Page 100 of A Kingdom of Lies
Jesibel startled from her slumber. She’d fallen asleep a long while ago, but I didn’t have the heart to wake her. She gave me a look, one brimming with concern. We’d yet to discuss the matter of what occurred to the fey when they were collected for their payment of blood. I hadn’t asked because it wouldn’t happen to me. I was here for an audience with the Hand, confirmed by the Twins themselves. He would not require my blood. At least that was the lie I told myself over and over.
“Whatever you do, don’t fight back.” Jesi took my hand and squeezed. She was cold to the touch, a whisper of the Court she would have once lived among. There was so much I didn’t know about her but in the short time I’d spent with her, what I had gleaned was that I could trust her. She oozed conviction which made me warm up to her with ease. “The process of bloodletting is uncomfortable, but not utterly painful. It will be over before you know it.”
I forced a smile, hoping to keep my thoughts from creasing my expression. I hadn’t the heart to admit aloud that I wasn’t planning on returning here – not yet. I would speak with the Hand, petition for my release and the safety of Duncan. Then I would come, with support behind me, and free Jesi and all the fey around me.
At what price?
“Thank you for everything, Jesibel.”
“Sounds an awful lot like a goodbye,” she replied, winking with tired eyes. “Go quickly and good luck. Iwillsee you soon.”
Luck. I needed more than that.
Jesi released me, crossing her arms before her, and watched me leave as though she was my guardian on my first day of freedom. Her entire being oozed with apprehension. As I left her, I buried a promise into my soul. If I was to succeed, I’d do everything to release the fey kept captive here. Jesibel, Elinor. All of them.
I walked towards the gates, chin raised high. The Kingsmen finally took keen notice of me from where they waited beyond the bars. The Twins watched too, not once taking their attention off me, their gaze prickling my skin. I looked up at them, holding their stare in competition.
It was a rehearsed process, I understood that as the imprisoned fey watched me as I passed, the ones closest to the exit of the prison rushed to put distance between it and them. I understood why when the gate screeched open, and the guards rushed in with unsheathed and sharp blades.
“Steady and slow,” the Kingsmen warned, urging me into a circle of them. Only when I had passed back out of the prison’s gate, and it closed securely behind us, were the swords put away.
It was all happening so quickly. Rough, gloved hands grasped my arms and moved me around as though I couldn’t do it for myself. I caught the flash of the metal leash that’d been removed from me upon my arrival, listening to the snap of the clasp as they promptly connected it back to the collar at my throat.
“I will not resist you,” I sneered, skin aching from their pinching and tugging. “There is no need to be–”
A cloth was held above my mouth and nose, silencing my appeal. The scent that followed stung at my nose, itching at my eyes. I tried to reach up and pull the hand away, but my arms didn’t seem to move. My mind grew heavy. Blinking, my vision doubled. The sounds around me seemed to stretch out as though I was disappearing further and further away from them. But in truth, I’d not moved an inch. Sluggishly, my eyes looked up towards the two figures of the Twins who still watched from their perch. Darkness crept in the corners of my vision. Still, they stood and watched.
The last thing I remembered were hands that caught me as my body gave up.
Then there was nothing but emptiness.
CHAPTER 35
I came out of the darkness slowly. It was a sluggish, painful dragging of my consciousness as it fought back from the brink. My hearing was the first of my senses that returned to me. I recognised the sound of dripping, gentle splatters as though a bowl caught droplets of slow-falling rain. Thedrip, drip, drip, quickly became torturous as it was without rhythm or pacing; even if there were other sounds, it was impossible to know as I fixated on the dripping.
Soon enough I could smell again. I half expected the stinging scent that’d coated the cloth to still cling within my nose, but it was the sharp tang of copper that greeted me. Pungent and undeniable, I wanted to hold my breath to rid myself of the disgusting smell that soon became a taste at the back of my mouth as that sense returned.
Then I could see again. Desperation had me crying out as I opened my eyes. That cry soon spluttered as the shock of light had me gasping and clamping my eyes shut again for relief from the brightness.
“Do not worry, Robin Icethorn, it will be over soon.” The person who spoke was close enough that they only needed to whisper for me to hear.
My body stiffened in response. I could feel that I sat in a chair with armrests that held my arms up at my sides at an odd angle. Only when I tried to pull away did I realise I couldn’t move – not because my body refused, but thanks to the strappings that kept my arms and my legs pinned in place.
I squinted, straining against the light to see who it was that spoke. Before me sat a man – a fey; the twin points of his ears revealed as much. A helmet of silver hair, wild and untamed, haloed his aged face. A messy beard covered his jaw. His eyes were hooded by heavy loose skin that did well to hide their dull green. A film of smoke seemed to cover them, catching the orange-flame light strangely. He too was sitting on a chair, an arm’s length away.
“Struggling will not set you free,” he said, voice gruff and expression bordering on annoyance. “It is best you keep yourself calm. Every drop spilled beyond the container is classed as a waste which will only prolong the letting of your blood. Let the creatures fill their bellies, and then it will be over.”
Creatures?
I looked down to my forearm, mouth dry and still filled with the taste of copper. Dark leeches clung to my skin, plump bodies wriggling as they sucked at my blood. Droplets trickled down my arm, falling over my fingers like water over rocks, where it splashed onto the ground beneath me. The sound torturous to my ear. There were a few other wounds upon my arm, small but angry. No doubt more leeches had been drinking their fill, and it wasn’t long until I found them, writhing in a ceramic bowl next to my boots.
Disgust rolled like an incoming storm within me.
“Are they… so desperate they must do this whilst I am incoherent?” I said through gritted teeth. “Is this how it always happens?”
The fey man looked down, shirt rolled up to his elbow to reveal the wounds that we shared; his arm was covered in the brown splotches that usually peppered an older person’s skin. Like me, fat leeches slithered against his skin, full to bursting. If someone didn’t come in and remove them soon, they would pop. “Depends on the person. Bloodletting can be a discomforting process. The more one does it, the less it is bothersome. But the little buggers love it. For the leeches, it’s a grand feast.”
Turning as much as the chair and my restraints allowed, I made sense of the large room we were kept within. A towering ceiling, walls carved from a white stone with veins of darker stone throughout, lit mainly by the burning fire that leaked warmth and the countless pillar candles that stood erect on metal holders along each of the four walls.
