She shushed me, shaking free. “Please.” A glance over her shoulder, eyes lit with patience as she unfastened her cloak. “There are no bounties on my head.”
The door rattled again, louder, the sound scraping at my bones. A pulse, not my own, quickened, stretching inside its cage. Fangs brushed my lip as I hurried to her side.
Gemma lifted a finger, stopping me cold. “This is a safe place, Verena.” Her stare stayed on the point of my teeth, her own clicking softly as her hand fell to her hip. The finger still pointed at me, unwavering. “Thatis not needed here. Ever.”
My spine loosened, posture fracturing, jaw slackening as if she had swiped the air from my lungs. Even the creature laughed cruelly inside me.
Her nod was small, approving as the mask fell, and she finally turned, leaning close to the door, one eye framed by the tiny hole in its center.
Fingers lifted, reaching for the iron latch, then paused as she whispered, “Though, you are not the worst horror some will ever see.”
The lock unfastened, and the door swung open.
Even when screams shook her walls, Gemma would stand unbroken, unfazed.
I had learned that from her, not to react, not to let it sink too deep.
They never sounded like misery, the screams coming from Gemma’s cottage. To us they were melodies, proof that life still clung, that hope was still possible.
But the silence that sat with us now...it was unforgiving.
The girl before us had not been stabbed, no blade had carved her open. Though blood still slicked her porcelain skin, bruises still marred her limbs.
She had been broken, shattered from the inside out.
Her eyes, once bright and eager, now stared empty toward nothing, light dimming with every unblinking second. As if her soul were retreating, trying to understand the cruelty done to her.
Her mother sat close, weeping into her hands, pleading with Gemma in a hoarse whisper.“Tell no one. Not a soul. Not even the walls.”
She was right. To speak of it meant death. Innocence hung around the girl’s neck like a noose, and if the palace knew, the rope would tighten.
Gemma’s hand rested on the mother’s shoulder, a gesture of reassurance in a world stripped of it. With her other hand, she offered a small vial—liquid red, glowing in the lamplight.
The same color as the stains blooming across the girl’s dress where her trembling hands clutched at her lap.
Gemma’s eyes glistened as she cupped the girl’s chin, steadying the fragile thing she was at just thirteen years old. She lifted her face until eyes met hers.
“This does not define you. What he took cannot be replaced. But it can be rebuilt.” The girl’s focus wavered, a dead thing searching for life. “Men like him count on our obedience, our fear. They expect us to yield and call it survival. But they forget, women are not built for surrender.” Gemma leaned closer. “He will suffer. But first,” her thumb brushed the girl’s damp cheek, “you will heal.”
The clink of porcelain jarred me, dragging me out of the memory I had gotten lost in of a girl carrying a tray to Elva’s table, yellow and brittle hair falling into her eyes as she tried to balance the weight.
Mina.
That’s who sat in Gemma’s kitchen, broken in a way no one should ever be.
She hadn’t spoken the man’s name. She didn’t need to. Some guards flirted, brushed fingers, sought out distraction in boredom, and though foul, it was a game played between equals, adults who knew the rules.
But this wasn’t that. And there was only one predator in Luamis who favored golden hair and those who wouldn’t fight back.
Prince Perseus.
My nails tore into the leather armrest, splitting seams when I saw him in my mind’s eye, smirking, polished, sipping wine.
Then I saw him breaking. Splintering bone by bone, pride shattered first, until he begged for death.
And gods help me, I would grant it.
Gemma didn’t look up as her finger skimmed the rim of her mug, round and round, a napkin crumpled in her palm.
