Illegal King by Mason Dakota

Author:Mason Dakota [Dakota, Mason]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Dakota Publishing
Published: 2019-06-30T16:00:00+00:00

Forty-One

Gradually my eye lids flickered open. I tasted blood in my mouth and felt it on the back of my head. My breathing was raspy and labored. Each breath sliced through layers of cloth and I realized that I still wore my mask.

With what took every muscle in my body, I opened wide one eye and then another, feeling the dried blood on my forehead crackle beneath my mask. I groaned in discomfort as my vision blurred and swirled.

A horrible throbbing settled at the back of my skull. My ears rang. I fought with all my strength to push through, as though I were swimming to the surface from the bottom a deep pool of mud.

I was tied to a chair. Dark brick walls surrounded me, but I felt a chilling breeze smelling of fresh rain mixed with the foul stench of the Stinks. Heat emanated from small flames flickering within a large metal barrel that sat before me. The surrounding darkness looked even bleaker and more indistinguishable past the fire’s radius. An army could have stood just a few feet into the dark and I would not have known.

Two men stood in the fire’s light.

One was Tempest Raven. He stood across from me by the bonfire and warmed his hands. A small bandage with dried blood covered over his right eyebrow, the result of my one good blow in our fight. I could only imagine how I must have looked by comparison. For the first time, I took stock of Raven. He had the black branded tattoo wrapped around his neck, marking him as a slave. He was ripped in muscle, scars and tattoos. Excessive tattoos attempt to cover up the wounds someone would have growing up in slavery.

I saw the second figure clearly once Raven moved away from the bonfire. He, too, was strapped to a chair, except he sat there with his head hung so low that I couldn’t see his face and identify him. His chest rose and sank slowly and only by gradual degrees. He breathed as though he was forcing air into his lungs. Dried blood and bruises covered him.

Something about him terrified me.

I turned my attention back to Raven. I watched as he brushed a hand through his short Mohawk and winced as his hand bumped his swollen forehead.

“Awe, did I hurt you?” I said sarcastically, coughing between phrases. I wasn’t that funny when strapped to a chair with my body screaming in pain from probably the most painful beating in my life.

Raven snarled.

“You know…I would have won if you hadn’t cheated.” I said.

Raven scoffed but said nothing.

“Why am I still alive? You had every opportunity to kill me.”

Still nothing, but he did look away from the fire long enough to glance at something only he could see in the darkness.

There’s someone else out there.

“Is this the part where you torture me for information?”

Once again silence.

“If you are going to do that, why not remove my mask?”

More silence.

“Who is that man over there?”

Still nothing.

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