, threateningly, as if they would toss him down headfirst if he didn’t climb.  Russ gave up trying to converse with them, saying, “Alright, alright,” in as cooperative a tone as he could manage.  He sat down on the edge and swung himself onto the ladder, feeling stiff in his right arm as he tried to grip the rope rungs.  He climbed slowly down into the dark.  There were no strips of light on the walls down there.

Once his feet touched the floor they pulled the rope up and slammed the grate back down.  He stood helplessly, looking up as the chains were rattled back in place.  Then he sighed, looking down to inspect his new “home” in the dim light.

It was round, larger than the size of the square opening at the top.  The floor must be like a honeycomb of pits, he thought.  He wondered how many pits there were and who else was inside them.  He had his pit all to himself; little comfort there.

It was bare except for the thin layer of straw.  He sniffed suspiciously, but it didn’t smell bad.  He wondered where prisoners relieved themselves.  Not that he had to go; he hadn’t eaten anything to speak of in so long that he was pretty empty.  But he figured the guards wouldn’t like having to be above a bunch of cesspits.  Maybe prisoners were let out periodically to do their business or wash up or something . . . that was an optimistic thought.  He shook his head.  Maybe the guards didn’t care about the smell . . . .  Or prisoners just weren’t fed, and were taken out before their corpses started to stink of decay . . . .

He sat down cross-legged below the grate and waited.  He reflected that the last time he’d been in a cell certain of death, it hadn’t turned out so bad.  But then again, he hadn’t seen Leeton mercilessly rounding up old people, women, and children and marching them off to prisons.  Strike that—  He didn’t know what awaited the other people in those buildings away from the large one.  They were a part of the same place, but who knew if the people had just been locked up inside or not . . . .  Who knew.  Maybe he was the lucky one.  But why?  Why either way?

He felt over his bandage and stretched his arm gingerly.  Then he inspected the cut on his left arm.  He’d be okay.  That at least was good.  He wished he had something else to do besides stew on his predicament.  He knew the longer he had to think about all the stupid things he’d done, and imagine what bad things might happen, the worse he’d be at managing to escape if he got the opportunity.  He would probably not even realize when he had an opportunity.  No, don’t think that.  You’ll just psych yourself out, idiot.

He decided to sleep.  He was tired enough, and at least then his negative thoughts wouldn’t be spiraling out of control.  More sleep would be good, too, he’d be less weak the more sleep he got.  So he curled up on his left side in the middle of the pit under the grate, wincing a little as his cut touched the straw.  But he tried to get comfortable, resting his head on his arm.  He couldn’t get comfortable, but he was so exhausted that he fell asleep anyway.

He dreamed the whole time, but he couldn’t remember most of them after he woke up.  He remembered the last one.  He dreamed about being inside the kennels in Varaneshe among Leeton’s dogs.  They milled around, ignoring him, but he was frozen in fear.  They brushed against his legs, jostling him.  He held his breath, thinking they didn’t know he was there.  If he moved or made a sound, they’d realize he was there and tear him to pieces.  He knew it.

He woke up with a start when he realized that there was movement near him in the pit.  At first his mind was still in the dream, and it told him one of the dogs had discovered him.  He jerked up, seeing something in front of him, and in terror he crawled backwards hastily until his back smacked up against the wall.  That snapped him out of it, and he remembered where he was.

But there was something in the pit with him.  He drew his knees up and curled into a defensive position, squinting into the shadows at the opposite side of the pit.  The light seemed even dimmer.  “Who’s there?” he finally managed.

Silence.  Then from above he heard noise, and looked up.  The guards were gathered around the grate, peering down at him.  They started talking, pointing down at him and over to the thing in the shadows.  Fear gripped him.  Had they put something dangerous into his pit while he slept, and were watching for the show?  He imagined what sorts of small but dangerous creatures could be dropped through the bars of the grate, and started to sweat.  The guards still spoke to him, in impatient and even derisive voices, motioning to him as if he was supposed to do something.  He just shook his head and pressed himself into the wall.

Finally they opened the grate, and one lowered a long pole into the pit.  Russ watched warily as it probed into the shadows.  The guard found what he was looking for and thwacked it.  Russ thought he was trying to make it angry so it would lash out and the fun would start.  It didn’t react right away, but the guards yelled at it and the insistent pole finally drove it out into the middle of the room.

The older bird-girl suddenly appeared, hissing and yelling at the guards.  She tried to grab the pole and yank it down, but the man quickly pulled it up out of her reach.  They laughed, slamming the grate down and settling back around it to watch.

Russ cringed but didn’t move.  Death by bird-girl, he thought.  He wondered if she still had her bread knife, and steeled himself to kick her away if she came hissing at him.  Instead she sat back and turned her angry spew of words on him.  Her hands were empty, and she pointed a finger at him, shaking it and yelling.  The guards laughed.  Whatever she was saying seemed very funny to them.

The girl spat at Russ and then fell silent, retreating back into the shadows.  The guards jeered at him, but he stayed where he was, making himself as small as he could.  As his eyes adjusted to the dim light again, he could see the girl across from him.  She was staring at him balefully, eyes glinting as if daring him to move.  He wasn’t about to, though he thought wistfully about beating the guards senseless with their pole.  If only.  He wondered how they’d known about his humiliation at the hands of the girl and her sister.

After a moment the guards parted, letting more light in.  He heard his name then, and looked up in surprise.

Alisiya stood looking down at him, smiling.  “My, my, Russ.  It seems as if another prophecy has come true.  You are in trouble and I am not.”

“Alisiya.”  He scrambled to his feet, fighting the impulse to growl What the fuck are you doing here?  “Get me out of here.  Please.”

She laughed.  “Why?  Because we are such good friends?”

He fell silent, stomach sinking as he realized she had made herself friends with his captors.  Maybe she had even told them to separate him from the others.  “What’s going on?” he demanded, squinting up at her angrily.

“I have given the Ricallyn a present,” she told him.  “Something they have always wanted.”

The Ricallyn . . . the Ricallyn . . . .  His mind raced, trying to remember the names he’d heard about or read about in Aysha’s book.  But he couldn’t think.  “What?  The who?  What’s gonna happen to me?”

Alisiya rested her hands on her knees casually as she spoke.  “I went to the Ricallyn and told them where they could find a Key.  They are very grateful to me, now.  In fact, they worship me.  They think that I am the Alisiya, Goddess of Air, Daughter of the Sun God, all that sort of thing.  We won’t tell them otherwise, will we?  I know that I can count on you.”

“What are they gonna do with me?”

“I am not entirely sure.  But, I would suspect that whatever it is it won’t be pleasant.  Do you remember how my mother and her family, Arlic and the rest, came from here?  Yes, well, they were all running away from the Ricallyn.”

“Just stop with the bullshit and tell me.”  He tried to hide his mounting fear behind bluster.

“Shhh.  Be patient.  I’ve learned a few things since I’ve been here.  For one, things have changed since my father came here, a hundred years ago.  Back then, the Byzaukyn ruled the city and were at war with the Osviran.  The Ricallyn were their allies.  Now, the Ricallyn rule the city, and they have been exterminating the other two, and using their Erykumyn for slaves.  Amazing, isn’t it, how time can change things?”  She smiled, enjoying the way she drew out her answer.  Russ gritted his teeth and waited, glancing warily at the girl every now and then.

“It would be a bad thing for me if they knew my mother’s family is of the Byzaukyn Erykumyn and my father is a Key.  And wouldn’t you love to tell them?  If only you spoke the language.”  She shook her head, clucking her tongue.

“Back when my father came here and so foolishly let it be known he was a Key, the Ricallyn demanded that the Byzaukyn King hand him over to them.  He and his dogs had got into a bit of a scuffle with the Ricallyn Erykumyn, who were police in the city at the time.  They felt the King owed them his life in return for their own men killed by his dogs.  Fair, really.

“Arlic and the rest didn’t like it because they thought the Ricallyn Erykumyn had attacked my father first, and so they took it upon themselves to free him.  Only, by doing that, they went against the Byzaukyn King, their master.  Unfortunately foolish of them, wasn’t it?  They had to leave Azmanval or be caught and executed for treason, so they escaped out of this world with my father.  And in thanks he killed my mother.”  She snorted.

“I didn’t kill any of the Ricallyn,” Russ snapped.

“But you’re a Key, Russ.  You are like dogseye to them.  The Ricallyn have always been fascinated with travelling beyond this world.”

Russ let out his breath.  “So they’ll want to use me to get around.  You were just trying to scare me.”

The catlike smile spread further across her face, and her eyes danced.  “The Ricallyn are particular about Keys.  Not everyone is born a Key.  Very few people that my father knew of in all his travels, at any rate.  The Ricallyn, rather than just tagging along with Keys they find, have been trying for hundreds of years to find a way to create Keys.  And to do that, they are sure they need the blood of a natural born Key.”

She let the words float down and settle around Russ.  He was silent for a moment, holding his breath and trying not to panic.  Then he said shakily, “You’re just trying to scare me again . . . .  I can, um . . . I could give them some blood.  It’s no big deal.  People donate blood all the time back home.  They can use it.”

“I said the Ricallyn are superstitious.  They have rituals.  They don’t just take a little blood in a tube and use it in potions like my father used to make.  No.  They take all of a Key’s blood, if they can get it.”

“You’re just telling me stories so you can laugh at me.”  Russ shook his head, clenching his fists and trying to keep the waver out of his voice.

“No.  Why do you think Arlic and the rest were so willing to break all ties to save my father?  It was not just the death of a man they thought innocent that moved them so.  It was the torment; the horrific, inhumane ritual killing.  Just imagine . . . what could move Arlic to so recklessly help a man he barely knew?”  She shook her head, clucking her tongue again.  “I do not envy you, Russ.  Not at all.”

“Go away.”  Russ sat down with his back to the bird-girl and stared stonily at the wall.  “Just leave me alone if you’re not gonna help me.”

“Help you?  That would be self destructive.  It was you who made the Ricallyn so pleasant toward me.  They are in my debt,” she went on, her voice carrying down mockingly.  “You make an excellent gesture of goodwill.”

When he didn’t respond she sighed, “Well, farewell until the ritual tonight.  In the meantime, I suggest you enjoy the few hours you have left.  The Ricallyn have another tradition, and you should be honored that they are recognizing you with it.”

Russ knew he was biting bait, but looked up.  “What the hell are you talking about?  Do I get to eat my own liver first?”

She tilted her head back and laughed.  “No.  When a Ricallyn man is sentenced to death, for whatever crime, he is granted one last woman before his death.  You haven’t been sentenced for a crime, but they are planning on killing you and so they thought it was only fair.”

It took a moment to sink in. “That girl is my . . . my . . . last woman?” Russ sputtered, turning red.  “I’m . . . I . . . I don’t want her,” he snapped, crossing his arms.  “Tell them to take her back.”

“They are not the most charming people, are they?  But they’re not going to take her back, she’s going to stay with you until they fetch you for the ritual.”  Alisiya shrugged, “I knew you wouldn’t be thrilled, but they were insistent and so I told them that you like skinny, feisty women.  They told me she is a newly captured Osviran Erykumyn.  Take her or leave her, but you can’t send a Ricallyn gift back, it will insult them.”

“Like I fucking care!” he exploded, jumping up again.  “Alisiya, you’ve had your gloating fun, you’ve got to let me out.”

“Why?”

“Because . . . because . . . .”

She shook her head, “I’m sorry, but I have to look out for myself.  Look on the bright side, you are not facing a future of being a sex slave for murderers and other madmen.  I hear that a lot of these women are killed by the men they’re given to.  At least your death is imminent and you won’t be wishing for it long before it happens, eh?”

“Alisiya.”

“Russ.”  She mocked his angry tone.

“Leave.  Me.  Alone.”

“I was going.  I’ve spent too long chatting with you anyway, it’s not really seemly for a goddess to be hanging about in a prison.  I will be seeing you.”  With that flippant goodbye, to match the smugness of all her words, she was gone.

Russ went back to staring at the wall.  So.  Apparently the guards had been wanting to see a different kind of show.  Bastards.  He thought about that, instead of his upcoming death.  It was a little easier.  He allowed himself to feel outrage on behalf of the female captives.  Thinking about that was better than the gibbering fear of being bled like a pig.  Cracked like an egg . . . squeezed like a lemon . . . or . . . .  He wondered if the younger bird-girl was going to be carted around to Ricallyn criminals, too.  As if they weren’t all a bunch of lowlifes.  It was disgusting.  It was all disgusting.  The people and the place and the lights in the wall and the pits and the straw . . . it was all so damn disgusting . . . .

The grate opened again, and he scrambled back to the wall, fearing they were going to try beating on him with the pole.  He looked up and saw that instead they lowered a bucket down by a rope, a hook on the end of the rope holding the handle of the bucket.  The bucket clunked against the floor and the handle dropped to the side.  The bird-girl suddenly lunged forward, grabbing for the rope and the hook, but the guard was too fast again.  Russ was almost glad.  He didn’t like the idea of the bird-girl with a hook.

The grate slammed shut again, and the girl gave him a sneer, taking the bucket and scooting back to her side of the pit.  My side, her side.  Funny how they had territories in this miserable little dungeon.

He watched her as she rooted around in the bucket. She took out bread and gnawed on it like a wolverine, making unappetizing noises as she scarfed it down.  There was dried meat and cheese too, which she shoved into her mouth so fast Russ could hardly believe she didn’t choke.  Apparently, it was his last meal.  She didn’t seem interested in sharing.  His last woman was eating his last meal.  He almost laughed.

Russ thought about trying to get some food away from her.  He didn’t want to give up and cry like a baby, not like last time, and he was already promising himself he wouldn’t go quietly when they came for him.  If he expected to fight against the Ricallyn he’d need some strength.  He was starving.  He watched as the girl took a flask out of the bucket and uncapped it, gurgling down what he assumed must be water.  He was thirsty, too.

This is misery, he thought.  But he didn’t move.  Frustrated, he told himself that if he couldn’t stand up to a girl he couldn’t fight against the guards.  But he didn’t want to go near her.  She was more frightening than the guards . . . they all looked the same to him.  She was like some wild, ferocious animal.  A crow.  A vulture . . . .  Were vultures ferocious?  They ate dead things, so maybe not.  Ugly as a vulture, loud and mean as a crow.  Skinny, feisty women, indeed.  Ha and ha.

He turned toward the wall and sulked, crossing his arms.  He wondered if Alisiya was telling the truth about the sex slave bit.  She had probably convinced the Ricallyn to send this harpy down to torture him and then made up the story to mock him.  She knew he only wanted Liseli.  Liseli.  He’d like to see what Liseli would do with this girl.  Yeah.  She wouldn’t let her eat her food and spit at her and stab her.  She’d turn the girl into a quivering little chickadee.  That’s what Liseli would do.

He shook his head again, hugging himself.  I’m sorry, Liseli.  I’ll come back.  Soon.  I’ll do better with the guards.  I’ll kick their asses.  I’ll get out of here.  I will.