Stars, stars.Every sane part of me hopes so.
And all the other parts pray it doesn’t.
Luckily, there’s no one to listen to my prayers.
There’s only a curtain of petals between me and oblivion. I think I’m choking on blood now. Gods, it’s disgusting.
I don’t pray, but all my hopes are in that princeling.
Fare.
I kind of wish he didn’t hate me.
I would hate me too if I were him.
The roses rot, and Rosalina disappears. I’m left with the post and the manacles, the goblins and this pain. Damn, it hurts. A miserable begging cry waits on my lips, and a green coil rises within me. I don’t know which one’s going to win, only that either way, I lose.
“That’s enough.” A familiar voice cuts through the fragments of my mind. The Nightingale stands before Emberlash.
“The Prince of Thorns hasn’t finished his punishment.” He cracks his neck, looking down at her. The fae man’s nearly three times her size, but she just raises her chin.
How long has she been watching? I don’t understand why she would want it to stop. She should relish in this. I killed her Dreadknights.
“My mother ordered two hundred lashes. You’ve done more, by my count.”
“Only one hundred seventy-five.” He licks his lips. “And the Queen won’t mind him taking a bit more, anyhow.”
I don’t know who’s lying.
The Nightingale puts a hand on her hips, but a few of her prismatic thorns break through the stone. “Perhaps, but if she sides with me, I’m going to request to deliver your punishment myself. Would you like to find out how I’d do it?”
“Can’t give lashes if you can’t take them. You don’t scare me, Princess.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t do something so barbaric as the whip,” she trills, the hint of a laugh in her words. More thorns burst from the ground. “I’d wrap my thorns around each of your five appendages, and pull and pull and pull, just to see which one breaks off first.”
“F-five?” Emberlash gulps, gaze flicking down.
The Nightingale steps forward, and the man staggers back. “I bet I know which small, scraggly part of you would snap first. Get out of my sight.”
Emberlash coils his fiery whip and spits on the ground before slinking away.
I want to collapse; I want to fade into oblivion. But I can’t. The hardest part is coming.
There’s the click of a lock. My wrists are raw and cut from the rusted metal. The Nightingale’s gloved hand is on my arm. “Stand if you can,” she hisses at me. “Everyone is watching.”
My voice cracks. “I can’t—”
“Stand.”
I know she’s right, so I do it, vision blurring. Gently, she weaves a thin thorn into my palm, and I squeeze down on it, the sharp bite of pain helping me forget about my aching back for a moment.
They’re all watching, this host of goblins and soldiers. They’ve seen me beaten before, of course, but Sira hasn’t been this upset in a long time. I can’t show them just how badly she’s hurt me.
Casually, I run a hand through my sweat-soaked hair. “Nothing like a session from Emberlash to really get the blood flowing.” I wink, gesturing to the bloody stone. “I’d recommend it anytime you need a boost.”
The faces of the crowd are completely shocked. Awed that I’m standing, awed that I’m speaking. Lastly, I fix them with a glare, a dark look that says: that pain was nothing to me, and if they ever disobeyed, this would be a fraction of what I inflict on them.
“Well, sister dear, shall we take our leave?”
