“If they've harmed you in any way, by damn they'll answer for it,” he said, “and they'll get no mercy from me!”
“No one has hurt me, Finn, no more than you can see. I suppose they will, though, for I've not been shown any kindness since they brought me here. I don't expect much from those who'd treat a being like this.”
“Who was it, who did this?” he asked, though he was near certain that he knew.
“The same bunch that brought you here, I think, though they all dress the same. Maddigern, though, he was the only one I knew.”
“Obern Oberbyght. Was he here as well, or only Maddigern?”
“I don't know any person with a name like that. Who's he?”
“Sorry, I forget. You don't know him, and that's no regret.”
Though he tried not to show it, Finn was greatly alarmed by Letitia's appearance, by her sad demeanor. While Maddigern hadn't done her bodily harm, he had clearly broken her spirit, left her too weary, too shorn of all feeling to even be frightened anymore. The luster was gone from her eyes, the dark, iridescent Mycer eyes that brought Finn a love of living he had never known before.
“Don't, Finn, please,” she said, with the weary shadow of a smile. “I can guess your thoughts as clearly as if they were printed in a book. You're bursting with anger, and that will do us no good at all.”
“A chance will show itself, Letitia. And when it does, anger may well prove a most effective weapon to set us free, for surely “Knaves and Staves, I've been so relieved to find you I haven't asked. Where's Julia, did she escape, did she get away?”
Letitia sighed. “They took her, dear. It breaks my heart to tell you, but she's gone.”
“Gone? And where, do you know? Have they harmed her, could you tell?”
“They took her, that's all. She maimed two or three, but they overwhelmed her at last. I imagine the very worst, for they'd never seen the like of her before. I think the Badgie folk have a great fear of any mechanical device. At least, I've always understood this to be so.”
Finn took a deep breath and fought to still his heart. Learning of Julia's loss, he had tightened the noose around his neck without thinking and nearly throttled himself.
“I don't know Maddigern's intentions,” he said, “but you're quite correct in thinking he wishes us ill. I have learned there's a great deal amiss in this place, intrigue and deceit, dark manipulation of a kind I've yet to understand.
“Though you and I have no part in this, it appears we have landed in the midst of a very sticky mess. There is great danger here, Letitia, I'm certain of that.”
“I don't guess you have to tell me, Finn. I'm not feebleminded, you know.”
“Of course not. I didn't mean that, I only meant to say… “
The words seemed to stick in his throat. He didn't know where to begin, didn't know what use it would be to waste words at a time like this when there might be little time left at all.
Maddigern wouldn't simply leave them here, he would see the business out. By now the Badgie would have discovered the spot where he'd broken through from the tunnels into the palace hall. And, if he guessed, if he imagined what he, Finn, had seen down there, if what Finn guessed about the Badgie was true…
He pushed the thought aside. That wouldn't happen, that couldn't be. The horrors a creature as cruel and demented as Maddigern might conjure in his head would make the simple act of dying seem a welcome reprieve.
“I don't know exactly what to say to you, Finn,” Letitia said, suddenly breaking into his thoughts. “I was quite angry-more than that, I suppose-when I left you there with the King and that-I saw how she looked at you, a look of such raw, unfettered lust, yet a look of cunning, cold and uncaring contempt for every male who ever gazed at her with helpless desire.
“She quickly let me know you had met her before, and that pained me most of all, Finn, for you hadn't shared that with me.
“That's when I turned and left you there, for I was so hurt, so angry, to think I had been betrayed… “
“I have not betrayed you, Letitia,” Finn said, cursing the deadly stricture of his bonds that kept him from going to her.
“I have wronged you, but only in a very slight manner. A passing weakness, a frailty of the moment, but never a betrayal of the heart. Never, certainly, a physical thing, an action beyond restraint-”
“Please, Finn, you'd best stop there and let it be, for you tend, in every matter, to go a mile farther than you need.”
Her smile, then, reaching him even through the weight of her weariness and fear, brought him such relief his eyes stung with tears. And, when he blinked them away, he saw that she was crying, too.
“I was not thinking clearly at the time,” she told him, “or I would have known you had truly done me no wrong.
Or surely not a great wrong, for such an exotic creature would turn any man's head. Even one as stalwart and strong as you, my dear.” “Yes, uh, well… “
Letitia's smile faded. “When Maddigern came, he told me that you had run, that you had left me here on my own.”
“You did not believe that.”
“No, not for a moment. It is what he told me next that all but shattered any hope for us all. He said you would be taken. That you would be brought here and-and that we would both pay the price for your acts against the King.”
“That is not what happened at all, of course. There are no acts against the King. Pots and Pans, there is so much I have to tell you, and I don't know where to begin… “
“Then don't, all right?” She closed her eyes, as if she dared not look at him again. “I don't think we have time to waste on your ventures, or any matter that may have passed before. I think that all we have is now.”
“It's not over, Letitia.” He strained against his bonds again. “I promise you, though things really do look chancy now, that we will overcome this, that no harm will come to you again. This I vow, with all my will, my love!”
And, it was at that instant, that moment, that the door burst open with such power, such might, that it slammed against the wall and sent a rain of dust to the ground.
“Well, then,” Maddigern said, his bristled face a pitiless mask, his eyes as hard as stone, “we are all here together, at last. Now we can begin… “
FORTY-FIVE
You gave us a chase, Master Finn. That was not a wise thing to do. Maybe you have no laws in that foul land of yours, but you cannot flout the King's justice here.”
“And what law did I flout?” Finn asked. “I'm afraid I don't remember any crimes at all.”
Maddigern studied him a long moment, as if he were giving the question deep and serious thought. Then, he bent down until his dark face was close to Finn's, so close that Finn flinched at the fellow's odorous breath.
“It is not going to be this way, human,” the Badgie said, his voice a near-gentle reproval, as if Finn were a rebellious pupil who had broken the rules.
“There are things I need to know. You will tell me these things, and you will not waste my time with foolish jests.”
The Badgie straightened, glanced at Letitia, then back to Finn.
“If I like your answers, things will go easier in the end. For the Mycer, I mean. There is nothing you can say that will be of help to you.”
Letitia gasped. The Badgie had meant for her to hear his words, and Letitia reacted as he was certain that she would.
“I don't expect any decent behavior. Nothing would surprise me, Maddigern. But you'll have to help me recall my misdeeds, or we'll be all day at this.”
Only the Badgie's eyes betrayed his fury. “Do you think I won't do things to her? Here, in front of your eyes?”
“Of course I think you will. And when you do, I'll admit to anything you ask. I'll tell you whatever you wish to hear. You've done this before, you know that's so. And when you're done, you'll wonder if anything I've babbled is true.
“Now. Why don't you simply get to it? I know I have nothing to win for myself, but I'll do what I can to save her.”