R’shiel had no illusions about what the Grimfield was like. She had heard of the women there. She had seen the look in the eyes of the Defenders who had been posted to the Grimfield. Not the proud, disciplined soldiers of the Citadel, the Defenders of the Grimfield were the dregs of the Corps. Even one year would be intolerable.
She was shaken out of her misery by a commotion at the entrance to the holding pen. The gate flew open and a body was hurled through, landing face down in the dusty compound. The man struggled groggily to his feet as the guards stood back to allow their officer through. With a sick certainty, R’shiel knew who he was.
Loclon surveyed the twenty or so prisoners. “Listen and listen well! The wagons will be loaded in an orderly fashion. Women in the first wagon. Men in the second. Anyone who even thinks about giving me trouble will walk behind the wagons, barefoot.” He swept his gaze over them in the silence that followed. No prisoner was foolish enough to do anything to be singled out – with the possible exception of the man who had been thrown in prior to Loclon’s arrival. As he finally gained his feet unsteadily, Loclon laughed harshly. “At least we’ll be entertained along the way, lads,” he told his men. “I hear the great rebel has a great deal to say when his neck is on the line.” With that the captain turned on his heel and the rough, barred wagons rolled up to the gate.
A circle opened around the staggering figure, and R’shiel realized it was Tarja. He wore a dazed expression and a nasty bruise on his jaw that was new since this morning. Much as she wanted to run to him and find out how he had escaped the noose, she had her own concerns. Loclon stood near the gate, arms crossed. He had a sour expression on his disfigured face and a savagely, black-streaked aura. R’shiel lowered her eyes, as the black lights around him flickered on the edge of her vision, wondering what they meant, not wishing to attract his attention. But he saw her. At a wave a guard grabbed her arm and pulled her across to face him.
“So you’ll be joining us, will you, Probate?” he asked curiously in a low voice. R’shiel realized he had been drinking. Was he being sent to the Grimfield as a punishment as well? Garet Warner didn’t seem particularly pleased with him this morning. “I could make this trip a lot easier for you.”
R’shiel raised her eyes to meet his, full of contempt, but he was drunk enough for her scorn to have no effect. “How?” she asked, knowing the answer, but wondering if he was foolish enough to spell it out, here in the Citadel. With a bit of luck, Lord Jenga might happen by. But even if he did, she thought, would he care?
Loclon reached for her and pulled her close, feeling her body roughly through the folds of her linen shift. She glanced around her, thinking someone would object, but the prisoners didn’t care, and the guards simply looked the other way. “You look after me, and I might forgive you,” he said huskily.
“I’d rather rut a snake.”
Loclon raised his hand to strike her, but the arrival of the court clerk checking forestalled him. “All present and accounted for, Captain. Except this one, of course.” He placed the parchment in Loclon’s raised hand. “You can leave anytime you’re ready.” The man walked off, leaving Loclon standing there, glaring at R’shiel.
“Get her on the wagon.”
R’shiel was hustled forward and thrown up on the dirty straw bed. The barred gate was slammed and locked behind her, and the wagon lurched forward. Sunny scrambled back and helped R’shiel to her feet. “You’ve got it made,” the
R’shiel didn’t bother to reply. Instead she looked up as they trundled out of the Citadel. Loclon and his men rode in front, followed by a full company of Defenders in the rear, leading the packhorses. The Sisterhood was taking no chances with Tarja.
The Citadel’s bulk loomed behind them as they moved off. She felt no sorrow at leaving, only an emptiness where once there had been a feeling of belonging. She remembered the strange feeling of belonging in another place that had almost overwhelmed her the year her menses arrived. Perhaps her body had known then what her mind had only just begun to accept. The idea no longer bothered her; the senseless anger that had burned within her for so long had begun to wane.
She looked along the line of wagons, considering her future. Loclon was going to be a problem, although R’shiel felt reasonably safe until they reached Brodenvale. With over sixty Defenders in tow, he was unlikely to try to make good his threats. But after the Defenders left the prison party at Brodenvale, anything could happen. She glanced at the following wagon. There were twelve men crowded into it, but they managed to leave a clear space around Tarja. He looked back at the retreating bulk of the Citadel with an incomprehensible expression. As if feeling her gaze on him, he turned and met her eyes. For the first time in his life, she thought, he looked defeated.
part four
THE GRIMFIELD
chapter 30
A full squad of Defenders had escorted Tarja down to the holding pens. Scorn, and even a little disappointment, replaced the easygoing manner of his guards. For many Defenders, even the loyal ones, Tarja’s refusal to betray his rebel comrades, even under torture, had earned him a degree of grudging respect. But then word had spread like a brush fire of his supposed capitulation, and he had lost even that small measure of esteem. Even those who didn’t think him capable of such a heinous act wondered at his sentence. By every law the Sisterhood held dear, Tarja should have been hanged for his crimes. Tarja wondered if people would think his mother had spared him out of maternal feeling. The idea was ridiculous. Anyone who knew his mother even moderately well would find it easier to believe that he had turned betrayer.
As the wagons trundled forward, he glanced up at the Citadel. He should have died there. He should have demanded the sentence he deserved. He would have been honored for generations as a martyr. Now he would be scorned and reviled. He would carry the taint of the coward who had betrayed his friends to save his own skin. As the Citadel slowly grew smaller in the distance, his thoughts returned to the events of the morning. He cursed himself for a fool, even as he relived his trial and the farce his mother had made of it.
“We have decided that in the interests of security your trial shall be a closed court,” Joyhinia had declared. She sat with the full court in attendance at the bench, the Lord Defender, Lord Draco, the four sisters of the Quorum and the First Sister. The ranks of spectators’ seats were empty. Even the guards had been dismissed. Tarja was chained to the dock in the center of the court. On the wall behind them hung a huge tapestry depicting a woman with a child in one arm and sword in the other. It hung there as a reminder to the court of the nobility of the Sisterhood. Its other purpose was less obvious. Etched into the wall behind the tapestry was a Harshini mural that no amount of scrubbing or painting had been able to remove. Tarja had seen it once as a child, on an exploratory mission through the Citadel with Georj.
“You didn’t really think we’d let you have your say in an open court, did you?” Harith asked. She had already sat in judgment in the Lesser Court this morning. She was having a busy day.
“Then you really do fear me. I can die content.”
“You won’t be dying at all, I’m afraid,” Joyhinia announced, taking malicious pleasure from his shocked expression. “A martyr is just what your pitiful cause is looking for. Well, they will have to look further afield than you. Hanging you will do nothing but cause trouble. We have decided to accept your apology, along with a list of your heathen compatriots, and in return you will be sentenced to five years in the Grimfield. After which, we shall consider your application to rejoin the Defenders, if we decide you have repented sufficiently.”
Tarja was dumbfounded. “There is no list. I do not repent.”
“But that is the delightful thing about all this, Tarja,” Jacomina pointed out. “There doesn’t have to be. As long as there is a suspicion that you have turned against them, the rebels will go to ground. Everyone knows you should be hanged for what you’ve done. By not hanging you, we have destroyed your credibility. I think it’s rather clever, actually. Don’t you?”
“Draco promised me a hero’s welcome to undermine my standing in the rebellion,” Tarja pointed out. “A prison sentence is hardly a reward for outstanding service.”
