I tried to lift the bar, but it wouldn’t budge. I stepped back and glared at the guard, pointing to the door. “Cotio!”
He kept glancing around, and I could see a bead of sweat forming on his temple.
I didn’t come this far to give up, though. I grabbed hold of his tunic and shoved him toward the door. I activated the fullest level of my bitch mode and hissed out,“Cotio,”the promise of death lacing my words.
Reluctantly, he lifted the latch.
Once it was up, I pushed past him and yanked on the handle of the door. It was heavy,shit it was heavy,but I managed to pull it open.
Pure darkness filled the cell, and I could barely see anything with only the small hint of light from the hallway.
“Cam? Ram?” I called out tentatively. A figure shifted in the gloom catching my eye. The brothers shuffled forward, and a distressed cry escaped me.
They hadn’t been beaten. They had been tortured. Dozens of ragged gashes oozed blood as they crisscrossed the entirety of their shirtless chest and arms. Bits of rock were embedded across their faces, pushed so deep into the skin that they formed small craters. One of them had a right arm that was twisted at an unnatural angle, and it hung limply at his side. The other hobbled forward on what was clearly a broken knee judging by the excessive swelling visible even in the low lighting. They were dirty and bloody and there was only a vacant expression where the joy in their eyes normally lived.
What really broke my heart, though, was their hair. Their beautiful locs had been burned off, the scorch marks on their scalps still raised and angry.
I rushed forward and slung an arm around each of them, knowing I couldn’t hold their weight for long. My body writhed under the onslaught of wrongness in the cell. God, how long had they been trapped in here, forced to endure that sickening sensation?
I managed to get them through the doorway and about ten steps down the hall before I collapsed under the heaviness of their massive bodies.
One of the brothers heaved himself up and clambered to his feet. The swelling in his knee was receding, and the sight of his healing abilities kicking in sent a wave of relief coursing through me.
“Can you walk yet?” I asked from my position on the cold dungeon floor.
“I think so,” the standing brother said, his voice thick and gravelly.
“We will be better once we get further from the Sonaria,” the other brother said, climbing slowly to his feet then casting down a hand to help me up. “It is still siphoning our magic even from out here.”
Moving as quickly as we could despite my weakness and their injuries, we made it up the stairs and back into the castle proper. Slowly, the gashes across their bodies sealed up, and the ugly red welts on their heads faded into smooth brown skin again.
I ran my hand over the scalp of the nearest brother. “How will I tell you apart now,” I asked, choking back a sob. Sin was a nasty jerk, but he had been right. This was my fault. I wasn’t in the city five minutes before I let the disguise falter and they paid the price.
“Do not be sad, Princess,” the one I was touching said. “Wounds heal. Hair grows. We have suffered worse before and would do it again in a heartbeat if it brought you happiness.”
“Besides, you can still tell us apart,” the other brother added, snapping his finger to pull a spark of flame from the nearest torch. He ran his finger across his left eyebrow, burning a tiny line through the center of it like a scar.
“Stop it, Ram,” I said angrily, pulling his hand away from his face before he got any more crazy ideas. “You need to stop burning off your hair for me.”
He laughed and gave me a hug. Cam joined in, and I savored the comfort of the two brothers holding me, knowing they were safe again. It was a strange feeling, the affection I had for these twins I met only days ago.
I never knew what it was like to actually have friends, but as a huge smile broke out across my face, I realized that just maybe I was starting to get an idea.
Chapter nineteen
I acted as look-out while Cam and Ram snuck out of the castle to head back to their cottage after I ordered them to lay low until I had a chance to speak with my father. I didn’t want to risk any overzealous guards trying to throw them back in the Sonaria.
Since I didn’t know when exactly my father would be back from Civi Adasa, and I was too antsy to rest like Dey suggested, I decided that I might as well explore the castle a bit.
I wandered down the halls past a few open doors, loitering briefly in front of each one to watch what was happening.
In the first room I came to, a few servants moved their hands in circular motions over tubs filled with clothing and soap, their magic churning the water. Off to the other side of the room, one servant used their power to suspend wet clothing in the air while another made sweeping gestures that pulled every drop of liquid from the fabric down to a grate in the floor.
I realized they were just doing laundry, but I still watched longer than was necessary, fascinated by how much effort went into something so simple.
The next room was even more intriguing, and it took me a few minutes to figure out what was happening. Six servants stood around a wide pool in the middle of the floor as their arms swirled about them. Undulating orbs of water rippled out of the pool and bobbed across the room to snake into a series of metal pipes along the wall. Other servants stood near the ducts, using fire in their hands to heat the metal as the water passed through it.
So that was how I got my hot shower. Everything in this castle functioned because elemental casters made it so. I felt a pang of guilt as I saw the boredom on every single face in the room. They would be gods in my world, but here they were using their magic for mundane labor.
