He stands before me, posture ramrod straight. “You will be able to move freely in here. You are not to leave, nor are you to harm yourself in any way. I’ll be back in a few days.” He rests an ice-cold hand on my face and cups my cheek. “And remember, darling, I’m here—” he taps the necklace resting at the base of my throat, “—and here,” he says, placing a gentle, cold kiss on my forehead.
The only thing I hear is the sound of my screams ringing inside my head.
Marik leaves me alone in my quarters for the next five days. I spend all five trying to break the necklace, but I can’t. So, I start trying to kill myself. But every time, Marik’s hold over me forces me to stop.
A knife rests in a wooden block on the kitchen counter, but my hand freezes when I reach for it. I fill the bathtub to the brim and hold myself under the water, but my body surges upward when my lungs beginto scream.
It’s a mercy that I’m allowed to cry.
On day twenty-five, Marik walks through the front door, startling me from my book. I was shocked when I opened it for the first time and my hands didn’t slam it shut. Apparently, I’m allowed to read. It’s been a small comfort, getting lost in worlds other than my own.
I sit up straight and watch him carefully as he strolls in. The ebony crown sits on his head, complementing his all-black outfit. “Honey, I’m home,” he says, dark eyes twinkling with the joke. Bile rises up my throat. “I thought you’d be happier to see me.” His bottom lip sticks out in a pout. “How about a walk?”
I brace myself, expecting to feel my body rise. But it doesn’t.
“Do you want to join me?” he asks, looking at me expectantly.
“Am I allowed to speak?” I ask.
He rolls his eyes. “Don’t be so dramatic. Besides, I did say you could speak when spoken to, didn’t I?” His tone is pleasant. I can’t wait for the day I can rip his tongue out.
“My answer is no.”
“Suit yourself,” he says with a shrug, then leaves.
For the next nine days, he returns and asks me the same question. Every day, I say no. Until day thirty-five, when I give in and say yes. I haven’t felt the sun on my skin or the wind in my hair in over a month.
Marik’s brows rise infinitesimally at my acceptance of his offer, as if my response surprises him. “Let’s go then.”
I stand, already having grabbed a pair of shoes before his arrival. He glances down at them but doesn’t say anything. He leads us down the staircase and out the front door.
The sun is absent, but the soft caress of the breeze on my skin wraps around me like a friend. My skin is pebbled with goosebumps, but Isavor every second. We stroll past guards in armor as black as midnight, a far cry from the forest-green uniforms they used to wear.
“I’m going to give you another chance,” Marik says. “The kingdom thinks Mae is alive. I would like to keep that illusion. It benefits me and it benefits the kingdom. They already had to go through the loss of their dear High Family, didn’t they? I’d hate to break it to them that the only living relative of the great King Silas is now dead.”
My heart stutters at the mention of Mae’s death. No, her murder. I can’t decide if I want to drop to my knees and scream, or if I want to reach for Marik’s dagger and slit his throat. It doesn’t matter. I wouldn’t be able to do either if I tried.
“Like I said, I can make you. However, it’s a lot easier for me if you just go along with it. Then I don’t have to worry about dictating your every move. What do you think?” His tone is maddeningly rational, like I’m the one who’s being completely unreasonable.
He’s right. He can make me, and there’s nothing I can do to fight him. I’ve been trying for thirty-five days. Whether I want to or not, hewillput me on the throne and force me to pretend to be Mae.
I meet his gaze. “I think I’d rather die.”
On day forty-one, Marik bursts through my front door. Two guards follow him, dragging a body behind them. I shoot to my feet, but Marik throws out a hand and freezes me in my place.
The guards drag a young deer hybrid, maybe eighteen at the most. The body of a man, but facial features that haven’t been hardened by the world yet. He’s limp, his eyes closed. One guard holds him up while the other takes the male’s right hand and holds it to the wooden fireplace mantel.
Marik strides forward, gleaming metal in his hands.
A hammer in one.
Nails in theother.
He walks up to the male and places a nail in the center of his hand. He drives it into the mantel with one swoop of the hammer.
The male jerks, his eyes flying open as a singular scream cuts through the air.
A tear slides down my cheek as Marik forces me to watch the whole thing. He hammers the male’s left hand and then his feet into the ground.
