Chapter 23 The Prison Wagon
Darius stood over the shattered prison wagon, black mist curling around his towering frame like living smoke. The chained prisoners stared up at him with a mixture of awe, terror, and disbelief. Their wrists and ankles were raw from holy-warded manacles that still glowed faintly with suppressing runes.
“Speak,” Darius commanded, his voice low and resonant. “Why is the Crown sending you to the Radiant Veil?”
None of them answered at first. Their eyes darted between his skull-like face, the glowing green sockets, and the mountain of corpses behind him. The older man who had recognized him earlier trembled, pressing himself against the broken wood.
Rhen stepped forward, wiping blood from his hands. “Easy. They’ve been through hell already. Give them a moment.”
One of the younger prisoners, a thin woman with matted hair, finally spoke. “They… they took us from our village. Called us spiritually corrupt. Said we were tainted by frontier demons. They burned half the houses and loaded us into these wagons like cattle.”
Darius crouched slowly, trying not to loom too much. “How many villages?”
“Too many,” an older man with a broken arm whispered. “Whole settlements along the western border have gone quiet. They come at night. Accuse people of treason or corruption. Then the Order takes them. No one ever comes back.”
Another prisoner, a blacksmith by the look of his scarred hands, spat on the ground. “My brother was taken last month. He questioned why the taxes kept rising while we starved. Next day, inquisitors dragged him away. Said he was spreading darkness.”
Darius felt cold rage building in his hollow chest. “And you believe the Radiant Veil is behind it?”
The woman laughed bitterly. “Behind it? They run it. The priests smile and talk about purification while they load people into secret wagons. We heard stories… experiments in the capital. Soul binding. They’re turning people into something worse than your kind.”
Rhen glanced at Darius, then back at the prisoners. “You’re afraid of him more than the men who chained you. That’s how deep the fear goes.”
One of the teenagers started crying quietly. “He looks like death. Please… don’t raise us. Don’t make us like you.”
Darius clenched his claws. The fear in their eyes stung more than he wanted to admit. “I am not here to turn you. I want answers. Tell me everything you know about these disappearances. Names of inquisitors. Where the wagons go. Anything.”
The prisoners exchanged fearful looks. The older man who had first recognized him spoke again, voice weak. “They take them to Blackspire Abbey first. Then… further. No one knows for sure. But the ones who resist disappear completely. Entire families erased. They rewrite the records. Say the villages were lost to bandit raids or plague.”
Vael stood nearby, silently unloading more supplies from the wagons. His massive presence made some of the prisoners shrink back even further.
Darius rose to his full height. “You will stay here under my protection. Those who wish to fight may join us. Those who want to leave may do so once we clear the roads. But know this…the Crown is not just corrupt. It is feeding on its own people.”
A middle-aged woman with a scarred cheek looked up at him. “You really are Commander Voss? The one who used to lead the Northern Legions? You fought for us once…”
“I did,” Darius said coldly. “And they repaid me by leaving me to rot under a pile of my own men.”
The prisoners fell silent. Some still trembled. Others watched him with a fragile mix of hope and terror.
Rhen helped free one of the manacles. “We have food and shelter in the fortress. You’ll be safe there for now.”
As the prisoners were carefully helped out of the broken wagon, one older man in the back began coughing violently. Blood flecked his lips. He had been badly wounded during the ambush. Darius moved closer as the man reached out with a trembling hand and grabbed the edge of his bone-plated armor.
The dying prisoner’s grip was surprisingly strong. His eyes locked onto Darius’s glowing sockets with desperate clarity.
“Your wife…” he rasped, blood bubbling at the corner of his mouth. “Elyra… she was still alive after the battle. They took her. The inquisitors… they didn’t kill her right away…”
Darius froze. The world seemed to narrow to the man’s fading voice.
“Tell me,” he growled, leaning closer. “Where? What did they do to her?”
The prisoner’s eyes fluttered. A weak smile touched his bloody lips. “She was… still breathing… when they dragged her away. Said she knew too much…”
His hand slipped from Darius’s armor. His chest rose once more, then fell still forever.
Darius remained kneeling beside the dead man, black mist swirling violently around him. The words burned into his mind like brands.
Elyra had been alive after the battle.
They had taken her.
Rhen placed a hand on his shoulder. “Commander…”
Darius rose slowly, claws flexing. The cold predator inside him roared to life, drowning out everything else.
“The Holy Crown will pay for every scream she uttered,” he whispered. “I will make them regret the day they ever touched her.”
The Hollow King turned away from the prison wagon, his glowing eyes burning with new purpose. The empire he was building would no longer be about simple survival.
It would be about vengeance.