I’d expected to rise, to float past my ruined body and drift toward the Aureveil. Instead, I sank, down into a well of nothing, a blankness so vast it erased even the reflection of pain.
My arms lifted of their own accord, unbound, a smooth surface meeting my palms, humming under my skin as my body collapsed to the floor.
It wasn’t the curse I felt, not entirely.
I could die here, I thought.I woulddie here,if fate would let me.
A boom cracked across the dark. The tremor moving through my hands, but the surface held. Somewhere above, Reve’s voice scratched and warped, muffled as if he were pounding at the other side.
I braced but even as it came again and again, I was immune. He couldn’t reach me in here. For a stolen second, I was untouchable. But I couldn’t stay here. My body was still there, and it could still die.
The words rose, even as my breath shook, first a whisper, then a vow.I am resilient. I am fearless. I am the force no one anticipates.
Each repetition swelled until it roared through me, louder than his whip, louder than the heartache. It lifted me upright until my spine straightened, my fingers curling into fists.
As many times as he had torn my skin, I rebuilt myself in those words.
I choose to rise.To live.To meet fate eye to eye.
And with that, I stepped out of the stillness, out of the quiet well, and hurled myself back into the fire—
The pain was instant.
“Look at you.” Reve’s fist slammed into my kidneys. White heat shot up my spine as my back bowed, the lashes across it blazing with a new burn. “I thought you liked the pain, my little beastie.” His nostrils flared, the inhale deep and starved. “Are those your tears I’m tasting?”
I still hung from the post, wrists flayed by iron, sweat-drenched hair sticking to my neck. My head tried to lift but fell limp again, too heavy for the tendons holding it.
I am resilient.
Stepping around me, his fingers skimmed the torn skin of my back, a mockery of tenderness. He bent low, thumb dragging a single tear from my cheek.
“I’m sorry, Verena. No more pain today.” A tilt of his head, almost fond, as he stood, moving toward the door. “You did well. Can’t say the same about your brother, though.”
My pulse lurched but I didn’t move. Didn’t give him the satisfaction.
“I’m going to heal you now,” he went on. “Wouldn’t want you bleeding out on me.”
I am fearless.
A cork popped. Then the liquid hit, ice first, then fire, spilling down my shredded spine. My shoulders rolled, desperate to escape the sting as it seared into the wounds.
“Oops.” His laugh cracked like another whip. “I lied.” Slowly, he poured the rest, until every nerve screamed. “There, all done.” Rubbing his palms together, he smiled before leaning closer. “Now that I know how sweet your screams can be, just imagine what I’ll coax from him next.”
When I didn’t answer, he hurled the vial against the wall. Glass burst, droplets splattering the stone where my toes grazed the floor.
He crouched in front of me, one elbow balanced on his knee. “A healer will be sent shortly to stitch you back together. In the meantime—”
Miraculously, my head stayed as he tilted it up, but my eyes slid past him to the pool of ruby at my feet. Gemma’s reflection wavered there, ghost-bright in the red, until my eyes squeezed shut and gave me only warped shapes drifting in the dark.
“Think about how much you enjoyed this,” he whispered. “Every lash. Every breath that caught in your throat. You belong to us now. To me. And if you so much as bare a fang,” the grin turned lazy, “I’ve imagined a hundred ways we could spend our time down here.” A finger swept a strand of hair behind my ear, an intimate touch in any other life. “Look at me.”
I didn’t.
Angrier, he said again, “Look. At.Me.”
That same finger hooked under my chin, jerking it toward him. Muscles screamed, wounds ripped open anew.
His eyes burned viciously. Mine stayed valiant.
