The wooden door swung open. Firelight flooded into the prison, casting impish dancing shadows. She stood as a warrior entered. Two more hovered in the hall behind him. Face hard as the stone around them, he unlocked her cell door. Mail gloves of a goldish hue protected his hands from the iron as he pushed open the door—could it actually be? Ichor-gold? Metal of the gods? The only substance that could protect a Pixie from iron.
“Come out,” he said.
“Why don’t you come in?” she said, taking a step back.
“You won’t like it if we do,” he said.
“I have a feeling I’m not going to like it either way.”
The two other guards barreled in. She managed to spin away from the first, sweeping his leg out from under him and causing him to stumble into the iron. He hollered as he hit the bars, but the bronze plates of his lamellar shirt protected him from the worst.
The second guard kicked her in the back, sending her sprawling onto her face. She’d known the attack was futile in terms of escape, but she’d needed to unleash some of her reckless aggression. And watching him collapse on his knees and vomit all over the stone gave her more pleasure than was probably healthy.
The guards descended, slamming their knees onto her back, crushing the breath out of her, and lashing her hands.
On the ground, the first guard heaved, spewing and shaking.
She grinned as they lifted her to her feet, and she realized that it may not have been a noble life, but somewhere inside, she had always been and would always be a Rae.
THERE COMES Apoint when words for pain run out.
Agony, anguish, torment . . .
As Lavana’s goblin pressed a brand of cold iron against her skin, on her arms, her chest, her legs, the pain-words exhausted themselves until she was laughing hysterically through her tears.
“Torture madness,” the floppy-eared, rust-skinned goblin reported, pushing up his spectacles on his mushed-in nub of a nose. “Happens to your kind now and again.”
“You’re useless.” Lavana shoved him aside, causing him to drop the iron rod with a clang onto the stone.
She slapped Magda’s face, again and again, until Magda’s laughter was choked off by blood springing up when one of her teeth was knocked loose.
Lavana seized her shoulders and shook her. Her pale blue eyes flashed with reflected torchlight. “Where is the Enneahedron? What did you do with it?”
Magda’s head lolled on her shoulder. Every time she was about to pass out, the goblin blew some damned glittering dust over her and she was wide awake again, drowning in sick pain sweat. She’d thrown up the bread and every bit of bile in her stomach, soiled herself, gone into a waking coma for a time, but had been relentlessly snapped back to awareness by the goblin. She’d screamed her throat raw and begged for them to stop, and yet, she hadn’t answered the question. Even she was surprised.
She spat out her tooth and a globule of blood onto Lavana’s scarred face. The burn left by Python’s iron rack had healed into a tight, red line.
So many scars, she thought with an air of melancholy.
Damion and Lavana, and now she, too, would be covered with them, though the goblin hadn’t touched her face with the iron yet. He was afraid facial wounds might hinder her ability to speak.
Lavana’s face twisted. “The spear,” she said.
“Are you sure?” the goblin asked, waddling on his bowlegs over to the array of iron brands. “It might kill her.”
Lavana straightened up, taking a handkerchief from the pocket of her over-gown and wiping the blood off of her face. “Let’s find out.”
“Giving up so soon?” a new voice said from one of the shadowy corners.
Magda hadn’t realized anyone else was there, but then, she’d been sinking and rising through consciousness so much it wasn’t surprising she’d failed to notice they’d received company.
Lavana spun, evidently surprised herself.
“Did you find anything?” she asked.
The shadows seemed to drift away from him like smoke as he stepped forward. He looked like a warrior or a Prince, except his long hair was strangely pale and his eyes very dark. Pixies with fair hair were exceedingly rare, though not unheard of. But her own amber eyes were considered quite dark for a Pixie. So it was startling to see eyes darker still.
“Nothing,” he said, black eyes sliding past Lavana and meeting Magda’s.
