If I had another life, I would not be here, I thought.
But I didn’t. This was the only life I had, the only one I’d known. I mourned that now. I’d dreamed of other things, things I knew I would never have…like family, a safe home, companionship,love.
I wanted to laugh at that foolish dream. Love didn’t exist in a place like this. It never could.
With one swift motion, the warrior sliced his sword down my back, but it didn’t puncture my skin. Cool air floated over my flesh and I clutched my thick tunic to my chest so it wouldn’t fall down my arms and bare my breasts.
With my back exposed, I craned my neck down from the sky and met the horde king’s eyes. Demon or not, he would still own my soul.
“Five lashes for your crime,vekkiri,” he said, his voice hard and guttural, his eyes like flint. “I will only give you one if you name the others.”
A weak part of me almost told him. I was only kneeling there now because the Dakkari had seenmein the Dark Forest, but they could have easily seen Kier or Tyon.
But I met the horde king’s eyes and said nothing. Instead, I hunched down, breathing deeply through my nostrils, looking down at Blue’s frayed feathers peeking through my fist. They had once been so beautiful and I’d ruined them with time.
The end of the whip slapped on the ground when it unraveled behind me.
The horde king waited another moment, as if waiting for me to change my mind.
Then his voice came quietly, piercing the air around me, “Bak.”
The whistle of the whip through the air—
My body jerked when the first lash landed across my exposed back. The pain didn’t register, not at first. But when it did, it was scalding hot and icy cold. I felt it in my fingertips, in my chest, in my legs, in my lips, in the roots of my hair. It was everywhere, all around me.
Through my heaving breaths, I looked past the horde king, at the crowd of my fellow villagers, people I’d grown up knowing yet hardly knew at all. A mixture of faces that blurred with the pain. I didn’t recognize anyone.
“Teffar,” the horde king commanded, his tone hard and merciless.
The second lash hurt more than the first. I went dizzy with it and felt my fingernails pierce into my palms when I squeezed them too tightly. I swayed, on the verge of toppling over onto my side, but kept my knees planted firmly. I thought of the grounder looking up at me from the burrow and I wondered if I’d killed its friend last night, its companion. Did grounders have companions, mates? Why did my life matter more than theirs?
It doesn’t, I thought. I took a life and so I was being punished.
He was stripping my numbness away, making me feel too much. I’d never felt closer to death than right then. I’d never felt closer to life either. It was strange. A strange combination that swirled in my brain along with the pain and the realization that if I had a choice, this wasn’t the life I wanted.
Through the cloud of pain, I perceived the horde king stepping closer to me. Tears leaked down my cheeks, though it didn’t even register that I was crying.
“Vorakkar?” the horde warrior behind me called out.
The horde king was so close that I heard his sharp exhale whistle through his slitted nostrils. Was he hesitating? No, surely not.
“Teffar,” he growled.
I couldn’t help the muffled cry of pain that escaped my lips when the warrior landed the third lash. It tore from me, a strangled, desperate sound.
A shadow cast itself over me. When I looked up, through my watery vision, I saw him. A wall that blocked out all light, steeping me in darkness. My back felt cold, but hot with my blood.
Glaring up at him with all the strength I could muster, I showed him my fear, my sadness, my pain, my grief, my rage.
Then a veil of realization, of crystal clarity spread over me, pure and untarnished. I had carried all those dark emotions with me through life, but I did not have to take them with me when I died.
I didn’t want to.
That was what Jana had done. She’d left her sins with me and died free.
Letting peace take their place, I made the effort to let them go, one by one, imagining that they were arrows from my bow. I shot them far away, their poison disappearing, as tears dripped down my face.
The horde king’s icy expression morphed and changed. His brows drew together, his lips pulling into a grim line. He peered down at me, stilling, and I wonderedwhathe was looking for.
