A Priestess for the Blind God (Legends of Rahasia Book 1)

Chapter Sixty-Two

"It smells like piss."

Ratu lifts her veil higher over her nose. Arno can't see her lips, but he assumes that she's silently laughing at him from that malicious gleam in her eyes. "Did you expect it to smell like cinnamon in the Empire's prisons, milord? Maybe a spoonful of honey?"

Arno lifts his shirt over his nose, the hard outline of his stomach peeking above his belt. "I've only ever been on the outside of these walls, Queenie."

"How dreadfully lawful of you."

Ratu winks at him, and then slips out a bone-thin knife from her belt, dashing from pillar to pillar when the prison guards' backs are turned. The prison building itself is hideously simplistic compared to the luxurious, domed architecture of the Empire. It has a squat roof, and archways carved in asymmetrically every few paces with the dull color of unheated clay. The Rahasian prison system is still relatively civilized compared to their paler-skinned neighbors up north. In the north, their glorious, unshaven monarch can jail a man just for looking at him sideways on a Tuesday. Here, at least there's a trial held by the Emperor's topmost advisors who see evidence on both sides. If the condemned are lucky, they're fined with a heavier tax of grain and gold. If they're unlucky, they rot in prison. If the gods have cursed them...

"The Pit." Ratu whispers, the veil flapping in the wind as she furiously attempts to keep her ensemble together. Her dark eyes point toward the darkest part of the prison, a room off the rightmost corner where the oil lamp circles barely brush. "Go to the Pit."

Arno glares at the guard leaning against the corner, flicking a piece of dirt out from underneath his nails. "Pergi, soldier boy. Go!" Ratu scolds.

Arno points to the fidgeting guard. "I'm not a ghost. I can't just disappear!"

Ratu sighs, picks up a loose piece of brick flaking from the wall, and tosses it so it hits the opposite side of the prison. The guard snaps to attention, blinking rapidly, releasing a string of curses ending in the gem of...

"Elder's arse!"

Arno stifles back a snicker at that one. Cato probably wouldn't appreciate that comment. Most soldiers were very proud of their arses, what with all the muscle training.

"Hey, soldier boy!" When Arno whirls around, Ratu's already across the room, inches from the room with the Pit. The prison guard is carefully inspecting where the pebble hit on the opposite side of the hall. Arno bounds over to Ratu's side, wincing as his clumsier footsteps occasionally crack against the floor.

"Remind me why we're at the Pit again."

Ratu rolls her eyes. "We need a sacrifice. The Pit's filled with the lowest of the low in these prisons. The rapists. The murderers."

"No thieves?"

Arno's smirking, but Ratu glares fiercely back. "Contrary to popular belief, there is honor among thieves. I wouldn't make a sacrifice out of a thief. They're practically kin. Besides, these people were all going to be executed anyway. If we didn't kill them, the guards would." On that note, they make their way over to the Pit, their shoes sliding on the refuse, bits of bone and rust, covering the floor. Ratu takes out her bone-thin knife again and raps it against the grate covering the infamous Pit. When Arno leans over the edge, his eyes only make out darkness, the tops of lice-infested hair gone wild, glimmers of wild eyes peering over thick beards. The prisoners below hiss like monsters, eyes flashing like horrid ghūls in deepest shadow.

Living men rotting.

***

Champions,

It seems we've ended up in the Rahasian prison system, more specifically, the worst of it:

The Pit.

This is super fun to write, let me tell you.

-Sophia