†
Ravan struggled to pull willful thought from the pool of unconsciousness that he seemed to be immersed in. He was sinking; no, he was floating, and it was warm—soft. Ahhh, this was so much better.
The first sense to return was hearing. Insects, specifically bees, surrounded him. He lay still, listening to the hum. Curious; why were there bees in heaven? And, why were they buzzing so closely to him? Why weren’t they stinging him? It must be for the honey, of course. A ghost of a smile caressed his sleeping lips. How he loved the sweet, rare treat of honey.
A few seconds passed, and he drifted blissfully away. After a while, he heard the bees again. No, wait…it wasn’t bees. It was human voices from far away. Oh, yes. They were droning, but definitely voices.
For a long span, he just listened as the faraway people came and went, slowly getting closer and closer. Soon he was able to pick out the variable timbres, men and women. No…just one woman. He focused on the sound of the woman’s voice. It was familiar somehow, and comforting, but agitated. Why are they arguing in heaven? He heard the deep voices of several men.
One said, “Monsieur Duval, he’s coming awake.”
Conscious awareness slammed against Ravan like a tidal wave. Suddenly and violently, he was aware of his horrible reality, that he was not dead after all. He breathed in deeply and coughed. This was unfortunate for his broken ribs grated one upon the other, and his eyes flew open with the terrible pain. He gasped as much from realization of his circumstances as from the agony of his wounds. But, oh, he’d never felt such pain! It hurt so much just to breathe, and for the first time in his life, he believed pain could kill him and that he might die from it.
For a few awful moments, he thought he might pass out and suffocate before he could get his breath. Tears ran from the corners of his eyes. Even more painful than his broken ribs was the terrible disappointment that smothered him. He tried to lift his head from the pillow, tried to focus on the figures in the room. Slowly, the familiar shape of the Fat Wife came loosely into view. He struggled to push himself up onto one elbow, struggled to speak to her only to glimpse her leaving the room. He was instantly afraid for her, afraid she might be implicated in his flight. Even so, it was a relief to see her, to know she was close by.
Another man, one he’d not noticed standing off his blind side to the left, shoved him roughly backwards back onto the bed. “Stay put you little bastard, or I’ll—”
“Unhand him, Pierre.” The voice giving the order was unfamiliar.
“Yes, Monsieur; as you wish.” Pierre Steele, complete with resplendent purple wound across his nose and face, snorted and stepped away.
It was agony to be pushed so roughly back onto the bed, but is served to make Ravan more acutely aware of his surroundings. He was back at the Inn.
He tried to assess his body for the multiple origins of pain. First, and foremost, was the excruciating pain in his chest. This was what kept him from taking a deep breath, and from the terrible grating sound, he knew his ribs must be broken. He recalled the same horrible sound when the deer he killed had fallen down a small ravine. When he heaved the carcass over, it made the same awful, bone against broken bone, sound. Upon gutting the beast, he’d seen the jagged fractures of the broken ribs.
Groaning, he became aware that his shirt was gone, his chest bound tightly with cotton sheeting. Reaching up, he discovered the ring on the silver chain was still there. He breathed an inaudible sigh, relieved that they had not taken it from him. His left eye was swollen shut, and a bandage pulled at his eyebrow. His lower lip was also swollen, and he tested his front lower teeth with his tongue. They were loose in the sockets.
His right thigh ached, and as he tried to flex the muscle, a searing pain shot through it. He could feel a bulky bandage there as well. Abandoning the fruitless efforts of movement, he finally lay back, helpless. Even the blanket scraped coarse and painful against his skin, and the room seemed much too warm.
There were countless smaller scrapes and bruises that he didn’t notice for the pain of the more serious ones. He thought briefly of the orphanage, wishing he was curled up next to the stove, listening to stories while his body healed. The Old One and Avan would have taken good care of him.
He abruptly abandoned the luxury of this memory and returned his thoughts to the perilous present. He needed to get his senses about himself, and he ignored Pierre, still standing to the left of the bed. He would deal with that fat bastard later.
Struggling to push himself up onto one elbow, he tried to focus on the face of the man who had spoken last. “Duval…I assume,” he murmured raggedly as he fought to compose himself.
“You assume right.” It was the same staggeringly deadly voice he’d heard moments before, as though an unspeakable creature was whispering. It continued. “Such a bright young killer you are.”
For the first time, Ravan perceived the wickedness that the man embodied. He braced visibly, forcing himself to sit almost upright. His instinct told him he was in a grave situation with this new stranger. Blinking back tears at the agony that wracked his body, he gasped, working to control any waver in his voice.
“I am no killer,” he said but knew this was not entirely true. He did intend, in Pierre Steele’s case, to make an exception.
Duval grinned, and his lips pulled back into a snarl that surrounded those unusually small, and staggeringly crooked, teeth. “Oh, but you will be…when I tell you to.”
He smoothed his thinning red hair back over his scalp in a very calculated way. A broad man who appeared taller than he really was, Duval had the appearance of an educated farm boy—a refined farrier. There was, however, something brutal about his eyes—something horrible and mercilessly pale, with peppercorn pupils that were abnormally pinpoint in the light of the room. Even as casual as he spoke, his demeanor was guarded, his arms folded across his chest.
Ravan struggled unsuccessfully to swing his legs out of the bed, facing Duval’s newest strong-arm, the towering Pierre. He ignored him, focusing instead on Duval. “To hell with you,” he said flatly.
Pierre took offense to the comment and backhanded the young prisoner, sending him across the bed where he threatened to tumble off the other side onto the wood plank floor. Ravan’s head exploded with brilliant sparks of light, and a shooting pain erupted in his left temple. Fresh blood stained the bandage around his head, above the eye, turning the crisp bandage a bright crimson. Blood dripped lazily down his left cheek. He gasped as the movement mercilessly assaulted his ribs, cruelly snatching the breath from him again. Lying there, he was unable to move, his eyes glazed over with pain and gasping like a dying fish. His vision faded, and he was on the verge of passing out again.
Duval ambled casually to the other side of the bed and caught Ravan before he tumbled full to the floor. He lifted the young man back up and eased him gently back onto the pillow. It was an oddly kind gesture, given the circumstances, and belied the man’s true intent. He then purposefully, almost gently, straightened the bed clothes as the boy blinked blindly up at him, trying to regain his senses.
“Ravan…” Duval dusted his hands and walked slowly away. “I know your kind. I know you will fight me, and I have played this game before, you see.”
“I’ll never work for you.” Ravan choked on the words, coughing, fighting to maintain wakefulness. He felt blood in his throat, and his head pounded a steady, crashing, wavelike rhythm, his eyes throbbing with each pulse. The bandage on his head was now too tight, and a wave of nausea washed over him. He struggled unsuccessfully to push himself further up in the bed, gasping with the effort.
“Not work for me, Ravan—you belong to me.” Duval turned, studied the prisoner, and grinned. It was a broad, flat, two-dimensional grin—horrible, like the rest of him. “You see, there is a difference.” He looked at the ceiling, gesturing gallantly with his hands. “I bought you. I own you!” He laughed outright and allowed his eyes to rest again on Ravan, all humor dreadfully absent. “You will do as I say—anything I say—or else—”
“Or else you can rot in hell,” Ravan interrupted, his voice ragged, his body tensing, prepared to endure Pierre’s forthcoming attack.
Duval quickly motioned the man to leave the younger one be.
It occurred to Ravan that his boots, leggings, and precious knife were missing. He quickly scanned the room for them. There were no indications of either his clothing or his knife. The clothes? Who needs them, but the knife? He would kill the thief who took it.
Duval continued as though he hadn’t heard the boy. “You see, Ravan, I know you would choose to die fighting me. And we have already observed that, have we not? That is good, although ultimately useless to me. But…” He paused, waiting until he had Ravan’s full attention. “Are you prepared to watch others die because you fight me?” Duval took a seat opposite his new possession. He folded his hands across his lap, fingers interlaced as though he relished this moment. “Because, it would take a monster to make such a decision as that.”
“The hell with you, I say! I have no one—” Ravan started to say.
“Don’t you?” Duval tapped his fingertips lightly together, obviating his mirth. He seemed to enjoy the game he was playing but was horribly inadequate at sustaining it for any significant amount of time. “I suppose the Innkeeper’s wife means nothing to you?” Duval watched as comprehension settled over his captive like a smothering wet blanket. “Or, the old man at the orphanage and his granddaughter, or…” He chuckled, carefully emphasizing his next words. “…those miserable, godforsaken creatures—the orphans?”
Bile rose in the back of Ravan's throat, and he became dizzy.
“I’ll kill them Ravan, one by one, every last pathetic soul. And I’ll do it slowly, painfully, and I will let you watch.” Duval could not seem to contain himself and laughed outright at the splendor of his game.
Growing faint, Ravan's vision swam, and Duval’s form faded from the outside in. The last thing he saw was the wide face and those pinpoint, predator eyes.
When Ravan next awoke, it was nightfall. His body tormented him again as consciousness assaulted him, but it was good to feel alive, even with pain. He was faintly aware of someone changing the dressing on his head.
As the vision in his right eye slowly cleared, he squinted, saw the Fat Wife tending his wounds. He tried to focus on her face but the task was too much, and he closed his eyes as a wave of nausea swept over him. He lay still, allowing her to minister to him.
Finally, he murmured, “What happened?”
She startled as though unaware that Ravan had awakened. “Child, you fell…from a cliff.” She wrung out the rag she was using and dabbed again at the laceration. “Pierre, that monster, has broken the wound above your eye open again. It’s quite a miracle that you are even alive, Ravan! You’ve been badly hurt, though. Now lie quiet and rest while I fix these dressings. Then we’ll have a bite to eat, eh?” She tried to smile and reached for dry linen.
“Where is he?” Ravan took her hand gently, stopping her task. With great effort, he focused on her sad face.
“Who, child?”
“Please, don’t try to protect me; you only hurt me.” He released her hand.
She sighed, wringing the rag in her hands. “Duval has gone into town for some supplies. He will be back in the morning, I suppose.” She reached up, smearing bacon grease onto the cut.
Ravan winced as salt met raw flesh.
“If we could only get you better and strong enough, I could fix the cart, and we could take you somewhere else, somewhere safe.”
“No! No, I can’t—I can’t run.” Ravan blurted back at her. “He would hurt you, hurt everyone that is important to me.” He grimaced and, with an incredible effort, sat up, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. He splinted his ribs with one arm and took shallow breaths. His body betrayed him, trembling unnaturally.
“Ravan, you can’t just live your life like he wants you to, on account of others,” she pleaded with him.
“I don’t intend to.” He struggled to stand but sat back down instead, quickly realizing the futility of it. “I will play his game for now. Then, when he does not expect it…” he coughed and spat frothy blood into his palm, wiping it onto the bed sheets. “…I will kill him.”
Her expression fell. Ravan saw it and thought that perhaps she realized that Duval’s assessment was partially true; he would kill if he needed to. But what of it? What man wouldn’t? It was like war, was it not?
“You must do me a favor,” he asked.
“Anything. What is it child?”
“I had a knife; it was in my boot.” He looked about the room more thoroughly than he’d been able to before.
She shook her head. “I’ll try to find it, Ravan, but I haven’t seen such a thing about.”
“It’s different.” He reached out, steadying himself on her knee. “It has a shaft made of antler horn, and the blade is double edged.” He groaned.
She tried to steady him. “If I find it, I’ll bring it to you.” She patted his hand softly.
“No. They’ll just take it again. Find it for me, and hide it somewhere they would not think to look—somewhere only you know of. When the time comes, I will come back for it.” He struggled again to stand, this time succeeding, if only for a moment. The blood rushed to the wound in his thigh and forced him to collapse back onto the bed. He finally accepted that he was going nowhere for some time.
“Ravan, I’ll find the knife, child. When I do, I’ll hide it at the bottom of the barley barrel. No one would think to look there.” She sounded pleased that she could do this small thing for him.
He nodded and closed his eyes, taking comfort in the proximity of her. She reached out to take his lean, battered hand into her fat one, sandwiching it warmly. He smiled weakly at the feel of her touch. Then, mercifully, he drifted deeply off into a dreamless sleep.