A Painted Goddess Read Online Free

keys jingle and the footsteps. Torchlight growing gradually brighter as they approached his cell door.
    What now ? Giffen wondered. Can’t they leave me in peace ?
    He didn’t mean that. Day upon day in utter darkness. Even the most hostile visitor was a welcome change of pace. And each visit was an opportunity. Giffen gathered information. He was biding his time. Somehow he’d get free, and then he would make every man, woman, and child in Klaar pay for their abuse of him.
    The lock rattled, and the cell door creaked open, sudden torchlight making him wince.
    It was that whore peddler Benadicta again. Two enormous bruisers in tow. His bruises still ached from the pasting they’d given him. He’d see those oafs dead as well, although he’d likely have to hire a gang of ruffians to make it happen. Benadicta he’d gladly kill with his own hands.
    “To what do I owe the pleasure?” he asked.
    “We caught your man Bolger,” Stasha said.
    “Congratulations,” Giffen said dryly. “Am I meant to be impressed?”
    “You’re meant to listen,” Stasha said. “Because this involves you.”
    “Please do go on,” Giffen said. “I’m aquiver with anticipation.”
    “Bolger had a note on him when he was taken. Sealed. He was delivering it to you.”
    Stasha took out the note and read it to Giffen.
    As he listened, he kept his face carefully blank, not wanting to react. He immediately realized his mistake. She was used to seeing him sneer. A blank expression was a dead giveaway. Giffen rolled his eyes as if he were bored, but it was too late. A hint of a smile at the edges of Stasha’s mouth. She knew. Giffen had the answers she wanted, and she knew it.
    “We already know how this goes,” she said. “You can tell us or be beaten and then tell us anyway.”
    “A beating. You’ve done that already,” Giffen said. “What of it?”
    “It can always get worse,” Stasha Benadicta said coldly. “We can take your thumbs. We can leave here with arms and legs. We can make you go away a little piece at a time. It might take all year.”
    Giffen tried to swallow, but his mouth and throat had suddenly gone dry.

CHAPTER THREE
    Hot and steamy and uncomfortable.
    That’s how Alem felt lying facedown on the mossy rock, his clothes clinging wet and heavy, the morning sun already baking the world. He’d been told this was still a mild part of the year in the tropics, the real heat coming deeper into the summer. But these were minor concerns.
    Alem was alive.
    Maurizan had fallen overboard the previous night when Miko’s scow had been caught in the grip of a tremendous storm. He’d seen her topple over the gunwale and then dove in after her without thinking.
    Because you’re a stupid thick idiot thicko , he thought.
    He’d lost track of her, bobbing in the water, waves crashing down on him. He’d lost track of the boat too. Lost track of the land. The currents took him at their whim. He’d finally bumped up against something that nobody would call a proper island, just a stretch of rock humped up out of the sea with moss and lichen growing over it. He’d sprawled there, rain lashing him, until he’d finally fallen asleep.
    He sat up now, limbs aching, and shaded his eyes against the rising sun. Alem stood, turned a slow circle. Open, empty sea stretched in almost every direction, but there was a small island east only a couple hundred yards away. He could probably swim it but would have preferred not to. And who knew what sort of creatures lurked the depths? Sharks were a common enough terror, but he’d heard of a lot worse. Things with tentacles that wrapped around a man and dragged him to the bottom, for example.
    And there could be strong currents. He might try swimming straight for the island only to find he was being carried sideways out to sea. His boots were soft leather. He could take them off and tuck them into his belt. They’d hamper his swimming, but he’d need them again when he made land. Yeah, it was