If you run, I’ll strike you down, Merihim warned.
Regretfully, Warren stood his ground. You can back out of this anytime you get ready to, he told himself. He held on to that thought.
You won’t live to regret it, Merihim warned.
Plaintive cries sounded from one of the cells near the demon. Two of the Darkspawn lashed out with truncheons and battered pale faces that stood just behind the iron bars.
“Please,” the hoarse voices croaked. “Please. We need water.”
“No water,” Hargastor replied in a thunderous voice. “You’re here to die atmy leisure. I want your pain writ upon these walls.”
Warren stared into the cells till he could penetrate the darkness. Human vision was blind in the darkness and he knew the people inside the cell couldn’tsee anything.
“Hargastor lives to torment,” the quiet voice said at the back of Warren’smind. “He’s no different than his master. Fulaghar has allowed him his pets.”
Judging from the clothing worn by the fourteen prisoners and the nine dead ones lying at their feet, they were all London survivors. Five of the fourteen sat at the back of the cave cell and conserved their strength. Warren “felt that they were military. A few of Great Britain’s police and military yetremained in the city as well. They listened attentively to the demons out in the passageway.
“You’re wasting your breath,” one of the soldiers stated quietly. “There’s nomercy in any of those devils.”
Hargastor laughed, and the sound of it filled the passageway. “You have meatto eat and blood to drink,” he rumbled. “The weaker ones among you have died andleft you their pitiful offerings.”
“We’re not cannibals,” a woman cried out.
“Then you’re dead sooner rather than later,” Hargastor said. “And those ofyou determined to live will feast on you.”
One of the military men cursed the demon, but most of the others broke down and cried.
“Let me hear the joyful noise of your lamentations,” Hargastor snarled. Helumbered toward the bars on his knuckles and rapped one big fist against them hard enough to make the door ring.
“You’re an ugly brute,” the military man said. “Foul and filthy. And one dayyou’ll get what’s coming to you. The knights will make sure of that.”
“The knights? You mean the Templar?” Hargastor cursed. “They’re dead andgone. Only a few remain, and they’ll die like rats when we find them.”
“They’ve killed better than you,” the man taunted.
Warren couldn’t believe the man was still talking. Surely he knew the demoncould kill him.
“That’s what he wants,” the voice said. “He’s a warrior. He would ratherspend his blood in battle than to die caged like an animal kept for slaughter.”
That mindset seemed alien to Warren. All his life he’d struggled to survive,and that meant never drawing attention to himself.
Except he was here now, and he was supposed to somehow destroy the behemoth before him.
Hargastor laughed, and the evil sound echoed along the passageway. Then the demons stopped and snuffled like a dog taking scent.
Warren eased back into the shadows.
“He has your scent, yer lordship,” Jonas whispered. Amusement colored hiswords. “You’ve still got flesh on your bones. And you stink of fear. Even I cansmell it, and I don’t have a nose.”
“Shut up,” Warren commanded.
Jonas’s jaws snapped shut with a click.
Darkspawn turned in Warren’s direction. They raised their weapons inreadiness.
“Stay,” Hargastor ordered.
Warren’s bowels turned to water as he tried to press himself into the stonewall.
Hargastor shuffled on his knuckles. “I smell you, human. You might as wellstep out of hiding. There’s no place to run.”
Warren tried to leave but couldn’t. His legs wouldn’t go in that direction.
Do not retreat before him, Merihim ordered. You represent me. I will not have my enemies think I am a coward.
Then why aren’t you here? Warren wanted to ask. But he only hoped hehadn’t thought that too loud.
“I am with you,” the voice said. “You aren’t alone.”
But Warren didn’t trust any of the voices inside his head.
“Come out, human,” Hargastor said more forcefully. “If I have to come afteryou, things will go much harder for you.”
Before he could stop himself, Warren stepped into the passageway. He knew he hadn’t moved his legs. Merihim had moved him. The demon hand knotted into afist.
“Come to me,” Hargastor ordered.
Even though he didn’t want to, Warren stepped forward. Fear rattled so badlyinside him he thought he was going to be sick. He swallowed bile and tried to remain focused.
Kill this abomination, Merihim ordered. Let his death be a message to Fulaghar.
“Bring him to me,” Hargastor ordered. “I’ll kill him to provide a banquet forthose among the prisoners who would live.”
The Darkspawn started forward.
Warren thought desperately. He saw the faces of the imprisoned humans lining the metal bars of their cage. If he could free them, even if he didn’t have anarmy he at least had a means of splitting the demons’ attention.
He concentrated on the lock that held the iron bars shut till he could picture the mechanism in his mind. He formed a blacksmith’s hammer in his mindand pushed.
Instantly, the lock on the cell door shattered. Pieces of metal jangled against the stone floor.
Whipping his demon hand forward, Warren threw a ball of fire over the first two Darkspawn. They ignited at once and twirled around madly in an attempt to douse the flames. Their screams ripped through the passageway.
“You’re free!” Warren yelled, impressing that suggestion to the prisoners inthe cave/cell. “Run for your lives!”
He wasn’t sure where they were going to run. From what he’d learned of thesanitarium, no one knew the lower levels existed.
The military men forced the other survivors up and through the door. Darkspawn turned toward them at once. Three of the military men closed on one of the Darkspawn. The demon fired a strange-looking red and gray weapon that belched red-gold bursts that ricocheted from the passageway floor and walls.
The creature managed only
