It was a little known fact that there were prison cells beneath the castle in Astaril. When the city was formed and the castle foundations laid, they were a very necessary part of the security and safety of the new united clans and a way for Andigre to secure criminals until he was ready to pass judgement. For nearly a quarter of a century, it was the primary location for imprisonment. However, since the building of a fortified gaol that removed the distasteful presence of prisoners out of the castle, the cells had not been used. Half of them had been repurposed, encompassed into other aspects of the castle so that only four cells remained.


    Caste Undern applied for permission to speak with Cleric Rodel and Captain Chael and was directed to the guarded door which led down a set of narrow steps that widened as they reached the base, the entire prison in white stone and grey bars. The cells had no windows or any access to the outside except the stairwell so the prison was illuminated with lanterns that hung from the ceiling down the middle of the dead end corridor with two cells on either side.


    “This is a prison?”


    Caste looked at Suvau who studied the prison with a critical eye.


    “I take it Fort Mavour’s dungeons weren’t so clean?”


    “Certainly not.”


    “At least you didn’t have to defecate in a bucket in front of your cellmates.”


    Suvau nodded. “You are right, of course…we didn’t have buckets.”


    Caste cringed then paused on the bottom step where they were greeted by a guard in purple, blue and white livery. “We are here with permission to speak to the prisoners.” Caste held out the signed missive to the guard who studied it then looked at Suvau.


    “Should your Maul be present, Deacon Undern?” His voice carried strongly through the prison.


    Caste cringed and turned to Suvau. “Maybe you should wait here.” He admitted to the big man in a low whisper. “These soldiers already count your people as less than human. I don’t really want your presence muddying the waters.”


    “Was that a dirty skin joke?”


    Caste paled, his freckles becoming the only colour on his face. “Suvau…I swear, that’s not what I…” Then he caught sight of his wink and groaned. “That was uncalled for.” He walked into the prison, hearing soldiers stand to their feet and move towards the bars. Caste was not there to speak with the soldiers but he could hardly miss the copper red of Chael’s sideburns as he came as close as he could.


    “Have you come down here to gloat?” He demanded.


    Caste was going to pass by but stopped and turned to the captain. “I was not the one who imprisoned, beat and accused the King’s daughter.”


    Chael’s countenance was pained. “Do you think we would have done so if we had known?” He demanded, gesturing to his men. “What do you take us for? Fools?”


    “No,” Caste turned and looked at the single occupant in the cell on the other side of the passage, still wearing his dark red cappa clausa, sitting on the hard bench with an even harder expression, “just misinformed.”


    Rodel’s eyes turned to him, every word spoken in the prison able to be heard by all as they bounced off the stone walls. “You gave the gall to accuse me of misinformation when it was yourself and LaMogre who smuggled a witch into Fort Mavour, manipulated the match against the minotaur and stole slaves from Sir Donimede.” He accused grimly. “Yet there you are, on the wrong side of these bars according to your crimes! Where is justice? Why have you been promoted rather than excommunicated from the Order? And where is LaMogre? Why is he not here?”


    Caste clasped his hands within the sleeves of his cappa clausa and took a deep breath as he faced the imprisoned cleric. “All costs of the theft have been guaranteed by another. As such, the charge has been dropped,” Rodel’s turned his head to stare at the wall opposite him, refusing to meet Caste’s eye, “as well as any collusion or coercion with any monster of Maul, including the allegations of fraternisation with a witch.”


    Rodel’s mouth fell open. “But…she is! She is a witch!”


    “Rodel, you are in enough trouble as is…”


    “I don’t care!” He stood and grasped the bars. “I watched as she communed with the minotaur so that it would do her bidding! She has ties with Maul! We are all witnesses to the way she sank her hands into a tree and withered in from the inside out, tearing it asunder!”


    “This witch you condemn and refused to name is Princess Genovieve, daughter of King Rocheveron and heir to the Astaril throne.”


    “It shouldn’t matter her name or status,” Rodel argued, “she is a witch!”


    “Actually, her abilities differ greatly to the tainted souls of women that the Grail has catalogued in the past. In fact, in Archdeacon Gerion’s thesis, ‘Condemning the Tainted’ we see…” Caste heard a deep throated grunt and turned to see Suvau shaking his head. “Right…of course. I need to remain focused and not descend into debate and facts.” He paused to collect his thoughts. “Despite the witnesses to this accusation, it has been overthrown by a higher authority.”


    “The King is being manipulated by a witch of Maul! Of course he would declare her innocent! Are Archdeacon Adamis and Bishop Peele out of their minds?!”


    “Actually it was Sir Garo Rylan who overthrew the charge, in agreement with King Rocheveron.”


    “Wait,” Kipre said nervously, “Sir Rylan is here?”


    “He arrived but two hours ago.”


    Kipre groaned and squatted down. “We’re dead. We’re so dead.”


    Caste studied Rodel who was losing confidence as his anger began to diminish in the face of overwhelming despair.


    “But…even then…LaMogre…he and the wit…Genovieve…Sir Rylan would never knight a man who undoubtedly bedded his wife.”


    “Even the charge of fraternisation has been appeased with the ‘Rite of Purification’.” Rodel sank onto the bench, his head in his hands.


    Caste studied the pathetic sight of the imprisoned cleric. He couldn’t have beaten him better if he had taken a mace and clubbed him half to death. Rodel wasn’t bleeding blood but hope was leeching from every pore.


    Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    “Why are you even here?” Rodel whispered, his voice captured against the stone.


    “Though we are hardly friends, we are both officers of the Grail.”


    “You think I need to confess my deeds?” Rodel snorted, his voice thick with disdain. “What is it the great and mighty Deacon Undern would like me to say?”


    Caste moved closer to the bars, his fingers curling around one. “Tell me that this venture from Fort Mavour didn’t have anything to do with sabotaging Judd LaMogre’s knighthood,” Rodel opened his mouth to protest, “or of ingratiating yourself to Sir Donimede in the hopes that he would condone his eldest daughter’s attachment to a cleric?”


    Rodel paused then Caste heard Arsch swear behind him, their words, though soft, caught by the ears of the soldiers.


    “This…this was all because you’re languishing for Willower Donimede?” Arsch exclaimed. “You told us we were performing a service to Astaril by exposing corruption in the only successful knighthood questor! You drove us across Terra because of a woman?”


    “I swear,” Chael looked out from between the bars, his teeth gritted together and eyes as dark as thunder, “if I ever get out of here, I will make you pay for the lives of the soldiers killed because of your lascivious nature!” He struck the bars, causing them to ring out then turned his back on Rodel, yelling a wordless curse. From the expressions of the other soldiers, though Chael had been unintelligible, they all shared his sentiment.


    Caste pressed his fingers to his nose. “Tell me what happened,” he said softly, “and for the sake of the men imprisoned in these cells, leave nothing out.”


    Rodel swallowed and looked at his shoes that peeked out from beneath his tunic’s hem. “After the feast, after seeing LaMogre nearly devour Willower with his ardour, I was in a daze. That she loved him was obvious but for him to kiss her and not actually love her…how dare he?” Rodel breathed in sharply through his nose. “I hoped, with his departure, that it would be the end of it and I swear, I was willing to let him go without exposing him and wounding her. However, at supper the night you left Mavour, all the guests who remained were gushing about imminent wedding plans, fabric for a gown…they all believed Willower and LaMogre had reached an understanding yet not one of them saw the grief in her eyes. She did not protest but she did not agree.” Rodel paused. “How can her own kin be so unaware of the sorrow of their own child?”


    “So you took it upon yourself to avenge Willower’s broken heart.”


    “I approached Sir Donimede after the meal and told him of my suspicions.” Rodel nodded. “I told him, if we could catch up with your company, remove the ‘nomad healer’ from Judd’s presence and show the proof of her witch nature, then LaMogre would be disgraced, his chances at knighthood destroyed and Willower would see him for what he was…a charlatan.”


    “Not to mention Donimede, who was insanely jealous of Judd to the point of trying to kill him in the Arena by ‘accidentally’ raising the gate, would be very, very grateful to you.”


    “I hoped for the gratitude,” Rodel admitted in a flat tone, past the point of attempting to lie, “but I swear, I didn’t know about Donimede trying to kill LaMogre. I just thought he didn’t like him.”


    “I suppose you were too busy mooning over Willower Donimede to notice.” Caste leaned on his left against the bars. “You set out the day after we left?”


    “With Captain Chael and a full regiment.”


    “What did Deacon Alast have to say about it?”


    “He wasn’t consulted.”


    Caste closed his eyes and tried to contain his groan. “Then what?” He asked tightly.


    “We rode north, taking, what we thought was, the most logical path you would have advised, going directly from Fort Mavour to Astaril.” Rodel shook his head. “However, despite our haste, we missed you.”


    “We didn’t go north,” Caste explained carefully, “we headed east.”


    “That was our conclusion when we had ridden past the southern end of the Hump without any sign of you.” Rodel nodded. “We were out of food and had several injuries following a werewolf attack in the night as we camped. We made for Quarre to regroup and tend the wounded. While there, one of the soldiers, who had followed LaMogre’s progress, recalled that he first came down the eastern side of Terra.”


    “We wanted to go back to Fort Mavour,” Captain Chael said tersely, “however Rodel argued that we had yet to do that which we were sent out to and ordered us east.”


    “You outrank Rodel in a military situation. You could have ignored his order.” Caste pointed out then saw guilt flash on Chael’s expression. “Oh I see…it was a matter of pride for you too.”


    “My men and I welcomed LaMogre. He inspired the soldiers and I judged him to be of good character.”


    “Well…at least this isn’t on all Rodel’s shoulders.”


    “Really?” Chael sneered. “Ask him where the cleric took us next?”


    Caste turned to Rodel. “Down south again and through the forest?”


    Rodel rubbed his hands together and sighed. “No. We headed directly east from Quarre.”


    Caste stared at him, unable to fathom the preposterousness of his statement. “You crossed the ‘Hump’? At Quarre? It’s the peak of its mountain range! And infested with basilisk!”


    “I found a map that showed a path winding through the mountains. I thought it was worth following.”


    “Goats would have had trouble with that path!” Arsch snapped.


    Rodel put his head in his hands. “Two out of our three horses fell to their deaths from the path and one soldier as he tried to save them. We became lost, suffered a horrific rainstorm…then had to leave one soldier as an endless lookout. A basilisk must have caught him during his shift. He was stone when we woke up. Then we finally escaped the mountains and headed straight to Fort Bastil where we found we had missed you by not one day!”


    “Thus you continued northwards instead of returning to Fort Mavour…” Caste sighed, astonished at how Rodel’s need for revenge had driven all sense and reason out of him.


    “We stopped at Fort Bastil to recover and replenish supplies then went on to Fort Faine and requested Sir Jesa’s monster cart which our remaining horse dragged to the village.”


    “You didn’t confront us there?” Caste asked, looking between the cells.


    “I was at the front and saw you leaving the village and that the witch, I beg your pardon, Princess Genovieve, was not with you.” Kipre explained. “We entered the village and demanded to know where she was.”


    “I doubt they would have just told you…” Caste said quietly, catching their expressions. “What did you say or do?”


    Captain Chael hung his head. “Threatened to beat their leader in front of his son.” He felt rather than saw Suvau’s dangerous glare from the stairwell. “We did nothing to them!”


    Caste closed his eyes. “And then?” He asked, trembling even as his jaw tightened.


    “We followed the path into the forest and came upon this woman as she destroyed the oak tree. She heard us and went to flee…and that’s when Rodel hit her with pommel of his hilt. She dropped like a stone.”


    Caste shook his head. “That’s some damning narrative…”


    “Yes but you can understand, we were just following Sir Donimede’s orders,” Captain Chael insisted, “and on the word of this cleric, we were right in pursuing your party.”


    “If that’s the sum total of your argument, I’d get comfortable in there.” Caste retorted.


    “Deacon Undern,” Chael begged, “I will bear the full responsibility for the actions of my men. I am not trying to escape judgement. But in the absence of Sir Donimede, I was in charge. Please, if there is any mercy to be had, spare my men.”


    Caste nodded then looked at Rodel. “What of the cleric? What say you about him?”


    “He can rot for all I care.” Chael’s response lacked any mercy at all. “To have led us on this mad chase was bad enough…but to find out it was because he was thinking with his groin and not his head…”


    Rodel cringed and cowered even further into the darkest corner of his cell.


    “I will do what I can.” Caste promised then turned and left, joining Suvau at the base of the stairs. They climbed halfway before Caste paused and put his hand against the wall, shaking his head. “Wasted lives…and not just the ones that will be executed but the potential…the position…” He licked his lips and breathed. “But at least the location of your people remains a mystery.”


    “Thank you, Caste.” Suvau nodded.


    “It’s just one answer amidst a sea of questions.” Caste lamented. “Maybe Judd will have good fortune in trying to speak with Aalis.”


    “Not from what I was privy to before being replaced by four armed guards.” Suvau admitted as they continued to climb. “King Rocheveron is letting no one in to see Aalis. It might keep Rylan away from her but it keeps all those that she trusts from her as well.”


    Caste eyed the big man as they stepped out of the stairs and along the corridor. “You noticed her terror?”


    “I could feel how cold she became and how she trembled in my arms,” Suvau nodded, “I also heard a father’s concern when he asked me to guard her.” He stopped Caste. “If he is so worried about her, why promise to give her back to the man that terrifies her?”


    “That’s probably the biggest question.”