The Fifth Vertex (The Sigilord Chronicles) by Kevin Hoffman Read Free Book Online

Guren.
    Unsure of what to do next, Urus held up his hands, jiggling the chains.  
    "Funny boy, eh?" Guren snapped. "Take his damn shirt off."
    The First Fist soldiers ripped off Urus's shirt, re-opening his stinging gauntlet wounds as it tore.
    "That's better," Guren said, standing in front of Urus. "On his knees."
    The soldiers kicked the back of Urus's knees, and he dropped like a stone, a cloud of dust billowing up around him as he landed. The vibrations from the crowd had stopped. Goodwyn had finished his performance and all eyes in the stadium were fixed upon Urus.
    Guren held up the branding iron, a circular symbol that contained four inward-pointed triangles and another circle within it: the symbol of the culled.  
    "Urus Noellor, I pronounce you culled. Hereafter you are not a man, you are not a boy, not a soldier, not a citizen. You do not exist and have no rights or privileges in this city. Like the captured war prisoner you portray, you will be fed and clothed and sheltered and nothing more, hereafter a burden on those in this city who perform their proper Kestian duties."
    Urus closed his eyes, clenching his teeth and fists. He knew what was coming next and imagined it might be more painful than surviving a fall from a rooftop.
    Guren pressed the red-hot branding iron into Urus's chest. For an instant he felt just pressure, then a searing sting, then unbearable scorching heat. He smelled the skin rupture and burn, saw the hair on his chest catch fire, smolder, and give off a noxious smoke. He was glad that he couldn't hear the sound of his own scream.
    "Now you can take him," Guren said, tossing the iron aside and walking away.
    Urus's eyes rolled up into his skull, his mouth sagged open, and the world faded into darkness.

5

    Urus awoke to a myriad bright, multicolored lights and fuzzy shapes, his eyes unable to focus. His knees hurt and dried blood clung to them, but his chest hurt more.
    The memory of the First Fist coming for him flooded his mind, shocking his blurred vision into crystal clarity. He remembered Guren searing his chest with the branding iron, remembered the pain right up until he passed out, unable to bear it.
    Gingerly touching his chest, he found that it had been smeared with a foul-smelling mud, probably made by the shamans—they were always trying out new muds and pastes that they claimed could cure everything from headaches to broken limbs. But there was nothing this mud could do to change his situation or dull the pain, no matter how pungent the odor.
    All eyes in the room were upon him. He stood and lifted his head. He was in a room crowded with people, all staring at the spectacle of his burnt, bare chest and wrinkling their noses at the stench. Urus couldn't blame them. He didn't know which smelled worse—the burn or the mud. At least most of the dung had been removed when the First Fist tore his shirt.
    This was no ordinary collection of random gawkers, however. Ogling Urus were the most powerful men and women in the city. They filled a large square chamber, most wearing their full combat gear. Even the shamans wore their decorative feathers and bone necklaces.
    To his left stood his uncle and to his right a collection of members of the First Fist and equally high-ranking members of the shaman caste.  
    In the center of the room knelt a man who was as tall on his knees as many of those standing upright, his strange gray skin highlighted by his bald head and a thin shock of white hair springing from his chin like the last remnant of a once-proud beard. He wore a peculiar blue woolen shirt that rippled in waves like the slopes of sand dunes, the shirt covered by a long, simple woolen cloak. His hands were bound behind his back and to his ankles with thick rope.
    Aegaz signed, "Are you all right?"
    Urus nodded tentatively. There was nothing all right about him or his situation, but he put on a brave front for the sake of those watching. He might not be a warrior, but he could still