he’d never face justice as long as he kept it to himself.
Days stretched into weeks while he waited for the new king to judge him for Cirang’s crimes. He went hungry at times because some of the guards claimed to have run out of food by the time they reached his cell with the slop bucket. In truth, they were afraid of him. He was certain of it, for he’d heard them arguing in whispers outside his door over whose turn it was to enter her cell to feed her or take her waste pail or fill her water bucket. His memory of Cirang’s life shed no light on the reason for their wariness, but he saw it in their eyes when they approached and in their haste in performing their tasks before locking the door and scurrying back up the corridor.
During the days, he spent his time staring at his pale, unwarded hands. Sewn into the skin of every newborn Nilmarion by the village shaman, the natal ward kept him safe from the evils through childhood. Its purpose was to protect him until he was old enough for the ward of readiness. While Tyr had become accustomed to seeing the unwarded faces and hands of the people of Thendylath, the lines on his own hands, and the reflection of those on his face, had always provided a comfort that resonated with the deepest, oldest part of himself. Although the ward lines hadn’t ultimately protected him from the evils as he’d been raised to believe, seeing his hands without them disturbed him greatly.
Nights were the worst. Time and again, he dreamed of bloody claws sinking into his skin, twisting his body and breaking his back with a snap. He awoke gasping for air and clutching at the muscle spasms in his back. He relived the demon’s brutal attack so many times over those weeks that he feared falling asleep. The injury that had caused Cirang’s death had only hurt for an instant, while the memory of it would be eternal. One night after another, he lay on the bed late into the mirknight, too tired to stay awake but too fearful of that awful pain to let his mind relax without jerking awake in anticipation every few minutes.
Some nights weren’t as bad. Those were the ones in which the horror of the demon, reaching for him with its black-clawed hands, made him scream aloud, waking with a start before the worst part came. Those nights, his fellow prisoners cursed him unsympathetically and promised to punish him in the most unpleasant of ways once they were freed.
One night, he dreamed the demon had him by the throat in its vice-like grip, just as it had done to Ravenkind. Tyr awoke gasping, unable to breathe. Something covered his mouth and pinched his nose shut. He tried slapping it away and felt what seemed like dozens of arms and hands pushing him down, wrestling his arms to his sides and spreading his legs apart. A candle cast shadows of his multi-armed attacker onto the wall above his bed. Trying to climb on top of him was the dreaded black-beard — the new gaol warden, appointed after the old warden was promoted to lordover’s captain. Tyr fought harder, realizing the warden had brought a friend.
Then Tyr realized he’d been stripped of his trousers. He managed to shake off the hand over his mouth. “No! Get off me, you ugly bas—” he said before he was muzzled once again.
“What’s happenin’ over there?” asked the prisoner in the adjacent cell.
“Shut up and mind your own business,” black-beard snapped.
Tyr got his right leg free and tried to slam his knee into black-beard’s groin, but the man was already on top of him. The blow did little to deter his attacker.
“Hold her legs, damn it.”
The guard got a hold of Tyr’s ankle and pushed it down onto the bed. Tyr bucked as hard as he could under the warden’s weight. He slammed his forehead into black-beard’s face. Black-beard reeled, freeing Tyr’s right hand. He drove his thumb into black-beard’s left eye. The warden rolled off him, screaming, and fell onto the floor. Now, with his hands free, Tyr sat up, grabbed the guard’s head, and jammed both thumbs into his eyes too. The guard screamed and let go, flailing with his arms and stumbling backwards. Other prisoners demanded to know what was happening.
Now free, Tyr leaped to his feet and into a fighting stance. “The warden and his