3
DINA
Astrange sort of peace has settled in the kennels over the past week. It’s a fragile thing, a soap bubble shimmering in a slaughterhouse, but it’s mine. The kennel master, seeing I survived the first day, has assigned me the beast detail permanently. The other slaves look at me with a mixture of pity and awe, but what they see as a punishment has become my sanctuary. It is the only part of my day that feels real, the only time I am not invisible.
Down here, in the cold and the dark, a silent conversation has begun between us. I no longer flinch when he moves, and he no longer greets me with a chest-rattling growl. While I scrub the grime from the stone floor just outside his enclosure, I hum. It’s the one thing I have that is truly my own, a wordless lullaby from a life before chains and brands. The melody fills the oppressive silence, and I watch as the sound washes over him. The tension bleeds from his mountainous shoulders, the baleful, hell-red glow in his eyes softens to the warm embers of a dying fire, and he watches my every move.
And each day, he gives a gift in return. He leaves a single, perfect piece of his raw meat ration by the bars, untouched. Anoffering. A repayment for the bread I once gave him. I can never accept the grisly tribute, but the gesture is a thing of impossible beauty. In his own, silent way, he is talking to me, telling me he sees me, that I matter. In this foul, dark pit, his steady, focused gaze makes me feel more like a person than I ever have in the cold, opulent halls above. He is a monster, yes, but I know with a certainty that defies all logic that he is not mindless. He is my friend.
Today, the air is particularly thick, the damp chill clinging to my bones. I am humming my tune, the sound a small rebellion against the despair of this place, when new footsteps echo from the corridor—heavy, measured, and too numerous. Not the shuffling gait of a slave or the lazy tread of a single guard.
My blood turns to ice. I scramble to my feet, my heart seizing in my chest.
Lord Jildred sweeps into the kennels, a vision of cruel perfection. He is every inch theKhuzuthnoble, tall and imposing in a tunic of midnight silk embroidered with silver thread that glitters like trapped starlight. His pale skin seems to drink the torchlight, and his long, platinum hair is a flawless cascade over his shoulders. He moves with a liquid grace that is terrifying, his violet eyes taking in the entire scene with a cold, possessive air. He is flanked by twoMiouguards in black and silver armor, their hands resting on the hilts of their swords, their faces impassive and brutal.
The cloying scent of his perfume—some exotic, sickeningly sweet blossom—invades the kennel’s foul air, a violation in itself. My humming dies in my throat. I drop into a deep bow, my eyes fixed on the filthy stone, praying he will ignore me.Don’t see me. Please, don’t see me.
He stops. The silence stretches, taut and terrible. I can feel his gaze on me, a ton of bricks pressing down on my bowed head.
“My, my,” his voice is a silken murmur, yet it cuts through the air like a shard of glass. “What do we have here?”
He moves toward the Urog’s enclosure. I risk a glance up through my lashes. He is staring at his "property," a small, displeased frown creasing his perfect brow. The Urog is not throwing himself against his chains. He is not roaring or slavering. He is sitting on his haunches, his massive form unnervingly still, and his red-ember eyes are fixed, not on his master, but onme.
Lord Jildred follows his gaze. His own eyes, sharp and intelligent as a serpent's, narrow. “It is… calm.” He says the word as if it is a curse. He turns his head slowly, his gaze locking onto mine. A cold dread, absolute and profound, washes over me. “You. Slave. What have you done?”
I can’t breathe. My throat has closed up. “N-nothing, my lord.” My voice is a pathetic, trembling squeak.
“Do not lie to me.” He steps closer, and the sheer force of his presence is suffocating. “I had this creature tuned to the precise pitch of mindless rage. It is a weapon. A tool. And it is watching you like a lovelorn pup. You have been… tampering with my creation.”
He is in front of me now. I can see the intricate silver rings on his long, elegant fingers. I can smell the wine on his breath. My world narrows to the pattern of the stone at my feet.
“I only feed him, my lord. As I was ordered.” The lie tastes like ash in my mouth.
“You were humming,” he says softly. The quietness of his tone is more terrifying than any shout. “I heard you.”
He reaches out, a single finger tracing the line of my jaw before tilting my head up. I am forced to meet his gaze. There is no anger in his eyes. There is only a chilling, curious cruelty, the look of a child pulling the wings from a fly.
“A flaw in the design, it seems,” he muses, his thumb stroking my cheek in a parody of affection. “That a thing of such power could be swayed by the pathetic mewling of a lesser being. It must be corrected.”
The blow comes from nowhere. The back of his hand connects with my face, and the world explodes in a flash of white-hot pain. My head snaps back, the crack of bone on bone echoing in the sudden, roaring silence of my own ears. I fall, hitting the stone floor with a force that knocks the last of the air from my lungs. The coppery taste of blood fills my mouth. The left side of my face is numb, then it begins to burn, a fire that matches the one I saw in the Urog’s eyes.
Through the haze of pain, I hear Jildred’s voice, bored and dismissive. “Take her to the chambers. Remind her what happens to slaves who forget their purpose. Be thorough.”
Rough hands seize my arms, hauling me to my feet. My legs won’t hold me. I sag between the twoMiouguards, my vision swimming. They begin to drag me away, my worn slippers scraping uselessly against the stone. This is it. The torture chambers. The screams I hear from there at night… they will be mine. Despair, black and absolute, swallows me whole.
And then a sound erupts from behind us that is not of this world.
It is a roar, but the word is too small for it. It’s the sound of a mountain breaking apart, of the sky itself being torn asunder. It is a tsunami of pure, undiluted fury that slams into us, a force that shakes the very stones of the foundation. The guards falter, their grip on me tightening reflexively.
But it’s thequalityof the sound that freezes the blood in my veins. It is not the mindless bellowing of a beast. It is a focused, articulate cry of rage. It is a declaration of war. The sound of a soul awakened and finding its voice in a scream of pure, intelligent fury.
I twist my head, my vision clearing just enough to see. The Urog is on his feet, straining against the enchanted chains, his entire ten-foot frame vibrating with a power that seems to make the air crackle. The red in his eyes is no longer the dull glow of embers; it is the heart of a supernova. And he is staring directly at Lord Jildred, a look of murderous, sentient hatred on his monstrous face.
Jildred, for the first time, looks surprised. Even… unsettled.
The guards recover, dragging me faster down the long, dark corridor, away from the terrifying sound. Hope is a fool’s dream, and mine is dead. There is no escape.
But as they pull me around a corner, another sound echoes from the kennels behind us, a sound that cuts through the Urog’s continuous roar. It is a high-pitched, metallic shriek.
