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I feigned sleep, my heart pounding in my chest as Mirijana’s snores filled the room. When I was sure she was deeply asleep, I crept to the door and cracked it. The hall was empty; my bare feet made no sound on the cold stone floor as I raced down the servant stairs and out into the courtyard where we’d come in.
The chill of early morning air stung against my skin beneath the sheer nightgown that hung from my body like a thin veil with a deep scarlet robe draped over it. My hair was tousled around me and I hoped it was enough of a disguise that if anyone saw me, they wouldn’t recognize me as a concubine, but as possibly a visiting noble.
With every step, I felt like time was slipping away from me. In the distance, I could hear voices coming from within the guard station and feel eyes upon me as though some unseen force were already catching up to me. But no matter how afraid I was, I kept moving.
The wind whipped through the city, carrying sand with a cacophony as if it was warning me, but I pushed the strange notion away. I had to get in there. Haemir couldn’t survive another loss.
I approached the guard station slowly, my hands shaking and my heart racing. The door was slightly ajar, giving me just enough space to slip through without creating too much noise. When I stepped inside, the guard turned his attention toward me and yelled in surprise before laughing.
“Are you lost?”
I pasted on a polite smile, biting my lip as I approached. “I’m sorry, I was separated from my—“ I launched myself at him, scrambling onto his back and wrapping my forearm around his throat.
He wheezed, trying to tear my arm away, his fingers digging painfully into my skin, but I squeezed tighter, cutting off his blood flow. He slammed my back against the wall and I groaned but didn’t let go. There was no way I could hold on long enough to strangle him. I had to make him pass out. His attacks became more and more feeble as I held on, my muscles straining as he crashed to his knees and I rode him to the floor, where he finally went limp.
“Fuck,” I whispered, shaking out my arms as I stood over him. Checking his pockets, I found a knife and grinned when I realized it was made of earthborn iron.Someone didn’t trust his compatriots.Earthborn iron stifled their gifts, preventing Elves from healing. Some were so sensitive to it that just touching it would burn their skin. I wrapped my hand around the leather handle, testing the weight of the blade. Perfectly balanced. Very nice.
The guard stirred, and I stabbed him without thinking, my knife slipping between his ribs and finding his heart. I didn’t enjoy killing an unarmed man, but I would do anything to protect my family. Wiping the blood off my hand onto his shirt, I left before anyone else saw me, darting past the barracks and into a dark alleyway where no one seemed to have noticed my presence at all. Taking a deep breath, I slumped against the wall behind me in relief as I surveyed my surroundings.
Chittering came from a cave entrance and I shuddered. That was the stable, which meant that the entrance over there was probably the dungeon.
I spotted a figure exiting the door as I watched; Theron, and he was followed by another man in a cloak. The Harvestman that had threatened to kill me, Herrath. My gut twisted with anger as I crouched in the shadows.
“Tough son of a bitch,” Herrath said. His voice held no hint of emotion or empathy; it was cold and calculating, just like in the bedroom when he’d threatened me.
Theron grunted. “I have to talk to Rhazien. We need more time.”
They’d tortured my brother. I wanted nothing more than to kill him right here and now, but that would only guarantee Gavril’s death when my collar prevented me from finishing the job.
I watched them leave and silently crept through the door, quickly dispatching the guard inside with my knife and pulling the key ring out of his pocket. The dungeon itself was a wretched sight to behold. The air was dank and smelled of sweat, urine, and blood. Low moans echoed against the stone walls as I passed by each occupied cell, and in the dead of night, there seemed no hope for any of them. Torches and stained patches of dried blood lined the floor, revealing more horrors than I cared to witness.
I breathed through my mouth as I made my way down into the depths of the dungeon. Dark shapes writhed in cells even farther below, their screams muffled by the thick walls so none could hear them but me. There were some Elves who were chained up with iron manacles that burned their skin and kept them from using their powers; others were just left to rot in isolated cells with only rats for company.
It was enough to make me sick to my stomach, but I kept going, determined to find my brother. After almost vomiting, I found him in a small cell at the end of the row, Roza and Cithara with him.
He smiled when he saw me, his fiery eyes attempting to widen despite their terrible swelling. It was a wonder he could see at all. Blood matted his dark curls around his horns, though thankfully they were both still intact.
“Kael? Thank Vetia, you’re still alive.” He stood up, reaching his hands through the bars and grasping my hands. I squeezed them, checking to see if all his fingers were there.
“I could say the same,” I choked out, my voice thick with emotion as I reached into my pocket and pulled out the ring of keys. Tears blurred my vision as I freed them, my brother sweeping me into a tight embrace.
A sob escaped me as he held me. He might be two years younger than me, but he’d been my light in the darkness as children. When I’d come to the desert, a frightened ten-year-old packed into a slave wagon, the dregs of the slave quarter had found me. An orphan with no protection? They took me easily, no matter how hard I fought. I don’t remember those months—my mind blocked them out—but I remembered when Haemir saved me. He’d broken in, swinging his great hammer into one of my captor’s chest, collapsing it with a wet crunch, before roaring and killing the rest until he’d painted the room red. I’d been terrified when he took me back to their barracks, thinking I’d traded one captivity for another until Gavril started flitting around me like a bright little butterfly, obviously happy and better fed than any other kids I’d seen here.
I pulled away, inspecting his face and making him wince. “Stop being a baby and let me see.”
“Stop it, Kael.” He dodged my hands. “Come on, we have to get out of here before they return. “
Roza, a Sirin Remnant with magenta hair that despised me almost as much as I disliked her, sneered at me. “What happened to your tits?”
“Oh, fuck off. Roza.”
“I think they look nice,” Cithara put in. She was a new recruit, a Fae Remnant with mismatched eyes that I’d never seen separated from her sister.
“See. The fae said it, so it must be true.” I said, shooting a glare at Roza as Cithara picked at her sleeve, apparently unaware that the conversation had continued.
“Enough of this. We need to go. Now.” Gavril said, tugging me toward the door.
“I can’t.”
