A Dragon's Tale Ch. 50

Faced with no one in front of her, she turned to help Kendra.

She needn't have bothered.

Between Alana's bow, Rachel's magic, and Kendra's skill, not one of their attackers was left standing. She couldn't help comparing this fight to the one in Dotmier. Damn; what a difference it made when she had telepathy, Alana had a bow, and their opponents weren't wearing full chainmail armor.

The men who had been keeping the royal family and the bodyguards pinned beat a hasty retreat after seeing that their comrades in arms were all dead. Instead of chasing him, Octavian and his men hurried over to the ladies and joined them in a defensive posture, taking Shara and Lyra with them to keep them covered.

*Thanks for the save Beth.* Selene thought to everyone as she looked at the first man that had gone down in front of her. He was still alive and now being guarded by one of Octavian's men. He was also covering one of his eyes and he was obviously in a lot of pain.

One of his eyes had been poked out by something that no one could see.

*You're welcome.* The blonde replied.

*We're safe sir.* Alana thought to everyone and Selene could feel Ethan's relief over their bond stronger than she ever felt anything from him before.

*Oh thank God.* He replied, and Selene could just imagine how he would've said it too. She felt nearly as relieved that--

"Rachel, your hand!" Alana nearly screamed.

Selene looked, and saw--

Holy shit!

On her left hand, Rachel was missing almost all of her pinky finger and about half of her ring finger.

They had been cut off.

"I... I didn't notice." The redhead stared at the bleeding stumps of her two fingers. As if she was in a daze, she raised her other hand, probably to heal it.

"No! Don't heal it!" Taloni shouted as dove towards Rachel. "I can reattach them if we can find the fingers, but might not be able to if you heal it too much."

Thus began the search.

It took them ten minutes to find Rachel's pinky finger, and another five minutes after that to find the missing half of her ring finger. Selene, all of Ethan's wives, Octavian, Shara, and Lyra all looked, while one bodyguard watched the injured attacker and the other hurried to a nearby constable's station. The Laerten town guard showed up barely a minute after the fight was over and half of them had joined in the search at Shara and Lyra's instruction, the other half forming a defensive perimeter at Octavian's orders.

A local restaurant owner had bade them come in once the digits were found, saying that he would be honored to help the wives of the prophet. The fight had scared all his patrons away anyway, so he cleared a table and they'd laid the redhead on it.

"I'm sorry, but this will hurt like Saidow's lair." Taloni said. She raised a bottle of some clear alcoholic drink the restaurant owner had donated.

"Do it." Rachel whimpered slightly as she removed the bloody cloth she had been using to staunch the blood flow. Alana offered her a piece of cloth to bite down on, which the redhead accepted, bit down on, and then nodded to their resident medic.

The Fey teen poured the alcohol over the bloody stumps of her fingers.

Rachel hissed and her hand shook, but she didn't move it away.

Taloni then poured the alcohol over the fingers themselves since they had rolled on the street, and then cleaned them off with her self-healing dress. After that, she looked at the redhead again. "I'm sorry, but you'll probably pass out from the pain."

"We can hold her hand down." Selene volunteered, waggling her finger between Kendra and herself, the two women who had strength-enhancing vambraces.

Rachel nodded.

"I have some paralysis cuffs in my possession for unruly captives." One of the town guards volunteered. "That will ensure she does not move during the healing.

"I have some laudanum; that should help with the pain." The restaurant owner volunteered.

Everyone looked at Rachel, who hesitated a moment before nodding to both. The redhead downed the measured spoonful of the laudanum that was offered and then Alana put the cuffs on her. Afterwards, the wood elf grabbed her uninjured hand and held it tightly.

Selene watched and waited while the Fey teen did her work. Tee took her time carefully lining up the fingers correctly before she started healing and Alana helped hold them in their proper place. Selene could see tears starting to form in Rachel's eyes during the alignment process and at some point she must've passed out.

"Bone-on-bone pain is the worst." Kendra said quietly as she watched from beside Selene.

"Oh?"

The former Aldmiri nodded, but didn't elaborate.

For the next several minutes, no one spoke. Everyone watched while Taloni worked and they all seemed to be holding their collective breaths. Alana especially was staring almost without blinking. Selene thought she might've seen the wood elf's lips moving. Possibly a silent prayer?

"Okay, all done." Taloni said after quite some time. "There's no permanent damage and I was really careful, so the scar should be barely visible."

The Fey teen wiped the hand clean once again, having done so several times while she was working. It did indeed look like the scars were very faint. They had good lighting in the restaurant and Selene was looking for them, but even so they weren't obvious.

Selene took a deep breath and felt some tension leave her body as she exhaled; she hadn't realized she'd been so tense. What a day, and it wasn't even lunchtime yet.

Likewise, Alana also let out a deep breath as she gazed at the redhead. Selene could almost see the stress melt away from the wood elf's body as she learned that her fellow wife would be okay. Alana and Rachel were more than mere co-wives though. Selene didn't know how to characterize their relationship, but was somewhere between co-wife, best friend, and lover; perhaps all three.

Regardless, the wood elf looked more relieved than Selene had ever seen her.

The Brazilian took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

"Yeah." Kendra nodded from beside her. The dragon huntress was silent for several long seconds before speaking again. "I finally realized the downside of having people in my life that I love."

"Oh?"

The raven-haired woman nodded slowly and swallowed hard, and her voice had the edge of a crack as she spoke. "I could lose them."

"Yeah." Selene swallowed hard, thinking of her brother. She leaned against the wall and took another deep breath and let it out slowly. "Holy shit; what a day."

"This can't happen again." Kendra said with a hard edge to her tone.

"No, it can't." Selene agreed in much the same tone.

"I can't lose..." Kendra's voice cracked slightly and she swallowed. When she spoke again, her tone was almost unnaturally neutral. "This has to stop."

"How?"

Kendra glanced out towards the street where the battle had just taken place. "We find out who sent them, then..."

The former Aldmiri glanced into Selene's eyes and the Brazilian woman had to resist shuddering at the cold, calculating, and merciless expression that she saw. This wasn't the pleasant woman that Selene had grown to know. This was another side of her. This was the assassin. This was the 'cold-blooded killer' that Kendra had once proclaimed herself to be. Selene hadn't quite believed it then, but now... looking at her eyes at this moment...

Now she did.

This side of her made cold shivers run down her spine. However, the raven-haired woman did have a point; this needed to stop. Moreover, Kendra had the skills needed to make it stop.

"The town guard took the sole survivor into custody." Selene said after several long moments. "That man who lost his eye."

"You need to talk to him." Kendra stated.

"Me?"

"Well, maybe not 'talk'." Kendra said, and there was a note of dark humor in her voice.

"Oh. That." Selene nodded slowly and then clenched her jaw, her eyes on the recently-healed redhead. "I can do that."

* * *

Ethan felt like he'd lost ten years of his life in the last few minutes. His heart rate was only now slowing down and he almost felt sorry for the patch of grass on which he'd been furiously pacing mere moments before.

They were safe.

He breathed yet another sigh of relief.

"I take it they're okay?" Salma asked tentatively.

He nodded. "Yeah. One of my wives just let me know. Rachel was hurt, but she'll be okay."

"Thank Illuminar, blessed be He." Talven said, looking up to the heavens.

Ethan wasn't sure whether to agree with him or not; he had no idea if Illuminar had heard his request or if it had mattered. Perhaps they would've been fine without it. On the other hand...

"We should keep going." Ethan said after a minute or two. "My family is safe and I'd like to be able to say the same for yours."

Talven nodded. "It'll take until near nightfall to get there, so good idea."

"Lead the way." Ethan said.

However, now that his conscious mind wasn't subsumed with concern for his wives, it swung back to the other thing he'd been feeling strongly lately. That feeling that he was being watched was still there and just as strong as ever.

He kept feeling like something was behind him and would glance back suddenly, but nothing was ever there. He thought he might've caught the barest glimpse of something occasionally, but he was never sure. His skin was crawling under his scales and if he had hair on the back of his neck, it would have been raised since that morning.

He heard a scuffling sound behind him and whipped around with his hand on his sword.

There was nothing there.

Or at least, thereappeared to be nothing there. There was enough vegetation in which to hide that he couldn't be sure.

* * *

"I'm just not sure how I feel about that." Selene said quietly to Kendra as they followed Octavian over the cobblestone street towards the local constabulary where the only survivor of the ambush was being held prisoner. The captain of Shara and Lyra's guard had refused to leave the restaurant until there were several dozen town guards to protect everyone, and even then he had insisted that the royal guard remain with them.

"He tried to kill us." Kendra replied. "I don't see the problem."

"The problem is due process." The ex-FBI agent replied, having thought about it a bit more since leaving the restaurant where Rachel was healed. "A man has a right to defend himself when accused and me digging around in his head undermines that."

"It didn't seem to bother you when you did it to that Luminar in Dotmier." The dragon huntress countered.

"Correction; it didn't bother meat the time." Selene replied. "Looking back at it, I'm not sure I should have."

"The difference here is that his man tried to kill us." Kendra replied. "This isn't about proving innocence or guilt; he's guilty. He attacked us without provocation and tried to kill us. If Taloni wasn't so skilled at healing, Rachel would be missing two fingers for the rest of her life. He's guilty."

"True." Selene frowned. "I still don't like it though."

"If we don't find out why they tried to kill us and who sent them, then perhaps next time one of us will get an injury that can't be healed."

The telepath nodded, not happy that Kendra was entirely right. "Okay, I'll do it this time."

"Good."

For some reason, Selene got the impression that Kendra was slightly irked at her for being hesitant to read the man's mind. It was something about her body language and tone, and how the silence between them was suddenly a little awkward.

She let that stand for almost a minute before she spoke up. "You were trained to use everything at your disposal, weren't you?"

"Anything and everything." Kendra nodded.

"I was trained a little differently. I studied law and the idea of due process is central. I feel like telepathy violates that."

"How?" The dragon huntress countered. "Isn't the point of due process to make sure that the guilty are convicted and the innocent aren't? You don't need witnesses or evidence; you can just know."

Selene frowned.

Kendra had a point.

"I understand and admire your restraint." The dragon huntress clarified. "Some people would be reading every person's mind to get an advantage and you aren't doing that. But due process is about justice; making sure that the guilty party is punished and the innocent aren't. You don't need due process because you can simply read someone's mind and know for sure."

"I can't disagree." She ran her hand through her caramel hair as she thought about it. "However, what if I read the mind of someone who's innocent? Then I've violated that man's privacy and he was innocent. That's not right."

Kendra inclined her head in concession. "I see why that would bother you."

"It doesn't bother you?"

Kendra shrugged. "From what I understand, people are always projecting their thoughts anyway, it's just that only telepaths know how to listen. Why would I have a problem with listening to what someone is already projecting?"

Selene frowned. "Hmm."

She cocked her head to one side as she thought about it. It really was true. There was a difference between stepping into someone's mind -- like she'd done with Percival, the luminar in Dotmier -- and just listening to what was around her.

Out of curiosity, she opened a one-way window in her mental defenses so she could listen to what people around her were thinking. As usual when there were a lot of people around, it was a cacophony of mental 'noise' that she couldn't sort out. However, she couldn't deny that people were broadcasting their thoughts all the time.

Hmm.

"On the other hand, people assume that their thoughts are safe from being listened to." The Brazilian woman finally said as she closed her mental defenses again. "Sure they might project their thoughts, but is that any different from eavesdropping on someone who is talking to himself when he's home alone?"

"Youdo know what I used to do, right?" Kendra gave her a wry smile. "If someone says it, I have no problem listening. It doesn't matter to me if they say it verbally or mentally."

"Sometimes, I find you a little scary." Selene replied with her own wry smile.

"Sometimes, I do too." The raven-haired woman replied, and Selene couldn't quite tell if she was joking or not.

"We're here." Octavian said.

Selene looked at the building, which looked exactly like she thought a medieval jail should look. It was a stone building with iron bars in the windows and otherwise was completely nondescript. It looked to be roughly square in shape and there were archers on the roof. The blue Timarou flag with its stylized white horse was flying proudly in the light breeze.

The inside was also about what she expected as well, though it was clean. There was a small area in the front where half a dozen fully armed and chainmail-armored soldiers were milling about. They were equipped with shorter swords than she was used to seeing, which would be more useful in confined spaces. There were hallways on either side of this front area that looked like they led to the prison cells.

Notably, almost all of them were empty.

"He's the only one on the left side and I will be there when you interrogate him." Octavian's tone left no room for argument.

"Okay." Selene and Kendra nodded.

He led them down the short hall to the jail cell at the end. It wasn't very large, perhaps six feet deep and four feet wide. Just wide enough for a simple bedroll with a tiny bit of walking space. There was a covered hole in the floor which Selene assumed was the latrine.

The man himself was wearing the same simple street clothes that he had been wearing when he'd attacked them. They looked sturdy and well made, but otherwise were nothing special. His face was similarly nondescript. He had a short beard of a common brown color, an average build, and he was only slightly shorter than average as well.

The only thing that stood out was the bandage on his eye that was held on by a gauze wrap around his head. He was holding his hand over his bandaged left eye and his face was twisted into a grimace of pain.

"What's your name?" Selene asked.

"Fuck off." He retorted.

"Time for plan B." Kendra whispered as she nudged Selene.

The Brazilian woman took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

"Selene." Octavian said quietly enough that the prisoner wouldn't hear. "I have no objection to you using telepathy, but I would object to you harming the prisoner's mind."

"Trust me, I have no plans to do that." She replied equally as quietly, then turned to Kendra. "If I don't find anything after a minute, start asking questions. It will be a lot easier to get information about the attack if he's actively thinking about it."

The dragon huntress nodded.

Selene took a moment to brace herself and then opened a one-way window in her mental defenses to allow his thoughts through...

Then hissed in pain and clamped her hand over her left eye as it suddenly exploded in pain.

Fuck!

She almost doubled over and had just enough awareness to slam her mental defenses shut as her legs started to give out from the sudden onslaught of pain. Thankfully, Kendra caught her before she hit the floor and the pain levels plummeted once she'd closed her mental defenses. It didn't go away completely though, not immediately.

*Selene, are you okay!* Ethan thought to her.

*I'm fine.* She grimaced. *I tried looking into the mind of the ambush survivor. Beth poked his eye out and I forgot that I can feel someone else's pain. It hurt like a son-of-a-bitch.*

*Oh, okay.* He replied, and she could almost see how he would be sighing with relief. *Don't scare me like that, not after earlier.*

*I'll try.* She replied.

"Forget to filter out the pain?" Kendra asked quietly once the Brazilian woman had straightened up some.

"I don't think I'll forget that again." Selene took a deep breath. "Okay, round two."

Remembering that intent was important when it came to telepathy, Selene opened a one-way window in her mental defenses and focused on not letting the man's pain affect her.

It worked.

It felt weird because she could feel that he was feeling pain, but she couldn'tactually feel his pain. The sensation was strange and not altogether pleasant, but much better than the searing pain from before. She took a moment to adjust to the sensation and then started paying attention to the man's thoughts.

He was very different from anyone else whose mind she had read before, except perhaps Raklan. She'd seen Ethan's mind when they'd bonded of course, that luminar in Dotmier, and she caught fleeting glimpses of Octavian and his men while practicing her telepathy, though nothing beyond surface thoughts. All of them had a certain essential goodness about them and their thoughts. They all had cares or concerns about someone other than themselves flitting through their thoughts and they were concerned about someone other than themselves.

This man wasn't.

As Selene looked through his thoughts, they were all of gold, women, -- and more than anything else -- what was in it for him. It seemed to be his sole concern.

As Selene let his thoughts flow around her, the man seemed to be staring at the Brazilian woman's body and face. Not her as a person; her body and face. She must've reminded him of someone because a memory popped up of him driving himself into a woman who looked vaguely like her only not nearly as gorgeous. He wasn't gentle. She seemed willing, but not enjoying it at all. Possibly a prostitute? He used the woman without regard for her at all. Even more disturbing, Selene could feel a rush of pleasant feelings coming from him.

She shuddered.

This was afond memory for him.

She nudged Kendra and nodded her head towards the man.