“I don’t think she knows how.”
“Trust me. Animals like me. Seriously, let me take her.”
I unbuckled the pauldron and carefully lifted it off me. He bent his knees a little and I set it on his shoulder and buckled it in place.
Tzeri hissed and snapped her teeth an inch from his ear.
“You’ll come to regret this,” I warned.
“No worries. We’ll come to an understanding . . .”
A figure lunged out of a side street. I caught a flash of steel as it sank into Lute’s side. His mouth gaped.
A hand gripped my wrist, and the world swirled into gray nothing.
Stab.
The pain burned into my side, hot and cold at the same time. It sliced into me, into my organs, and my whole body screamed.
I gasped.
Someone scooped my legs from under me and dropped me onto something hard. The pain in my side exploded into blinding agony. I tried to get up, but a hand clamped my throat and slammed me back down. My head bounced off the hard surface. My vision swam.
Something caught my neck, constricting it.
I blinked away tears. The Butcher’s face came into focus. I tried to punch him. My right arm didn’t move, but my left did. He caught my fist and forced my arm down.
“Flailing won’t help,” he said.
Some kind of restraint clamped my wrist. I kicked with my left leg. My heel drummed something hard. I was on a table. I was onthe Butcher’s table.
He stepped to the side. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a workbench with something metal on it. The Butcher turned back to me, a mace in his hand. He walked to the end of the table. Steel fingers gripped my ankle. The mace swung up and came down. Agony crushed my left knee. I screamed like I’d never screamed before in my life.
Through the haze of pain, I saw him move. He clasped my right ankle. I knew what was coming and that half a second of anticipation nearly broke me. When the blow came, I almost blacked out. I wanted to black out.
He slapped my face lightly. “Not yet. Stay with me awhile.”
Tears streamed from my eyes. I couldn’t stop. Everything hurt.
He pulled a knife out and began cutting off my dress.
I would die here, on this table. I knew it with absolute certainty. There was no escape.
The Butcher leaned over me, his dark hair dripping over his shoulders. “Are you with me? Do you understand what’s happening?”
I stared at him, wishing I could claw his eyes out.
“Good,” he said. “You’re bleeding from a lacerated liver. I nicked a major blood vessel. That is a mercy. The last one you will ever know. You will be dead in half an hour.”
If only I could get a hand free.
“You’re not getting the full treatment. You haven’t earned it, and you don’t deserve it. You are not one of us.” He tapped my chest. “You don’t have the heart of a knight.”
Fuck off, you sick asshole.
“I will make it simple for you. There are things I want to know. Tell me and I will end it fast. Refuse, and I will fill the last moments of your life with agony.”
I clenched my teeth as hard as I could.
