A Darkness Below: Chapter 7
Well, since I messed up and forgot to post a chapter last week, I am going to toss out another chapter for all of you fine folks this week. Enjoy! As always, upvotes are most welcome, as well as any comments or critiques!
If you're just coming to A Darkness Below, you can check out the previous chapters here:
Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6
The door to his cell opened, causing Jasen to open one eye and lean his head up.
He hadn’t been sleeping really; he never slept, but he had been lost in his thoughts. Every once in awhile he’d catch a glimpse of something other than the diamond sand of the desert. Poplars, lined a cobblestone road, and green grass swayed in a gentle breeze. The sun warmed his skin, burning bright in the middle of a sapphire sky. Cool, white marble, shaded from the heat of a summer day. They always came as fleeting images that he couldn’t place, but he knew there was something more to them. They were older than other memories. They were his oldest, he suspected.“Back again, Maggie?”
“Were you expecting someone else,” she said, ever eager to deposit her delivery and leave him in his cell.
“No, can’t say I was. Don’t really get visitors down here,” he said, chuckling a little. He shifted to sit up against the stone wall as he watched her walk into his cell and come to a stop in front of him. The chair was still pulled out, an open invitation that she looked to continue ignoring.
She tossed him the glass bottle filled with blood, catching him square in the chest again, this time with a little more force than before. Jasen made a sound at the impact, but he unscrewed the top just as he had before and drank it down. He felt better than he had in some time, and despite the hollowness in his cheeks and eyes, he looked much more composed than two weeks ago, when Maggie had come down the first time. Jasen set the bottle down by his feet like he had before and looked up at her.
“Something bothering you?”
“What do you care?” she snapped.
“Just making conversation. You don’t have to be curt with me. I’m not trying to glean anything out of you,” he returned, his tone intentionally softened.
“Spare me,” Maggie said, rolling her eyes. “If you could talk long enough, you’d convince me to give myself over and sate your thirst so you could escape. I’m not stupid. Wasn’t born yesterday.”
Jasen chuckled and tucked his feet underneath him, slowly lifting himself up to stand. The chains and manacles didn’t allow him to travel far from the wall, but it felt good to stretch his legs. It also put him on even footing with Maggie; now, instead of looking up at her, he could afford to look slightly down at her.
“You know, we’re not all blessed with the gift of a hypnotic voice. I can’t entrance anyone by wiles alone. I have to persuade people the old-fashioned way. Anyway, what’s eating you?”
Maggie furrowed her brows. She didn’t really want to have this conversation with him. He was no better than an animal, and yet, who else could she talk to? They all seemed to want to give her the same response to her concerns: write a report, file it, and send it up the chain. Fat lot of good that had done her thus far. With a sigh, she slid into the chair and took a seat.
“The thing that landed me down here delivering you your repulsive meals was something that one of you said to me, before I sent its head looking for its body. It was talking about an attack on the Order. On Cahir itself. I’ve seen similar reports come in elsewhere, but no one wants to believe that there’s a credible threat there.”
“Maybe there isn’t,” he said simply, shrugging his shoulders.
Maggie looked incredulously at Jasen. Had she really bothered with all of that explanation just to be stonewalled again, this time by a damned monster in a basement? She instantly regretted saying anything. Jasen rolled his shoulders and twisted his neck back and forth, releasing a series of sickening pops.
“Oh that felt fantastic! Sometimes it’s good to just stretch your limbs,” he said, arching his back and shaking his legs out.
“Then again, Maggie, maybe there is a credible threat. Maybe they’re talking about it because they know you’re short-handed here and couldn’t repel a direct attack. If I were scheming to take down the Order, that’s what I’d do.”
“Is that what you’re trying to do?”
“How do you propose I’m organizing anything from down here? I’m not...how do you say, telepathic? We don’t all share some mystical link of minds.”
“So then you think this is worth some sort of investigation.”
“I don’t underestimate my enemies. I did that twice; once against others, and once against myself. Both times I lost the fight. Now I assume that I’m going to lose the fight and work my strategy back from that assumption.”
Maggie shut her eyes and grit her teeth together. Of all the people in this castle, the only one that was giving her theory any weight was the only one that no one listened to. Suddenly her eyes opened and she cocked one brow up.
“How the hell do you know about our numbers?”
“Your father doesn’t come down to ask about the weather, Maggie.”
“My father? What in the bloody hell do you two talk about anyway?”
“History, mostly. He likes to complain to me, and I like to listen. It beats listening to myself.”
“Wait, you mean to tell me you two talk?” She looked at him in disbelief. “Like normal people?”
“Why not? I respect your father tremendously.”
“Some respect, seeing as you killed our people before he managed to capture you and throw you in this cage!” she spat, glaring daggers at him.
“I respect him, not the Order,” Jasen replied, making certain that she understood the distinction. “He accepted my surrender, even when his more overzealous friends did not. I could have killed all of them, but I didn’t, and he appreciated that. Whatever you think of your father, he’s an honorable man.”
“I know he’s an honorable man,” she retorted, her voice raising in volume. “I don’t need you to tell me that. Why he spared you is beyond me, honorable or no.”
Great story!
Thank you! Glad you're enjoying the story I'm putting out here!
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Always a good read. So many talented writers on here that I may never have time to read real books again. Would be neat if when a book like this is finished that it could be compiled into an Ebook format. Then, maybe even form a tab exclusively for completed works on Steemit. That would rock!
Oh buddy...it's going to happen. @rhondak and a number of others at the Fiction Workshop on PALnet have been discussing plans to set up a website to compile all of these stories together under a label.