seon

He just sat there on the bed, alone, broken, hurt. He couldnt move. He didnt feel like moving. His whole body was numb. His hand was swallen, broken. Eve had tended to his wounds but the wounds ran deep. Deeper than the skin, deeper than the flesh, deeper than the bone. All the way down to his now wretched soul.

He had watched his wife been dragged around like a criminal, imprisoned, although pregnant! He had yelled that to Eve's face more than just once. She payed no heed. He had to act. He and Auril jumped on Eve and with fast swings they managed to drop her unconsious. Gorn had actually felt sorry fer hurting that guard. She was doing her duty, but that when things went awry.

Several Covians walked in and seeing the two Kaldorians armed and the Covian guard on the floor they immediatelly charged. Gorn tried to explain to them, but the first hit made him angry. He drew sword and then hell got even worse. He hit them with great fury and anger knowing that failure would result to death, not his...No he wasnt fearing his death, but Calantha's and the seed she carried inside her. Auril was there fighting like a lioness protecting her young ones. She stabbed, she poisoned, she jumped on them headbutting them, but they were two many. Two Kaldorians against too many Covians. As Gorn fell he saw with the corner of his eye Auril falling too.

When he came around Auril was dragged away to a cell and an iroclad Covian leaning over him. Gorn was worried. He turned to look at the cell where Calantha was held. Was she alright? Was the baby alright? The only words that came out his mouth :

"Put me in the cell with meh wife."

Dragged around he was tossed there with her.
Calantha was crying. He couldnt stand it looking at her crying. He loved her so very much that the very sight broke him apart.

Crowd began to gather outside and inside the jail. He cought a glimpse of Edwin outside trying to find out what happened, but his eyes stopped on that silent Covian recruit looking through the bars.

- Dimman! He exclaimed.

He might had left Kaldor to join the ranks of Cove, but still he was pure blood Kaldorian. A man of honour. He quickly explained the situation to him, begging him to help Calantha. Dimman was a good man. Still is....He tried, he failed.

The cell door opened. A tall Covian came inside. His intensions were written across his face. As he walked slowly towards Calantha, Gorn jumped on him. They fought. Like two hungry dogs fighting fer the last piece of meat. Gorn though -weak from his wounds- fell.

Calantha was screaming and crying as the Covian punched her and kicked her.

It was after the Covian exited the cell that Calantha curled down on the ground holding her belly, crying her eyes out from pain. But there were screams coming through the walls. In the next cell Rebecca who was arrested with Calantha was tortured. Her screams piercing his mind. He was laying helpless on the floor of that cell. Bruised, cut and wounded.

He opened his eyes a bit later, when the cell door opened again. This time a man with a different armour. Someone called him Hugo. He paced towards the woman slowly, as if each step was a quake. Gorn came around fast to the very thought of his wife being tortured again. There was struggle, but another Covian walked in grabbing the young Maul by the neck. The poor lad gurgled helplessly watching his beloved being tortured.

Each hit on Calantha's body was a flaming blade thrusted in his heart. At some point Hugo started hitting her belly. Despite his pleeds for mercy, the torture continued. Hugo took the beaten Calantha out to be supposedly released.

Gorn, still under the clutch of the Covian guard, was dragged outside too. To the torture room. Last time he saw Calantha she was being dragged outside. Beaten. Shamed. She was alive. Tis all he thought...and the baby???

He had been tortured before. Gorn didnt mind that. His body showed marks of whippings, burns and branding. He was tossed on a stone chair in the torture chamber. Unable to react he was having difficulty to see from one eye, swallen as it was. There were about five Covians around. They had an argument. Tis all he could figure out. Then his mind just......slipped away to the days before....to the day he proposed her in the Trinsic park....the day he saw her as a bride....till the day she told him she was pregnant. He was so damn happy that day...So damn happy. His mind remembered:

- Whats this? Calantha smiled slowly looking down at Gorn.

- Doesn't it look like it? Gorn looked at her grinning.

She smiled. He remembered that smile vigorously.

-A....crib?

He felt being dragged out.

- Move out! A strict voice ordered him.

He could barely walk. More like a moving coprse than a living person he was dragged out of the prison. His mind was so numb that he couldnt remember when was it that he was dragged out on the woods, tied to a savage banner pole. It was that Covian guard that many months ago attacked him, the Commander and Arinar. It was Demarian.

A sharp pain like a burning spike struck him on his left hand, making him scream. It was an inhuman voice that came out. A voice deep as he bowels of this earth. Grim like the face of death itself. A call to Raza...He fainted.....

He came around every now and then as Eve was dragging him away from Demarian with the aid of Dimman. At some point he woke up, slightly opening his one eye. He heard her voice. She reassured him Calantha was alright. Gorn gestured her to her to lean over.

- Iiiff....th' bb..baby dies.....I..'ll eat...y;r heart. He whispered.

He ment it. His body might have been broken, but inside his head the game of life and death was on. The bet? Everything....The winner? Didnt matter...

After he was dragged away to Buccaneer's Den, he was led to the healers' hut there. In his fever, in his anguish the call to Raza was answered. His mind filled with rivers of blood and fire, in a city of Steel! Auril and Edwin found him yelling, screaming and griding teeth. Calming the young Maul wasnt easy. Auril pittied him, drew her knife. Not a good way to die, but better than living half, and crazy. Edwin was swift to break in. He stopped her kindly. and managed to get Gorn to calm down.

Then Auril left to bring the captain. Gorn kept asking for Calantha and the baby, but the young recruit told him she was alive and that he took her to Strongholt. A while later, the Captain barged in. Seeing Gorn on the bed he ordered him to stand. Gorn was already half way standing seeing an officer's uniform. He tried to look as stout as he was hours ago. Failing.

- Yer arm is broken? Said the Captain noticing the hand in the sling.

-Aye sir. He sounded broken like his body. But tis my shield hand sir.

- Can ye hold a sword?

Gorn drew his sword. he had difficulty to keep it steady but it was enough

-Good, then Ill be expecting ye to fight when we go to war tommorow.

His heart all of a sudden started pumping quickly. Veins were ready to explode. He wanted to scream, to roar, to make the God of War himself to come down following the warcry and bestow him Glory! Adrenaline to the extremes. His mind set on one goal. Revenge!!!

Only now, many hours later, as he sat alone in the infirmary did he allow tears to come up. Tears for his wife, tears for their unborn child's fate, tears fer his loss of innocence.....He felt an empty shell. A ghostly figure....

The images of the city of steel drenched in a river of blood and fire was all that kept him company.

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