Sanctuary - Lynn Abbey [230]
“What did he tell you to do?”
“He said I was going the wrong way. He said I should turn around or I’d be back where I started.”
“And did you turn around?”
“Furzy feathers, Grandfather! It was a monster. It would have eaten me if I didn’t!”
Grandfather laughed—Grandfather hadn’t been there in the dark; it hadn’t been at all funny, even though the monster had told Bec the truth, and he’d found Soldt again shortly afterward. Then Grandfather coughed and started to choke. Bec dropped the staff. He knelt beside the pallet and pounded gently between Grandfather’s shoulder blades. The spasm slowly stopped.
“Are you better now, Grandfather?”
“Better? I’m alive, that’s better than death. Pick up the staff.” Bec did and offered it to Grandfather, who refused it. “What did you tell the Hand, Bec?”
Bec sprang to his feet and shouted, “Nothing!” but that was an outright lie, and immediately he felt his veins filling with fire. “All right! All right! When she saw me—when she recognized me—Leorin gave me something to drink. I wasn’t sure if I could trust her, so I took a baby sip and it was vile, so I spat it out. She made men hold my arms and pull my hair back ’til I couldn’t keep my mouth closed no matter how hard I tried, then she poured it into my mouth. I tried to spit it back at her—I tried, but the men, they held my nose and I swallowed. I had to swallow. I couldn’t not swallow. They didn’t care when I told them that my stomach hurt afterward, just asked lots of questions—like you’re asking now—only they wanted to know about you and Cauvin and what we did at the ruins.
“I wouldn’t answer, so they brought another boy to sit beside me. He answered the questions. I yelled at him to be quiet, but my stomach was real sore, and I couldn’t stop him, no matter how hard I tried. Some of the things that other boy said were stupid lies, but he told the truth, too. I couldn’t make him stop.”
Grandfather shook his head. “You need not blame yourself that you answered their questions truthfully. They gave you a potion to separate your conscience from your knowledge. There was no other little boy—”
“There was!” Bec insisted, and his blood didn’t boil. “He didn’t even look like me. I wouldn’t talk to her. I wouldn’t talk to any of them!”
“Very well, there was another boy. Did that other boy make any promises? Did he promise to do something at another time or when he saw or heard some specific thing—a word, perhaps, or an image?”
“No!” Bec replied, still indignant. “They tried. They twisted my arm until it hurt real bad and the big, mean one—Strangle, I think, was his name—he lashed his whip across my chest and told me that there were bugs in the cave and they would burrow into the cuts he’d made and they’d eat me from the inside out. Then they heated an iron poker in the fire ’til it was red-hot and held it so close to my eyes that I could feel the heat coming off; and Strangle said he’d stick it in my eye if I didn’t promise to do what the other boy promised to do. But I scared that other boy away and told Strangle to sit on his froggin’ poker! That’s when she tied me up again and dumped me in a cage. Strangle said they’d come back; and they did. And I was afraid because … because I didn’t know if I could scare that other boy off again. Then I heard Cauvin and thought everything was going to be all right—
“But it’s not, Grandfather—it’s not. The questions they asked—it didn’t matter what the other boy said, because no matter what they did to me, I didn’t know what they wanted to know. I told them your stories—The other boy told them. But they weren’t what Strangle wanted. He asked questions in languages I didn’t know. Cauvin won’t know them either, but he told Strangle he was your heir. Grandfather—he lied to them … He’s made himself one of them, but he lied, too. And when Strangle asks those questions, he won’t be able to answer them. He doesn’t even understand Imperial. Strangle will hurt—” No, that wasn’t the truth. “Strangle will kill him. Strangle and Leorin will kill Cauvin!
“You lied to me! You lied!