Dahlia: A Novel of Dark Desire

Chapter Eight

The next morning Dahlia slipped on her lightweight tunic and pants then pulled her dark, auburn hair into a knot, preparing to run her troops through another exercise. Nel had been progressing nicely over the past week she noted cheerfully, especially since she'd assigned Fidelity to oversee his exercises in mental defenses. Fidelity's mind was like her chosen weapon, a hammer that pounded at her opponent's psyche until they crumbled. Not very subtle, but undoubtedly effective.

Dahlia grabbed her own weapons, a set of jet battle axes, and slipped them into the sheath strapped across her hips. An unusual pair, their make and material gave them a lighter weight but an unbreakable strength. She could swing them as fast as the normally lighter swords but back up any cut with their blunt force.

She joined her barrack members, already present on their training ground, and instructed them to pair off and work with their padded or wrapped weapons. Fidelity exchanged her hammer for the wooden one.

Dahlia strode among them as they practiced, correcting as she went. She caught sight of Borreal approaching out of the corner of her eye and drifted closer to him.

"Captain," he inclined his head.

"Captain," she returned the nodded greeting. "Any word on progress with the prisoner."

"We've kept him awake. His mental state has greatly weakened and under persuasion from my guard he's admitted to much but doesn't seem to be able to divulge his reason for wanting the journal."

"He's admitted to being a spy for the emperor's forces and we've received some useful tactical information for our efforts," Borreal continued, "but I'd like you to take a look and see if you can break the concealment that's been placed on him. There's no doubt in my mind that the concealment is not of his own making. He's in no state to continue maintaining it."

Dahlia nodded and waved Sabir over to her. He broke off from his work with a junior member and jogged over.

"Yes, Captain?"

"Oversee the rest of the team's training then lead them on a run through the trees around the barrack. I'm going to accompany Captain Borreal."

Sabir nodded and took over her post, walking through the paired soldiers.

She followed Borreal back past the main building and down into the area prisoners were kept. As they approached Macada's holding cell she resisted the urge to wrinkle her nose. She knew the methods were necessary but she'd never been a fan of inflicting pain for the sake of pain. A fight and a kill were worlds different from the misery she knew could be housed here.

She braced herself and opened the door to his cell. The traitor didn't look good. She imagined he wasn't entirely sane any more. She didn't look forward to touching his mind. Every time she touched something like that it left a lingering impression, like a scar on her psyche. She was careful to heal and care for her psyche so that the scars didn't build up over time and drive her into the same misery and despair she'd witnessed.

She steadied herself and looked into his eyes. Natural windows to the mind, they were the easiest place for her to enter. She felt the rush of misery, hopelessness, and confusion surround her but she set out her own boundaries and waded through, brushing past the sensations but never letting them run through her or cling on.

She dug through to the edge of the wall she'd encountered in his memories enclosed in her trap. She approached it sideways, touching it without looking directly at it so as not to activate the mental construct that had been put in place to conceal the wall from her. Then she began to bind it in place so it couldn't shift away from her as it had before. She located the root of the energy maintaining the concealment on the wall and then slowly disconnected it from the wall. Building on that work, she was able to work the concealment apart from the root. The energy composing the concealment collapsed in on itself, dissolving away and she was able to look directly at the wall.