backs of his hands, on his throat, black, as if etched in ink through his pale white skin, a relief roadmap pointing straight towards Hell and damnation to come – for that was where he would soon travel. When a Blacklipper became so marked, he had only limited time on the face of the world. He carried a small black crossbow, which quivered even as his fingers quivered.
'And I am Jagor Mad, because I'm mad,' rumbled the third, a huge bear of a man, a good head taller than Kell and rippling with muscle like an overstuffed canvas sack. His head was misshapen, and riddled with scars and dents. His nose was twisted, and stubble grew unevenly around wide scar tissue tracts. His fists were clenched, and he carried no weapon like the other two, who both wore short swords. His eyes were gleaming, and his gaze never left Kell.
'I remember you, Jagor Mad,' said Kell, almost amiably, although his eyes gleamed in the gloom. 'I put one of those big dents in your dumb head, if I remember it rightly. I reckon it should have knocked some sense into you, but I can see I'm fucking wrong.'
Growling, Jagor Mad stepped forward, but Dandall's bony fingers spread out, his arm blocking the huge man's path.
'Let me kill him, Dandall, let me rip out his windpipe with my teeth!'
'Not yet,' said Dandall, voice soft. He focused on Kell. 'You put us all here, my large and wearisome friend. But now,' and he laughed, a nasal whining like spent vachine gears, ' now we three are the Governors of the Black Pike Mines. Behind these doors, we have three thousand new soldiers, our new model army! Once, they were convicts, and Blacklippers and scum, the freaks and the murderers, the outcast from pretty little Falanor, but now they're under our command and we rule these damn mountains, this mine and this fucking fortress!'
Dandall motioned, and Grey Tail stepped forward. The crossbow lifted, suddenly hissed and took Kell in the shoulder, punching the large man backwards. He stumbled, but righted himself. He grasped the bolt protruding from his flesh, and blood pumped out through his fingers. His eyes glowed. 'Just like a coward,' he growled, voice dripping liquid hate, as Jagor Mad stepped forward and with a devastating right hook knocked Kell to the ground. Jagor put one knee on Kell's chest, and grabbed the bolt. He applied weight, and Kell groaned like a dying wolf. Saark leapt forward, but a rattle of bolts from the balcony above clattered around him on the cobbles, and Saark did a crazy dance, hands over his head, trying his best not to get pierced.
'We got you now, Kell old boy,' Jagor Mad spat, furious scarred face looming down at Kell as if from a toxin- induced nightmare. 'And you know what?'
Kell was swimming, not because of the pain or the bolt – he'd been shot before. But because of the drugs coating the bolt's tip, which even now entered his system forcing him down into a realm of drifting unconsciousness. And as he swam deeper and deeper down down down, losing control, losing connection, down into the inky void of bitter lost dreams and terminal disappointments, so Jagor Mad's last words rattled in his thumping, crashing skull…
'Get the girl. We'll torture her first.'
CHAPTER 8
When Kell came round, he was lying in a dark cave, bright winter sunlight spilling in unwelcome and unholy, and thumping his already pounding head with big new fists. For a few moments he thought he'd been on the whiskey again, down that hole, locked in that dungeon, and a terrible dread stole over him and he rifled frantically through the pages of his fractured memory. But then, like the break of a new dawn, images slowly filtered back through the upper reaches of consciousness. Black Pike Mines. Dandall, Grey Tail and Jagor Mad. Crossbow bolt. Right hook… Kell clutched for the bolt, but it had been removed, his shoulder bound with a torn section of shirt which he recognised as Saark's fine lace frippery. Great, he thought. Just what I need. Saved from death by a dandy idiot.
'Don't worry. There's no badness in there. And if there was, I'll be damned if I was sucking on your foul necrotic flesh.'
Kell groaned, clutching his head, and sat up like a bear emerging from hibernation. His dark shirt was torn and bloodstained. The world swam. Then, he thought of Nienna.
He rose, like a colossus, and strode at Saark. 'Where's my granddaughter?' he roared.
'It's fine, Kell, don't panic,' Saark held up his hands, 'that Jagor Mad was just putting his fist up your arse. Giving you something big and hard to worry about. I can see her from here, she's tied up in one of the cells across the way. Over there.' He pointed. Kell squinted.
Kell took a few moments to analyse his surroundings. To his right loomed the great wall of the Black Pike Mine fortress, containing hefty stone barricades replete with steps and towers on which soldiers could defend against any opposing force. The valley floor ran pretty straight, pretty flat, and was lined to either side by hundreds, no… thousands of cells, all carved into the natural rocky walls and fitted with sturdy iron bars. Kell and Saark had been locked in one of these. Nienna, in another.
'Why didn't they separate us two?' he grunted.
'They didn't want you dying; gave me a needle and thread, had me patch you up good.'
'Why the hell would they do that? There's three hundred men out there must surely want my blood.'
'I thought you said a hundred?' Saark shook his head. 'Anyway, they, er, they said something about sport, and entertainment, words of that calibre, and then something about a trial. They don't want you dead. Not yet. Not before you suffered as, I assume, they feel they have suffered under your rough justice.' Saark's eyes were gleaming, and he grinned at Kell without humour. 'They want to play, Kell,' he said.
Kell digested this information. He finally caught sight of Nienna across the valley floor, and gave her a wave, but she seemed lost in a half-sleep, staring at the roof of her cave cell. Kell's tongue probed his dry mouth, and he cursed these people, and cursed the drugs they'd used to incapacitate him. By the Bone Halls, he thought, they'd better finish him off next time or he'd crack a few skulls!
Kell's gaze swept left and right. He could see, perhaps, three hundred men. They were roughshod, most quite stocky from years working in the Black Pike Mines. These were Falanor's worst, most grim and nasty criminals. The murderers, rapists, smugglers, child-killers. Kell stared at them with uncontrolled disgust, and an even bigger disgust at what he must do. He sighed. It was the only choice he had.
'So, come on then,' said Saark. He was looking sideways at Kell, eyes narrowed. 'What's the big plan now, eh? You managed to get us caught pretty bad, with your so-called ooh Governor Myrtax is totally trustworthy and we can go in and get something to eat old horse shit. And they've gone and captured Mary. I tell you something, if they cook my donkey, there'll be hell to pay.'
'Stop whining.'
'Give me some answers then, damn you!'
'Listen to the demands of Saark, the wonderful, masterful, all-powerful vachine shagging vachine coward. I didn't see you doing much to help when they peppered me with fucking crossbow bolts!'
'It was one bolt, Kell. Hark at the power of a man's exaggeration!'
'You're a fine one to speak. If anybody believed your tales, you'd have impregnated half of Falanor by now!'
'Maybe I have! They do say I have a certain way with the women.'
'Yeah, and I bet you carry enough pox to drop a battalion. Now shut your mouth, Saark, and tell me what they did with my axe.'
Saark frowned, then rubbed his bruised face. He, too, had taken a beating at the hands of Jagor Mad. As the huge oaf declared, he was indeed, at least partially, mad. But then, Saark was getting used to taking a beating in the fiery orbit of Kell's legend. After all, that's what friends were for, no?
'They dumped it in one of the cells, I think. Along with Nienna and the rest of our weapons. It's got to be said, Kell, sometimes I wonder who you love the most: Nienna, or that damn axe?'
'The axe'll never let me down,' growled Kell, face locked in a terrible anger. 'Now listen to me, Saark. This is the plan.'
