Realm of Light - Deborah Chester [143]
Still, it would do no good to tell this worker that his efforts were in vain. If the shadows decided to come creeping into these dungeons, they would do so whether the torches burned or not.
Needing something to do, Caelan watched the man work. There was something familiar about the man, something in the set of his shoulders, the way he moved. He wore a long leather apron to protect his clothes from the pitch. His head was concealed by a hood, worn presumably for warmth. Caelan could not catch a glimpse of his face. Yet his hands were powerful and broad. He swirled a torch in the barrel of pitch, then lifted it and lit it.
As he set it in a sconce near Caelan’s door, his uplifted face was partially illuminated for a second.
“Orlo!” Caelan said eagerly. “Orlo, it’s you!”
The man looked around as though startled, then backed away hastily into the shadows.
“Come here, you old donkey,” Caelan said, glad to see his former trainer. “It has been too long.”
Orlo glanced up and down the passageway, as though making sure no one overheard them.
“No talking!” he said sternly. “You’re under a rule of silence.”
Caelan obediently lowered his voice to the merest whisper. “Come and let me look on your face. I am glad to see you.”
Orlo, however, hunched his shoulders and pulled his barrel and cart down the passageway. He set to work busily with the next torch, ignoring Caelan completely.
Hurt, Caelan stared after him. “It’s me, Orlo. Caelan. Don’t you have—”
Cold water came splashing through the window, hitting him in the face and driving him back. Sputtering, Caelan wiped his eyes and found a bearded face glaring in at him.
“Shut up!” the guard said. “Or the next bucketful will be dung. We’ll put a muzzle on you if we must.”
Caelan stepped all the way back to the far wall, saying nothing. He knew what a muzzle was, a terrible torture device that was fitted over a man’s head and slowly tore out his tongue by the roots.
Not daring to move, he waited until the guard walked on. There was a brief murmur of conversation between the guard and Orlo; then the guard’s footsteps gradually faded. Only then did Caelan venture back to the window and peer out.
Orlo had gone around the corner and was no longer in sight. Caelan waited a long time, hoping, but Orlo did not return.
Someone moaned in a cell farther down the row. Another man coughed constantly, as though he had a rotted lung. Those were the only sounds.
Orlo had been his trainer, gruff and brutal at times, relentless as he drove Caelan through his drills. But he had taught Caelan how to fight and how to survive the ring. He had made Caelan a champion, and eventually the two men had become friends. But that had all ended the night that Caelan was wrongly accused of attacking and injuring Prince Tirhin. Orlo had believed the accusations, and until now Caelan had never seen him again.
It seemed Orlo had not softened. Caelan waited, but his former trainer did not come back.
Hours went by, enlivened only by occasional light earthquakes that shook the walls but did not bury Caelan alive. With nothing else to do, Caelan paced and bleakly looked into his own future. So much for destiny, he thought. So much for carrying Exoner against the dark god.
A commotion in the passageway sent him to the rear of his cell, out of reach and out of trouble. A face peered inside.
“You! Stay back!”
It was an unnecessary command. Caelan knew they were about to open the door. He could smell food, and his stomach growled urgently. This wasn’t the time to make a break for freedom. He could hear the other guards grunting and clanking their weapons restlessly. They were just hoping for a prisoner to try something stupid. A dead prisoner was a prisoner who did not have to be fed.
A scrawny boy came stumbling inside. He set down a pail of water,