Mad Lord Lucian by Shay West Read Free Book Online Page B

and wrung their hands.
    “Have you checked her bed? The stables? The latrine?” Dreban demanded.
    “We've checked everywhere. Lilla's missing, taken by the spirits of the dead!” One of the scullion maids burst into fresh tears.
    Dear Spirits. The head of the kitchens is now missing .
    “Senda. Have you seen Lilla this morning?” When Senda shook his head, Dreban cursed. “Simon, you are in charge of the kitchens until further notice. I suggest we all get to work. Mandor won't want to be waiting for his breakfast.” He stormed out mumbling about the injustice of it all, that he should have to deal with having to tell Lord Mandor that his head cook was missing.
    Senda went to work, his mind numb. It had been easy to ignore the reports of the missing when it wasn't anyone he knew. Lilla wouldn't have run off. If she wasn't at her station, something was dreadfully wrong.
    Lord Mandor did not seem to care that Lilla was gone. As long as Dreban kept the household running smoothly, he was perfectly happy.
    Weeks passed, and each night, more people disappeared from their beds or never returned from their errands, leaving their frantic families to guess what might have happened. They began to look at each other with suspicion and fear, wondering if their neighbors and friends had anything to do with the disappearances.
    And yet, no one looked to the one man who was responsible. Not one of the townsfolk seemed to put Anali's arrival together with the horrible happenings on the island. Senda imagined him watching over the chaos he created, smiling in malicious glee.
    Many folk started to talk about leaving the island. Senda worried what would happen if word reached Anali's ears. Surely he couldn't allow people to leave and spread tales of what was happening here. Someone was bound to question Lucian's murdering of Lord Suasor and Anali's hanging of Lord Byron's household.
    Senda watched soldiers make their way through the city. The sound of their marching was deafening. People watched from doorways, windows, and balconies wondering what the commotion was all about. Their tear-filled eyes met Senda's own, and all he could do was stare back, mouth slack, head moving from side-to-side in useless denial. The soldiers pulled people into the streets, kicking and screaming, only to slit their throats and leave them to bleed to death in the dirt and filth.
    Senda shrank back into the shadows of the buttery, hands over his ears, trying to shut out the screams, the sound of crunching metal on bone, the splatter of blood and gore against the walls, the wails of the injured and dying.
    “I told you Lucian had appointed me as overseer, to dig out the rotten filth of his people. I told you I have ways of detecting the seeds of treachery. What happens today is on your heads.”
    Senda whimpered in fear as Anali's voice washed over the entire island. The same prayer played over and over in his mind: Dear Spirits, please help us!
    But no help came. The soldiers moved across the island, dragging commoner and noble alike into the streets to kill them in cold blood. The Mystic's voice rang out, telling the people that it was their fault and that he and Lucian meant to destroy the scourge that infected the island.
    After what seemed an eternity, the soldiers marched back to the castle, their shining armor covered in blood. No one wanted to be the first to step out of their homes. Children clung to their parents, or stood in doorways staring at the bodies of their parents in the street. The silence was deafening. Not one woman wailed, not one child sobbed.
    Senda ventured from the buttery when he heard Dreban's voice asking everyone to return to their duties.
    “How can Mandor expect us to clean and scrub? Shouldn't we be worried about the bodies?” a groom asked. To do his duties, he would be required to go outside to the stables.
    “I only know what Lord Mandor ordered. Do you want him to throw you out of his home? You will be killed come