"May the Order free my mind from base, unclean desire."
Crack!
The kneeling Sister Weranda bit her lip almost hard enough to draw blood as she brought down the lash once more onto her naked back. Nonetheless, she did not hold back, and the leather thongs bit into her spine and ribs once more.
"Let the Order grant me serenity, and the courage to do right."
Her hand trembled, but it did not betray her.
Crack!
"Let the Order show me enlightenment!"
Weranda tottered and almost fell, but she raised the lash again.
This must end soon, a rebellious part of her mind cried, but she pushed the thought away, crushing it into nothingness. Penance was just, and it was unworthy of a potential member of the Anointed Score to wish it over before it was finished.
"Blessed be the Order!"
Her right hand rebelled, refusing to lift the whip. She gritted her teeth, trying to overcome the traitorous member, but without success. Tears of shame and helplessness spilled down her cheeks.
"Sister,” she said to her attendant, Sister Brin, without raising her head, “My body has betrayed me. Please wield the Corrective for me."
"This happens to us all sometimes, Sister,” Brin said, a slender woman of maybe thirty years. She wore a perpetual expression of serene contentment and never raised her voice. “You completed the chant, and I did not see you skimp a single lash. As your petty Superior, I give you permission to forgo the final stroke, in recognition of your diligence."
Weranda opened her mouth to protest, but it would be a fault of Obedience to disobey even a temporary Superior, who represented the Reverend Mother in her absence.
"Thank you, Sister Brin,” she said, instead. “Blessed be the Reverend Mother!"
"Blessed be she, the Wielder of Truth!” Brin responded, bending over to pick up the lash. “I declare you shriven."
With shaking hands, Weranda drew her habit around her shoulders, cursing herself for her human frailty. Brin seemed so kind, so beatific, and Weranda longed to unburden her troubled soul to her. However, the Order's strict rules forbade this.
"Take a few minutes to collect your thoughts and compose yourself, Sister,” Brin said. “Give thanks that your vocation is still strong, and reflect on what you have learned."
Her head still bowed, Weranda heard the nun's soft footsteps tapping on the flagstones, followed by the creak and bang of the chapel door. She was alone with her thoughts, and she felt more alone than she had in her entire life.
This is your fault, Afelnor, she raged internally, as saline streams ran down her cheeks. You have ruined my inner peace, you foul rapist! I found my vocation, and you did your best to destroy it! I hate you and all those like you.
Instead of finding solace in her meditation, as she had so often done before, Weranda became more and more agitated. Her bloody back and her aching knees screamed at her with their trifling, physical demands, and she wished Brin had not removed the Corrective.
Although she tried to push away the memory, her mind went back to their times together in the big bed in Grimm's tower at Crar.
How nervous he was at first, she thought, so careful not to hurt me, trying to please me…
No! That was just his perverted male artifice! Mother Lizaveta has shown me the true way, free of physical lust and distraction. I will never again surrender my soul to a filthy male!
Denied the painful, mind-numbing solace of the Corrective, Weranda pounded her shoulders and breasts with her small fists, trying to rid herself of the foul image of the flushed, sweaty male grimacing and grunting over her like some filthy, rutting animal, but she could not.
I hope the Reverend Mother is ripping the flesh from his back right now; him and his bestial confederates!
She longed for Sister Brin to return, to bring a measure of order and serenity back to her life. The normal peace and contentment of meditation had been denied her, and she could not drag her mind from memories of her former, debased existence. Perhaps it would help her to see Grimm being punished for his evil acts.
"Thank you,” Grimm whispered, forcing himself to stay on his knees. His head lolled on his heaving chest, but he did not-would not-fall.
Another pain, dull and inchoate, and he felt his head pulled back by the hair.
His eyes focussed on a wizened, sweaty, hate-filled face he dimly recognised as that of Lizaveta.
"Why do you thank me?” the Prioress's harsh voice demanded. “Why do you not curse me?"
Grimm spat a thick gout of bloody sputum onto the floor. “Because you want me to curse you, witch,” he croaked through cracked lips. “I had to thank Magemaster Crohn whenever he beat me as a Neophyte Questor. He knows more about torment than you ever will; he broke me, but you won't.
"Your only recourse is to kill me."
Lizaveta's face contorted, and Grimm's body writhed within the grip of the demanding tentacles of self-doubt and fear. However, he knew now how to resist the Prioress's emotional attacks: he let them wash over and through him, but he retained a small inner mental sanctum, an island of resistance within the sea of pain and misery.
"Thank you,” he gasped, as the Prioress released his hair.
Grimm collapsed to the floor, the shackles on his arms preventing him from holding himself upright, but he felt a warm glow of satisfaction. He had taken everything she and her two attendants had thrown at him, and he had prevailed. He could not attack them with his body or his magic, but he had withstood them.
Nonetheless, the onslaught of physical violence and Geomancy had been shocking, and he wondered how many more of these sessions he could stand. He knew he could hide his inner drives and personality from Lizaveta, but he feared permanent damage to his body and his sanity.
Lizaveta clapped her hands. “You may leave, Sisters,” she said. The two attendant nuns curtsied, and the Prioress waited until they left the room.
"It does not end here, Grimm,” she croaked, her face pale. “This is just the beginning. I am patient and resolute, and I never give up."
"Then we will both suffer a long, painful and fruitless experience, Reverend Mother,” Grimm said, forcing himself to sit up. “You will never break me this way. It's too intense, too swift. It gives me no time to reflect, to doubt myself. You think your methods sophisticated and irresistible, but you're just an amateur; Magemaster Crohn's worth ten of you."
Lizaveta struck his left temple with a knotted fist, and he fell again, but the pain was subsumed within the other agonies clamouring for his attention; his arms, legs, stomach, head and, above all, his testicles. His tongue ran across loose teeth, and he offered a bloody smile.
"Thank you,” he whispered.
Take the bait, bitch, he thought.
"We start again tomorrow.” The Prioress's face contorted in rage. “I see we may need to revise our approach."
Grimm's heart soared, before Lizaveta's words sent him crashing back to the floor.
"We went too easily with you,” she said. “Tomorrow, we'll work with renewed zest. Sleep as well as you can tonight; you may consider the last two days as rehearsals."
Where is Shakkar? Grimm wondered, fighting rising panic. He wouldn't just have left us for no reason! He must be coming!
He tried to keep his expression calm, as if his battered body meant nothing to him.
"As you wish, Reverend Mother,” he said. “That will only make it easier. After another few days like this, I'll die, and you still won't have broken me.
"I'll have won. Even if I'm wrong and you do break down my resistance, I'm bound to invite suspicion if I saunter into High Lodge looking like tenderised meat."
"Geomancy is not restricted to emotional control, young Questor,” Lizaveta said, replacing her enraged grimace with an almost beatific smile. “If you become so damaged that your life is in danger, we can repair the injuries, so you will be fit to undergo further instruction. By the time you are ready for your mission, you will be whole and undamaged.
"Are you now so confident, Grimm?"
The mage knew he had failed to hide his dismay from his face. The prospect of death had been almost a comfort to him, and the Prioress had snatched that hope away from him.
I can't resist this for day after day! Grimm raged, inside his head, before his Questor will clamped down on his wayward emotions.
I've just got to believe that Shakkar hasn't deserted us, he thought. I've got to work on Drex whenever I can. Perhaps the General will find a way out. Perhaps Guy will break away from her control…
"No, Prioress,” he said at last. “I admit you have shaken my confidence. However, I will still fight you to the last vestiges of my will. We Questors are not easy to control, as you will find."
"Pride, defiance, and self-determination are admirable qualities,” the Prioress said. “The Guild forges its Questors in the hot fire of the Ordeal and then tempers them in the cool balm of brotherhood. A tempered blade does not break with a single blow. Instead, one must work it repeatedly, weakening it further with each bend until it fractures. Your resilience enables us to prolong the experience; when you break, it will be decisive and irrevocable."
Grimm knew what Lizaveta said was true. She would break him, sooner or later. It was only a matter of time.
"So, how does your beloved grandson respond to this treatment?” he asked. “Is he bending, or has he already broken?"
Lizaveta snorted. “I have no need to treat Guy so,” she said. “He despises Horin and he is ambitious. I only need to work on his existing drives. Some misguided principle makes him resist us, but his defiance is not as strong as yours. Where you must be broken, Guy just requires a little gentle bending until he takes on the form we desire."
"Why are you doing this, Lizaveta?” Grimm asked. “First Thorn and now Guy; why?"
Lizaveta shrugged. “Witches are tolerated in the Guild demesnes, like troublesome, senile relatives. Where are the splendid establishments for young girls to learn the way of our Craft? Where is our High Lodge?
"It pleases me for my kin to be the means of the Guild's downfall; its systematic enfeeblement, destruction and remoulding. In its place will arise a new magical hierarchy, based on feminine principles of decency, justice, and respect."
She's insane, Grimm thought.
"So what you are doing to me, what you do to your nuns; is that decent, just, or respectful?” he demanded.
Lizaveta shrugged. “I am a pragmatist,” she said, her eyes distant and dreamy. “I take no pleasure in doing what I must, but I will not waver. I will brook no defiance, for my aims are just. I will not rest until Geomancy is as respected as Thaumaturgy, until the two crafts are equal in pre-eminence."
Grimm shook his head in wonder and then regretted it, as a carillon of agony clanged and chimed in his brain.
She really believes it! he thought, as the clamour in his head began to subside. Can I make her see the insanity of this? Is it worth even trying?
Perhaps not, but I doubt agreeing with her will make my lot any easier.
"Laudable aims, Prioress,” he said aloud, dragging himself to his feet and facing the Prioress. “If I thought you meant those stirring words, that would be one thing; however, I don't. You don't want equality; you want complete domination of both mages and witches. How does torturing your wards free them? How do you defend that?"
"Who are you to lecture me about torture?” Lizaveta demanded, a pair of small, red patches blooming on her pale cheeks. “How did your beloved Guild turn you into a Questor? Were you not tortured for their ends? They make you risk your life again and again, to pay for the abuse they heaped on you! Is that just?"
Grimm opened his mouth to retort, but he closed it without speaking, as a troubled thought swam into his consciousness: She's right! How many times have I been told that the Questor Ordeal is a distasteful but unavoidable facet of Guild operations? My Ordeal can't have been any worse than that of hundreds of other Charity Students, and the same torture is probably going on right now in a forgotten corner of some Guild House. When I think of poor Erek, who chose to commit suicide rather than face another day of his abuse…
Are Lizaveta's methods any worse?
"Think about it, Grimm,” the Prioress said, her voice softer, if still harsh and unpleasant. “I beat you, and you thank me because that is how you were taught to respond to abuse, like a good little automaton. Is that the mark of an enlightened, honourable regime? Can such brutality be overcome with soft words and gentle rebukes? Yes, I am inflexible and stern; it is my only means of changing a system that should be detestable to any right-thinking person.
"You will suffer again tomorrow, and again the day after that, and for as long as is necessary, Grimm. After all, you are a proud, indomitable Mage Questor, are you not? Just ask yourself one question as you writhe in pain: why are you fighting?
"Do you think the Guild loves you? The indoctrination is so strong that even my own son, Thorn, sent you to try to kill me. All I ever did was to try to raise him to the peak of Guild status, to bring about the replacement of a corrupt and perverted establishment that isolates its members from women; half the world's population, dismissed by a lie!"
Grimm gulped. He knew the Guild regulations concerning physical relations between men and women were based on untruth; a mage did not lose his powers after sexual congress. Why did these strictures exist? Surely for no reason other than the total subjugation of Guild men and boys!
Crack!
Grimm raised a trembling hand to his burning left cheek.
"Thank me for that if you wish,” Lizaveta snarled. “You have given your life over to suffering. If that is your desire, I'll give you suffering."
Grimm tried to speak, but he could not. Strong emotion welled within him, threatening to overwhelm him. Drawing great, hacking breaths, he fought to control himself. He waved his hands and screwed his eyes shut; Lizaveta's rhetoric had provoked a greater result than all the pain he had suffered in the previous two days.
"You're just playing with my mind, witch,” he said, almost sobbing.
"Is that so bad?” Lizaveta asked, running her fingers over his bruised face. “Why fight it? I need you to love me so that you will help me achieve my ends, but I bear you no personal animosity."
The Prioress’ face looked almost appealing, attractive… for just a moment. The vision of Drexelica as Lizaveta's indoctrinated, willing slave destroyed the brief image.
"I will fight you to the end of my life, bitch,” he whispered, although he knew his feeble voice lacked conviction. “I will fight you every step of the way."
"That is your privilege, Grimm,” Lizaveta said. “Just remember that a single, heartfelt kiss will stop the pain and the suffering. Did your precious Guild ever offer you that escape?
"I will send food, and I advise you to eat every scrap. If you are as resolute as you say, tomorrow will be hard on you."
With that, she was gone, and Grimm fought the urge to call the Prioress back.
I will fight, he thought. I'll beat her yet!
He crushed down the traitorous thought that bubbled up from within: Why?
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