Through the darkness that threatened to drag her down and the pain that numbed her mind, she found a sliver of wind, whispering at the back of her mind. Her companion, her shield, her sword.
Linn latched on to it. And pulled.
Her Affinity roared to life. Vasyl’s weight lifted from her and she heard him shriek as he slammed into the opposite wall. The gale howled; the torches in the dungeon went dark.
Somehow, Linn dragged herself to her feet.
Somehow, she picked up the discarded dagger by the dead guard’s side. Limped toward Vasyl, the winds screaming at her back, the knife in her midriff slicing with every shift of her body.
“We slit-eyed deimhovs have our rights to this world every bit as much as you do,” she managed, and the words, instead of becoming lost, seemed magnified by the wind, echoing down the lightless corridor. “And I will show you what I can do.”
She brought her dagger to his chest and pushed.
The hatred, the animosity, and the terror faded in Vasyl’s eyes. Within moments, Linn was staring into the blank gaze of a corpse.
She crumpled a second after he did. Her winds had gone; the corridor was eerily silent. The torches were out. Her prison garb was sticky, she realized, from a mix of her and Vasyl’s blood. Lying there, alone in the darkness, slowly bleeding out, she held a hand before her.
Was this it? Had she endured and survived years beneath the hands of her traffickers and exploiters, only to die without anyone even knowing? She thought of her mother, who would never know what had happened to her that day she went to the ocean and never returned.
Her thoughts blurred; she was slipping. Her brother’s face came to her first, radiating joy, forever frozen in childhood. A memory…a dream, of him alighting at the edges of the cliff, his footsteps echoing as he approached her, laughing.No fair, ane-ka, you cheated!
Enn,she tried to say, but her arms were heavy as she reached for him, and the shadows were closing in.
His face morphed then, eyes gleaming strangely silver in the darkness, his skin a deeper hue as he drew closer. The world rocked gently. She fought for consciousness, her limbs dragging against her urge to move,move, move,or she would be—
“Calm down,” a deep voice said, “unless you want to die.”
It grew lighter. Warmer. The face swam in and out of focus, and her wearied brain struggled to make sense of it. She was on a flat surface, the world anchored around her.
Something cold touched her lips, trickling down her tongue and sloshing over her chin.
Water.
She drank greedily, half-aware that she clung to a rough hand that held the waterskin before her. She drank until she paused to gasp for air.
Her head still pounded, and her body ached as her consciousness rose to clarity. The first thing she noticed was the draft, subtle but cold and pine-scented. It slipped through the cracks in the window to her left, carrying over the oakwood desk where she lay, and stirring the flames of the candle.
Window,she thought, and everything came rushing back.
“No,” Linn gasped, sitting up—which was a terrible mistake. Her head threatened to split into two, and a sharp pain sliced through her abdomen.
“For one so stubbornly alive, you seem quite intent on dying.”
Her head whirled. “You,” she choked out.
The yaeger watched her, leaning against the marble wall of his study, arms crossed. The flickering candlelight sketched the sharp ridges of his outline, the cords of muscle that showed even through his uniform. His eyes were narrowed, his head tilted just slightly, as though she were a particularly difficult puzzle he was trying to figure out. “Please relax. You were unconscious for nearly twenty-five minutes, and I’ve given you all the healing draft I have. I’d rather not have you pass out on meagain.”
Linn suddenly realized the ache in her head was fading. Even the pain in her side dulled as she sat still, watching him watching her. Her wound was cleaned and bandaged, and an oversized cloak was draped over her.
Her hands sat on her lap, disturbingly empty. Her knives. Where were her knives?
“In case you’re looking for these.” A sweep of his fingers, and Linn’s daggers—the ones she’d stolen from Isyas—appeared in the yaeger’s hands.
Linn tilted her head down slightly, watching him approach, her body coiled like a spring. Injured and barely revived, she couldn’t do much against him even if she wanted.
The boots stopped clicking. The yaeger was an arm’s length from her, dagger held lazily in his hand. A dull red wound marked his palm. She thought of the way his hands had touched her cheeks, her shoulders, her clothes, his blood—which had passed for hers—slick against her skin.
“I told you I would come for you, and we’d leave this place together.” His voice was deep, cold, with an undercurrent of command. “You would rather risk death than trust me?”
