fear, to enjoy his agony and terror!
He had barely got up when the troll jumped down to him softly, like a giant cat, although twice as heavy as Oleg. A curved blade glittered in his right hand. Oleg leaned against the wall desperately: a deadlock, but the troll didn’t raise the sword. He could hack Oleg’s head off, slash his body slantwise or down to the waist, but that was too easy death!
Suddenly, Oleg grasped what the troll wanted: to slash his belly open, guts to fall out, death be inevitable, but last long, very long, and the victim to know it coming, to wail in fear, to crawl, with the wet grey tangle of his entrails dragged behind…
He gathered his last strength, pushed off the stone and leapt on the troll, his right foot aimed at the sword paw, his left one — at the groin. The troll stirred, the sword slipped off his finders and went tinkling down the stairs, but Oleg’s left foot missed and kicked the monster’s hip instead. The troll reeled, his blood-colored eyes flashed like burning coals when the wind blows ashes off them. Oleg alerted, fell on his back, defenseless like a baby before a wolf. The troll hung over him, huge and ferocious… and rushed for the blade.
The sword lay a floor below, shimmering like a fish just out of water. The troll stooped for it. Oleg jumped down at him, kicked his back with both feet.
Any man’s spine would have been broken like an overdried splinter, but the troll only collapsed, his body rolled a floor downstairs, with a thunder of bones. Oleg felt cold when he saw a glitter in the black paw — the troll had seized the sword!
Gasping for air, Oleg rushed back to the top of the wall.
The castle was an ordinary tangle of walls, towers, stairs, and landings made for defense, good to place catapults and blazing tar barrels at, but Oleg realized with fear that he got lost. He ran to the corner, rounded a watchtower with a sleeping sentinel inside and stopped, trying to figure out where he was.
The clatter of troll’s sharp claws on the stone was approaching, as the monster ran up the narrow stairs. The sword swung in his paw, glimmering in the moonlight. His ears were pointed and upright like a wolf’s, his big white teeth bare and gleaming.
Oleg retreated until he climbed on the observation deck, the highest point of the castle. Over the wooden railing, he saw stars: cold, far, and prickly on the sky as dark as sin, the ground far below in the blackness.
The troll sniffed, raised his head. His grin got broader, he went upstairs in a slower pace, bending slightly: a tight, alerted ball of bestial muscle.
Oleg retreated to the edge of the deck, looked around like an animal at bay. His right arm still ached, fingers bent poorly. The troll ascended slowly, in silence, his eyes fixed on Oleg. The broad curved blade shared the predatory glitter with the monster’s big teeth, the four curved jutting fangs the brightest.
Oleg’s back clung fast into the corner, the railing cracked. The troll climbed on the deck in five steps. Their eyes met. Seeing the runaway fully in his power, the troll grinned with malice. He made a step forward, yellow saliva foamed in the corner of his thick lips. He watched the victim’s face with delight. It was a helpless creature trembling before him, and he wanted to take all the pleasure of it, to the last drop, to revel in fear and awe before taking a life — with regret for impossibility to kill twice, trice, many times — taking it slowly, for the victim to see own death, inescapable and terrible…
The troll raised the sword in right hand, his left one stretched aside, reaching the rails. Oleg hardly took his eyes off the glittering blade. The troll grinned: this time no way for his enemy to escape. Suddenly he tossed the sword to another hand. Oleg’s heart beat faster, but then he looked in the beast’s blazing eyes and realized: the troll has equal use of both arms, he plays with the sword to make his prey liven up for a moment, to plunge it into a deeper agony and terror afterwards.
The rails crackled under Oleg’s weight. He felt poles moving apart.
Oleg was fingering a rough pole behind him when his palm found the knife hilt. He flinched. How could he have forgotten it?
Trying to look petrified with fear, he pulled the knife out cautiously, gripped the handle. The troll made one more slow step, his gleaming red eyes almost burnt his prey through.
A crow cried harshly above their heads. The troll shot a glance at it. His eyes returned to his prey at once, but Oleg had time to swing his hand: so fast that he saw only a blurry move himself. The troll gurgled as if he choked with wine, his eyes popped out. The knife was deep in his throat. His monstrous hairy paws convulsed, the sword slipped out, struck against the stone, bounced and stopped.
The troll seized the knife handle, lurched. Oleg saw the blade, dark with blood, in the huge hand, a hole in his throat, blood gushing out like a mountain stream, foaming and steaming in the moonlight. The troll went staggering to Oleg, his hand with the knife advanced, his eyes such a bright blaze that Oleg could see nothing but those red fires.
Keeping an eye on the troll, Oleg picked the sword, jumped into the corner. For a moment they stood, devouring each other with eyes. Oleg raised the sword: heavy, sharp, with a curved blade. The troll reeled but kept walking, a knife in his hand stretched far ahead. He was wild, wheezing, covered with blood.
Oleg did not strike — the troll collapsed at his feet, sprawled like a cut-down tree.
Thomas hung in his chains, feeble and half-conscious, when he heard the door bar click, then a soft whisper. “Sir Thomas! Don’t sock me on head!”
A familiar figure slipped into, setting the door ajar. Thomas jerked his head up, peered at the wonderer, unable to believe his eyes: Oleg had a sword on his belt and a knife in hand. He stopped in the middle of the torture chamber, giving his eyes time to accommodate to the fading light of the only torch. “Oh…
He approached, seized the hooks on which the tormented knight was hanging. The muscle bulged on his shoulders. Oleg sniffed, pulled — and the iron pin creaked out of the wall. Thomas could not believe his eyes, but the wonderer, breathing heavily near his left ear, tugged another pin — and Thomas was free.
The small room smelled of burning, the air was stiff. A wall was covered with hooks, pincers, saws, iron rods used to pierce a leg through, special tongs for tooth wrenching and lip ripping. The corner housed a small forge and a pile of firewood. Wincing, Thomas rubbed his swollen wrists. “Was there a guard?”
“There is,” the wonderer said in a dull, almost sleepy voice. He did not seem to mind the thick iron ring chaffing his neck. The deeply curved writing on it, visible in the semi-dark, said the slave belonged to Baron Otset. Oleg looked around the chamber sadly. A bunch of keys that had once been on the jailer’s belt jingled in hand. “Can you walk?” he asked softly.
“My bones intact,” Thomas informed bitterly, with waking hope in his voice. “I’m burnt and beaten, that’s all. I only mind I didn’t hit back this time!” He snatched at his slave collar violently: that damned thing was burning him days and nights.
The wonderer glanced back at him from the door. Thomas followed him out, screwing of bright light: there were two torches lit in the passage. The wonderer glided along as a shadow. On the go he threw the bunch of keys under a heavy gate, with a wide stream of sewage running out from under it. There was a startled cry, a trample of bare feet.
“Runaway slaves there,” Thomas explained unnecessarily. “You knew it?”
“It’s the same everywhere. All the same…”
Thomas struggled to keep up but suddenly checked himself. “Wait! We won’t get out! At night the yard is guarded by a troll. I don’t know where he came from…”
“You could have warned before,” the wonderer grumbled. “His watch has ended.”
Thomas sneaked after him, clutching at the wall. The answer puzzled him. He could barely keep up with Oleg: stiff legs were reluctant to obey.
“Let’s go to stables,” the wonderer said. They stopped. “Your horse is there.”
