Darkness. Zara could see nothing as she gazed straight ahead of her into the void as one blind. Her body screamed with protest as she held her cramped, contorted position, not moving except to draw long, slow, faint breaths. Cold, murky water seeped through her clothing, making her skin crawl as the stagnant, icy slime clung to her flesh. The stones she lay on were hard and broken jaggedly, pushing painfully against the bones of her back and hips. She had not moved for hours. Flashes of light had invaded her consciousness from time to time as her captors searched wildly for her, but the beam of lanterns had never fallen directly on her. Every time that the rocky walls of her hiding place were illuminated, she held back a shudder, closed her eyes, and imagined that she was just a part of the stones.
She felt as if she lay in her own coffin, the square sides pressing in about her. When she had first been thrown into this prison cell, she had made a thorough search of the barren room. High in one of the walls, about ten feet up, she had discovered a deep cleft where on of the rectangular foundation stones had crumbled and been removed. No one had bothered to replace it, since the wall was still three feet thick where the hole was. Zara had tried to reach the gap for what seemed an interminable amount of time, scrabbling vainly at the damp and slippery rock walls. She didn't know how she had ultimately clawed her way to the cleft, only that she had pulled herself into the opening with shaking limbs and wrenched her body about violently to fit into the shelter of the fissure. They had cursed and searched and shouted when they discovered the empty cell, but they had not found her.
Her limbs began to tremble with chill and exhaustion. At first, she had vaguely thought that she could attack a guard when he came to search again for her, but realistically, she realized that she was too weak. Zara knew that she could not stay here forever, but she could think of no way to get out, unless she was among the ranks of discarded dead. The dungeons of Minostaur were infamous for their security, as well as for the punishments that were meted out there.
A clang echoed down the hallway outside her cell as a door slammed shut. Footsteps marched closer and closer, a faint light flickering into her vision. In an instant, Zara made up her mind. Slithering out of the small aperture, she dropped to the ground. Her legs gave way beneath her and she fell heavily to the hard stone floor. Wincing in pain, she drew a ragged breath and felt about her in the dark. The bobbing glow of a torch was glaring through the few narrow slits in the iron door, and a jangle of keys sounded as the lock was coaxed open. Her fist closed on a loose rock. Diving to one side of the door, she pressed her body close against the cold wall, trying to make herself invisible.
The door swung open and light blinded her dark-accustomed eyes for a moment. Sightlessly, she threw the stone across the room, where it clattered loudly over the sandstone floor. The Atherian standing in the doorway dodged into the cell and held his torch high, searching the shadows of the wall to his right. Seizing this tenuous opportunity, Zara slipped through the open door.
Mercifully, the torch-lit passage was empty. Goading her leaden limbs into a run, she hurried down the corridor to the cover of a stairwell. A door opened at the end of the hallway and another guard entered. Shrinking back into the shadows, she watched as he approached. He seemed to be looking right at the stairwell. Limping, she hastened down the steps, descending into the deepest bowels of the dungeon. The click of a metal-toed boot hitting the stairs sounded behind her. Recklessly, she hurled herself into the large chamber at the bottom of the winding stair. Casting her eyes about wildly, she dove behind a large rack of chains set close to the wall.
Within seconds, the man walked casually into the room. He crossed to the far wall and selected a few strange implements from an array of shelves. Stomach turning, Zara took in the hellish chamber she had stumble into. She did not want to look at it, and she did not want to know what the various objects in the room were for. The man passed by her again, and she listened to his steps fade away.
Closing her eyes, she wracked her brain for a way to escape this nightmare. Her thoughts slipped back to her excruciating days in this pit, her fevered mind vainly attempting to unravel the strangest of occurrences. She had no idea how long she had been held by her enemies; she remembered only pain, and her mind leaving the time and place to save her. All except for one occasion. Almost hallucinating, her mind took her back to those moments.....
She was fighting tooth and nail with three prison guards, her strength pitifully weakened. One man succeeded in tearing her ragged clothes away. Her eyes lit with rage, and for a brief moment, the guards witnessed again the true Aenetian captain. Kneeing one man in the groin, she crushed the instep of another and turned to the guard still holding her clothing. Taking his knees out, she planted one foot in the middle of his spine and snapped his neck with a powerful twist of her arms.
It was more power than she should have had left. Almost fainting on top of the dead man, she was unable to resist as the remaining guards pulled her upright and strapped her roughly to an angled table, yanking her legs apart to tie her ankles down. Once she was secured, they stepped back to stand to attention on either side of the door. Semi-conscious, she wondered what they were waiting for. Then the door opened and a man resplendent in a black and scarlet general's uniform swept in, his long, jet-black hair almost blue in the cold, dim light.
"You may leave," he told the guards quietly, motioning for them to carry away their dead companion as well. He turned his piercing, startlingly azure eyes upon Zara as the door swung shut. Silence filled the room as he regarded her. Slowly, she mustered what alertness she could.
"General Tarsus." Hazel eyes stared back at his, unabashed, proud.
"So, we meet at long last, Captain Zara," he replied.
"Has Aleron grown desperate at last? He finally begins to realize he will get nothing out me?" Zeira asked scornfully. The general removed his satin cape, tossing it to the floor.
"No. He knows that he will or will not. He is not desperate; he is an emperor. As his general, I am the one who should be concerned with you." Carefully, General Tarsus laid his sword aside, followed by his leather gloves and surcoat. "The Emperor trusts that I will do my best. He knows that you are strong." The general ventured too close and Zara spat in his face.
"You speak so high and fair. You disgust me, you pig," she snarled. "I know your business. Your false respect only brings you lower."
He smiled. Planting his feet, he crossed his arms and considered her with steely eyes.
