To overthrow the cruel King who brutally slaughtered her foremothers, the last surviving water witch Elara Consuli must team up with novice warrior Juda Vikaris from the Serpent Order and realise an ancient prophecy, before the blood-thirsty ruler d...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
Rimo Tor-Narun was a complete cûnt and make no mistake.
Since his win in the training yard, he'd been nigh on impossible. It was all well and good for The Grim to lash the error of pride into the novices until the backs of their thighs bled, but the likes of Tor-Narun believed they were above such rules. And besides, he was smart enough to cage his pride whenever the Commander was on hand with his batak whip, and would instead save the self-congratulatory brogboar shit that poured out of his pretty mouth for his fellow novices.
Being paired with Rimo for patrol duties was starting to feel like a torture, and Juda couldn't help but wonder if the dead gods were punishing him for failing to control himself after his meeting with the witch. The only desire he should have felt was the kind that involved his blade, not the kind that had him on his knees, picturing her crying out his name, instead of Estella. His rage should have been locked away, restrained until the time was right when he could fully unleash it on Ban-Keren, not wasted on a witch who'd threatened and humiliated him.
Patrolling the mid echelon seemed a pointless task too. With tensions running high, Juda couldn't understand why they hadn't been sent to the slums, but it seemed the King was keen to ensure the nobles felt safe and protected – and well they might need it when Grimefell discovered Ban-Keren was to deny them the Dreynian water.
Until then, Juda had no choice but to stay on watch with Rimo and hope the bastard tripped and fell on his own scimitar. He'd already imagined killing him countless times since they'd left the novice barracks. Coming up with imaginative ways to disembowel Tor-Narun was at least taking the sting off how fucking painful it all was.
'Not long, I wager,' Rimo said, as they walked not far from the point at which the King's Library intersected with the Druvarian Coffer, where the novice's father, Benal Tor-Narun presided over the Banker's Council. 'Two more cycles, three at the very most, and I'll be advanced to the King's Guard. You see if I don't.'
Juda stifled a frustrated sigh and resisted the urge to glance up at Roth's tower. He'd rather have been dangling from the twisted turrets with one sweaty hand than listening to Rimo's drivel, but short of thrusting his blade through the brat's throat, he was stuck with this until eventide.
'Of course,' Rimo bleated on. 'I'm sure my father will speed up the process. A sizeable donation to The Grim should do the trick.'
Juda pulled up his hood as the skies grumbled overhead, their growing unrest dulling the midtide sun. 'The Grim cannot be bargained with. You know that as well as I.'
Rimo shot him a look of amused disbelief. 'Everyone can be bargained with, Vikaris. Enough coin can buy a man whatever he pleases – power, possessions, women. My father has been doing that his whole life.'
Juda wanted to tell poor deluded Rimo that it wasn't just women that his father bought and that it certainly wasn't power he sought when he was on all fours getting his arse flogged by the courtesans he paid for the pleasure, but instead remained silent. All in good time.
