"I hope you have a strong stomach," said Kameko as she and Nasrin escorted Sam outside into the early daylight. Apart from the guards stationed at the outer edges, the convent grounds were empty of people. A somber silence filled the air, too quiet.
Sam swallowed nervously. "Why? What does the Arbiter have planned?"
Nasrin's hand tightened on her shoulder, her grip on the border of pain. "Nothing," she said. "She wishes only to open your eyes to the truth."
Sam didn't believe that for a second.
The dungeon, as it turned out, was its own separate building, a fortress outwardly no different from the domed structures beside it. A single novitiate was posted outside the entry door, which Sam found strange. Shouldn't they have more guards? And then a terrible thought crossed her mind: Maybe the novitiate was the only one left.
Behind her mask, the guard's gaze narrowed into slits. "You," she hissed, starting toward Sam.
Nasrin released her grip on Sam to restrain the guard. "Enough," she said firmly. "Return to your rooms, novice. Kameko will take your place." More gently, she added. "Sleep if you can. It has been a long night."
The guard spared one more hateful glare for Sam before ducking her head in acknowledgment. "Thank you, Sister Nasrin." She pulled a heavy chain of keys from around her neck and handed them to Kameko before stomping off.
Kameko let them inside but did not follow them in, leaving Sam alone with Nasrin in a large square room, bare of furniture or ornamentation. In the middle was a hinged trapdoor leading to a narrow flight of stairs. Nasrin grabbed a torch from the wall to light the dark stairwell, turning around at the top of the stairs to look at her niece. Her eyes were glacial, any hint of familial warmth long gone. "Come," she ordered.
Down and down they went, deep into the bowels of the earth. Sam stuck close to Nasrin; it was too dark to do otherwise. The torch lit only the three feet in front of them and the three feet behind. Flashes of color flickered at the corners of her vision, but they moved too quickly for Sam to pay them any real attention.
Finally, they reached the bottom of the stairs. A portcullis spanned the entire passageway, raised partway. Through the vertical slats in the grate, Sam could see the massive iron crank to raise the door was unmanned. Again, she wondered, where were all the guards?
She must have spoken aloud, or else Nasrin read her thoughts. "Dead or in the sick bay," her aunt said grimly. "Today we mourn. By tomorrow, those who are gone or injured will be replaced."
Sam gulped. "What about your other prisoners? Aren't you worried they'll escape too?"
Nasrin laughed, but the sound was hollow. "This prison was built to hold the Traitor King himself. A few ordinary men are of no concern."
She frowned at her aunt. Twice now the Sun Sisters had mentioned the Traitor King. Vaguely, she recalled a story her mother told her when she was a little girl about a king who had betrayed his own people for a taste of glory. But it was just that: a story. Both Nasrin and the Arbiter spoke of the Traitor King as though his existence were fact. Likely the truth lay somewhere in the middle.
They slithered on their bellies under the portcullis, careful not to graze the pointed spikes at its base. Now they stood in a cavernous vault with a high, natural ceiling, more like an underground temple than a dungeon. The far wall sported a remarkably well-preserved mural of the Three. It was clearly old, though, painted with the flat color and odd proportions that marked the style of the Age of Shadows. Emese sat on a throne between the two brother Gods, one hand on her husband's shoulder and the other palm up on her lap, balancing a golden cup. Cathair, wearing a crescent-shaped crown, faced the same direction as his wife. Teivel's face was angled away, but his eye was painted unnaturally far to the left, so that it gazed upon Emese. He held a tall scepter that coiled like a snake.
"It's beautiful," Sam said, surprised.
Nasrin spared her a cool glance. "'This was a sanctuary long before it was a prison. It was warded to keep demons out. Now we use it to keep evil in. The aliah is the first prisoner in a thousand years to break out."
"Perhaps because he isn't evil," Sam muttered to herself. If her aunt heard her, she said nothing.
The vault was at the epicenter of a rat's nest of tunnels that must have been burrowed out after the decision was made to convert the sanctuary to a dungeon. The ceilings were so low that even Sam had to hunch her shoulders to avoid hitting her head, and the air stunk of sewage and rot. They turned left, right, left and then left again, until Sam was too muddled to find her way back out again. How in the Gods' name had Braeden managed to escape? She would've gotten lost.
Nasrin took yet another turn, and called back to Sam, "Watch your step!" Too busy trying to orient herself, Sam tripped.
And fell on top of a very dead body.
She screamed, out of shock more than anything else. It wasn't her first dead body--far from it. But there was something about stumbling on a fresh corpse in a dark, dank space that knocked the sense out of her.
Sam shuddered, wishing she were a million miles from here, preferably soaking in a hot bath.
"I tried to warn you," came Nasrin's disembodied voice from further down the tunnel. Torchlight flickered around the bend, and then shone on Sam and the corpse beneath her. She could make out itsâherâfeatures now, frozen in a grotesque mask of fear. The sister couldn't have been much older than she. "Who is she?" Sam asked.
Nasrin's mouth tightened. "Her name was Gita. She took her sister's oaths last month. May the Gods forgive her cowardice."
Sam struggled to her feet, covered in blood and whatever else was in the disgusting muck that coated the tunnel ground. She could smell herself--and she smelled gods awful. "Her cowardice?"
"You will find no more bodies in these tunnels. She is the only sister to die running away."
Sam gritted her teeth. How could this cold fish of a woman possibly be related to Tsalene? "Perhaps she was running to get help."
"Perhaps," said Nasrin doubtfully. She eyed Sam askance, and, echoing her thoughts, added, "You are too much like your mother. You must learn to harden your heart."
Sam didn't agree, but kept silent, trudging after Nasrin in the muck.
As the labyrinthine maze of tunnels wound to an end, Sam heard the faint sound of voices. She recognized the Arbiter's too-sweet peal above the rest and shivered involuntarily. Weak light pooled out through a small hatch in the wall so narrow they had to crawl on their hands and knees to pass through it. Through the small passage was a large hold, with eight lines of cell blocks radiating out from the center like the spokes of a wheel. It was nearly impossible to tell how many cells held prisoners, since a barred portal was their only window in, and it was too dark to see much of anything through them. Here and there, a man screamed or someone cursed, and somewhere, a female prisoner cackled madly.
The smell hit Sam first. If the air had been foul-smelling before, now it was downright putrid. An open sewer ran the length of the room, but it was not the worst source of the stench. Something was burning. Smoke hung over the hold in a thick gray fog, stinking of overcooked meat. As long as Sam didn't breathe through her nose, she'd stay on her feetâshe hoped. At least Nasrin seemed to be struggling too, breathing in short, shallow gasps.
Something wet squelched beneath her feet. She looked down. Blood. So much blood. The floor was sticky with it, the stones painted a dark crimson.
And in the middle of it all was the Arbiter, walking toward them. She was uncharacteristically disheveled, her hair fighting free of its tight coils. Her billowing white robes were not so elegant splattered with blood. But despite her state of disarray, she remained eerily calm. "The aliah is gone," she said, her sweet voice sharp as a blade's edge.
"I heard."
"You heard," the Arbiter sneered, dripping with sarcasm. "Of course you had nothing to do with it."
Sam returned her sneer. "I don't know how he escaped from here anymore than you do."
The Arbiter's eyes held a sudden gleam Sam didn't trust. "He escaped without you. He left you here."
Sam suppressed a wince. That barb struck home. "I suppose he did," she said evenly.
A white eyebrow rose. "And you would still defend him?"
"I would," Sam said between gritted teeth. "You don't know what happened here. Not for certain."
The Arbiter was openly gloating now. "You may draw your own conclusions. Allow me to show you."
A/N: Sorry, looks like this chapter is going to be a three parter! Wanted to get more done before today but also wanted to get you an update :/ Will try to get part 3 done relatively quickly.
As always, please share your thoughts in the comments!