chapter SEVEN
Smack. Slap. Slap.
Smack. Slap. Slap.
The sound assailed her first, coming from somewhere in the murky haze, rhythmically, not unlike a really slow waltz tempo. One, two, three. One, two, three. Smells reached her next. Some familiar. Some not. Damp earth. Rusting iron. Old wood. Some type of meat roasting over a coal-fired brazier. A wafting bit of incense. And then she got a whiff of sweat. Unwashed bodies. Blood.
Fear.
Jeannette wrinkled her nose and squinted, trying to see down the corridor she found herself in. Light percolated in dust-filled sunbeams, streaming down in waves that radiated heat. She looked up, taking in several slits high in what looked like stone walls. She ran her eyes down the wall, and then reached a hand out, watched her fingers until they touched. Grazed. Her fingertips slid along the wall, getting chaffed by the emery-board type surface. Not stone…or if it was, it was rough-hewn. It felt more like brick. Looked like it, too. Dull color, too. Mostly beige.
Jeannette followed the wall downward, evaluating. Deciding. The floor matched the same shade as the walls. She lifted her skirt hem. Oh, look. She was still barefoot. She wondered momentarily what sorts of viruses and funguses she might be toying with by running around barefoot in a strange place. Atop a strange floor. Wait. She skimmed one foot along the floor, lifting a fine layer of silt. That was wrong, too. This wasn’t floor. It looked more like packed sand. Damp from some sort of water source.
She dared open her senses more, pulling in the scent of animals…grains. Dung. The smells got added to – now carrying the aroma of strong perfumes, vying with each other for mastery. She caught a whiff of spices – perhaps cinnamon and sandalwood. And somewhere she thought she detected a floral undertone, not unlike rose petal. The air grew humid. Hot. Sapping at her will. Taking her strength. Sending a slight sheen of perspiration to coat her entire body, sticking the t-shirt and cotton skirt to her.
She walked deeper into the abyss. Losing what daylight she’d had, but gaining flickering torchlight in its stead. It gave her patches of light to see with. And even that had little flecks of sand reflecting in it.
This is the future?
Oh, dear. Look, Jeannette. Looks like someone had finally done it. They’d flipped the switch. All the proselytizing and negotiating and political rhetoric had been for naught. They’d unleashed a bomb. Annihilated. Destroyed. Humankind had lost electricity. And with it, they’d lost technology.
Jeannette frowned. Wait. Something didn’t feel right. Anything nuclear would have worse consequences than sending the world back to what looked like the dark ages. Wouldn’t it?
Smack. Slap. Slap.
The odd three sounds continued apace, now growing louder and interspersed with a groan. And that became a low continuum of them. Lots of groans. From lots of throats.
Jeannette rounded a corner. The stone gave way to bars. Old, iron bars, rusting from the ground up with the damp. And behind them were men. In various stages of undress, age, nationality, and every stage of health. Or…un-health.
Jeannette stumbled, her toe catching in the dirt, propelling her into a collision with a large man, except at that exact moment he moved, completely unaware of her existence. Jeannette’s palm skin tore as she caught herself on the wall, scraping minute cuts into her flesh. That was odd. She’d never had physical manifestations before.
She spun, putting her back against the wall, to watch the man shove a long, spear-like object through the bars. He was dressed in a long robe, of some dark material without a hint of ornamentation, and he had his head wrapped with an Arabic covering she knew to be called a ghotra. She wasn’t surprised to hear him speak what was probably Arabic. She didn’t understand it, but the inhabitants of the cell thing did. She watched them scramble out of reach, some even using other occupants as shields.
Smack. Slap. Slap.
“They’re going to kill him this time!”
“Shut up!”
The words weren’t loud, but the guard must have heard it, too. He stopped poking with his spear-thing and cocked his head. They weren’t in view, but the first speaker sounded young. His voice had roved two octaves with pubescent vigor. His answer had been curt. Final. Angry. They’d also used a language she actually understood…but how? Nothing about this vision made sense. Something was wrong. She’d gone somewhere meaningless. It resembled a studio set for a Spartacus movie, or maybe a Persian epic that featured pain and suffering among war prisoners.
Jeannette closed her eyes again. Released all thought. Began by envisioning darkness. Obscurity. Blankness. She inhaled; held it for eight seconds while her heart did a slow count with her; exhaled. Repeated the process. And then she opened her eyes.
Smack. Slap. Slap.
“Why doesn’t he speak? Give them what they want!”
“Because he’ll never give his word not to try to escape.”
“Then, why doesn’t he just lie?”
Nothing had altered. She was still stuck in some sort of purgatory, getting sensory overload by the moment. Growing more appalled. Distressed. Jeannette slid along the wall, her skirt snagging on the rough bricks as she went. Good thing she still wore her denim jacket. It could take such abuse. The embroidery had come out nice, too. She’d drawn and stitched a daisy onto this one. It matched how she’d felt at the time. It also laundered well. No wrinkles.
Normalcy. She had to think of the normal and mundane. That was the path back to sanity.
“He’ll never lie! His word is his bond. It’s all he has left.”
“But…they’re killing him!”
“Hush, HanRick, before they hear! They won’t kill the champion. Not when he has a fight next sennight!”
“But listen! He’s not even conscious!”
“Oh. He’s conscious.”
“How do you know?”
“He flexes with the blows? You see? Aware. And waiting.”
“Waiting for what?”
“Their arms to tire…or the specified count to finish. I don’t know how many lashes he earned for this escape.”
“You mean attempt.”
That was another voice into the mix. Older. Frail-sounding. Cautious.
“They’ll still kill him!”
“Lower your voice! Imbecile! They’re using restraint. KayNan recognizes it as well.”
“Restraint?”
“Aye. They’re using straight whips, not the flagrum. And that’s Mehmed in the center. You know his arm is puny. His blows lack sting. He’s probably not even breaking skin.”
“Aye. While Yashid has the bullwhip. Less damage. Even if he tries to power through his blows.”
“They’re still whipping him!”
“Shut up, HanRick before they hear you!”
“So? What more can they do to me?”
“They’ll use you! Fool!”
“Use me…for what? I can’t heft chains, let alone fight with them.”
“They’ll use you against KayNan! You know the rules! No emotion. Remember?”
Jeannette was cold. Faint. Shaky. She was going to be ill. For the first time in her life, a vision was causing real physical symptoms. And then the guard fellow passed her, so close he ruffled the hem of her skirt with his proximity. She froze, conquered any reaction, and then had to will her pulse to calm, too. She’d never been so frightened.
She heard a cry. Chains rattling. A blow. Then another. And then the youth yelled for KayNan, his cry loud and heart-rending, until it got choked off. Jeannette’s heart ticked up another notch, startling her with the intensity and strength. Surely, KayNan wouldn’t allow them to hurt the boy. Would he?
Her feet moved involuntarily, her hands gripping bricks to hold her upright. She didn’t want to know more. She didn’t want to see. She didn’t want anything to do with it. She wanted her little shop in Philly. The little piece of square footage she called her own. She longed for her chest containing all sorts of dried herbs and teas; the little cash register that was rarely used; the credit card/debit terminal. She wanted normal. Mundane.
Sane.
A torture scene came into view, a man at the center, stretched out by iron cuffs on every limb, and those were attached to walls with lengths of chain. He was on his belly, atop a large barrel-looking thing. Four men hovered near him, three with whips.
Smack. Slap. Slap.
Oh no. No. It was KayNan.
The unarmed one looked pretty large. Stocky. Dressed in the same type robe and ghotra as the guard had been. He stood at KayNan’s head, watching, his arms folded atop what looked to be a hefty belly. The others were on either side of KayNan’s body, using their whips in a series of three. One heavy smack, followed by two light, sliding slaps. This was the source of the rhythmic sounds she’d heard earlier. Shivers rippled along her limbs while her belly churned warningly. She couldn’t be ill. She had to get beyond the weakness. The shivers. The cold. She was about to violate another rule. She had to do something to stop it.
Those whisperers had been mistaken. The first man had a lot of power to his whip. Each smacking blow rocked KayNan’s body slightly, and sent pink mist into the air above him. That fellow definitely broke through skin. KayNan’s back looked like fresh, ground meat.
Jeannette gagged, shoved a hand against her mouth to stifle the reaction, while everything wavered. The view blurred with a wash of tears. She blinked them down her cheeks. More came. She stepped forward. She had to stop this! And at the first move, the view altered, grew dark about the edges, while the flesh about her nose started tingling. Oh, sweet heaven. She really was going to faint. During a session. She couldn’t comprehend what might happen. And then KayNan lifted his head and saw her. His vivid green eyes went to slits…
“Damn you, Woman!”
Jeannette dangled from KayNan’s hands, holding her beneath the arms to where her head brushed the plane’s ceiling. If perishing of fear were possible, she was suffering it. Especially at the expression behind those same green eyes as he glared at her.
“I told you I didn’t wish to relive any of it!”
Jeannette didn’t think through her next move, she just did it, lifting an arm and holding her palm to his cheek. Her touch changed everything, stilling him, shocking them both. If he’d been angry, it was now dissipated. Calmed.
“Oh, KayNan,” Jeannette whispered.
“Don’t say it.”
“What?”
She brought her other hand up, cupping the other side of his face. That was strange, but her palms stung from the contact. If she checked, they were probably scraped. As if she’d really been there. At that place.
“I don’t want your pity. Or your compassion.”
Fresh tears made him glitter. She blinked them onto her cheeks, clearing the view.
“What…do you want?” she managed to whisper past cold lips.
He started shaking. His eyes darkened. Loomed larger. More intense. Captivating. Enthralling. He lifted his upper lip, displaying fangs. And then the cockpit door slid open. Both Jeannette and KayNan turned to look as the pilot craned his head back, slid his headset off, and then grinned.
“Oh. Apologies. I need you KayNan. Front and center.”
“Now?”
“Right now. We’ve got company. And they mean business.”