Why Does Everything Have to be So Hard?
“If you just tell me where she went all this could stop. I could tear it out of your mind, but that would leave you a husk. You don’t want to be a husk do you Trisha?”
I paced back and forth. I hadn’t condemned her to a cell yet. There was a room just before the blocks of cells for processing prisoners and striping them of anything that might assist them in causing trouble. For Trisha that wasn’t much. When we liberated the place all the prisoners were naked. Brandis had even taken their undergarments. It was all so excessive and stereotypical.
“What does it matter, you will never let me free again.”
“No, probably not. I mean, you benefited off of Brandis’ rule. You’re just bitter now that you’re a common courtesan and not one of his chosen. The rooms you used to frequent are three stories up and MUCH dryer. It is wet down here. Why do dungeons always have to be so grimy do you think? No matter how much work I do there’s always something wrong.”
It was a matter of annoyance, but part of it was the portal. It sat over a large part of the dungeons and some sort of toxic energy made everything wet, moldy, and caused even the stone to stink. Prisoners complained about nightmares. I wondered how much worse it was when the portal was open.
“I won’t tell you anything.”
She had the conviction of a zealot. Despite my best efforts I wouldn’t get through to her. It wouldn’t stop me from trying, but she had convinced herself her conclusions were the truth. There was no reaching her now.
“Not even if I threaten you family? You brother and his wife and kids? Your mother?”
“Leave them out of this you swine. They’re not involved, and they were not loyal to his majesty.”
“His majesty, is dead. He can’t hear your adoration any more. As for your family, I already had them investigated. They didn’t seem loyal to Brandis, not like you were. Your brother even refused your aid with your sick mother. His pride, your sacrifice, and a dying mother. So tragic. That doesn’t change the fact that you sided with a megalomaniac tyrant who killed thousands in his quest for power.”
“And you’re different?”
“I like to think so. I don’t sacrifice people for favor from eldritch beings and I don’t punish people for looking at my wrong.”
“Yeah, you’re benevolent.”
“I didn’t say that. Benevolent, good, rulers are the stuff of fiction. They are storybook ideals worthy of reaching toward, but impossible to emulate. Not that I couldn’t be kinder. I have a particular disdain for enemies. You would be dead already if I didn’t need something from you, but I’m not above threatening your family to get the information I want. Of course, I’ll probably just rip it from you mind, but Ariadne is a busy woman, I can’t just bother her every time I need information. Don’t make me bring in your nieces.”
“You’re bluffing. You don’t hurt children.”
“Not usually, no, but do you really want to take that chance? Hurting children was the purview of my predecessor. He seemed hellbent on doing every nasty deed.”
“He was righteous. He destroyed the wicked and exalted the faithful.”
“Uhh huh,” I decided to change the subject. “Who is this woman to you? She’s a would be assassin who failed, let me stress that, and now she’s on the run and is prepared to endanger anyone to avoid capture. She would have tried to hurt your king as well. Why are you protecting her?”
“To spite you. You took everything from me. You overturned a kingdom for your own interests, and you’re cruel, and when his majesty returns he will reward his faithful.”
“Even if that were true, it won’t be you. You’ll be dead. That cruelty thing, remember. Tell you what. If you tell me where she went, I’ll let you go. Of course, I’ll have you watched, but you can be alive when your majesty tries to return. You can see me kill him all over again.”
