was strong, and he could not afford to underestimate it. But he craved the hunt. He needed it the way he needed air. After everything he had endured over the last three days, the urge to vent his frustrations on the source of it all was like a bad taste in his mouth.
The pulsating evil led Vambran to a door at the end of the passage. The force he sought lay beyond that portal. It beckoned to him, taunting. He hesitated, listening. No sounds arose from the other side, but some presence lay beyond. Something that hated him. Adjusting his grip on his sword, he shoved the door open and peered inside.
The chamber beyond was out of a nightmare. Implements of torture filled much of the room, and the lieutenant could see a laboratory along one wall, jammed with alembics and decanters containing all sorts of vile things. Half of them turned his stomach when he recognized them and the other half-well, he didn't even want to guess at those.
A cloaked figure stood at a table in the laboratory, its back to Vambran, apparently working. Even when the door slammed open, the figure barely twitched. It wore a brown robe with a hood pulled up, completely hiding its head. It didn't stop in its work as it said in a masculine voice, 'I wondered when you would get here.'
Vambran paused with one foot inside the room. He stared at the figure, unsure what sort of trap he might be falling into. 'How did you know I would come?' he said, hoping to draw the man out, get him to turn around. He looked around the room as he spoke, searching for other threats. He saw nothing, but there were so many items filling the chamber, so many places to hide, that it seemed ridiculous
'I know a great many things,' the figure said, moving from a small apparatus over to a flask resting atop a ring stand and heated by a candle. 'For example, I know that you are here to stop me from completing my quest, and that you have brought great magic with you to do so.'
Vambran swallowed, circling wide of the figure, wary of having some caustic substance hurled in his direction. 'Then you must also know that I'm set on staying around until I finish the job.'
'Finish the job?' the figure in the brown robes said with a hearty chuckle. 'You aren't serious, are you?' And he began to turn around, spinning slowly to face Vambran. 'After all,' he said as his face came into view, 'you couldn't finish the job twelve years ago.'
Vambran stared at the man whose features remained partially hidden within the hood of the robe. The cryptic comment baffled him. But when his enemy reached up and pulled his hood back, fully revealing his face, a memory came flooding back to the mercenary. A memory of a man lying near a pond, with a crossbow bolt protruding from his chest. A dead man.
'You!' Vambran said, stunned. He reached out to grab hold of a table to keep his balance. 'But you're dead! I saw your body!'
'As I said,' Rodolpho Wianar replied, 'you couldn't finish the job then, so how do you expect to do so now?'
Vambran reeled at the revelation. Still alive! How was it possible? Then another thought struck him. No, he realized, dismissing it. Xaphira would not have made such a mistake. He was dead, and brought back from the dead. But why?
Vambran's eyes narrowed. 'Your death was a screen, a cover-up, wasn't it? Everyone was supposed to assume you had died, and I was set up for it.'
'Right you are,' Rodolpho Wianar said, looking pleased. 'They said you were bright,' he added, chuckling. 'I just didn't believe them, seeing how you kept dragging your family into the middle of all this.'
Vambran shook off the backhanded compliment. 'But I wasn't the one who killed you before,' he said. 'And you know that.'
'Too true.'
'I bet you know who did, too.'
'Yes, he does,' came another voice from a corner of the room, one that Vambran recognized. He shot a glance over to confirm that Junce Roundface was standing there. 'He knows very well I was the one who punctured his heart with one of your own bolts that night.'
Vambran snorted in disgust. 'Of course,' he said sarcastically. 'Speak of a devil, and he appears.' The lieutenant moved slightly so he could keep both opponents in view. 'Come to gloat over my shock and surprise?'
'Truthfully, no, though I'll take that as an added bonus,' the assassin said, smirking. 'I actually came to throttle Rodolpho here for not living up to his end of the bargain.' He turned to the hooded man and asked, 'Unless you'd like to reconsider giving up the cure?'
Vambran eyed the assassin with suspicion. 'The cure?' he asked. 'You have a cure?'
'No,' Junce answered, still looking at Rodolpho. 'This wretch of a man refuses to divulge it.'
Rodolpho laughed. 'What, and ruin everything just when I'm on the verge of marching an army to my cousin's gates and demanding his surrender? I think not. Now, why haven't you died yet? Surely you've been exposed to the plague by now.' He spun and hurled a beaker of something viscous and yellow at Junce.
The assassin seemed to anticipate the attack, for he leaped out of the way, allowing the glassware to shatter against the wall behind him. But as soon as it did, a phlegm-colored cloud of vapors expanded outward, drifting to fill the room.
Junce backed away from it, stumbling as he bumped into a horrific torture rack. The cloud billowed up and outward, threatening to engulf them all.
'I'm sorry you won't be able to take that cure back to dear cousin Wianar,' Rodolpho said, striding across the room to another door on the far side, 'but you can let him know yourself, once you're part of my army.' He opened the door as Junce and Vambran retreated from the cloud, backing into the same corner, trapped. 'Just in case you manage to evade my recipe,' Rodolpho added, swinging the door wide, 'my seven apprentices are on hand to finish the job.'
One by one, seven figures filed into the chamber, fanning out to stare at the two men pinned in the corner. Each man and woman might have been young and strong when they entered into Rodolpho's service, but no longer.
Vambran could see the beauty that might once have been part of each face, but that beauty was twisted and distorted in undeath. Pieces of flesh were missing, exposing bone beneath, and where the creatures' eyes should have been, red points of malevolent light glowed instead. Dressed in fine clothing and wearing cloaks of red and gold, the seven gruesome figures stood waiting and watching.
Rodolpho waved at the two men and disappeared through the door.
As memories of the previous night washed over Emriana, she felt her knees weaken, her hands tremble. Denrick was leaning against the wall, his hands folded across his chest, still wearing that smug grin that haunted her. She retreated a step, wanting to turn and run, fearing that she would never flee fast enough.
'Hello, Em,' Denrick said, pushing away from the wall and following her, sauntering. 'I was hoping you'd stop by for a visit. I enjoyed last evening so much, and I thought you might like to spend time with me again.'
No! Emriana silently screamed, fighting the feelings of helplessness. Not again! 'Get away from me,' she said with as much cold hatred as she could muster. 'I know you're not real.'
'I'm not?' Denrick asked, looking wounded. 'Last night sure felt real enough,' he said, that smug smile returning. 'And this is certainly real,' he added, lunging forward and grabbing at the girl's wrist.
His grip was strong, so strong. He twisted her arm, bending her hand and elbow awkwardly out to her side. The pressure locked the joint and forced her to torque her body, to bow. She understood what he was doing, the mental edge he was gaining from making her bend to him. She wanted to fight it, but he kept twisting, forcing her down, down to one knee lest her arm pop free of her shoulder. His smile was gone, replaced by a grimace of effort. His eyes held a sparkling glint that radiated hatred.
'Ow!' she cried out as he continued to push, continued to angle her body to the floor. Her arm hurt and her mind told her she was not strong enough to fight him, to resist him. He would have what he wanted, again.
No, she thought, more firmly. Not again. Never again.
And in that one moment of clarity, Emriana remembered that she was strong, too. She could fight Denrick in ways that he could not defend. She could turn the tables, gain the upper hand. She stopped giving in to her fear and
