Chapter 10
Tortured friends
The state of Oz was desolate. All the bright colorful, cheerful and frankly all of what made Oz the fantastical magicked Land it was famous for, was gone. The land looked burned blackened darker than ash from flame. The Birds still existed but had not held a Conference in quite a while. It was rumored they had gone into isolationism what with Dragons returning. Though some claim still that the Birds have a part yet to play in this; what that part may be no rumor can answer as of yet.
Princess Nastoya was feverishly trying to maintain order in the Vinkus with Anthony traveling the lands on his newly planned mission. He was now on course for Munchkinland to find the Dragon Cupboard and see if Shell resurrected friendly Dragons on accident in the heat of his spell making fury. Though it was still only a remote possibility that there were friendly Dragons, the thought of not even trying was too dumb to carry out. It was decided then that Alec son of Ozma and Anthony the Blue Wizard, wielder of the Dragon staff, would venture East in hopes of reuniting with his old friend Blufire. If he was not there, their road turned South towards the Death Marshes to rescue Glinda, Ozma and Evardo, Ben, Argy, and Julia. What they didn't know however, was that the Death Marshes required a price if one wished to stay within its borders for longer than a few seconds to settle a dare amongst rebellious friends.
Hundreds of miles under the Oz crust layer of soil, lay Sheltergard's Lair. Nothing but a hidden and cursed stone chamber illuminated only by the torches the Guard of the Torture chamber carried. Shells guards were a monstrous creature. Not quite human, but not quite animal either. With the scales, claws and head of Dragons, and the body structure of a human, the Drogan as they are called, were merciless. Their inmates tonight were the highest ranking government officials, heroes, heroines, and even Ozma, the Queen Priestess herself, was locked under chain and whip. The Drogans were not instructed to keep the six most important people to Oz and to Anthony's heart for no reason. Shell wanted pain. He wanted to bring the level of hurt and unforgivable helplessness to Anthony that he had felt for years. His methods were brutal however. All of them had soiled their once beautiful uniforms, broken bones, dark larger than normal bruises, and were bleeding all over the floor. Either that or they had been bled so frequently, that stains of pools of blood lay by their stationary limbs.
Their mouths, hands and feet were not just bound. If they dared to speak even a mumble, the curse Shell hexed upon the place would create such agony that they would "wish you had never been born in the first place, filthy fairy maggots!" Drogan said. Clad in his master's now trademark ebony armor and holding a torch in one hand, a mace in the other. Behind him another Drogan crept from the shadows of the cell. There was no more talking. The guards threw down their torches in the center of the room and pulled out their steel whips. They thrashed and cracked their whips slicing and stinging and stealing away flesh clean off the bone with every screeching strike. Ben was hit first, then Argy, Evardo, Julia, Glinda and Ozma was last. They had a pattern, start with Ben end with Ozma striking everyone in the room from left to right. Five more lashes and the blood covered the floor; no stone was visible through the agony and despair. Ben Argy and Julia were all screaming with the persistent throbbing pain all over their legs, backs and stomachs. Lady Glinda was conscious but fading, being abused the hardest among all the others, the guards dictated amount of pain to be delivered based on how dear to Anthony's heart they were. So while all of them were choking on their own blood, Glinda was having the hardest time remaining conscious. Her frizzy golden hair was now pink with her own blood, and he gown missing all of its gems that made it sparkle, and was torn in many places from the sword lashes a day before. No one had lost limbs yet, but they all agreed that would have been less painful to experience. Since the time of Julia's kidnapping, (she being the first one in Oz to vanish that people cared about,) to now, it had been five months. Everyday Ben, Argy, Julia, Glinda, Ozma and her husband Evardo were tortured. Beaten, clubbed, poisoned, abused (never sexuly only physically), and starved. Starved of light, food, water and of joy. It was only thanks to Ozma's incredible magic that even when they were barely alive hanging only on to oxygen for life, that they were able to live. Ozma though severly injured, was still the most powerful sorceress in Oz. Her only disadvantage was her mentality. It was lucky for them that she the day she was kidnapped into the same prison as Ben and the rest of them, placed a spell on the lair and its allied prisoners. Had she not placed the spell so early, she would not be mentally able to cast anything of actual use by now. And the non magicked human boys and girl would most likely be dead already.
So knowing this, the three humans Ben, Argy and Julia, only in their hearts and silent minds thanked Ozma for saving their lives. Though they were in great misery pain and agony unlike any they had ever experienced, they were still alive thanks to her. Every night at the end of torture rounds, they would in tears try to verbally thank her, but the hex the Emperor placed, gave them more torture breaking the rules with their audible voices.
As if they had all not had enough for one night, the Guards had two more plans with them. First was to try out the new molten limestone that the Nome King pioneered a few cycles back.
"Ozma, the girl who saved Oz from terrible wickedness, come to bleed!" The Drogan hissed and laughed hysterically slapping her fiercely with his armed gauntlet hand, sending her back on the floor screaming from applying pressure to her still very raw wounds from the whipping earlier. Everyone was in tears now. The physical pain was far beyond the threshold anyone could have even fathomed. The emotional pain of seeing each other in so much blood, was terrifying and frightening. Just before the Drogan was about to poor molten limestone (liquid rock, so yes it is quite hot) all over her body, someone objected through her cries and bleeding.
"NO! Not her! Please, take me instead," The noble woman cried from the very deepest somehow still beating parts of her tattered heart. The Guards halted their actions hearing the bargain and weighed the situation. Follow direct orders from the High Emperor, or kill someone else equally as powerful? Ben, Argy and Evardo, the only males in the room, wept not wanting anyone to take the limestone, couldn't bear to watch nor even turn their heads even if they did want to.
"Very Well, my lady, you shall take her place, come with us and you will burn in haste!" The guards chanted as they dragged the poor battered woman across the floor to await further mutilation. Though Ozma was saved, she could not bear to move herself from the floor, crying to herself, loving all in the room with all her golden heart, and not wanting anyone to do this, but being so humbled by the act of self-sacrifice in her name.
The Guards forced the person to her knees, and shoved her head down on a block much like the set up for a beheading. Only instead of an executioner, there was another Drogan standing ready to poor the molten limestone over her brave loving body.
"What is your name fairy?" mocked the Drogan.
"Glinda… the Good," and with her slow reply, she whispered something to herself in a familiar but foreign tongue, she winked at Ben through the crack in the stone wall, and saw that he noticed through his tears and gasps for air in such miserable pain. Ten she closed her eyes.
"From dust, to dust!" The Drogan yelled as he dropped the pan of limestone all over the body of Glinda the Good. Back in the main torture chamber, all of the remaining people sobbed, hearing the helpless painful cries and screams from the braves Sorceress any of them had ever seen. Ozma had now passed out, never before had she ever cried so hard and lost so much blood, and yet felt no warmer a heart than in this dark, painful deathly moment.