Blood poured out of the wound and I struggled against the chains.
Dirthraz’s eyes flicked towards her. “He’ll notice if we linger.”
Iris pouted, but even she wasn’t foolish enough to disobey.
“Fine. But we’ll play again, little flame.”
Dirthraz unlocked the chains and when I tried to lunge at him. He sent his curled hand into my stomach, knocking me back to the bed, as all air left my lungs.
They didn’t waste time, checking on me, leaving quickly and slammed the door behind them.
I let my fires simmer to clean the wounds, the shoulder became bearable again but my thigh… Something was wrong.
It wouldn’t heal properly, the blood stopped pouring, but the area around it turned dark. I felt dizzy, stretching for some of the bed silks and ripping them to shreds to tie firmly over the wound in an attempt to wrap it.
What kind of magic had she been using? Neither the Demon King nor hers were elemental magic… just like Malakai’s wasn’t.
For a long time, I didn’t move. I sat on the edge of the bed and focused my all on simply breathing.
My body ached, but my mind, was sharper than ever.
I exhaled once, steady.
They wanted a frightened girl, wanted cracks in my resolve.
I would give them nothing of the sort.
The door creaked open long after the echoes of their laughter had faded. I’d stopped trying to sit up, the pain in my thigh pulsed too steadily, black veins crawling out from underneath the silks around it, like ink under my skin. My shoulder was better, but my thigh burned from the inside, and with each breath it felt as if her claws were still there, piercing.
Footsteps, slow and even, crossed the marble floor outside. No hiss of amusement, no clatter of weapons, just the steady rhythm of someone who didn’t need to rush.
Zinlia appeared beside me. I caught a glimpse of her through my lashes—petite, still, eyes that had never known flame. Her presence was as quiet as a graveyard.
She crouched without a word. A bowl of water appeared from somewhere, steam rising faintly. A white cloth, too white for this place, unfolded between her fingers. She touched my shoulder first. The hot fabric stung worse than a blade would have.
I flinched, but she didn’t react.
The cloth passed over torn skin, wiping away blood with patient, practiced strokes. There was no tenderness, but no cruelty either, only precision, like I was a thing that needed maintenance.
“Does it please your king,” I rasped. “That his minions are playing with me like I’m their latest toy?”
Zinlia wrung out the cloth, the bright red of my blood swirling in the water. “He prefers his possessions intact.” Her voice was flat, a shadow of sound.
Possession. The word lodged somewhere beneath my ribs.
When she turned to my thigh, she ripped off the silk and bared the corruption. It writhed at her touch, the black lines trembling under my skin. Her magic, cold, freezing against my skin, pressed against the infection, forcing it to still. I bit my tongue until I tasted iron.
“Zinlia…” My voice cracked. “My friends, have they been taken too?”
She paused, a momentary flicker, a hesitation in the steady rhythm of her hands. But she resumed just as smoothly as before.
“I do not know,” she said flatly.
I wanted to believe her, yet I didn’t.
The cloth swept over the last streak of blood, and she straightened. The bowl’s water had turned murky, the color of dusk.
“You should not struggle,” she said quietly. “It makes the pain worse.”
