Like a cornered animal, her hackles rose as she jerked, muttering syllables of nonsense.
But it wassomething. A start.
Inching closer, I lifted Kali’s chin, urging her to look at me. It took everything in me to calmly whisper the nickname I had bestowed upon her a hundred more times. But the two words had helped to bring her back before, and I hoped it would work now too.
After an eternity of blinks, of heartbeats, her panting eased, and finally, recognition shone in her forest-green eyes. “Gedeon.”
I cupped her face, her skin cold and clammy. “There you are.”
Frowning, she lifted the shard she must have grabbed after the lights went out. In a deliberate motion, she placed it aside, the few navy lines forming a pattern on the porcelain. “I didn’t cut myself this time.” Wiggling her three remaining fingers, she gave me a weak smile. The gauze wrapped around her palm had protected her flesh from being sliced open.
Careful not to aggravate the stumps and accidentally cause her more pain, I took her hand and brought it to my mouth. “You did well, Kali.” Peppering the uncovered area with kisses, from her wrist to her fingertips, I praised her, “I’m so proud of you.”
She flushed so adorably, it numbed the soreness in my lower ribs.
“How are you here?” she quietly asked. “I saw you drop to your knees beside Ezra.”
“He brought me here to meet the Head of Ardaton. Did?—”
Her jaw dropped. Gazing past my shoulder, she stared at the group of Damia’s people looking everywhere but at us. And then immediately nestled closer to me, clutching her knees to her chest to cover up as much as possible.
I cursed internally. I had forgotten she wore not a scrap in a space filled with trained fighters.
“It’s okay. They’re here to protect us,” I reassured her, grabbing the pile of clothing off the examination table. Lifting the long-sleeved tunic up, I rasped, “I have to ask, Kali. I was there when Adder instructed the doctor to bring you to the other Heads. I watched them bend you over the table, but then the lights went out. Did Ardaton’s government…succeed?” I couldn’t force myself to say the words describing the higher-ups’ intentions.
Stuffing her arms in the sleeves, she bit out, “No.” Flakes of crusted blood rained in a shower as she pulled on the medical tunic. “When everything went dark, they just dragged me out of the room.”
Although the revelation didn’t assuage my wrath, it reduced the tension enough for my hands not to shake as I guided her legs into a pair of white, loose pants. She didn’t question my actions, allowing me to dress her, and I breathed easier once the strings around her waist were tied.
Even with the power out, it was nowhere near cold enough for a person to feel discomfort, yet I pulled Kali in, pressing her front to mine, sharing my body heat and rubbing her back, relishing her quiet sigh.
But any time I touched certain spots on her body, she muffled her whimpers by biting my shoulder, the pinpricks her bites elicited stoking my need to dismember those at fault.
“Who did this to you?” I asked, softly and controlled, though my knuckles itched to graze the faces of those who had tortured her.
She didn’t respond, and I cradled her head, silently coaxing her to admit the name.
“I don’t know.” Kali licked her split lips. “She was wearing a medical mask.”
Someone from the prison’s medical staff, then.
“Was she?—”
A loud bang announced an intruder. The door handle bounced off the wall right as a tumble of shoulder-length caramel curls popped out in the doorway. Covered in grime, Ryder trudged in with?—
“Zion,” Kali and I said simultaneously as he emerged, shirtless. His front boasted a new set of cuts too shallow to cause any internal damage, but the quantity and placement of them ensured each movement would stretch the wounds.
While Adder had taken me to what he called an observation room, someone had been sent to deal with Zion.
“Pretty birdie.” Zion sauntered toward us like all was good and his arm hadn’t been pulverized or secured in a makeshift splint—a piece of rod and strips of colorful fabric. “My strawberry.”
The weight lifted off my chest at his stupid nickname for me. At him being able to walk.
At him being alive.
Pausing ten feet from Kali and I, he surveyed us. His gaze lingered on my form, trailing from my injuries to the layers of caked fluids and filth. My clothing had been soaked through and through.
“The blood on you both…” He bit his fist, sniffling. “It’s so hot I want to cry.”
