She’d already ripped his heart out. Why wouldn’t she finish him off?
Suddenly a shrill alarm rang in short, staccato bursts.
Shouting orders and questions, people ran along the hallway outside an instant before the door to his room burst open.
Clarion paused as he saw Zarya. His look of shock turned to relief—an expression that only confirmed the fact that she must have known what they’d been doing to him. “The Sentella’s here.”
Her face lit up. “Is Kere with them?”
“I don’t know. They came in hard and shooting at us.”
Her happiness died. “What?”
“Yeah. Pip said they’re seriously pissed off over something. Damned if I know what.”
She scowled in disbelief. “That makes no sense. We haven’t done anything. Why would our allies attack us?”
Darling wasn’t sure if all of this was real or if he was hallucinating again. He’d imagined his rescue so many times…
It’s not real and you know it.
No one’s ever going to release you.
Clarion pulled his blaster from its holster. “I’m going to meet Pip at the con room. He was trying to talk to Nemesis, but he said it was ugly. I’ll let you know what I find out.”
Zarya did her best to make sense of why the Sentella would attack them when they’d always been their best allies. But at least she’d get some answers now. “Send me word immediately when you find out what’s going on.”
Nodding, Clarion left.
Fear cramped her stomach. She turned back toward the prince and for the first time, she realized the horrendous condition he was in. Granted she’d been furious over Kere, but how had she failed in her anger to see what a wretched mess they’d made of him?
And the smell in his room…
She gagged on it.
What was that? It smelled like a herd of something had died and rotted.
Pressing her hand to her nose to block the foul odor, she cringed at what her soldiers had done to the poor man who hung from the ceiling by chained, raw wrists. His long red hair was matted and gnarled with blood and dirt. A thick auburn beard obscured his features and like his hair, it was matted with blood and something she thought might be vomit.
His naked body was bleeding and bruised everywhere. So much so, that there was a pool of blood, both dried and fresh, on the floor around his ravaged feet.
She couldn’t even begin to count the bruises and cuts that marred his frail body. A body that had been ripped when they’d brought him in.
Now…
He looked tiny and shriveled from malnourishment. Had they not fed him at all?
Not even once? From his ragged appearance, she’d say no.
Aching over his abuse, she dropped her gaze. All of a sudden, a scar on his right thigh caught her attention. Unique and unusual, it was more than familiar to her.
No…
Her heart hammered in panic. It couldn’t be.
It couldn’t.
Yet she remembered tracing a raised and puckered scar that went off in five directions like that one, on Kere’s thigh.
Right. Where. That. One. Was.
She wanted to deny the obvious. But as she looked him over with new sight, she realized he was the same height as her unseen lover. When he’d been brought in, his hair had been the same length.
His build…
Oh God, no. There was no way.
It wasn’t possible.
Was it?
Her entire body shaking from dread fear, she moved closer to him. There was one way to know for certain.
Please, let me be wrong. Please. She wasn’t sure if she could live with herself if her suspicion was right.
She cupped his chin in her hand and carefully lifted his head. Bile rose in her throat as she saw his injuries. Through that thick, matted auburn beard, Pip had carved his name deep into the prince’s right cheek. The man’s eyes were swollen closed by bruises that were in various states of healing.
Her hand shook even more as she pushed his filthy hair back from the left side of his face and she saw the confirmation of her worst fear. The prince had a vertical scar that ran from hairline to chin, over his eye.
One identical to Kere’s.
Tears welled in her eyes as reality slammed into her with a violent fist.
“When you see me, I want you to remember not to judge me by my looks… Promise me.” She’d stupidly assumed that vertical scar that bisected his face was what Kere had feared her leaving him over.
But it wasn’t.
He’d feared that when she learned he was the prince they fought against that she’d hate him for it.
Pip’s words rang in her head again as he threw her mother’s ring on her desk. “Out of everything we confiscated from our royal prisoner, that was the only thing the bastard put up a fight to keep. Only that. I figured it had to be worth a fortune given the rest of his shit and how much it cost… the damn thing is as fake as it can be. He said it wasn’t worth the price of the appraisal.”
Darling Cruel had fought only to keep her mother’s worthless ring—a ring Kere had vowed to protect with his life.
Kere had gone missing the same day Clarion had abducted the prince.