Book 2: Sea of Delarn

Chapter 1: Prison

Delarn was constantly thinking about what her mentor had told her when they dragged her from the throne room. It ate her, and she couldn't keep her hands from wringing and teeth grinding. He had promised to help her, but no help came.

There was no mercy, even from who claimed mercy. Instead, took her to the port city of Tristam on a very slow wagon and locked her away. She doubted she would see anything familiar again.

Her gut told her if they sent her elsewhere, it wouldn't be a fresh start. More likely imprisonment or slavery. The legality wouldn't prevent them from quietly trading her off. In Fennerey, she had heard it often from her sect of Salvikans—a group that followed a god of chaos. She knew better than to doubt how much worse her situation could get.

The first night felt the worst. She had grown used to the rhyme and reason of traveling on the wagon, and by the time they got to Port Tristam, it was familiar. If they had spent the rest of her life pulling her along on a wagon with her head covered and her arms tied, she thought she might not mind. She missed it once they dragged her out of the wagon and dragged her along like an unruly horse. Things grew worse when they brought her into the cold, dingy Port Tristam prison.

The scent and feel of the fresh sea air unnerved her, knowing freedom was so close, and the sea turned her stomach. She never thought she would smell this, let alone the stale prison that mixed with the sea salt and made her lungs burn.

She had plenty of time to think about it. There was little else while being pulled through the dark hall to her cell. The warden—a slothful man that appeared less than interested in the proceedings the longer it went on—joined them. Her eyesight had gotten no better and had only grown worse, so when they shoved her into her dim cell, she could hardly make out anything at all.

"Please," she choked, her voice cracking from lack of use while she was being transported. "It's so small, and I can't see. How am I supposed to stay in a place like this?"

"You should have thought about that before you committed a crime," the warden drawled as he looked in at her, but like everything else, he was only a dark smudge on the other side of hard prison bars. The men responsible for transporting her gave harsh and ugly laughs, knowing the truth that brought her here. She felt hot anger fill her stomach as she moved to grip the bars, but they were moving away and leaving her behind.

They were leaving her here. It wouldn't be until someone came for her in a day or two. They intended to leave her forever to rot. As that settled in, she felt frenzied and gripped the bars harder. She tried to shake them to minimal effect and wailed her despair, fear, and discomfort. At least she had the cell to herself.

After immeasurably long in the terrible darkness, she settled back. She decided the best course of action was to find a comfortable position to sleep, or perhaps to cry in. It was important to assure herself that there was no one hiding in the corners. Maybe bite them before they bit her.

It was little more than a small box, big enough to stand up and long enough to lie down. She could feel the thin cushion that was her bed, made as bare as they could without doing away with it altogether. She tried to hold back a repulsed moan as she felt her hand touch something wet on the floor and tried to convince herself it wasn't piss or blood. At least it wasn't another person.

Things she hadn't really considered before were turning her stomach. She imagined bugs swarming her the second she laid down, and the urine scent suffocating her in her sleep.

A hand snaked out and snagged her wrist, and she shrieked and tried to tug away. It came from the cell next to hers and was quick to drag her hard and fast against the bars and knock her senseless.