The Blades of Liars: Rebirth of the Phoenix Book Two by Storm Russel

Author:Storm, Russel
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: anonymous
Published: 2023-11-10T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter seventeen

Jules

Raj watched as Hart walked out of the room where Bruce was being kept. “Any luck?”

Hart shook his head. “No words. No gestures. He just stared straight ahead.”

Raj sighed. “I had the same results. He knows how to deal with interrogation tactics.”

“The tactics we’ve tried so far, anyway,” Lorna said. “He might not be so resolved if we put him through some mild torture.”

“What did you have in mind?” Hart asked.

“We could try sleep deprivation. Starvation. Dehydration. Noise exposure. Nothing serious, yet.”

“If we’re going to try, we should start soon,” Raj said. “Those take time to be effective, and I don’t know how long we’ll be able to stay here.”

“I advise that we don’t let him know we’re using these tactics,” Jenall started. “Depriving him of sleep, food, or water would be the easiest to execute effectively.”

“Very well,” Lorna said. “We’ll do all three. I’ll have a Wali enter his room every half hour to ask a mundane question, and if he ever asks for food or water we’ll say we’re only providing it once per day. In reality, we’ll give him water every three days, and food every five.”

“That seems appropriate,” Hart said slowly. “But what will we do if Kraken Overlord sends his Truthwardens to attack us? We have less than two days if the soldiers who ran alerted him.”

“I’ve been thinking about that,” Jenall said. “If Lorna’s information about military records is true, then losing the Claw’s leaders will have been a crushing blow for the Kraken. He still has his Truthwardens, the soldiers who used to occupy this military base, and the escaped Claw members, but sending enough of them a day’s journey north would be risky.”

“It’s a game of chicken,” Lorna said with a grin. “Kraken Overlord was not prepared to be confronted in his own city. That much is clear. We need to exploit his lack of preparation before he can catch up.”

“What are you proposing?” Hart asked.

“We need to face him before he gets reinforcements,” Jenall said softly. “We could stop this war before it truly starts.”

“Killing the Kraken,” Raj said softly. “Let’s think this through. We need to prepare for the rest of the kingdom blaming Kerajaan. The death of a monarch could inspire a nationalism that this world hasn’t seen in hundreds of years. It could create countless Truths, each geared toward defeating Kerajaan.”

“That’s very true,” Jenall said. “But if Kraken Overlord really is the one with the power to orchestrate the movement of the jin, killing him means stopping the jin from returning.”

Raj blinked, seeing the jin’s pale stares as they clawed at Shuoma’s innocents. Yes, if the Kraken did allow the jin to attack, he needed to be stopped.

“We might not have much time,” Jenall said. “We arrived nearly a week ago. If Kraken Overlord reached out to his allies across Drakk, they could be arriving soon. There’s only one question that matters, here. Do we think that killing Kraken Overlord will stop the jin from returning?”

“It’s a gamble,” Lorna said.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.