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Then a crack echoed through the clearing and her arm bent backward, the bone protruded from her skin, and Rion’s chest was heaving all over again.
He blinked and she was gone. So was the meadow.
He stood beneath barren trees, their branches reaching toward the sky with spindly fingers. A cold breeze ruffled the dead leaves and Rion turned to find a single headstone at the end of the path. He closed his eyes, unwilling to approach. He didn’t want to see the name etched into the surface.
Then he was falling all over again and the visions kept coming. Them at breakfast with Ellie and Talon only for the room to explode in a mass of hysteria. Ellie begging him to stop, pleading with him over and over. She screamed that she’d trusted him and he saw the betrayal behind the tears in her eyes.
Then they were at the training grounds. He was trying to command his magic to stop, but it kept moving of its own accord, just like it had done in his youth and before he could stop it, Talon’s lifeless body fell against the stones.
He tried to run but couldn’t. Tried not to listen and failed.
Arianna’s voice kept echoing through it all. Sometimes she’d smile, other times she’d beg, but her screams were the worst of hells and they shattered every last shred of his sanity.
***
Rion’s eyes fluttered open and for a terrifying second, he thought he’d gone blind. His body felt leaden and his blood sluggish. Drugs? Dehydration? A mixture of both?
He tried to focus on his surroundings, but everything was black save for the dim flickering light beneath a door. Not blind then, but his vision still blurred. A bitter copper taste coated his mouth and his throat burned like he’d swallowed fire.
Rion flexed his wrists and grimaced. He tilted his head up to stare at the iron shackles biting into his skin and the chains that held his body upright. He didn’t know how long he’d been hanging there.
The chains loosened every now and then, of that much he was certain. He had vague memories of lying on the cold stone, saliva and blood and filth pooled around his freezing body.
Rion gritted his teeth and dragged his feet beneath him, fighting for the strength to lift his aching limbs.
Blood rushed back to his hands and his fingertips tingled. Rion tilted his head to the side to stretch his neck and instantly regretted the movement. He slowly tilted it back, wincing against the pain.
Nothing was broken, though his fingers were certainly bruised enough to suggest otherwise.
For the first time in what felt like days, Rion’s head had cleared. This wasn’t a nightmare, or a vision, or anything of the sort. He was awake, finally, through he had no idea how long he’d been here.
Rion rolled his wrists and surveyed the room. It was too dark to see much, but he could tell the cell was small and no one else occupied it. No blanket, no bucket, not a single thing lay on the floor aside from a drain at his feet.
The darkness smelled of mold and water trickled down the walls. Water he would have gladly sipped from the floors if he wasn’t restrained. Gods, his head was pounding.
Rion shifted a foot only to hear the rattle of more chains. They’d shackled his ankles, too.
Was he back in Móirín, or had they thrown him in some underground dungeon beneath Ruadhán?
Did Arianna—everything came rushing back to him then. The bite on her neck, her arm bent at an awkward angle, the bond snapping.
The bond.
Rion desperately reached for it and stopped himself as if hovering outside a forbidden room. Three small fraying strands were all that was left. They were so weak compared to the braided rope that had stood in their place. He didn’t dare reach for them.
Did Arianna know he was here? Was—was she the one who had ordered him imprisoned?
She’d told him to run, but in that terrible moment, the warriors in that room had wanted to kill him. And rightfully so. Maybe someone she’d ordered had put him here. Hell, maybe Talon was his overseer.
Pain echoed through his heart and body as if someone was beating a drum. He ached beyond reason and his mind plagued him with images of her distraught face.
The betrayal hurt the most. She’d trusted him and he’d broken every scrap of that trust.
Rion gritted his teeth and his chest heaved, throat burning with tears he tried to swallow down. He could still hear the echo of her arm cracking and he swore he could still taste her blood on his tongue.
Rion tried to assess himself in the darkness. His chest was bare and itched terribly as if something were coating his skin. Blood, most likely. Parts of his body burned, whispering of old wounds that had yet to fully heal.
Some of the images were real, then. Like a fist flying from the shadows to collide with his jaw or a sharp object sliding just beneath his rips and left there for what felt like hours.
