KINGDOM OF THE STONE -- a Wattpad featured novel

Chapter Forty One

Servants stopped in doorways with wide eyes and open mouths, or froze against the sides of the hallways as Amantis dragged her tripping through the house.  Charissa tried to cover her nakedness with her one free hand, but her failure only increased her shame.

"This is entirely your fault," Amantis said.  "You deny me, you insult me, make me a mockery among other men and now you violate your vow."  He dragged her through the antechamber where petitioners waited to ask him for jobs or food, then through the great room.  "I can see now that the Lord of the Mountain has seen your pride and your arrogance and has decided to judge you.  Unfortunately for me, I seem to be his instrument for your humiliation."  They burst into the kitchen surprising two cooks who paused in their chopping and stirring to stare as Amantis opened the cellar door and pushed Charissa inside.

Charissa's foot slipped on the damp smooth-worn steps and she fell sliding several steps on one leg and hip.  Amantis closed the cellar door, plunging the stairs into darkness.  Charissa lay on the stairs, sobbing; the scrapes on her ankle, thigh and hip started to burn.  Sphal's pale face with his shocked and pleading expression flashed in her memory.  He had seemed so confident and so strong!  How could he fail her?

"Shut up!" Amantis hissed, surprising her since she thought he had shut her up there alone.  "Too much light," he grumbled.

Charissa looked around and saw only a faint crack of light slipping under the door.

A fumbling hand found the top of her head, grabbed a fistful of hair and jerked her upward.  "Come on."

Charissa stumbled and slid down the steps in a sideways crouch as Amantis dragged her forward by her hair.  At the bottom of the stairs he flung her into the cellar room where she landed bruising her other hip. 

Shivering on the cold damp stone, Charissa lay sobbing until she heard Amantis fumbling with his belt.  Fearing he meant to rape her there in the dark, Charissa pushed herself upright, determined to fight and, if necessary, die before he touched her again.  The heat of her indignation burned away her tears, but then the sound abruptly ceased.  Tensed, waiting for his assault, she sat puzzled by the silence, before noticing a faint glow.

It began as a faint speck of gray light, moving slightly as it grew like a will-o-wisp approaching from a great distance.  Differently colored lights joined it as it neared and soon the lower curves of Amantis' enraptured face glowed in the rippling, watery light.

Lord Above, save me!  He's using that accursed stone, she thought.  Every time he consulted it he committed some new atrocity.  The thought of what it might have in store for her made her weak with fear.

The stone was smooth and irregularly shaped, like a common river stone, but it seemed to have no depth as if the stone were simply the hard edge of a hole punched through Amantis' hand and chest and the world itself, into the infinite blackness beyond.  When he turned his hand to admire it, the stone didn't seem to rotate so much as change shape as if the objects the hole penetrated were warping around its edge.

Charissa turned away, disgusted by the lust on Amantis' face as he looked at it.

"The Lords Beyond have suggested the most appropriate and ironic punishment for you."  Amantis grabbed her hair and dragged her to her feet.

"You mean the Lords of the Void, don't you?  Except the fallen aren't lords of anything are they?  They're prisoners."

Amantis slammed her head into the shelves.  A wave of hot pain spread across her forehead where the edge of a shelf struck her.  She tried to mock him with laughter, but it came out sounding mad.

"I am going to very much enjoy this."  Amantis shoved her into one of the larger shelving sections and stomped her through until she fell out into the space on the other side.