“Very efficient of you.”

She looked up at the hardness in his tone, seeing something in his gaze that gave new fire to her anger. Disappointment. “I am not here because I choose to be, Darkblade,” she told him. “I am here for the sword of the Trueblade so that I might earn the love of the Father by bringing down your unholy Realm. I am not your friend, your sister or your pupil. And I do not care one whit for your approval.”

Janril Norin coughed, breaking the thick silence that reigned in the aftermath of her words. “Best be looking for the guard captain, my lord. If this is to be done today.”

“That won’t be necessary, Janril.” Al Sorna tossed the ring back to Reva. “Keep it, you earned it.”

CHAPTER TWO

Frentis

The shaven-headed man coughed blood onto the sand and died with a faint whimper. Frentis dropped his sword next to the body and waited, still and silent but for the harsh rasp of his breathing. This one had been harder than usual, four enemies instead of the usual two or three. Slaves scurried from the dark alcoves in the pit wall to clean up the mess, dragging the bodies away and retrieving his sword. They kept their distance from Frentis. Sometimes the killing rage the overseer instilled in him took a while to fade.

“Remarkable,” said a voice from above. There were three spectators today, the overseer joined by the master and a woman Frentis hadn’t seen before. “Hard to believe he’s actually improved, Vastir,” the master went on. “My compliments.”

“My only thought is to serve you, Council-man,” the overseer said with just the right amount of fawning servility. He was a diligent fellow and never overplayed his part.

“Well?” the master said to the woman at his side. “Does he meet with our Ally’s approval?”

“I don’t speak for the Ally,” the woman said. Her tone, Frentis noted, was free of anything that might be described as servility, or even respect. “Whether he meets with my approval, however.”

Bound as he was Frentis could not outwardly express surprise, or any other emotion not permitted him by the overseer, but he did twitch in astonishment as the woman leapt into the pit, landing from the ten-foot drop with practised ease. She was dressed in the formal robes of a Volarian highborn, dark hair was tied back from a face of feline beauty with eyes that gleamed bright with interest as she examined Frentis’s naked form from head to toe. “Prettier than I expected,” she murmured. She looked up at the overseer, raising her voice. “Why is his face unscarred?”

“He never gets any scars, Honoured Lady,” Vastir called back. “A few have come close over the years, but he was already highly skilled when he came to us.”

“Highly skilled were you, pretty one?” the woman asked Frentis, then grimaced in annoyance when he didn’t respond. “Let him speak,” she called to the overseer.

Vastir glanced over the edge of the pit at Frentis, and he felt the slight loosening of the will that bound him. “Well?” the woman demanded.

“I am a brother of the Sixth Order,” he said.

She raised an eyebrow at the lack of an honorific.

“My profound apologies, Honoured Lady,” Vastir gushed. “However many punishments we administer he refuses to use correct language, and we were cautioned that the only death he should face would be in the pits.”

The woman waved a hand in dismissal. “Swords!” she commanded.

There was a moment’s confusion above, a whispered discussion between master and overseer from which Frentis discerned the words, “just do it, Vastir!” Another brief delay then two short swords were tossed into the pit, landing in the sand between Frentis and the woman.

“Well then,” she said in a brisk tone, shrugging off her robes to stand as naked as he was. Her body was lithe, displaying the finely honed muscle of one who has spent many years in hard training and was, by any standard, quite beautiful. But what interested Frentis was not the curve of her thighs or the fullness of her breasts, but the pattern of whirling scars that covered her from neck to groin, a pattern he knew with intimate precision. They were an exact mirror image of his own, the matrix of damaged tissue One Eye had carved into him in the vaults beneath the western quarter before his brothers came to free him.

“Pretty aren’t they?” the woman asked, seeing how his eyes tracked over the scars. She came closer, reaching out to caress the whirling symbol on his chest. “Precious gifts, born in pain.” Her hand splayed flat on his chest and he felt warmth emanating from it. She sighed, eyes closed, fingers twitching on his skin. “Strong,” she whispered. “Can’t be too strong.”

She opened her eyes and stepped back, removing her hand, the warmth fading instantly. “Let’s see what your Order taught you,” she said, crouching to pick up the swords, tossing one to him. “Release him!” she ordered Vastir. “Completely.”

Frentis could sense the overseer’s hesitation. In the five or more years he had been caged here they had only ever fully released him once, with very unfortunate results.

“Honoured Lady,” Vastir began. “Forgive the reluctance of one who only seeks to serve . . .”

“Do as I say, you corpulent pile of dung!” The woman smiled for the first time, her gaze still locked on Frentis. It was a fierce smile, joyful with anticipation.

Then it was gone, the will that bound him lifted like the planks of the stocks he remembered so well from childhood. The sudden rush of freedom was exhilarating, but all too short.

The woman lunged at him, sword extended in a perfectly straight line for his heart, agile, accurate and very fast. His own blade came up to meet hers, deflecting the thrust with scant inches to spare. He whirled away towards the wall of the pit, jumped, rebounded from the rock, back arched as her blade slashed beneath him, landed on his hands in the centre of the pit then bounced to his feet.

The woman gave a laugh of unbridled joy and attacked again with a prepared scale of thrusts and slashes. He recognised it from one of the Kuritai he had killed a few months ago. It was how they taught him, new tricks every time to sharpen his skills to ever greater heights. He parried her every blow and retaliated with a scale of his own, learned under another master he had once thought harsh but now recalled with fond remembrance.

She was unfamiliar with these moves, he could tell, parrying his thrusts with less fluency than she had displayed in her attack. He forced her back to the wall of the pit, completing the scale by feinting a blinding stab at her eyes then bringing the blade up and around to slash into her thigh. Their swords rang as she parried the blow.

Frentis drew back a little, meeting the woman’s gaze. She was still smiling. The parry had been too fast. Impossibly fast in fact.

“Now I’ve got your attention,” the woman said.

Frentis smiled back. It was not something he did with any regularity and the muscles of his face ached from the novelty of it. “I’ve never killed a woman,” he said.

She pouted. “Oh don’t be like that.”

He turned his back on her and walked to the centre of the pit. They had given him a choice for the first time, and he was taking it.

“This could be a problem,” the woman said, her voice soft, and he realised she was thinking aloud.

“Honoured Lady?” Vastir called down.

“Throw me a rope!” she called back. “I’m done here.” She gestured at Frentis. “You can have this one for the spectacles.”

“He’ll make fine show at the victory celebrations, no doubt,” the master said. Frentis found it strange that he sounded relieved.

“Indeed, most honoured,” Vastir agreed, dragging a rope ladder to the edge of the pit, “I should despair if all my efforts were wast—”

Frentis’s short sword took him in the neck, slicing through veins and spine to protrude from beneath the base of his skull. He staggered for a moment, eyes bulging in terror and confusion, blood gushing from mouth and wound, then collapsed forward, landing on the sand of the pit with a soft thump.

Frentis straightened from the throw, turning to the woman. Death would come now, killing an overseer was a crime they could not forgive, whatever his value might be. However, he was dismayed to find her smile had returned.

“You know, Arklev,” she said to the master, now staring at Frentis in appalled astonishment. “I think I’ve changed my mind.”

? ? ?

The binding came again when she had climbed out of the pit, clamping down hard with enough force to make him stagger and fall to the sands, his scars burning with an agony as yet unknown. He looked up to see her smiling and twiddling her fingers, remembering the warmth that emanated from her touch. This is her! he realised. She binds me now.

He watched her laugh and disappear from view, the binding lifting after a few seconds more torment. The master lingered a moment, his lean features regarding Frentis with a mixture of anger and fear, restrained but still palpable to a man well versed in reading the face of his opponents.

“Your Realm will suffer for your failure to die today, slave,” the master said. Then he was gone and Frentis experienced a sudden certainty that he would most likely never see him again. It was a shame, he had hoped opportunity might arise when he could send him to join Vastir in the Beyond.