Chapter B2C41 - Broken

Chapter B2C41 - Broken

It was tempting to reach out and tap at the array with a finger, just to make sure it was working. Poranus glared at it, unwilling to believe what he was seeing. The eyes could lie, he knew it well, especially when a person was tired.

And he was tired. Exhausted. Day after day, he and the Magisters had poured their magick into the sigils, turning arcane energy into pain, until he had begun to believe it would never end.

Yet, as he continued to look, the sigils continued to lie dim. No response from the brands meant that the slayers in question were not acting against instructions. Despite the fact he’d been pouring his life into the sigils for weeks, he double checked to make sure that the two he was looking at corresponded to Magnin and Beory, and they did.

“Well, it’s nice to finally close the book on this little task,” a cultured male voice said from beside him.

Poranus ground his teeth, but tried to keep his dislike under wraps. No need to aggravate his fellow Magisters, particularly one on the fast track for promotion.

“You don’t see this as a little suspicious, Herath?” he asked, gesturing to the unlit sigils. “After more than a month of resisting the highest level of torture the Magistry has ever devised, they just... give up?”

Brushing back his long golden hair with one hand, Herath smiled and shrugged carelessly, irritating his contemporary even further.

“It’s clear that the Steelarms concocted some method to resist or limit the effects of the brand, but they were unable to suppress it completely. Despite their best efforts, they were eventually broken down by our relentless pressure. A triumph for the Magistry and quite the feather in our cap, in my view. The strongest Slayers in the entire province couldn’t resist our will. Doesn’t that mean all is working as intended?”

Poranus’ eyes boggled.

“We needed a rotating team of Magisters working around the clock for a month to get any response at all! Does that sound like everything is fine? They must have discovered a flaw, or weakness.”Updated from novelbIn.(c)om

As he muttered to himself, Herath just shook his head.

“I swear, you just refuse to take a win when it’s handed to you. Look,” he pointed, “the sigils are silent. The Steelarms will obey, or they will die. That is the end of it.”

Despite himself, Poranus tried to let his irritation and anxiety go. He was just being paranoid. An unfortunate result of the ordeal he’d gone through over the previous weeks.

Just by a hair, he allowed himself to relax, and only then did he realise how tightly wound he’d become.

“I need to sleep for a week,” he muttered, and Herath grinned.

“I’d invite you to the Jorlin estate, the grapes are being harvested at the vineyards, you can smell the wine in the air,” he closed his eyes and flared his nostrils, as if imagining the rich scent, then shook his head, “but only family are allowed. Apologies, brother.”

“Then why mention it?” Poranus growled.

A robed servant nervously tapped at the door.

“What?” the disgruntled Magister snapped.

Always has to flaunt his family connections, as if his natural gift for magick wasn’t enough. Arrogant prick.

“The Lady would like to see you,” the servant bowed.

Blood instantly froze in his veins.

“Do you mean myself, or Magister Jorlin?” Poranus forced out.

“The Lady requested you by name, Magister Taridus.”

Herath placed a comforting hand on his shoulder.

“Try not to piss her off and get yourself killed,” he said, smiling.

It was a good answer. Neither yes, nor no, he simply spoke the truth. Everyone believed they were foolproof.

“Then the Steelarms are moving to execute their criminal child?” she asked, as if discussing the weather.

“We have no reason to believe otherwise, my lady.”

Her eyes flickered down to the page then back to meet his.

“And what is your personal belief, Magister?”

A direct question. The worst kind.

“I believe... that the Steelarms developed a method that allowed them to blunt or resist at least part of the pain caused by the Mark,” he said slowly. “Using this method, they were able to endure until this point, but now their will has broken and they obey. That is what I believe to be the most likely series of events.”

It was the most likely. Herath had believed it also.

“I did not ask what you believed was most likely. What do you believe?”

He swallowed.

“I... find it... difficult... to believe that two individuals such as the Steelarms would give up so easily. I do not believe they will willingly kill their own child.”

Lady Erryn watched him for a moment, a glimmer of interest finally appearing in her eyes. She leaned forward, resting her chin on her own steepled fingers.

“Well, I should hope that they don’t,” she said dryly.

Poranus was taken aback. Isn’t that what they’d wanted all this time?

“I don’t understand,” he said, “you don’t want them to kill him?”

The noble shook her head slightly and tsked, her brown curls waving.

“What will happen if they refuse to obey their orders?” she asked him, as if lecturing a student.

As if I didn’t know.

“We will use their Marks to torture them to death,” he said.

“Obviously. Now that they no longer resist, they will not be granted a second chance. If they do not bring us the head of their boy, we will resume the torture in a week.”

The Magister wanted to slump forward. So his ordeal was not over yet. How he yearned to be free of this laborious nonsense.

“So you would rather the boy was left alive, and the parents killed?” he asked.

“You are not thinking with enough clarity,” she said. “All three of them will die. That is our will.”

All three of them?

“When you say ‘our will’...” he began.

“The Aristocracy speaks with the voice of the Divines,” she cut him off, blue eyes glinting like steel. “They have ordered it, and so it shall be.”