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Stars explode in my skull and my teeth rattle. I can’t see anything. Pain radiates from my head and down my spine. My stomach lurches, and I nearly throw up. I’ve never been hit that hard before. I’m completely dazed. I can’t even feel my limbs.
“You frustrating little shit,” Roanac snaps. He starts dragging me up the steps by my hair. “While I do admire your tenacity, since it proves the strength and power of your blood, this kind of ridiculous rebellion will not stand!”
Behind the door, I can still hear banging. Now it’s from multiple people, and I realize that all three men are trying to get the door open now. They must have defeated the vampires. That’s good. But what about the shades? Will they come after them? There are hundreds in this castle.
Hopefully the shades haven’t realized anything’s wrong and they’ll be left alone. What if this is how it happens? Fear grips me. What if this is why I’m alone, and this is how the men die? What if it’s because we’re not together and they’re up against an entire army of shades?
I know that they’re all tough. I know it. But three of them against hundreds?
Roanac keeps dragging me by my hair, and I can’t even work up the limb coordination to get to my feet. My head is throbbing, and I can’t see properly, it’s all blurry. I think I might be drooling because my mouth is slack. My arms feel heavy and they’re not moving the way I want them to, like when you sleep on a limb so it gets that awful tingly feeling and your coordination’s shit for a minute.
“This pathetic fighting endsnow,” he snarls, kicking open a door. We’ve reached the top of the stairs, thank fuck. I feel like one big bruise.
He lets go of my hair, and I fall to the floor, my hands finally working enough to catch myself and keeping me from banging my head again on the stone floor. Okay, okay, think, Kiara, come on!
This room is smaller than I would’ve expected. I thought if he got me he’d take me to the fancy underground room from before, with its Aurora Gems and its huge contraption. But we’re up at the top of this staircase in a fairly small room, with what appear to be thin slit-like windows that overlook the courtyard. I can’t get a good look between being on the floor and with my vision still so fucked up, but I imagine this has a good bird’s eye view of everything so that Roanac can see any attacking forces coming.
The walls aren’t adorned with anything special, no runes or wards, but in the middle of it is some kind of table-altar-thing. It’s made out of stone as well and has huge straps on it.
Yeah, I don’t like where this is going.
I try to push myself up onto my knees, at least, but Roanac scoops me up with an arm around my waist like I’m rag doll and flips me over, then lays me down on the altar thing and begins to strap me down.
I kick and hit him, but my blows are wild and off target. Fuck. I think I have a concussion. That blow to the head really did me in. I try to focus and make my blows land, but that just makes my head feel like it’s being split open. Darkness lurks around the edges of my vision, and I have to blink several times to get it to go away.
“Aren’t we… in the wrong room?” I manage. My mouth feels weird, and heavy. I’m definitely concussed. I hope that this doesn’t give me permanent damage. I’ve heard some real scary things about concussions.
Roanac chuckles. He still sounds angry when he speaks, but also confident now that he’s got me where he wants me. “Oh no.” He tightens the straps. Fuck. I’m trapped. “I don’t need that contraption to clarify your blood. That was for the Aurora Gems. Is it preferable? Yes. But a good strategist knows how to improvise.”
He glares down at me, his eyes blazing. “All I need is you.”
I shudder. Fuck.
CHAPTER23
Istruggle against the straps, but they’d be tough for me even if I was at my full strength and hoo boy, I really am not. I’m struggling not to panic—the anxiety is rising in my throat like a bubble and it’s hard not to give into it. I take in deep breaths and try to keep myself calm.
Roanac begins to chant. I don’t know what he’s saying, but it sounds harsh and snapping, like his voice is a cracking whip. From far away, what feels like miles, I can hear the men continuing to yell.
I hope they can reach me in time. I don’t want this bastard to win.
Roanac pulls out a long, wicked looking knife. I yank at my bonds, twisting and turning this way and that, but he plants his hand on my head, and I’m forced to stay still. Shit. He keeps chanting as he rips my clothes open with the knife, exposing my bare skin.
Oh fuck. I realize what he’s going to do just before it happens. I saw this in the vision when I used my Sight that helped us find that other mage. He’s going to do to me what that mage did to him.
I try to brace myself, but there’s really no way to prepare for someone stabbing you. He doesn’t just plunge the knife in, oh no, he uses it to cut open a line down the center of my chest, just like the mage did with him.
Aside from the overall blinding pain, I feel sick. I don’t like to think of myself as a wimp but fuck, all of this blood, the fact that I’m literallycut open,it’s sickening. I struggle to swallow down the bile in my throat. My head is still pounding. Fuck. I’ve never been in pain like this before. I wish I could just push through it, be powerful and unstoppable and rip these damn straps out of their holds, but I think I might throw up instead.
Roanac keeps chanting, and then my blood starts to moveup.
It no longer seeps from the wound to run down my body. Instead it floats upward in droplets, like reverse raindrops.
Okay, I really might be sick.
Roanac takes the knife he used on me, and without even wiping it off first, he cuts open his chest scar.Ew.We’ll just add this to the list of traumatizing things happening to me right now.
What is he doing? Black sludge oozes out from his cut. That doesn’t look like blood at all. It doesn’t even look like a proper liquid. It’s thick and viscous, and I wrinkle my nose up at the smell of it. I’ve never been around a rotting body, but I’m pretty sure that this is what they smell like.
