Linn’s back ached with echoes of the wounds he’d inflicted. But that didn’t matter. Flesh wounds were just that: physical. It was the mental wounds one had to watch out for.
Still, she couldn’t stop a sharp cry from escaping her lips as Vasyl’s foot slammed into her ribs.
“There we go.” He grinned as she doubled over, winded and gasping for air. “Ignoring us, you slit-eyed deimhov?” He suddenly grasped her neck and shoved her against the wall so hard that her skull cracked against the rough blackstone. Linn gritted her teeth against the stars that burst before her vision, forcing herself to remain motionless.
She needed to have them believe she was weak. She’d struck back in the beginning, landing blows and jabs at her guards and Vasyl—and she’d been punished for that. Strapped to the wall without an inch of moving space for days. Deprived of water and food until her lips bled and she passed out.
Day by day, her struggles had weakened, her blows landed softer and softer, until one day, they’d found her curled up in a corner of her cell, head bowed, arms clasped. They’d sneered, and she’d tolerated their dominating touches and lingering fingers as though they owned her.
Little did they know that it was all part of a coordinated act.
She kept silent as they dragged her up, her cuffs chafing against her wrists, cracking open flesh that had already rubbed raw. Linn allowed her head to loll slightly and let her legs trail limply against the floor.
“Deities-damned useless Kemeiran,” Isyas growled as he lugged her after him. “Get the hell up, won’t you?”
She ignored them.
“We’re executing her in a week,” Vasyl said to Isyas, and despite everything, Linn shivered at the callousness of his words. He spoke of her death with less emotion than he’d speak of livestock. “We’re not to touch her after today; they want her healthy and alive for the axes.”
They hauled her past cell after cell and then up a flight of spiraling stairs, during which the air grew steadily less rank and the darkness began to turn into flickering light. Fresh, snow-scented breezes brushed her cheeks, feather-faint, yet she found her senses awakening as a flower would to sunlight. The Deys’voshk that ran through her blood blocked any response from her Affinity—yet still, despite all of that, the cool winds stirred in her chest, breathing life into her. Life, and hope.
It was when they continued up the stone steps that she realized something was different. Normally, they crossed through the first set of blackstone doors to a corridor of interrogation rooms. Today, they continued: up, up.
As though sensing her trepidation, Vasyl smirked at her over his shoulder. “There’s something special waiting for you,” he said, and the pure glee in his voice made her shudder. “We’ll see if you don’t spill all your filthy secrets today, Kemeiran.”
She stumbled on one of the steps, her ankles chafing against the rough stone. Isyas let out a frustrated groan, and together, he and Vasyl hauled her up the last few steps—through a different set of blackstone doors, followed by a second set of iron doors.
Her bare feet hit clean, cold marble. Tapestries appeared on pristine white walls, depicting white tigers, the Deities, and the usual Cyrilian fanfare.
Her escorts led her down several forks and turns, and she noticed the elegance of the polished oakwood doors, the tiger’s-head brass handles, the alertness of the guards. This had to be a place for highly ranked guests frequenting this prison. Linn knew little about Cyrilian prisons, and less about the Wailing Cliffs other than the possible fact that it was on a set of high cliffs. The entire prison was a tower with no windows and a single, highly guarded entrance that promised a swift death if one were to try to escape—even for someone like her.
It was a risk she would have to end up taking.
Isyas unlocked one of the heavy oakwood doors. Linn followed his hands as he looped the key back onto his belt and fastened the metal buckle with a secure click. The door swung open, and before she’d even had a glimpse of the room, Vasyl shoved her inside with a vitriolic push.
“Enjoy your last interrogation, deimhov,” he sneered, and the door slammed shut.
She was lying in a crumpled heap on the floor. Yet slowly, her senses stirred as she realized that her face was warm with a familiar, delightful sensation, like a mother’s kiss.
Sunlight.
In an instant, Linn was on her feet, the chains on her wrists and ankles lighter than air as she crossed the room in two, three steps. The window was shut tightly, sealed on the outside by thick iron bars that broke the sunlight into blocks.
Linn pressed a hand against the cool glass, her breath fogging so that the snow-covered landscape beyond was a hazy, glittering stretch of white. The Syvern Taiga spanned out beneath her, specks of dark green peeking out from the crusted snow. Above, the sky unfolded in a brilliant, eternal blue.
She was so mesmerized by the view that she almost—almost—missed the silent opening of the door, and the footsteps that fell like shadows.
Linn spun around as the door clicked shut.
She wasn’t sure what—or whom—she had been expecting, but in the midst of her shock, there was also the realization, like a tightening of tangled strings, that this was fate.Action, and counteraction.
“You,” she whispered.
He was even more vibrant and alive than she remembered in her memories of the moonlit tower. As he stepped into the sunlight, each line of his muscles looked to be sculpted, his every edge sharpened to the lethal precision of a warrior.
The yaeger’s boots clipped on the floor as he paced forward, his movements as deliberate as those of a tiger circling its prey. He was still dressed in armor—but she noticed that it was no longer the glittering gray livery he’d worn back in Salskoff. His new outfit was a smoother, silver-white metal that glinted in the sunlight, and the snowy cloak that he’d worn so proudly was gone.
Somehow, it made him look incomplete.
