But then she looked at the empty chair where Ky would be sitting. She thought of thedamaged goodsinsult Polan had spat at him. Polan wanted to prove that Ky was weak, that he couldn’t protect her.
If she broke, Polan was right.
But if she held on?
She realized with sudden clarity that the battle wasn’t about avoiding pain. The Stone would hurt; she couldn’t stop that. The battle was aboutwhere she lookedwhen it happened. Polan wanted her to look at him, to beg him for relief, to thank him when it stopped.
No.
She clenched her fists, her fingernails digging into her palms. She wouldn’t look at Polan. She wouldn’t give him the validation of her plea. When the Stone screamed, she would look at Ky. Shewould lock eyes with him and she would endure it, proving to him—and to herself—that while Polan might own her body, the woman inside was no longer his.
She could turn Polan’s theater into a stage for his own failure. The thought was a tiny, dangerous spark in the overwhelming darkness of her fear. For the first time, she wasn’t just planning to survive him.
She was planning to destroy him.
40
THE STORM BREAKS
Ky was shoved into the tent, two large bandits holding his arms. He didn’t know what was happening, only that he had been hauled from the darkness of the stockade into the oppressive, lamp-lit interior of Polan’s command tent.
The scene that greeted him sent a wave of white-hot rage through his veins. Gessa stood in the center of the room with the unnatural stillness of a statue. She wore a cold iron collar, and her hands were clasped in front of her, white-knuckled. Polan was there, circling her, a glass of wine in one hand, looking like an artist inspecting a damaged sculpture.
“Ah, Instructor Ky,” Polan said softly. He gestured to a spot near the entrance. “Bring him in. I want him to witness the treatment.”
The guards forced Ky to his knees. He didn’t fight them yet; his eyes were too busy tearing the room apart, looking for an angle. He clocked the position of the guards. He saw Gessa, pale and rigid, illuminated by the flickering golden light of a brass oil lamp sitting on the corner of the desk.
“You broke her, Instructor,” Polan said, his voice ripe with mock disappointment. He moved to stand behind Gessa, placing his hands on her shoulders. Ky saw her flinch, a faint tremor, but she didn’t pull away. “You filled her head with noise. You dragged her through the dirt. And now, I have to scour it out.”
Polan’s hands slid down her arms. Gentle. Possessive. “She is magnificent, isn’t she? A fine instrument. But she is vibrating with chaos. She needs to find her center again.”
He looked at Ky then, his eyes flat and pitying. “You Spurs... you treat your charges like skittish foals. You whisper to them. You stroke their manes when they tremble. You teach them that it is acceptable to fear the whip.”
Polan shook his head slowly. “I see a thoroughbred. And when a high-spirited animal shies at a shadow, you don’t whisper sweet nothings in its ear. You tighten the reins. You force it forward. You break the panic before it breaks the horse.”
Polan moved around to face her. He reached out and brushed a stray lock of hair from her forehead. “We had such a future, Gessa. A legacy. A son to inherit these mountains, to restore the power my family lost.”
He looked at Ky, his voice dropping to a proprietary purr. “You tried to steal that from her. You tried to turn a mother of kings into a fugitive. But we can repair that. Once her mind is clear... we will resume our work on the heir. Won’t we, my dear?”
“You coward,” Ky snarled, the word scraping out of his throat. He surged forward, testing the grip of the guards. “Don’t you touch her.”
“I can touch her,” Polan corrected calmly. He didn’t look away from Ky as he reached out, his hand sliding up Gessa’s arm to cup the nape of her neck. He squeezed—a firm, possessive pressure.
Gessa didn’t pull away. She didn’t even flinch. As his fingers dug into her skin, she went unnaturally still, her eyes slipping shut.
Polan smiled, his thumb stroking the sensitive skin behind her ear as if rewarding a pet. “Because I am the only one who knows how to fix her.”
He turned back to his desk and picked up the Stone. It was grey, smooth, and innocuous.
“Now, my dear,” Polan whispered, pressing the stone into Gessa’s palm and closing her fingers around it with his own hand. “Focus. Let the noise go. Give it to the stone.”
Gessa’s eyes snapped to Ky’s.
It was instantaneous. Her body went rigid. A sheen of sweat broke out on her forehead, and her jaw clamped shut. The cords in her neck strained against the iron collar. The stone was feeding on her power, twisting her own magic into a searing feedback loop of agony.
But she didn’t look at Polan. She locked her gaze on Ky, her eyes wide, burning with a desperate, silent message.I am here. I am yours.
Ky saw Polan stiffen. The anticipation on the man’s face soured into confusion when the scream didn’t come. He frowned, looking down at the stone in Gessa’s hand, then up at her face. He traced the line of her unblinking stare across the room until his cold eyes landed squarely on Ky.
