The Assassin and the Sorceress Ch. 05

"How did you wind up with her?"

Susan swallowed. She looked like she didn't want to answer that question. Adrielle repeated her question. This time, Susan replied, making no eye contact at all.

"She... captured me."

"Why?"

"I don't know. To torment me?"

"How many years ago was that?"

"I don't even know."

"What year was it when she took you?"

"It was... Do you know Years of Our Lord? Do you still use that?"

"Yes, of course."

"It was... Three Hundred... Three Hundred and Eighty Seven, I think."

"My God!" Adrielle could barely believe it!

"Why? What year is it now?"

"It's the Year of Our Lord One-Thousand-and-Twenty-Two. August twenty-first, if I've been counting right."

"My God..." Susan agreed.

"Over six-hundred years..." Adrielle mused, running the words over her tongue as if testing the feel of them. "That's quite a long life!" But when she looked over at Susan again, she saw Susan looked morose, almost on the verge of tears.

"You don't like it here, do you?"

"No," Susan whispered.

"The others aren't nice to you, are they?" Adrielle risked rubbing the girl's shoulder. The risk seemed to pay off. Susan turned her head and looked her in the eye at last. She was definitely beginning to tear up.

"No. They aren't. I never knew it had been so long."

"Why does she keep you here?"

"She's very possessive. Also, maybe for revenge."

"Revenge? What on Earth for?"

"I don't want to talk about it."

"Is that why she treats you so much worse that everyone else? Some old grudge?"

"I think so."

"But then why does everyone else treat you like that?"

"Because she does. She's the mistress of the castle, so why wouldn't they do what she does?"

"I don't think they respect her like you think."

"What do you mean?"

"They need her. She can give them anything they ask for. They don't love her any more than a rich man loves his gold. And she knows it, too. I think that's why she's so sad all the time."

"She's sad?"

"I think so. She hides it well. Most people who are sad all the time learn to hide it. At least you're honest about it. You're one of the few."

"How do you know she's so sad?"

"I've spent a lot of time talking with her. I figure even an old witch like her deserves that. Maybe I figure she'll stop being such an old witch if somebody finally listens to her." That earned a chuckle from Susan. That was progress: amazing progress, in fact!

"And how's that going?"

"Well, there's still some work to be done. She's been sad for a very, very long time, so I guess slow progress to be expected."

"It's not going to work. She's a monster. Pure evil."

"I don't think she is. Have you heard the story of how I came to be here?"

"Yes, a little bit of it. She announced it at your first supper here. You had come for Gwendolyn?"

"That's part of it. I came here to kill her. For kidnapping Gwendolyn."

"Right."

"If I had caught someone sneaking into my bedroom to assassinate me, I suppose I would have killed them given half a chance. Before even asking why. But she didn't. She asked me why I had come to kill her, what crime I thought she had committed to deserve death. It turned out it was a misunderstanding. I thought she had kidnapped Gwendolyn, but I was wrong. And she forgave me. Do you think a monster could forgive somebody that tried to kill them?"

Susan didn't answer.

"Like I said, there's still a long way to go. How I've seen her treating you, it's not acceptable. But we can't fight her; she's nearly omnipotent. We can't run away. So what's left? All we can do is try to get through to her."

"And you think you can... 'get through' to her?"

"Yeah. I think I can. Maybe you can help."

"How? She hates me."

"That might change. And even before then, maybe you can help me by telling me about her. You've been with her the longest."

"I don't really know much. It sounds like you already know her better than me."

"Or you could tell me about her powers... how they work, if there are any limitations." Adrielle moved her eyes to the window in front of them. "Maybe there's a way outside that window after all. We just have to put our heads together."

"How? I've tried it a hundred times! And you said it yourself: she's almost omnipotent."

"Yeah, well I'm pretty clever. Prettydamnclever, even! I have to be to be an assassin. I might think of something eventually. But the more I know about her and her capabilities, the more likely I'll find some blind spot or another. I'll get us out of here. Instead of killing somebody, maybe for once I get to save somebody. Maybe that'll be my redemption. What do you think?"

"I like your original plan better. I think killing a monster like her could redeem you of any sin."

"Well, I haven't ruled that out yet, either. Though... I wouldn't like to. Only if there's no other way. And if I can even find a way to do it in the first place."

"The invincibility spell... it has to come off every so often."

"Really?"

"You might not have had it on you long enough. But flesh is alive; it has to grow. It has to keep healing and replacing itself. That's what she told me. The spell locks certain things in place, so the process gets backed up. Keep it on for too long, and... I don't know. I've never seen what happens, but she says your skin might die eventually. She used to have to lift the spell every few days, but she's been working on the spell so it blocks the natural process less and less. It's still not perfect. Now she only has to remove the spell once every year or so, for a few hours."

"Well that's very interesting."

"I'll let you know if I can think of anything else."

"Thanks. Hmm, of course that presents another problem. We have to make sure this spell is off of us before we escape, or one day our skin might start, um, dying."

"I know. I think that's the real reason she keeps it on us. Even if we were to escape, we'd need to come back eventually."

"And if we do manage to kill her, what happens to the spells she has on us? Will her magic survive her? Forever?"

"I don't know."

"Well, that's another reason why killing her should be a last resort. Absolute last."

"I don't know. Everyone else in the world dies. You haven't lived hundreds of years yet, so you don't know what it's like to literally have no end in sight, to have death itself taken from you.Stolenfrom you! We're mortal beings, we humans. We'remeantto die eventually. I'm tired, Adrielle. And I don't care if I die because my skin rots off. At least it's an end."

There was a long silence as Adrielle tried to think of what to say.

"Well,I'mnot to that point yet, Susan," she said at last. "Even if you are, I'm not willing to put myself through that. Until we know more about what will happen to our skin, I'm not willing to risk that just yet. I'll help you escape, but at least if she's alive we can come back if we have to."

There was more silence. It was Susan who broke it next.

"Adrielle?"

"Yes?"

"Have you really killed a lot of people?"

"Yes. A few."

"Do you regret it?"

"No, not really. Maybe I was just trying to be poetic when I said all that stuff about redemption. Yeah, apparently I can be poetic when I don't mean to. No, most of the people I killed were dangerous and wicked people. Sometimes I wonder if I'll have a few things to answer for when I finally meet my maker, but it's not the people I've killed I'm most worried about."

"Who have you killed?"

"Well, there was Matthew the Ogre."

"An ogre? You killed an ogre?"

"I suppose. That's what they called him, at least, and the description was fitting."

"Matthew... That's a strange name for an ogre."

"Yeah. Matthew was named by the church that found him. He was left on their doorstep as an infant. They never knew for sure who his parents were, but they had suspicions. They said his deformities were a punishment from God, a punishment for the bad things his parents did. If the rumors had any truth to them, his mother was married, but had a secret lover. She got pregnant, and feared her lover was the child's father, so they conspired to murder her husband. The attempt failed. Next, she tried to kill the unborn child in her womb to cover up their affair. That also failed. It was for those sins that Matthew was given his deformities. And when they tried to escape their divine punishment by abandoning him to the church, he became a curse on the whole town. Or at least that was what the town gossip said.

"Matthew was hideous, a monster in every sense of the word. He grew up big and strong: VERY big and strong, but too deformed to do much real work, and too stupid. He was also dangerous, prone to fits of rage. I never saw any of this myself. This all happened in a small village a ways away from the city, but still legally under the Count's protection. Matthew supposedly ran off into the wilderness one day. They thought that was the last of him, until one day, years later, children started going missing. Four of them in all, one of which was taken from her crib in the middle of the night.

"A few nights after the fourth went missing, one of the town watch said he saw a hulking form hiding in the woods, which ran off as soon as it was seen. It didn't take them long to remember Matthew the Ogre. I was one of those who volunteered to search the surrounding woods for him. It was me that eventually found him. I guess he had found an old hut miles and miles away from the village, maybe once used by a hunter. Or maybe he killed the owner. He certainly didn't build it himself. He was... monstrous. He had a hunchback, but was still almost ten feet tall. His arms were almost as big as me. He was hideous, his eyes looked like those of an animal. I could barely believe something like that could come from a woman's womb. Then again, nobody really knows for sure that he did.

"I tried to talk to him. He tried to speak back to me, but I couldn't understand him. His mouth didn't seem like it had been made for words. I tried to go in his hut, but he didn't like that. He attacked. He picked me up, both hands around my waist, and bit into my shoulder. He almost snapped my shoulder bone.

"Luckily I managed to get my weapon out of my belt with my good arm. I started stabbing him anywhere I could. I must have pierced him ten times before he finally screamed and threw me on the ground. It was a messy fight. Thank God he was so clumsy. If he had gotten ahold of me one more time I think that would have been it for me. He could have thrown me twenty feet up in the air with those arms!

"I cut his arms a few times with my dagger when he made grabs for me. But it wasn't until he tripped and fell that I could get close enough to do some real damage. When it was finally over, I went into his hut. I found... I found the bones. Of the children. It was the hardest thing I'd ever had to look at in my life. I vomited. Then I just cried."

"Why did he do it?"

"Who can say? Maybe he was a demon sent to plague us for our sins. Maybe he was an evil man. Or more likely he was just an animal and didn't know any better. That's what I'd bet on, but it doesn't matter. It's for God to judge now. All I know was that he was too dangerous to be kept alive."

"You don't think God sent him as punishment? You doubt the church's explanation?"

"I suppose it's possible... but it's just as likely he was nothing more than an accident of birth."

"Really, Adrielle? You doubt the words of the church?" Susan said with the smallest semblance of s smile.

"Haha! The church didn't exactly declare that as doctrine. The idea that Matthew was some sort of punishment from God was more town gossip than anything. Although... that notion did make it into a few sermons. So, yes, I suppose the church did eventually declare it.

Susan smiled. "I like you, Adrielle."

"Ha! Uh, thanks? I guess you share Morgana's opinion on the Faith?"

"I've only ever seen Christianity used to oppress people, to keep them under control. Morgana has magic. She doesn't need sermons about demons and hellfire to keep people obedient. But where I grew up, the lords used the Bible constantly to tell people what to do and how to live their lives. But I don't know if it really improves their lives. I had hoped that it might fall out of fashion eventually, though I guess it hasn't."

"I have seen it used to good ends. But, yes, I have also seen it used for that as well. In fact, that was another person I killed. I killed the leader of a cult. Maybe you'll like this story."

"A cult? Were they pagans?"

"Not exactly, though they were heretics in an even worse way. Their leader quoted the Bible, though poorly. He used it like a weapon, bending its words in ways that benefited him. He claimed to be the second coming of Christ. He said Armageddon was near, and that only his personal followers would be saved. There may have been about a hundred of them. A hundred-and-fifty at most. They had built a village of their own off in the middle of nowhere, wooden walls all around it. Not sure if it was to keep people out or to keep them in."

"What was his name?"

"I never knew. He made his followers call him Christ, and that's the only name I've ever heard anyone call him. I refuse to call him that now, even if he's dead. I just think of him as the heretic now. I guess that's my name for him.

"Count Bastian knew about the heretic and his cult for a while. They were heathens, but he figured let them have their fun if they weren't hurting anybody. That was very benevolent of him, now that I think about it. How many priests these days, or ever, would consider an opposing religion not an immediate threat to them? But all the same, when they started murdering travelers on the road, that put an end to that thinking. He could have marched his men into their walled village and slaughtered them to the last, but he wanted to know more about them first. He wanted to know how something like this could possibly get started so he could keep it from ever happening again. He sent me to infiltrate the cult. I would learn what I could from the inside, and then kill him when I saw fit.

"What I learned was terrifying. Not that a man like him can exist. The world is full of madmen; that's nothing new. No, the terrifying part was that people actually followed him: enough to give him real power. When you command over a hundred lives, you're something to be reckoned with. And they let him rule over their lives gladly! He took all the pretty women for himself. He must have had like twenty wives, a good third of the women there. His youngest wife was just thirteen years old. Disgusting! But it gets worse. He'd order his followers to kill people for no reason, and they'd do it. They didn't question him. They even enjoyed it. I saw it for myself a few times. The look of exaltation in their eyes as they committed murder at his behest... It still gives me nightmares to this day. Not him. Them! I spoke to a man who had killed his own son as a show of loyalty. And he said it with pride! Like he had passed the ultimate test. It was like the tale of Isaac, except... except... he was never told to stop. All these people would have had to have done was collectively decide that he was crazy and just stop listening to him. But nobody did. He made examples of anyone that showed signs of thinking independently."

"But you eventually killed him?"

"Yes, eventually. First, I tried to talk to some of his followers in private. I wanted to see if I could get them to leave him of their own free will. It was hopeless. They...knewhe was God in the flesh. Some of them threatened to kill me for heresy. I mostly got out of that by claiming he had sent me to test their faith, and that they had passed."

"Clever!"

"Or just lucky. I was his favorite wife by then, so they were cautious to go against my word. They were also extremely gullible. I suppose they'd have to be to be there in the first place."

"You were his favorite wife? Did you have to...?"

"Yes. I did have to. Thankfully, I managed to satisfy him well enough with my, um, mouth."

Susan made a disgusted face.

"Yeah, it wasn't pleasant. It was better than the alternative, though. No way was he gettingthat."

"So when did you decide to kill him?"

"I killed him exactly when Count Bastian told me to: when I had learned everything I thought I was going to. I had been there for just over two months, about as long as I've been here now, and in that time he had ordered five of his own followers killed. I have no idea how many people had been attacked outside of his cult in that time. People were dying. It was definitely time to end it."

"Was what you learned worth it?"

"Yeah, I think so. I learned that people can be astoundingly gullible when the lie benefits them. That was how he gained his followers. He told them, the hundred or so who listened to him, that they were better than anyone else on the Earth. It was okay for them to kill outsiders and take what they wanted from them, so long as they worshipped him. They had nothing but eternal salvation ahead of them, and 'eternal domination over the unworthy multitudes,' as he often worded it. One hell of a promise, huh? None of them ever figured they would be the next one torn apart.

"But, yes, how I killed him. I suppose I could have just slit his throat in the middle of the night like I did with several others, but he was a special case. I wanted a confession from him. I wanted him toknowwhy I was killing him, and I wanted to see it in his eyes.

"I had lots of time to prepare, after all. So one night I requested that he spend the night with me alone. He usually took several of his wives, but he sent them away at my request. I did my usual service to him, the last one. As soon as he was asleep, I shackled his hands and slid a gag I had made around his face. It was a wide leather strap that fit from his chin up to his nose. I had tied a noose of sorts around the back, so when I pulled it tight it stayed that way. I had coated the inside of the gag with grease from the kitchen, so it made an airtight seal around his mouth. Then I pinched his nose shut with my fingers. That was important to me. Don't judge me, but I wanted it to be my own hands that snuffed his life out, not some tool. You never met him."

"Oh, don't worry. No judgment from me. I hope you enjoyed it."

"Yes, I did. He tried to fight me, but he was old and I was young. My gag worked perfectly. He could barely even groan. So I gave him a quick speech that I had constructed just as carefully as that gag. I used the short minute or two he had left to tell him what a heathen he was. I told him the only thing more disgusting than sucking his cock all those times was calling a deceiver like himself 'Christ.' Then I asked him a few questions. I told him to say 'yes' or 'no' by blinking. I allowed him a few breaths, as many as I thought he needed to survive my interrogation. He confessed everything to me. The last question I asked him if he was really Christ returned. He blinked 'no' over and over again, pleading for his life.

"So I whispered into his ear 'Too bad. I'm still going to kill you. I'm going to send you to the man you claimed to be. You'll be disappointed to find out he's very real indeed. How do you think he will judge you after you perverted his name so?' I held his nose tight. He struggled, then he twitched, and then he stopped moving altogether. When I was sure he was good and dead, I left him as he was and snuck out quietly. I can only imagine what it must have been like when they found him. The cult fell apart in days. A lot of them died in some kind of fight, maybe over who his successor would be? I don't know. Whatever it was, Count Bastian's men showed up and arrested the survivors with little trouble. A few of them were rehabilitated, some were executed for banditry, but most of them are still rotting away in the dungeons. They could never be made to give up the lie. I think it's because they couldn't bear the shame of admitting, even to themselves, that they had been fooled by a fake. It hurt them less to keep the lie and rot away in the dungeons, telling themselves they were still right."