Page 36 of Caress of Fire
Henron motioned to him, his silhouette cast in shadow between the low buildings of the slums, and Fedryc approached. He could feel hundreds of eyes on him as he walked closer to the buildings. The stench of poor sanitation assaulted his nostrils as he came to stand by Henron, whose face was carefully devoid of disgust as he stood next to a pile of human waste.
“Ignio Marula is waiting for you in his tavern.” Henron motioned to a dark side street. “Apparently, he’s been expecting you.”
“He has, has he?” Fedryc couldn’t disguise the loathing in his voice. “What have you learned about him?”
“Thatmanis a loose title for the creature,” Henron answered, his mask slipping for a second, revealing a deep-seated anger. “He’s the landlord for most of the slums. Makes the humans pay a tithe to reside in the capital, if you could call these houses a residence. He also controls all the illegal fighting rings, gambling holes and brothels in the city. He’s probably the richest man in Gelmor.”
“And he owes his fortune to the human misery.” Fedryc nodded his understanding. It was time to put an end to the thug’s hold over his people, his capital. “No more. This ends today.”
“It makes him a powerful man, with powerful allies,” Henron cautioned. “He’s dangerous. Do not underestimate him.”
Fedryc stared at his friend’s face for a while. Henron was smarter than any other man he knew, and he trusted him like no other. In fact, Henron was the only other man he trusted.
“Take me to him.”
Henron nodded, and Fedryc followed him through a series of dark streets and even darker alleys until they stood in front of a rambling building filled with the drunken voices of many men.
“This is it.” Henron put his hand on his short sword and glanced around. “The Watering Hole is Ignio Marula’s favorite tavern. It’s also his most profitable brothel.”
Fedryc’s hands closed into fists as he nodded sharply. He knew why his friend had told him about the brothel being Ignio Marula’s most profitable. The thug had invented a very lucrative way for the poor souls who owed him more money than they could pay to repay him. He took a female member of each family who couldn’t pay their debts and worked them in his brothels, racking up their debt each month with an interest rate no one could get ahead of—until the woman was used and broken.
This could have been Marielle’s fate.
Fedryc’s nails dug in his palms hard enough to pierce the skin, and a drip of blood fell into the dirt of the alley. “I’m going in. Keep your men at the ready in case of any bad surprise.”
“I think bad is the only thing you’ll find in there.”
Fedryc didn’t answer as he stepped inside the dark, dank place.
The air was thick with the scent of unwashed bodies, alcohol and smoke from men inhaling from strange, circular devices made of dried brown leaves. Fedryc could see men gathered around small, round tables, hunched over brown, foul-looking drinks, despair and anger folding around their faces in deep wrinkles, even on the young. Most of them where humans, but some Delradon were sprinkled here and there, sharing the others’ misery.
“My Lord, what an honor!” a tall, painfully thin Delradon man called from the farthest recess of the dark space. Beside him was a narrow staircase tucked against the plain wooden bar where a sour-faced, bulky Delradon man wiped a glass with a stained rag.
All eyes went to him, and Fedryc understood the man knew what he was doing by calling the attention of everyone in the place to his presence. Fedryc had no doubt that the High Lord of Aalstad would not be well received in a hovel like this one, and that it wouldn’t take a lot to incite these men to violence against him. They had no idea that a Draekon Lord could kill them all easily.
Fedryc made his way inside the place under the openly hostile stares of the customers, his eyes holding each glare until the other man looked away. Finally, he came to stand over a round table at which the thin Delradon man sat, his crimson eyes gleaming with fake awe. A row of rotten yellow teeth showed as a wicked, servile smile pulled his thin lips apart, and Fedryc shook off his impulse to turn away and leave the repulsive place behind.
“Are you Ignio Marula?” Fedryc stood in front of the Delradon man, his hand twitching near his sword hilt, itching with the desire to draw the weapon out.
“That I am, my Lord.” Ignio Marula widened his smile, giving the appearance of a snake opening its mouth. “And what can the humble Ignio Marula do for the new High Lord of Aalstad?”
“I am here to retrieve the brother of my Draekarra, a young human named Devan Jansen,” Fedryc stated, his eyes missing nothing of the perverse glee in Ignio Marula’s eyes.
“Your new Draekarra? That is great news. Great news, indeed. It would be an honor to have you sit at my table.”
Ignio Marula gestured to the seat opposite him and Fedryc reluctantly sat, fully aware that the room full of men was at his back. Ignio Marula leaned on the table on his elbows, his foul, acrid breath reaching all the way to Fedryc. His face lost its smile and turned into a predatory stare.
“Where is Devan Jansen?” Fedryc bored his gaze into the thug’s eyes, hoping to intimidate the old criminal into obedience. It took less than a second for him to understand it wouldn’t work. Ignio Marula was fully aware of the leverage he had against Fedryc, and by giving him the news that Marielle was his Draekarra, he had but ensured that the thug would try to get as much as possible for Devan’s life. It mattered not. He would retrieve the foolish boy alive for Marielle’s sake, no matter the cost.
“Oh, don’t worry about the boy.” Ignio Marula straightened and made a jerky motion to the sour-faced man behind the bar. “He’s here, under my protection.”
“I will retrieve him then.”
Fedryc leaned back on his seat as the sour-faced man put two grimy looking glasses on the table alongside a bottle filled with brown liquid.
“I would love nothing more than to hand him to you, my Lord.” Ignio Marula spoke with a pained expression, like he truly wanted nothing more than to help. “But the boy has a debt, you know. And any man of honor knows a debt has to be repaid.”
“I am aware of Devan Jansen’s debt.”
