Chapter 47. Berserker

rigit panted in the darkness of her little cell. Her fruitless attempts to open the heavy door by repeatedly throwing herself against it had failed. Her only comfort was that Pendaran’s screaming had stopped. It had been the worst hour of her life listening to him and not knowing what was being done to him and being utterly helpless to stop it. In the silence that now descended upon her black stony prison she shivered and wept.

 Trembling with cold and weariness, she called upon the energies of her healing signet. How odd that it had not been removed from her hand. Somehow she doubted it was a mere oversight since every trace of armor had been stripped from her body. As for her weapons, she had little doubt they had been tossed over the side of the ship during their wretched journey. It seemed she had spent an eternity locked in the hold puking her miserable guts out for she did not travel well at sea. And now she had traded one tiny dank prison for another. At least this one wasn’t rocking and pitching.

She had only seen Pendaran once since their capture. It had been shortly after Ashekoroth had effortlessly flung her off the ship in chains and left her curled on the pier. Drakkonus had stepped off of the gangplank with her friend slung over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. Face down, Pen’s condition was unreadable. His wrists were still bound against the small of his back but he was motionless, suspended in a deep sleep.

He was alive at least. Or had been while he was screaming. She comforted herself by deciding that he had been crying out in defiance, refusing the wishes of their vile captor.  But clearly he had also been in unbelievable pain.  She swallowed, blinking the tears from her eyes as she thought of all that he had suffered over the course of the last few weeks.  It was not fair.

She kept thinking back on the unknown man that had tried to escape from Ashekoroth only to be tranformed into a horrible demon dog. Merciful Dwayna, she and Pen were in up to their scalps in the worst vat of yak dung she had seen in a very long time. She had failed him again, first by being a drunken fool and attacking instead of withdrawing to get help, and now by being a captive that could be used against him. Ashekoroth wanted him broken, that was the only reason to torment someone like that. And she knew Pen. He would cave in if a friend were harmed on his behalf. He valued his own safety so little and it infuriated her.

“Damn you, Pen!” she shouted, hoping he could hear her, “You fight him. Don’t give him anything and don’t you dare try to save me!”

She flung herself against the door a few more times to emphasize her words. It did not budge, but the light that peered through the crack beneath it flickered as someone or something passed in front of it.

“I’ll kill you!” she shouted, resuming her fruitless attack, “You won’t use me against him! I’ll snap your ruddy neck in two!”

“You will do my bidding,” said the hideous voice into her mind. She shuddered away from the door feeling violated and vulnerable, “Be silent, my prize.”

“I’m not your prize you miserable piece of yak s***! Get out of my head and face me.”

“You belong to Ashekoroth now.”

“I belong to myself, you filthy beast,” she roared, emphasizing her rage with a loud crash against the door. Damn him to Grenth’s darkest hell. She’d rip his eyes out and force them down his throat. She’d shred his nether regions and feed them to his miserable dogs.

“I hunger,” the man said into her mind, cold and potent, “and now you will learn to fear.”

“Fear me!” she howled, cursing ferociously as she slammed against the door. Then, to her shock and dismay she was thrown against the opposite wall when the door was thrust open. Winded, she slid to the floor, gasping and stunned as Ashekoroth’s grim black form filled the narrow opening.

Brigit choked as the stench of rotting corpses and low tide filled the little chamber. Her jaws loosened, threatening to spew the contents of her empty stomach as she scrabbled madly to regain her feet. The thing that gazed down at her now was not the man who had poisoned her with his sweet perfume and rendered her helpless in the square. She trembled as she gazed into the face of a pale cadaver, a putrescent imitation of a living man that retained only the cold murderousness of Ashekoroth in its stance and clouded gaze. Opening her mouth to scream, she was silenced as its powerful grasp locked over her throat and drew her to her toes, pinning her to the damp wall.

“You will feed me now, and then you will obey.”

Retching and gagging, she clasped his cold clammy wrist in a futile attempt to dislodge it.  Brigit refused to panic even as her world became splotched with color and shadow and her head sang as she was deprived of breath.  It was dishonorable, but like all things dishonorable, uncommonly effective.  She pounded him with several sharp jabs of her knee to the groin, gratified to feel the crush of bone and flesh.  Oddly, it had no effect whatsoever.

Brigit panicked now as she fought to breathe, her throat aching as she writhed and fought a losing battle.  He was too strong even against her blind rage and she faltered, trembling and limp in his grasp as his hideous face drew closer.

“No!” she pleaded silently.

And then to her shock and horror, Ashekoroth fell against her and collapsed amid a shower of broken green glass and a spray of water.  On the verge of fainting, she could only watch as Ashekoroth hissed and sputtered, melting away into a reeking puddle.  She slid down the wall gasping for breath as a stranger stood over her clutching two more wine bottles by their necks as if they were juggler’s batons. 

“Come!” he said sharply, grasping her arm and tugging on her.

Her neck ached, bruised where the villain had crushed her.  She gazed up at her savior with his porcelain face and flaxen hair.  He was the most beautiful man she had seen, more so given her brush with death.  Maybe she was having one of Lemony’s infamous dreams. 

“Are you an angel?” she rasped.

“If you knew me, you wouldn’t ask that,” he said darkly but a smile teased the corners of his grimly set mouth, “Get up, now.  He isn’t dead.  He’ll be back and we need to be gone from here.”

“But you killed him,” she croaked.

“It’s hard to kill what isn’t alive.  Now come before he returns to finish what he started.”

Brigit staggered to her feet and invoked the power of the healing signet, signing in relief as it suffused her with healing energies.  Growing frustrated, the man tugged at her again and she stumbled after him.  Once they were in the stony corridor outside her cell she could see that his once fine clothes were in tatters, damp and crusted with dirt.  There was a large cut in his burgundy jacket where something had snagged him and ripped a jagged scar along his back and arm. 

“Thank you,” she said awkwardly as he scanned the passage ahead of them, “I’m Brigit.”

“Armand,” he muttered, cringing away from her touch as she tried to get a closer look at the wound.  He was so pale and fragile looking in the torch light, his lovely eyes shadowed with exhaustion.  She wondered how long he had lain in hiding in Ashekoroth’s lair and where he had come from.  Brigit opened her mouth to speak but he held up a finger and shook his head. 

Yielding, Brigit relented.  There was little else to do but follow.  It certainly beat the alternative.