Ellina didn’t hesitate. “I will take his punishment.”
“No,” Venick said. “Ellina,no.”
But she unbelted her sword and threw it to the ground. Her quiver. Her bow.
“You will take his punishment?” Raffan repeated.
“It is my right as a soldier.”
“It is,” Raffan agreed, watching Ellina remove her weapons. “But I am wondering at your reasons.” He switched back to elvish. “I am concerned, Ellina. I do not understand what has possessed you.”
“Are you denying me my right?”
“No. I am merely questioning your motives. Why do this for him?”
“You want to punish me,” Ellina replied. “I am giving you what you want. What do my reasons matter?”
It happened quickly. Ellina throwing down her gear. A rope. Her hands outstretched, the cord twisting to bind them. Venick’s heart pounded as he watched, helpless. He didn’t understand what was happening, couldn’t comprehend it. The satisfaction on Raffan’s face. The grim resolve on Ellina’s. The sadness in Dourin as they turned Ellina and tied her wrists to a tree. Purposeful, methodic, as if this was a dance often rehearsed. Venick remembered Dourin’s words to Ellina then, the somber set to his gaze.I know how Raffan is with you.
It wasn’t until they ripped open the back of Ellina’s tunic that Venick understood. His mind shut down, his whole body revolting at the sight. Scars. A maze of lines crisscrossing her back, some old, white, others pink and new. A whip was produced and placed in Raffan’s hand. The elf positioned himself behind her.
Venick was distantly aware that he was yelling. He heard his own voice that sounded nothing like his voice. And then, the snap of the whip as it came down. It shredded a red line across her skin.
Venick raged against the elves who held him, threatening, then pleading as the whip came down again and again, striking new patterns across old ones. He saw the curve of her spine, the way she gripped the rope, silent, blood pouring.
His fury was a wave that frothed and swelled inside him. It crashed over his head, pulling him under.
TWENTY-TWO
Venick woke to darkness. He shuffled himself upright, blinking past the skull-splitting headache, both trying and not trying to remember how he’d landed here.
It was Dourin who’d dealt the blow. He’d come out of nowhere, his aim precise, ramming Venick’s templejustso. Hard enough to knock him unconscious. Not quite hard enough to kill him. Call that a favor. Call it mercy.
Call it what is was, Venick: a mistake.
Maybe not. If Dourin wanted him dead, a sword through the neck would have done the trick. If Dourin wanted him dead, he wouldn’t be splashing water on Venick’s face now to wake him, gripping his shoulder firmly in a way that warned silence. The warning was unnecessary. Venick was not a fool.
But he had been.
He shook his head, water droplets spraying. It was night. He was still bound. He looked around, trying to get his bearings. His headache came alive with the movement. His vision swam, then greyed. He thought, vaguely, that he might black out again.
“No,” Dourin hissed in elvish. He lowered his face to meet Venick’s. There was something odd about his expression, something new. “You understand me, do you not?” Venick glared, but Dourin only nodded. It was his scowl, Venick realized, that looked so strange. Or rather, the smoothed brow where his scowl usually was. Dourin was looking at him differently, as he never had before. “Did Ellina—?” But he let out a little laugh. “No. Of course not. You knew before. Another elf taught you. I do not know how I missed it before, but I see it now. I can tell you understand me.”
“Understandthis,” Venick snapped, and spat in his face.
Dourin didn’t flinch. Didn’t even draw back. He closed his eyes as if with all his effort, bringing up a hand to wipe it away. “Maybe use your words now.”
“You disgust me,” Venick growled, all the recent horrors reemerging in flashes of color and sound. He thought of the way Dourin had helped bind Ellina’s hands, the way he stood by as Raffan ripped her to pieces. The images all came crashing back, a shower of hurt and anger and pain. Venick felt sick all over again. “You knew what he would do to her. And you justlet him.”
“If it had beenyoutied to that tree, Raffan would have whipped you to death. Do you understand that? She saved your life. Again.”
“I would rather be dead. I would rather bedeadthan this.”
“You are a bigger idiot than I thought.”
Venick was too angry to speak. He could still see the hot flash of the whip, cuts splitting along scarred skin, the way Ellina knuckled her ropes. He could see every moment right up until Dourin had knocked him cold. Venick didn’t know how long the whipping had gone on after that. He was afraid to know.
“Listen to me,” Dourin said. “Raffan is her bondmate. Do you understand what that means?”
