The Sword of Retribution

The Spies - Part 4

     That night, after reporting to one of the tower’s practice floors where everyone in the tower gathered in shifts for the clay man strip search, Resalintas and two other priests went to the tower’s temple of Samnos, where the captured vampire was being held. One of the priests accompanying him was another priest of Samnos called Millis, but the other was the city’s oldest and wisest cleric of Caroli. A withered and bent, grey haired old man called Father Luchos who hobbled along slowly and painfully with the aid of a gnarled, wooden staff that had been polished to a sheen by the simple action of having been held in his hands for twenty years.

     He wore only a loose, coarsely woven brown robe, tied around his waist with a simple length of rope, a pair of sandals and, of course, a silver caroli flower on a chain around his neck. He was only fifty years old but looked at least thirty years older than that, having been aged prematurely by the holy power that had poured through him all his life. Lining his face, turning his skin to pale, dry leather and swelling his joints with arthritis. His eyes still looked as young as they ever had, though, and glowed brightly with intelligence, humour and a faith so unshakeable that the Copper Mountains would tremble like a house of cards in comparison. Resalintas had asked him to join them for the confrontation with the vampire, in case they needed his Goddess granted powers to hold the undead at bay and, when he’d got over his shock at learning what the priest had in mind, the old cleric had agreed, saying that if he couldn’t talk them out of it, they’d need someone there with a little common sense in case things got out of hand.

     They reached the temple and went right in. A table had been set up in front of the main altar, on which lay an expensive looking mahogany coffin, the lid of which lay on one side so that the statue of Samnos, standing just behind it, could look right in and see what it contained. Two more priests of Samnos stood guard on either side of it, and a dozen soldiers armed with wooden spears and maces were lined up along the walls. They weren’t taking any chances with the occupant of this coffin. Vampires were powerful, it was true, but the people gathered around it now could handle any vampire that had ever lived. He wasn’t going anywhere unless he could come to an arrangement with the three newcomers who had gathered around the coffin and he knew it as he stared back out at them, his eyes blazing with frustration, hatred and fury.

     He was very tall, well over six feet, but gaunt, with sunken cheeks and a thin neck in which the tendons, veins and windpipe stood out prominently. His limbs were skinny and sticklike and his hands were bony with bulging, arthritic looking joints. He should have looked frail and weak, but somehow the priests looking down at him could sense the tremendous strength and power in him. A strength so great that he could bend inch thick iron bars with his bare hands or break a man’s back with a single, casual blow.

     It was the eyes that gave him away, more than anything else. Without them, the rest of his body might have been mistaken for that of a fairly ordinary, if rather tall, man of about fifty, but the eyes blazed with such malevolent hatred that even Resalintas had to steel himself not to take a step backwards in shock. Millis’s hand went to his sword and half drew it from its scabbard, and Father Luchos held his caroli flower tightly in one hand while whispering a fervent prayer beseeching his Goddess’s protection. The vampire leered at them, glad that he could still command such awe and fear, even with a stake through his heart holding him helpless in his coffin.

     “Cut its head off!” cried Father Luchos desperately. “Kill it while we’ve got the chance! It’s madness to think we could ever deal with such a creature!”

     “No!” said Resalintas, glancing around at the other priests. They had advanced with drawn weapons, but Resalintas warned them back with his eyes. Resalintas then turned his attention back to the vampire. The creature had won a subtle, psychological victory over them, and it was necessary to win back the initiative before any meaningful negotiations could take place. The vampire had to be made fully aware of its own helplessness, had to be firmly convinced that they, the priests, were in control here. His sense of superiority and his scornful disdain for the priests had to be completely shattered.

     Resalintas stepped up to the coffin and looked the creature in the eyes. The vampire stared back, and a silent battle of wills took place between them. Millis, standing nearby, could sense the tremendous mental forces passing between them, could almost see a line of pure hatred flowing between their eyes. The priest turned bright red and beads of sweat broke out across his face, but it was the vampire that broke first, averting his eyes and twisting uneasily in his coffin. One hand fluttered towards the stake through his heart before falling limply back to his side. He now looked a little scared, and Resalintas nodded in satisfaction, waving the others to join him. Now they could talk.

     “What is your name?” he snapped in the tone of voice that had become a legend in Fort Battleaxe.

     The vampire looked back at him, but avoided the priest’s eyes and fixed on the thin, tight line of his mouth instead. “You have the honour to address Bakoulos Drak, Lord of Marlania,” he said in a voice that tried hard to be firm and confident but wavered at the end, betraying his fears. “Release me now, and I may be merciful, but be warned! If I escape, when I escape, I shall come for you and I will not be merciful. Your screams will echo across this doomed city and...”

     “Be silent,” said Resalintas calmly, and the vampire fell silent instantly. “Now listen to me, Bakoulos Drak. You are not going to escape from here, but it’s just possible that we might let you go, if we can come to a mutually amicable arrangement. The alternative for you is the separation of your head from your shoulders, ending your wretched, miserable existence, something that Father Luchos here is keen to do in any case, just out of general principles. You’re probably too proud to make a deal with us, in which case we can take care of this distasteful business here and now, but if you are fond enough of what we may, however inaccurately, call your life to want to prolong it, then this is your one and only chance to do so. Speak now or die forever.”

     The vampire glared back at him, his whole face twisted with hatred and fury, as well as a little fear, but he said nothing. After a couple of minutes, Resalintas sighed. “Oh well, it was worth a try. Let’s end it.” He picked up the long dagger that lay on the table next to the coffin, held it against the vampire’s throat. He tensed his powerful muscles to begin cutting.

     “What kind of arrangement?” blurted out the vampire.

     Resalintas stayed his hand, noting with satisfaction that the last of his haughtiness, arrogance and pride had deserted him. The creature was now ready to bargain for its life, for want of a better word. He Kept the knife where the vampire could see it, turning it so that the light from the temple’s glowbottles was reflected from its razor sharp edge.

     “There are certain things we would like to know,” he said. “Things known to you or that you could find out without too much effort. Give us this information and you may go free, although with certain restrictions on your movements and activities.”

     “What do you want to know?” asked the vampire.

     There was a defeated tone in his voice, but it was false and the priest recognised the craftiness and deception beneath it. He fixed the vampire’s eyes with his own again, therefore, and stared hard. “And make sure you tell the truth, because I will know right away if you lie to us. You can be sure that if you try to deceive us, you will be severely punished. You may be immune to most things that cause pain and suffering in the living, but you can still be hurt and I know how to do it. Is that understood?”

     The vampire nodded dumbly and now there was genuine fear in his eyes. Resalintas nodded to himself with satisfaction. The most important part was over. Up until now the vampire had felt only contempt for his captors. Frail, pitiful creatures that would all be dead in a few short decades, struck down by the passage of time itself. Even when he’d been taken to Battleaxe Tower and placed in the temple and it had become clear that they had something special in mind for him, he had very clearly felt only a rising curiosity and the expectation that an opportunity to escape would come.

     That hope was gone now, Resalintas was pleased to see. The vampire now knew that the priests could inflict unbearable agony on him and do it as coldly and impersonally as a butcher carving up a side of beef. They would do it without the slightest trace of compassion, remorse, sympathy, without even any anger or hatred. The vampire would be merely an object that would yield something useful if certain things were done to it, like an ore that yields metal when melted in a furnace. The vampire would be seeing all this in the priest’s eyes and Resalintas was confident now that when the priests began asking questions, he would answer with nothing but the whole, absolute truth.