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Caleb breathed hard where he was swaying, watching his friends retreat. He saw them start to turn back, likely trying to get back to him, but no, they couldn’t do that. They had to get out of here. He pulled out his phosphorus and swiped it across his hand, casting Wall of Fire in between them and him and the Tomb Takers.
He could hear them yelling, but he just screamed, “Go.” A second of nothing and then he could hear them retreating.
He fell to his knees and panted on the snowy ground, glancing around at the Tomb Takers as Lucien said, “Sometimes, you all are really stupid.”
He glanced at Gelidon, and she vanished. Caleb huffed a small laugh at that. Smart of Fjord.
Lucien growled and looked around before his gaze narrowed on Caleb. Caleb lifted his head up, knowing there was nothing he could do to prevent the inevitable but unwilling to show weakness.
Lucien stalked up to him and unleashed a flurry of blows with his swords, each cutting and piercing in Caleb’s skin. Caleb clenched his jaw, trying to draw on all that experience of having to remain silent as his skin was pierced and penetrated by crystals and anything else that satisfied Ikithon’s thirst for punishment and pain.
And then Lucien kicked him to the ground, his furious face twisted in corrupted malice, and raised his sword, driving it into Caleb’s chest. Caleb screamed, a fiery pain blooming around his heart, and as his vision darkened, he wondered if this is what Mollymauk felt when he died as well. And then darkness claimed him.
Caleb woke up with a gasp. That was the most surprising thing he registered first. He blinked and groaned, still feeling the pain searing across his chest. Cree hovered above him, her hands dimming with radiant energy. He breathed out, his chest shuddering.
“Good, you’re awake,” she said.
Why had they healed him? To use him as leverage, maybe.
He shook his head. Whatever Lucien did to him, he could deal with it. He’d dealt with worse.
“Search him. Find something to keep him powerless. I don’t care. But we’re regrouping and then going after them,” Lucien ordered, his calm demeanor more frayed than Caleb had ever seen, rage simmering just underneath as he paced in front of him.
“What’s your plan here, Lucien?” he asked, hoping to keep him distacted for as long as possible, to give the others as much of a chance to escape and go get help as possible.
Lucien glanced at him before looking away, his fists clenching before they relaxed.
“Easy, we’re going after them, going to bargain with you and then kill you all,” he said.
Caleb hummed, about what he thought. “Good luck with that,” he said as Tyffial and Otis searched him. Pulling things out and flinging them to the ground. Caleb glared at them and muttered, “Be careful with those.” They said nothing so he rolled his eyes and turned back to Lucien.
Lucien huffed, a hint of a scornful smile twisting his lips. “That’s quite the brave face you have going,” he said.
“I am afraid of many things, but you aren’t one of them,” Caleb said. “You can kill me or torture me or use me for a bargaining chip, but I know that the Nein will come out on top, and you will lose.”
Lucien raised an eyebrow. “Really? You have quite a bit of faith in a group of people who just abandoned you to die,” he said.
Caleb laughed. “You must be quite desperate if you’re resorting to trying to shake my faith in them with such obvious twists on the truth that a five year old could pick up on it.”
Lucien glared and stalked forward, his fists shaking before he stopped and took a deep breath.
“Well, it’s no matter. They may have something we want, but we have something they want more. Regardless of what you say, they won’t beat us,” Lucien said.
“If that makes you feel better after the embarrassing defeat you just suffered, then go ahead and keep telling yourself that,” he said.
“And in what world would this battle be a defeat? We kicked your ass, nearly killing you all,” Lucien said.
“Yes, but this was us severely hindered by the fight earlier and suffering from exhaustion, yet even as you kicked our asses, we still got one of your threshold crests and got away with it,” Caleb said. “Face it, Lucien, you’re out matched.”
“You’re mouthiness is really starting to get on my nerves,” he said, his smile tight and voice deadly.
“Then get on with it. I’m tired of sitting here and listening to you rambling on as if you have any control or, even, an inkling of an idea of what it going on here,” Caleb said.
Lucien actually laughed at that. “What? You think you know what’s happening better than I do.”
“Yes, I do. I’m not blinded like you are,” he said.
“Enlighten me, then,” Lucien said.
“Alright. You are a power hungry fool. You are messing with something far greater than you realize and when you finally get what you want, it will be like nothing you are imagining,” Caleb ignored the flicker of flames and screaming at the edges of his mind. “You think you have even a modicum of control when you are nothing more than a puppet for something much bigger and much badder than you could ever imagine. You think you’re important, but you’re nothing more than an ant who is helping this Somnovum, and they will crush you the minute you stop being useful. You are a blind fool who thinks that he can see everything when nothing is illuminated and you will get everyone hurt for your hubris.”
Lucien was quiet for a long moment before he scoffed. “Such poetry. Did you speak this way to Mollymauk? All those fancy words covering up cowardice and misunderstanding, it makes me wonder if he was relieved when he died because he wouldn’t have to listen to them anymore.”
Caleb flinched slightly despite it being a cheap shot, something about Caleb’s words must have gotten under Lucien’s skin.
Fine, if he wanted to bring Mollymauk into this, then Caleb could take cheap shots as well.
“You know, you and Molly aren’t that different,” Caleb said.
Lucien rolled his eyes and said, “This is a pathetic attempt to sway me to some kind of good side. I thought you would be better at this.”
“I am not trying to sway you. I’m merely stating a fact. You’re both arrogant and kinda dicks. I hope we didn’t give you this idea that he was some sort of saint. He wasn’t—“
“Speaking ill of the dead—“
“You aren’t dead,” Caleb said, sincerity leaking into his voice. “And I’m saying this because I think Molly is you, but he’s an uncorrupted version of you. He’s a version of you that values kindness. He’s a version of you that wanted to leave the world a little better than he found it. And I pity you that you can’t see the value in those things anymore.”
Lucien glared and said, “Find something to shut him up. I’m done hearing his voice.”
“Afraid of the truth,” Caleb sniped.
Lucien snarled and lunged forward, taking them both to the ground. Lucien hovered above him, his hands coming to grasp his throat and tighten around it. Caleb struggled, trying to shove him off. A moment later, Lucien was pulled off by Cree.
“Lucien, stop. That’s exactly what he wants. We need him, anyway,” Cree said.
Caleb coughed as he sucked air in.
A moment later, Otis said, “I found something.” He held up the silence collar that Caleb had been tinkering with.
The blood drained out of Caleb’s face as he looked at it. Of course, a couple nights after he’d managed to get it working, someone else would find it and use it on him.
Lucien grabbed it and glanced at him. At seeing the poorly masked fear in his face, Lucien grinned and examined it.
“What is this?” he asked.
Caleb didn’t answer, his jaw clenching as he sat up, unwilling to be lying down while this happened.
“What? No snarky answers or witty comebacks. This little ol’ collar rendered you completely speechless,” he said. Caleb couldn’t suppress the full bodied flinch at the words, fear pumping through his veins as he pushed down the memories of that cold weight around his neck.
Lucien laughed. “Wait, does this actually silence you? A wizard without words or sound. That would make you completely powerless, wouldn’t it?”
Lucien considered it for a moment longer before kneeling in front of him and opening the collar. Caleb jerked back and tried to scramble away, panic starting to course through him. He had completely forgotten that was in his bag, hadn’t once considered it being used against him again, but here he was, among enemies, alone, and about to be rendered completely helpless.
Zoran grabbed him and pushed him toward Lucien’s smiling face, holding him in place, restraining any weak struggling, as Lucien placed the collar around his throat, locking it into place. Caleb shivered, not from sitting in the snowy darkness but feeling the magic ripple through him, knowing that there would be no Veth this time around to get it off of him. He was powerless.
“Try making a sound,” Lucien ordered.
Caleb glared at him and spat at his face.
Lucien blinked and wiped the spit off his face. “Alright, if that’s how you want to play this. I’ll give you a choice. You either make a sound now or I shove my cock into your mouth and choke you to see if you’ll make any sound then.”
Caleb jerked back, his eyes wide. Ikithon had, of course, trained them to seduce targets and had threatened them with this type of violence to desensitize them, and Caleb had warmed people’s beds to earn coin or food or shelter, but being with Nein, being surrounded by gentle, nice touches, being able to say no to their touches, he hadn’t forgotten about this kind of violence, but he’d thought it was behind him.
“Fuck you,” Caleb snarled, but, as expected, no sound came out. Just him mouthing the words.
Lucien laughed in delight and ran his fingers through Caleb’s hair. “Good boy,” he mocked. “Give me some rope,” he said to the other Tomb Takers. One of them handed him a length of rope. Lucien grabbed Caleb’s wrists and tied them together before bringing the rope up to the small loop in the front of the collar, tying a knot in it, and then used the remaining length to yank Caleb forward slightly.
“I think this is much better, don’t you?” he said.
Caleb glared at him before flipping him off.
“Still so brazen. Let’s see if we can’t work that out of you, make you a nice, good boy, by the time we get to your friends,” Lucien said, yanking harder on Caleb, jerking him forward enough that he couldn’t keep his balance and fell onto his hands and knees.
Lucien smiled down at him. “Alright, let’s go,” he ordered, pulling on Caleb hard enough that Caleb had to scramble to stand up and follow close behind.
Caleb closed his eyes and prayed to anyone listening that the Nein would make it to Essek, prayed that they were all okay and would be safe soon, prayed that they wouldn’t do anything stupid on his behalf, prayed that they would do whatever was necessary, even if it meant sacrificing him.