It was then that I noticed the other one had crept closer. He studied my eyes when I looked at him and reached out a hand. I tried not to flinch, but those claws looked no less sharp on the children. He paused and looked at the other kid uncertainly. They both looked at me and the little one touched his face, then pointed at mine. I nodded once, then realized they might not know what that meant, so I carefully, slowly, touched his cheek, then pointed at mine. He eagerly reached a hand forward, and I closed my eyes to avoid losing one to his grappling claws. But his touch was gentle, his skin smooth despite how hard it looked, and I opened my eyes again to see him staring at me in wonder, touching my hair, tapping my lips so I smiled andhe could study my teeth. It differed only slightly from human cultures exploring each other for the first time. Vorpyr had hair themselves, draping around their horns, but it was possible none had the light color of mine because they seemed interested in it.
They became more animated as I engaged with them, and soon the smaller one, who indicated he was called Alryv, crawled up on the bed with me, sitting in the crook of the arm that wasn’t bound as I rested against the headboard. I quickly caught on that they had an exclamation that I could equate with “wow” or maybe “cool” and the structure of their childish basic sentences as they spoke to each other started to reveal itself as I listened intently.
A whooshing sound had all three of us at attention. I turned toward the entrance stiffly, unable to move farther thanks to my bound hand, and suddenly I realized how vulnerable I was. Not that I hadn’t been before, even with both my hands free.
Smoldering eyes met mine and I forced myself not to shrink back. Another male stood next to him and both boys scrambled to their feet, standing at attention. They each clapped their wings together once. Some part of my brain, the part that wasn’t absolutely terrified, cataloged the action as something like a solute or respectful motion to a superior or perhaps it was age related, where those younger did it to those older.
The smaller male vorpyr said something to them sharply, but Emerald Eyes used a softer tone and rubbed a hand affectionately over the stubby horns on the little ones’ heads as they darted past. Were they his children?
Alryv paused in the doorway long enough to give me a smile and a flap of his right wing before scurrying after the other. My captor watched with an unreadable expression. The other male left with the children and when Emerald Eyes stepped close, I pressed back, entirely too aware that I had been stripped of myclothes and now only wore a soft gown with nothing underneath. At least now I would find out why I was here.
“You should have said you’d die in the heat without water.”
Heatstroke. I’d been so focused on everything else it hadn’t even occurred to me.
“Are my companions ok?” I stared up into his face, as if his expression would tell me the truth no matter his words.
“They are fine.” He stepped closer. His powerful thighs, clad in fitted black pants, were at the level of the bed and he seemed to take up all the space in the room as he towered over me. “They need to be around to keep you from lying to me further.”
I steadied my breathing and kept my voice calm. “Why not let me die? You know I’m not military.” I needed the brute to realize that I wasn’t a fighter. I was a civilian caught up in all of this. I didn’t know if that mattered to them, but I had to try. Jaron and Tatiana were here because of me, I couldn’t give up.
“What lies were you spitting to the small ones?”
I kept my scoff internal. “We don’t speak the same language, male.”
He leaned down and I tilted my head up, meeting his gaze firmly. If I was going to die, I didn’t want to go out giving him the satisfaction of seeing my terror.
“You dare to call me male?” His voice was deceptively soft and the hair on the back of my neck stood up, a shiver tracing its icy finger down my spine. “You think I will allow disrespect from you?”
“You refuse to tell me your name or what to call you.” I responded. As his intense gaze pinned me I dropped my eyes down to his throat and had to force them back up. “I study other cultures in order to facilitate communication, never have I meant to be impolite.”
Our gazes locked, and he slowly stood back up to his full height, allowing me to breathe again. “You didn’t tell me what interaction you had with the small ones.”
“They were curious about my hair and lack of fangs and we exchanged names.” Exhaustion was eating at me, no doubt a result of the painful flushes of adrenaline I’d experienced today and then the heatstroke, and all I wanted was to lie back and close my eyes. Block him out.
Without warning he leaned over me and I sucked in a sharp breath, pressing back into the pillow to get away from his intimidating bulk. A slow smirk curved his lips. He held my gaze as he extended his claws. I’d noticed vorpyr claws seemed to extend and retract, but now they were so long I wondered if he could tear out a human’s heart with them. If hehad.
I was hoping to reason with him, but maybe I should focus my energy on trying to think of a way out of here instead. He sliced through the rope binding me and gripped my bicep, tugging me. I scooted to the edge of the bed and stood, feeling small and vulnerable as a breeze coming in through the open doorways stirred the white dress that sheathed me.
He led me out of the small room and I gazed around, taking everything in as quickly as I could. The main room had light wood floors and open windows and double sliding doors. Multiple doors were open, showing rooms similar to the one I was in, or closed with shadows outlined behind them. On one side of the room sleek floor to ceiling doors, the same light wood as the beams and floor, hid what I imagined were medicines and other supplies.
At the open sliding doors, he turned to me and I tensed, afraid of what was to come. Would he take me back to the ledge? Would he interrogate me? I feared all the outcomes. I wasn’t strong, like our spies or military. My gaze roved over his sharp horns, wings tipped with razor-sharp claws at the top and sharp black spikesat intervals around the rest of his wing. What this big male could do to me…
“Vorazyr.” I blinked. He tilted his head. “My title. You may call me Vorazyr.”
A small breath left me and I nodded once. I didn’t let myself hope that this was progress.
This time he didn’t force me into his arms and fly me anywhere, he guided me down the steep staircase in front of him. The stairs were carved out of the cliff and I pressed my side to it, afraid of the sheer drop. The sun was dipping in the sky and it reflected against the gold of the cliffs and the brightly colored homes, creating funnels of color almost like rainbows all across the canyon. I stopped to gaze at it in wonder.
“This place is beautiful.” When I glanced back, I found him staring at me, face hard. He pushed my shoulder none too gently and I started forward again. We passed archways and entrances to larger buildings. Some I got a glimpse of inside and could pick out grocery items, a tailor shop, and a shop that had bejeweled daggers and jewelry. How interesting it would be to speak to them.Yes, I should definitely make time for cultural immersion in between all the running and screaming.I forced my gaze away.
We were about two-thirds of the way down the cliff and still dozens of feet above the ground when he prodded me over a walkway and into the only building that was shuttered. When I stepped inside and he slid the door closed behind us I had to blink a few times before my eyes adjusted. An orb on the wall provided soft light. My throat constricted as reality crashed down on me. Chains came up from the floor and dropped from the ceiling. The smell was clean, almost like antiseptic, but not as potent. The horrible, invasive thought that it would have been better if I’d stepped off the stairs ran through my mind.
“Put her in the chair. Do not start without me.”
I had seen nothing but the chains that I kept my gaze fixed on, so movement deeper in the room made me jump. It was the other vorpyr, the one with red eyes. The one who’d been kinder to Tatiana. This one might be reasoned with. He came up to me and blinding light filtered in for a second as the Vorazyrleft.
“Come.” he ordered. He didn’t touch me but gestured to a chair toward the back of the room.
