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My gut clenched at the memory of that web on his face. The horror in his eyes. I would have killed him in that moment, as he’d wanted. As I would have wanted if I were in his position. But Prisca was right. We would find a way to give him back his life.
I had spent my life doing the kinds of things that would make Prisca sick if I told her each one of them. She knew some of it—knew, and somehow had accepted me anyway. She believed it was Conreth who was at fault.
The truth was, I’d been fighting the monster inside me since the moment I’d crawled out from beneath that kitchen table, sure I would see my father, and met my brother’s eyes instead.
No one made it through life without being made to pay for their worst choices. If the gods really did have a hand in our lives, they had waited patiently—until I had something I couldn’t bear to lose. And then they had struck.
Finally, my senses pricked, and I slowed her to a walk, feeling eyes on me. I caught the gleam of a trowth stone, emerald green in the darkness. One of the sentries was about to warn his superiors of a fae approaching.
I dispatched the sentries from afar, spinning my power through the forest. Sentries wouldn’t have the information I needed.
The generals would be in their own tents, helpfully marked by their much larger size and the extra guards stationed outside.
My power groaned within me, urging me to burn the entire regiment to ash. If I gave in to the lightning that cracked deep beneath my shields, thousands would die.
If that would lead me closer to finding Prisca, I might consider it. But disregarding the fact that she would be devastated to learn what I had done…
If I killed everyone, there would be no one left to question.
Tying my horse to a tree, I drew my sword. My fae senses gave me the advantage in these situations, regardless of how many men they had. I’d shifted back to my fae form, and my ears caught every snap of a twig, every whispered word, every small movement. A few hundred footspans to my right, a couple of soldiers were walking toward one of the tents, mumbling about one of their superiors.
I melted through the forest, easily finding the tents that would house the most important generals.
The sound of laughter spilled into the night, and I flexed my hand around my sword.
I stepped out of the forest, stalked toward the tent, and speared my lightning through every soldier who stepped between my body and the generals in that tent.
The laughter turned to screams.
I smiled.
* * *
It began again. And again. Eadric would leave us for a few hours, allowing enough of Soltor’s power to regenerate. Then he would return. I lost all sense of time. I lost all sense of myself. The only thing anchoring me to the world was Cavis and the deep brown of his eyes as they met mine, urging me to hold on.
I would hold on. We would get out of this place. This would all end. I just had to keep going.
“I’m tired of this,” Eadric said finally.
“Go…take…a…nap.” I lay curled on the stone floor in a fetal position, shuddering with agony.
Eadric kicked out, slamming his foot into my gut.
I couldn’t breathe.
Cavis roared. And I could hear the helplessness. The powerlessness. He was fae. A warrior. And Lorian had once muttered about Cavis’s obsession with protecting those weaker than him.
The moment was spiraling out of control. I opened my mouth, but Eadric kicked me again, this time right beneath my ribs. My breath puffed out of my lungs again in a strangled groan.
When I could focus again, Eadric was pointing at Cavis. “Hurt him,” he snapped. “Hurt him so badly, she has no choice but to tell us what we want to know.”
It would work. I knew it would work. By now, Eadric knew it too. And his eyes burned with sick delight.
If it were just me here, I could hold on for days. Weeks. But seeing Cavis in this amount of pain, seeing him fighting back…the confusion that kept turning his gaze distant as his brain bled, the manacles preventing him from healing…
There was no torture that could be worse than this.
Rolling, I made it to my knees. There had to be something I could give Eadric. Something that would keep him busy, buy us a little time while he had his people investigate it.
