"You'll swing for this," the prince said dropping the man's head.
The injured man slipped off the table onto the floor and lay there moaning.
The prince bent over Tigen. "I told you!" he said to his unconscious son. "I said that your fascination with slaves would bring you no good." He shook his head in disgust.
He didn't even care if Tigen was alive or dead.
Rage filled Repentance.
She backed up. "Stand away from the door," she whispered to the king.
She had no time for troopers, and no help would be forthcoming from the dungeon master, but she would free the king and knock the prince over the head with her paddle. She would save Hot Springs. For Sober.
The prince looked up, then. Straight down the hall and into Repentance's eyes.
He flashed a wicked smile.
"Well, Repentance. I'm happy to see you again."
"Sober," she whispered, tears streaming down her face. "Forgive me."
"Get back away from the door," she called to the king. Then she raised her paddle and swung at the door handle with all her might. The paddle connected with a shock ran up her arms and rattled her teeth.
The door flew open.
The prince laughed. He stood at the end of the hall, clapping his hands and laughing. "You keep on surprising me, Repentance. You just killed your farmer."
She stared at him. She could hear the words, but she wasn't sure what they meant.
"Repentance, help me." The king was backed against the far wall in his cell, his floor receding.
What had happened? Something was terribly wrong, but she wasn't sure what exactly. She tried to replay events, but all that came to her were pieces of pictures and phrases. Sober telling her to free the king. His sad smile. His hand on her cheek.
"Repentance!" the king called.
She jerked back to her right mind. She'd chosen to save the king.
She held out her paddle. The old man came to the edge of the receding floor and grabbed a hold.
She counted to three.
He jumped and she yanked.
He was so frail that he flew across the void and slammed into her. They both went down onto the floor. The back of her head bounced on the hard ice. Lights flashed before her eyes. She blinked several times, trying to clear her vision.
The king lay on top of her, coughing. The prince was still laughing. The ice floors under the cells receded fully into the walls with a scrape and a click. She looked down the hall at Sober's window. It gaped at her. Empty.
She tried to roll the king off of her, but before she managed that, the prince arrived. He looked down on her, gloating.
Repentance blanched.
The dungeon master stepped up behind the prince, rubbing the back of his head. He peered over the prince's shoulder with bleary eyes. "Still here, then," he said. "No one has escaped?"
"No credit goes to you on that account," the prince said with a sneer.
He used his foot to roll the king off Repentance.
The old man hit the ice and cried out.
The dungeon master, seeing the king's face, gasped.
The prince dug his toe under the king and rolled him over again, moving him toward the open water under his cell.
Repentance bit her lip, trying to think. This was not going to happen. Sober did not die for nothing. She was not going to lie there and watch the prince throw the king into the lake.
The king pulled his feet up, bracing them against the wall. He tried to say something but only succeeded in breaking into a spasm of coughing.
The prince leaned over to yank the king's feet from the wall.
"Arrest him," the king managed between coughs.
Repentance lay still, not wanting to draw attention to herself. Where was the paddle? She looked out of the corner of her eyes.
The dungeon master, obviously afraid to touch the prince, said, "That's the king."
The prince threw a look over his shoulder at the man. "I am aware. Do you want to help me and live, or will you stand there and make me do all the work myself?"
Repentance felt around the floor, her hand burning. Finally her search was rewarded when she brushed the paddle with her fingertips.
"Are you sure you want to throw the king in the lake?" the dungeon master asked.
"You, my dear dungeon master, just made the wrong choice," the prince said. "Did you never learn that it's dangerous to question those in authority over you?" He turned back to the king, bent down, and grasped the king's legs.
Repentance had the perfect opportunity. She slammed her heel into the center of the prince's face. His head jerked up.
He stood, blood gushing from his nose. "You will die for that."
"I'll die either way," she said. She closed her hand around the paddle, rolled over, sprang from the floor, and took a swing at his head.
The paddle connected, and the prince slumped and landed, unconscious, on top of the king.
The dungeon master stepped forward. Repentance waved the paddle at him.
"I'm not going to hurt you," he said. "I'm trying to help."
"Move back."
"I swear," he said. "I didn't know the king was locked up here. The prince brought him down with a bag on his head, packed him into this end cell, and wouldn't let no one near him. He brought the prisoner's meals his own self."
From under the prince came the sound of the kings racking coughs.
"Get the king off the cold floor," Repentance said, weakly.
The dungeon master pushed the prince aside and picked the king up as if he were a small child.
As the king came up, the prince's unconscious body rolled off his legs, balanced for a moment in the cell doorway, then started to
