Chapter 11: Dungeons

Bee felt like screaming when the Fomor behind her dragged the bag over her head. As they grabbed her under the arms with iron-like skeletal fingers and steered her out of the hall, she wondered why she hadn’t felt the pinch on the way in.

Probably because I thought them flesh.

Árchú’s cackling laugh, really more shriek than cackle, chased them through the door as she decided An Dagda somehow learned that Myrddin had been possessed and sent her after Brenós to stop him from falling into the hands of the demon. But why did he send Bren in the first place, if it even were An Dagda who sent her brother? As she thought about it, she realized it had to have been the Chief, because only he knew where he hid the stone, or so the legends said. When he created the Five Kingdoms, he invested the stone with much of his power, so the humans he brought to the land would thrive, something else the legends claimed. He then hid it somewhere.

“Which must have weakened him terribly,” Bee said, earning a wrench from the Fomor to her left. What was puzzling her was why he felt a need to send Myrddin to defend it? What had changed? Who was he afraid would snatch his power so much that he gave up the secret of the stone?

Perhaps the same as the one who’d benefit most from a weak God? Danu?

The saying was that disrespecting a woman of the Sí was a risk not worth taking, but would Danu threaten his power base? She’d heard that the Mother Goddess could be rancorous, but to that extent? Of course, An Dagda’s epithet: the Cheerful God was just horseshit. He was about as cheerful as a boar spear up the arse on a cold and windy winter’s night. Still, she doubted his moodiness would be enough to warrant such a betrayal.

Bee frowned through the holes in her bag at the enveloping darkness. Spaced braziers intermittently lit the recesses, which did nothing to brighten the tower. From the limited sight her hood provided, Bee thought there was a mist oozing from the mildewed walls of the fortress’s innards. The stench of putrefaction didn’t lessen the deeper they went, but rather seemed to take shape and form as the mists that were creeping over her feet, making Bee thankful for her boots.

“It’s the mist that stinks,” she hissed, earning her another wrench. “There’s no need for violence, so there isn’t.”

Her proclamation earned another wrench and a grunt, and she decided to hold her tongue. If they wrenched any harder, she was in danger of a dislocated shoulder. Once again, her guards half-carried, half-dragged her down stairs, only this time the staircase spiralled and she thought the guard on the inside, the narrow side, would be in danger of a fall. Bee didn’t think that breaking her neck on a spiral staircase because a bag of bones lost its footing would be a fitting end. Keeping her eyes tight shut, she prayed to the Three Sisters until they reached the bottom. It seemed to take a lifetime, but eventually they made level ground and she opened her eyes to see they had made it to the dungeons.

They were in a long, arched corridor. On the left, sconces hung between each archway, providing light, illuminating a mildewed green tinge covering the walls and floor. On the right, iron grills marked the cells, which would hold several prisoners. As far as Bee could tell, each of the cells was empty until they reached the final door, which they had bolted shut with an iron padlock, gleaming new in contrast to everything else in the corridor. A torch on the wall of the cell revealed a bundled shadow at the back, which had to be Bren. One of her guards unlocked the door while the other cut her bonds, and they pushed her into the cell, none too gently.

Bee pulled the hemp sack off as the iron grill clanged shut and walked to stand over the bundle, rubbing her wrists to get some life back into them. She felt no emotion as she stared down on him, curled up in a foetal, defensive position. She thought the clanging of the bars would have caused some reaction from him, but he was corpse-like in his stillness.

“Hiding in the shadows, are ye?”

Bren remained still. Crouching, Bee put a hand on his shoulder and tried to turn him gently. His reaction was violent and shocking, a wailing scream of “Nooo!” filled the cell, and probably half of the tower, before he crouched further into himself and edged closer to the wall. She was about to try again when she heard a door bang and the thumping of approaching, booted feet. After a few moments, an armored skeleton arrived before the cell, carrying a long spear. The guard grunted and banged the bars with the spear’s haft, trying to cow them. Instead of showing any fear, Bee grinned and blew the skeleton a kiss. The monster grunted and retreated the way it had come. Bee suspected that if there had been a face, it would have shown a little embarrassment.

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“Did ye see that, Big Brother? No, of course not, ye’ve got yer face to the wall.”

As soon as the door banged shut, Bee went and crouched beside the gate. As she’d suspected when the spear shaft knocked a pile of brown flakes off the bars, there was rusty metal lying all along the ground directly under the barrier. In contrast to the gleaming new lock, the gates were crumbling where they were.

Good news, Bee thought as she grabbed the lock and twisted it vigorously until it came away in her hand. Staring at it, she thought about the legends surrounding The Four. Marbh was the leader, the one with a modicum of intelligence, the one the Giant relied on. Concaire was mischievous and a little of a prankster, as well as cunning. Plasgorta was like any pestilence, horrific and unrelenting. Holding the lock, she thought the stories about Árchú must be accurate. The demon of war was said to be a monster of extreme violence and very little wit. He must have ordered the Fomorii to lock Bren in the dungeons and trusted them to ensure the cells were still strong enough to keep him there.

Why didn’t ye escape, Big Brother, she wondered.

Glancing over her shoulder, she saw Bren had finally moved and was sitting with his back against the wall.

“So, it’s really you, Little Sister,” he said.

“Aye. Who else would it be?”

He shrugged before saying, “I thought the demon was playing one of his tricks.”

“Why’re ye here, Bren?”

“I was taken by that monster in the throne room,” he said, his face clouded by confusion.

“No. I mean, look.” Bee held out the lock and moved the door slightly with her finger. “A leanbh could’ve escaped.”

“I didn’t think to look, Bee. They burned me half to death each day to learn what I know, so my mind was too fragile to be searching for ways of escape.”

“And what did ye tell them, Bren?”

“I told them I know nothing,” he said, not meeting her eyes.

He’s keeping something from me, she thought. And he looks remarkably well for someone who they tortured half to death each day.

“I’m going to scout. Ye stay here. There’s no point in blundering into trouble because I didn’t take time to see what’s what.”

Bee’s brother shrugged again, still not looking at her. Shaking her head, she tested the cell gate and was relieved when it didn’t squeal like the portcullis. To her right, there was nothing but a dead end of mouldy, green bricks, which seemed to ooze the stinking mists that had confused Bee when they first arrived in the dungeons. To her left, there was a long corridor that had seemed shorter when she was bundled along it by the guards. Where the spiral staircase waited, she could just see a door in the shadows beside it. No doubt, that was where the guard went after knocking flakes of rust off the cell’s bars. As far as she could tell, there was no other way out of the dungeons.

Bee remained in the corridor for several moments, trying to decide on what to do. She thought that silently climbing the spiral stairs was out of the question. The guardhouse was directly below, and even alone, she didn’t believe she could climb the narrow stairs in silence.

Returning to the cell, she leaned down before Bren and said in a low voice, “I’m going to look in the guardhouse. There’s a good chance the bag of bones here just now is the only guard. I’ll try and overcome it.”

“And if it’s not?”

“Then, Big Brother, ye’ll be on yer own.”

Bee didn’t say that if it was the only guard, she didn’t think she could overcome it. It was a warrior, however old and skeletal. She couldn’t use Earth Power because Árchú would know immediately, which seemed to be one of the things Bren had surmised, if not the only thing. Not that any of that helped, because even together, they would be no match for the War Demon. If they had a troop of Neit’s Maidens, they would have a chance, but only then.

She edged along the corridor until she arrived at the door. There was no sound from within. The door appeared heavy and new, which meant she could open it without triggering a screaming alarm that would alert whoever or whatever was inside. Taking several deep breaths, Bee pushed the handle down, praying to The Three that the door was not visible on the inside, perhaps around a corner, or behind a curtain. As soon as the door was open wide enough, she put an eye up to the crack and felt her heart skip a beat.

Not far into the room, four guards were sitting at a heavy, rough-hewn table, with their backs to her. A fifth guard sat facing her, but its head was down, concentrating on cleaning a heavy hammer that was lying across the table. Bee was about to close the door and return to the cell, there to think of some other way for them to escape, when the skeleton facing her lifted its head and winked.

How can it wink without eyelids? she thought, just as the monster exploded into action, lifting the hammer and smiting the guard directly opposite.

Bee had never seen a skeleton struck with a heavy warhammer, but she was not surprised at the result as the collection of bones exploded into a pile of decrepit death, leaving armor on the bench, as though an invisible warrior was sitting there. The guards with their backs to her did nothing. They must have been too shocked to react, and the hammer took only moments to reduce them to piles of bones shrouded in clouds of dust.

Bee lifted her head and looked at the grinning face before her. Where moments before there had been a monster guard preventing her escape, now Donálaí stood grinning at her.

“Hello, Bee. Are you pleased to see me?”