The jail smelled horribly- Mi'ishaen's face wrinkled in disgust as soon as we entered and were handed off to the three "inner cell" guards. I fared a little more poorly, my body nearly constantly attempting to force what I'd eaten the day before out of me. The inmates that were in the upper cells seemed to be minor offenders- young, skittish, worried looking. But the deeper that we descended into the cells, the older, angrier and harder each criminal looked. Mi'ishaen planted a hoof against the bars of one curious male, crushing his grime-crusted, sausage-thick fingers without remorse. My stomach twisted violently at the sight of his bloody, smashed hand, but by that time, the soldiers didn't even bother to grab a bucket for me.
Mi'ishaen and I were taken to the cells across from the "questioning room" and thrown into separate cells, side by side, with no other prisoners on the level with us. Niku was dragged, barking and snapping, around the far side of Mi'ishaen's cell and attached to a chain that was probably supposed to fasten someone's manacles to the wall. Angry, he tried to follow the guards to harm them, but quickly ran to the end of the chain, choking himself instead.
The guards kicked and laughed at him. Two of them turned to walk back up the carved ramp toward the upper levels of the jail, but one of them stayed behind, sitting at a rickety wooden table to play five finger catch with a dull knife. Mi'ishaen spat at him, heaping curses on him under her breath in her native language. To no real effect, however- he sat contentedly, slamming his knife into the wood table around his fingers- and only catching a finger once or twice. I leaned against the cold wall and counted in time with his rhythm, realizing after a while that it was what was saving him from losing fingers. I wondered what he would do if he actually had to play against a live opponent, instead of sitting alone, able to go at whatever pace he chose.
"Knew I'd see you again, you know," he offered after he'd successfully completed the round of his left hand twice. "Your type comes back."
"So you must see your mother often," Mi'ishaen spat bitterly.
"You could take up a trade," the guard continued, completely ignoring the insult. "Weren't half bad sharpening weapons, I'm told on good authority. You learn to smith in the Hells?"
"You learn to play five finger catch with your little sister? She must make twice her allowance money playing with you, you bloodmop."
"Hey!" the guard shot, pausing his game for a moment. "You're no lady, but save this one's ears, yeah? Mouth like that ought to be stuck in a trough."
"I'm not the one who started this lovely little chat," Mi'ishaen crabbed. "I didn't ask for your delicate company. You don't like what I say, don't talk to me."
So the guard fell silent. Other than the constant bang-bang-bang-bang-BANG-bang-bang-bang of his knife on the long-suffering table, his cursing when he caught a finger and Mi'ishaen's cursing when he tried to strike up conversation, there were no sounds. Niku, who had been so furious before, fell oddly silent.
I could only tell that it had gotten late by the fact that a long while after we arrived, he was brought food and ale by a slender Human female. He ate his fill, demanded more ale twice, settled his stomach loudly, then finally fell into a overfilled stupor.
It seemed Mi'ishaen expected all of this.
"He's dead to the world," she whispered after he began to snore. "Aleksei would make a fool of him in any tavern."
"Aleksei made a fool of a Dwarf in his own tavern," I responded with a smile.
"I can get us out of here," Mi'ishaen offered brightly. "We can find some place where the guard line is thin and slip through to whatever land is north for a while."
"They can't hurt me," I replied, somehow knowing that this was what she was most concerned about. "Neither of us had time to do anything wrong; actually getting out would give them something to charge us with."
"Well, you're not sleeping on this floor," Mi'ishaen decided. With that, I heard the bars in her cell clatter, a tear of fabric, then a clacking report that meant her hooves had hit the ground. The guard stirred with a snort, but a flash of white flew over to him- it took me a few more moments to realize that Mi'ishaen had quickly moved to him and hit him in the head to put him back to sleep.
"He'll remember that," I warned weakly.
"He won't; he's drunk. He's just lending me his keys-"
"We shouldn't break out-"
Mi'ishaen turned from the guard, keys in hand, and put a finger to her lips. "Quiet. I'm not breaking out, I'm breaking in."
Niku, perhaps understanding what she was doing, stood and began whining with occasional yips that threatened to become real barks. Mi'ishaen opened her own cell and dragged out a terrible looking skin that vaguely resembled the one that'd been thrown over some straw in my cell, shushing Niku to no avail as she opened my cell bars. When she let herself in, dragging the skin behind her, Niku at last let go of one full voiced bark that reported sharply up the hallway.
"Oh, for- hang on," Mi'ishaen sighed with exasperation. I could see nothing, but heard the rattle of keys and chains that meant that she was setting Niku free. Perhaps she expected him to run off down the hallway toward the outside, but instead, he tore around the far cell's corner, pushed his snout into my now-open cell door and leaped on me, burying me in affectionate dog-kisses. "He loves you," Mi'ishaen said offhandedly as she got inside my cell, reached around with the keys to lock it, then put them on the floor and pushed them back toward the guard. "After having known you for a day. Quite an effect you have on males of all races and types. A little inconvenient, but I can't say I blame them."
I sat up with some difficulty, having to push Niku off me, but managed to get a hand onto the small of Mi'ishaen's back. She turned, sat down on the floor and managed to pull me and Niku into her lap. Niku was well pleased with this arrangement, and refused to move from my lap, effectively pinning me into Mi'ishaen's lap.
"Are you comfortable?" I asked breathlessly, since Niku's panting pushed hard against me. "You didn't pull that fur in here just to be stuck on the bars-"
"It's about as comfortable as I was the first time I was here," Mi'ishaen smirked, laying her arms over my shoulders. "I'd rather be stuck with you than the sot. Rest well."
It was wasted hope, unfortunately.
I dreamed of walking alone on an endless beach, a pitch black sea pulling its tide as far away from me as it could. Far above me, the gargantuan carved wrought metal arches of Sunderhope crowned blackened, blasted peaks that pierced a violet sky. I was weighed down with chains everywhere- in my hair, on my arms, wrapping around my body and dragging behind me in the sand. It seemed they not only were around me, but also sprung from me, pushing out of my flesh at strange angles like exposed broken bones, twisting this way and that. I felt tired- a weariness that came from hauling all the weight- and completely lost. The true Sunderhope of my childhood was nowhere near any water of any kind; the three wells that existed in the commune had been summoned by magic many years before I'd been even thought of. This knowledge, which bled through from my waking mind to my dream's awareness, did not bring fear upon me, but instead a sense of hopelessness. Worse, no matter how far I walked, the sights around me did not change; it seemed as though I may as well have been standing still. Yet, in the distance before me, a voice encouraged me to continue. At times, it seemed like Aric's worn and reedy voice, at others, Svaentok's rolling low tones- once or twice, it took on Vhalan's troubled tenor. But at all times, it repeated the same thing-
"I have seen you, and I await you."
I woke up with a jump when I felt a tug- Mi'ishaen had been yanked up, and Niku instantly jumped, barking. I rolled over just in time to see Mi'ishaen smack the right side of the cell, face first. She thumped down to the floor with a pained grunt, but when the guard- the same one she'd hit the night before- came forward to strike her again, she spun around and planted a hoof into his groin. I hurtled myself forward immediately, both to keep any more harm from coming to her, and to keep her from striking anyone else.
"Enough- all o' ye, no better than fishwives and their menfolk!" cried a now-familiar voice. Sure enough, the red-haired dragon guard returned and pressed himself between us and two other town guards. "Ye bloody horses' arses makes me job a muckle hell; I stay not in the spire, like I ought, nor on the docks, where I were put, but I must needs be down in the belly of the blasted place, watching ye whilst ye watch the prisoners. Makes a body wonder what ye does with them what lives here, then, when no one's about."
"Push off, MacSairlen, she hit me first," the first guard spat, his filthy face glowing with anger. "She's got no respect for anyone."
"By the beard, an' I'd no' stayed- ha' ye then respect, eh? To bash a body into the wall? 'Tis a blow like that killed before, innit? Or did that wee problem, what I hears ye're still on watch for, slide clear of yer minds?" Karth roared, backing all three town guards up to the far wall with the force of his anger alone. Beyond me, Niku barked his agreement, but when I turned to look at him, he laid down quietly. "Hawd ye on to this lass, and I'll take this lot into me own custody, seeing as that what ye brings her down here for were a numptie charge to begin with- 'aberration' me gram's knickers. Mind ye handles that one proper, or I'll ha' ye banned from service, the lot of ye- Council of Merchants and their bloody appointments be damned."
"Enough, that'll be quite enough," a fourth guard volleyed, pulling off his gleaming helmet as he trotted down the walkway that came from the higher levels of the prison. His face was long, lean and bitterly experienced. Because his skin was high toned and his jaw strong, only the bold, thickly-drawn semi-circular tribal tattoo around his left eye betrayed his Orc heritage. "Took me long enough to get to this mess, but I'm here now. The three of you do get out- let me hear just one more poor report from MacSairlen, of all people, and I'll beat you back to the merchant's guild myself without even glancing at your records." The three guards shuffled off slowly, but without any back talk. After watching them leave, the half-Orc turned his attentions back to Mi'ishaen, who had rolled away from me and laid with her hands over her face, and to me. "Shame we have to keep meeting this way, Karth- wish I could get you out from under the dragon. Who have we?"
"Mi'ishaen," Karth sighed, trying to help Mi'ishaen up, only to be swatted away. "New bone rattler's cousin, town tales says. Last time she were here, that's where thee gets thy Dragonborn from."
The guard chuckled to himself, crossing his strong arms over his chest. "Ah, Voyonov. Good, frank, incredibly strong. Haven't gotten around to battle-testing him myself yet, but saw some good work out of him in the yard- even with that awkward weapon. And this?"
"Silverwitch or crone or hag, or some such stuff, says Ulwen and his lot by the docks," Karth shrugged. "Don't sound right to me, but from what noises they made, thou'll't choke thyself to death with the Drowtalk. Dog's name escapes me, but from the ink on him, he's the battle hound of the gang leader what were just hung a day gone, missing his master and fresh found another."
"Niku," I interjected, to everyone's surprise. Niku responded positively, however, turning around in a few circles and sitting back so that his wagging stump of a tail was high in the air. Instantly afraid of the attention I'd drawn to myself, my gaze and tone lowered as if by enchantment. "His- name is- Niku."
"I see- I suppose I should introduce myself. I am Nithraz, High Captain of the Guard. Recent promotion, you understand, as the male for whom I used to be Lord Captain has died rather suddenly," the guard stated seriously, turning and pulling the chair from the table behind him to sit down. "Karth, do me a solid and take Mi'ishaen up a level. I hear she's owed an apology by Ygroff, whose hand I told the court healer to leave just as it was. Males want to know what chases females off toward abomination, I say there's the start of it."
"We're due a talk about that, mind thee well," Karth replied quietly. " 'Tis little business of ours who takes what into their rooms when comes the night."
"Perhaps aberration is dandy in Cormyr," Nithraz replied, looking up at Karth, who'd finally convinced Mi'ishaen to stand up. "But in Urmlaspyr, we don't tolerate it. No good for the children. Now go on, and have the healer take a look at that eye- do you want shackles for her?"
"Nay, 'tis nae danger of her wandrin'off," Karth replied, having already turned his back both on Mi'ishaen and Nithraz. "She's a tricky sort, I ken. Lies like she breathes. But thee sits with what she puts store by, so says Voyonov. From the looks o' this morning, he says right. Keep the lass well, is all." Having gotten most of the way up the walk way toward the next level, the Cormyran soldier turned around and looked expectantly at Mi'ishaen, who was still checking the rest of her body for damage. "C'mon, then, won't ye?"
Mi'ishaen looked back at me, so I got up and kissed a growing bruise on her arm as gently as I could. "Let calm fill you." Although the traditional calming words of the tiarnaí daor were all I could think of to say, I was still somehow surprised that some swift reprimand did not follow my daring to use the masters's speech. Oddly enough, the sayings of docility had always truly comforted me, and I half-hoped they would do the same for her, no matter the murky past they had sprung from. She put the bruised arm around me for a few moments, then let me go and turned to follow Karth with a completely silent, uncharacteristic compliance. When her form disappeared under the walk way's stone arches, I sat down on my knees and feet, awaiting whatever words would come from Nithraz. Niku, who had been patiently lying down near the back of the cell, got up and put his heavy head and one paw in my lap.
"You are the first prisoner to speak of calm down here since a set of three Shadow Child witch women," Nithraz noted, leaning back in the chair with a contemplative look on his face. "I was a tot then- this was years ago. Masters of magic. Could twist the mind in your skull until it was mush. Yet they were brought down here, to the very bottom cells, and they spoke of nothing but calm. My father was amazed at them, spoke sadly of them, when they were burned."
"Why were they burned, master?" I asked, though I kept my eyes lowered.
"Master? Heh, no, no thanks. They were burned for unauthorized witchcraft, sweetheart. Around here, you can only practice magic if you're registered with a recognized coven. Doesn't matter who you worship or what you do, really. Even Shar's got a temple, unfortunately. The Council just has to have documentation. They love their paperwork, and it's our job- well, my job, really- to get it to them. So tell me, where do you practice?"
"I do not practice," I began softly. "But I have been asking many questions of the master Aric, in his temple to the Raven Queen close to the shore."
"Ah," Nithraz reflected warmly. "Loved for his wisdom, feared for his knowledge. You picked well- bone mages are dangerous, so the Council won't question his 'enlightenment' long enough to figure out whether you're really one of his acolytes or not. Now, are you a pickpocket?"
"Yes," I replied simply.
Nithraz's face changed slightly, as though he were surprised to hear this. I was not sure why he should be, as I was certain that he would not have asked the question if he had not been made aware of what I'd done. "And did you help to kill those rat thieves on the docks?"
"Yes, I did."
"Have you ever been a slave?"
I paused, now really wondering why he should ask such a question. Figuring after a few moments that he was perhaps testing my honesty, I gave a proper answer. "Yes."
Nithraz suddenly got up, coming inside the cell and squatting down before me, which caused his sword to scrape at the ground. Niku got up and eyed him suspiciously, so I put my right hand on his neck to calm him and convince him to sit down.
"Look up," Nithraz commanded. When I did so, his dark brown eyes instantly fixed upon my own. "Tell me, are you enthralled? Fight it, just for a moment. Any sign will do."
"No, my lord," I said, the reply coming so quietly that it was just a breath away from being a whisper.
"But you consort with that Tiefling- you're saying she's not controlling you in any way?"
"She controls me, but without force, for she abhors slavery," I found myself saying. "I would obey any command without question, and would, as my gift to her, even obey unspoken directives."
"What you describe is aberration- do you know what that means, girl?" Nithraz asked with a note of urgency. "It's clear that she is dominating-"
"No, my lord, not so," I interrupted, trying to make myself more insistent. "She would not accept me as a slave. She hates slavery of all kinds. I don't follow her because she dominates me- I am- free."
"Then you are aberrant," Nithraz sighed, somehow wounded by this. "Consorting with this Tiefling as you have done in public, naked, in full view of children- I'm afraid you'll have to be scourged, at least."
"If this is what must be done, then let it be done," I nodded, allowing my gaze to settle more comfortably on the floor.
"You- are- oddly accepting of this entire situation," Nithraz noted, crossing his arms. "You do realize how this sounds very like domination, enchantment- as though you're not in control of your own mind?"
"I understand that you wish to defend your children," I replied. "I saw no one on the shoreline, but I did not look closely. I did not wish to harm a child, but if I have done so, I must be harmed as well, for that is the way of things."
"And taking things that belong to others is harmful as well, did you know that?" Nithraz said, almost with a chuckle in his voice.
"I did not think that they would feel it gone," I shrugged. "Yet, if they were hurt by my actions, then I must also be hurt."
"So if this is the 'way of things,' why is the true High Captain dead? How do you explain that, sweetheart?" Nithraz asked mournfully. I looked up at him, and reached out a hand to him slowly.
"I do not know what he did in his life. But I can tell you what he was doing right before he was killed."
Nithraz looked at me, braced himself, and nodded sharply.
"He spent his last moments threatening Mi'ishaen when he who you call Voyonov had directly asked him not to. He had insulted both of them, was separating them with his sword, and was about to harm Mi'ishaen. Bahlzair took offense and killed him, for he is jealous of his kills, and has marked Mi'ishaen and Voyonov for himself."
"Sounds to me like your friend Bahlzair is dangerously insane." Nithraz got up and turned his back on me, and I put my hand back on my lap, where Niku looked over and licked at it. "Why are you telling me this?"
"Why should I not be honest with you, my lord?" I asked, completely confused. "You are asking me these things for the good of the people you serve, so that they may be properly defended from all things."
"So if I asked you about all the things that Mi'ishaen and Bahlzair, who seem to be the two nuts in your fruit cake, like to do for fun, you would tell me?" Nithraz snorted derisively.
"Yes," I nodded slowly. "There is no reason to do otherwise."
Nithraz sat back down in the chair by the table and looked at the knife marks on the surface, tracing a few of them with a distracted finger. "It's intriguing how you say that. 'There is no reason to do otherwise.' There is never a good reason to lie."
"Not so, my lord," I breathed. "I have lied with good reason many times."
"If you have a master plan behind all of this, you're doing a miraculous job of hiding it," Nithraz sighed. "Lying is wrong."
"Not so," I replied, finding that I wanted to look up at him. In the brief silence that followed, I allowed myself to look at his distant, thoughtful face. "If the truth will harm someone, then the truth becomes wrong."
"Is that your only moral compass, then? What hurts and what does not hurt? Can you justify all your actions, both good and evil, by saying, 'I didn't mean to hurt anyone?' "
I shook my head, and Nithraz snapped his attention from his thoughts to my face. "No, I cannot. Sometimes I do mean very much to harm someone. Purposefully hurting someone, either by what is done or by what is not done, is evil."
"So you have done evil, then, by your own standards?" Nithraz sighed, glancing at his helmet, which sat on the floor beyond my cell.
It was my turn to think, this time. Niku picked up his head for a few moments, and when I looked down at him, I thought of the males from whom I'd defended myself, and the one unfortunate male who did not escape Vhalan. I had watched him become Vhalan's host, and had not done anything about it.
"Yes."
"I see why I was called in on this, but I don't believe I'll be able to charge you with anything at all in public court," Nithraz announced at last, getting up and walking over to reach down for his helmet. "I can't possibly explain abomination to you if I have to first define what simple good and evil are. I'll arrange to have you released into Aric's custody, and we'll see what he can do to keep you from consorting naked with other females."
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