He was smiling.
He looked me right in the eye and said “thank you” in a voice so rough I think the words might’ve hurt coming out, and I’ve never felt happiness so fierce.
For the first time since I climbed in Haedeon’s sleigh all those phases ago, I felt remarkable.
“Okay, that’s the last,” Bhea says, smoothing an oil over my back—her hands soft and tender, rubbing all the tension from my now-healed flesh.
Battling the urge to groan with relief, I open my eyes, looking straight into a pair of intense cinder orbs, a line dug between the King’s thick brows.
“You okay?” he asks, tightening his hold on my clammy hands.
“I’m great,” I slur, tugging them from his grip.
Never better. So glad he tortured me back to health during my last living moments. What a way to go out. Fitting, but a bit shit.
I lean back so I can lift my hands up over the chair’s headrest without snagging my chain and take the towel slung over his shoulder. The one he’s been using to dab at my forehead whenever sweat beaded down into my lashes.
“I’ll get my fine-tipped prongs for the pin,” Bhea says while I stuff my face in the towel, scrubbing the tension from around my eyes, hearing the sound of her footsteps before she begins rummaging through something.
Her words finally sink past the fog currently clouding my head.
Prongs?
What do they need fine-tipped prongs fo—
Oh.
I pull the towel from my face, catching the King’s stare again. “You’re removing the pin?”
Makes sense. Wouldn’t want any hatchlings choking to death on it if I’m carted west and spat out in a Moltenmaw’s tinder nest.
“You wear iron cuffs,” he murmurs, his gaze dragging over every angle of my face—like he’s mapping out the shape of it—landing on my eyes again. “The pin is unnecessary.”
“Well, yeah. But I’m unnecessary, remember? Skin slabs … Rekk Zharos’s finger … I don’t think you appreciate quite how close you came to being hacked into bits, then tossed off the wall. But hey, thanks for mending me before I die, even though it makes no sense.”
The corner of his mouth kicks up. “Hacked into bits, you say?”
Obviously.
“You’re the biggest male I’ve ever seen.” I shrug, biting down on a wince because that pin absolutely hurts. It’s blatant now that my skin’s no longer slashed to ribbons. “There’s no way I could’ve dragged you to the edge after I slit your throat.”
“But you didn’t …”
I frown, wishing he wouldn’t stuff my indiscretions in my face like that.
He smelled good.
I fucked up.
Let’s not dwell on it.
“The prongs aren’t here,” Bhea says, and that small smile instantly falls off the King’s face as he pushes to a stand.
“I have some in my saddlepack, but it’ll take me a while to get there and back,” he announces, striding toward the window covered by a round of aged, half-rotten wood. “How are we on ti—”
“Give me a blade.” I wave my hand in the air, jingling my chains. “I’ll cut it out.”
The King abruptly stops, and both he and Bhea glare at me like I just asked them to pretty please bare their throats so I can slice them open.
I roll my eyes.
“I won’t stab you. White flag, remember? I won’t give it back, either, so don’t give me one you’re particularly attached to.”
The only thing worse than losing a good blade is losing all your good blades, dammit.
The tips of my fingers tingle with the urge to gouge them through Rekk Zharos’s throat and rip out his trachea with my bare hands. Now that I’m mended, the injustice is extra crippling. I’m more than well enough to hunt him if it weren’t for these fucking chains.
“I can put a salve on it,” Bhea suggests, turning her attention to the King—like I’m not even here.
“That’s a terrible idea,” I gripe, reinserting myself back into the conversation. “I have a pin in my shoulder.”
Now that we’re all talking about it, I’m growing more and more pissed that I’m going to die with this thing in me, and I think it’s only fair that I snatch my comforts wherever I can find them, thank you very much.
I lean back from the chair, spinning so I can see the King properly. “You have a blade, no doubt. Hand it to me,” I say, flopping my hand out for him to fill. “Any blade. I’m not picky. Let me root around for a bit. You can close your eyes if you’re squeamish.”
He clears his throat, not for one moment dropping his gaze to my naked breasts now on full display while he turns and grabs the wooden window covering. Sliding it sideways, he peers out, muttering a curse beneath his breath. “Does the salve have rindleroot in it?”
To numb pain?
Interesting.
He wants to ease my suffering as I’m hailed into death. And there I was ordering a handsaw to make disassembling him easier.
“It does,” Bhea responds, digging her hand into a large leather bag she has stretched open on the worktable. She pulls a jar free like it’s some sort of trophy, and I frown at the lumpy green paste inside. “And fermented eahl eggs.”
To disinfect. But most importantly—to make you smell like you’ve been shat on.
No, thank you.
“You know what?” I say, trying to wrangle my shirt back on. “Fuck it, I’m good. Doesn’t even hurt. Let the hatchlings choke.”
“Do it.” The King slides the window cover back into place, snipping off the extra spill of light. “We don’t have time to cut out the pin,” he says, nailing me with a stare that shoots straight through me and out the other side. “The aurora’s about to rise.”
My heart plummets so fast I almost vomit.
Damn …
Guess it’s almost time to die.
Iside-eye Wrook’s empty cell as I rock from side to side, dragging my itchy back against the stone—an itch that threads bone-deep in places, making me want to rip apart all Bhea’s hard work just to satiate the uncomfortable sensation.
Guess the Incognito King made good on his promise while I was away. I hope Wrook’s satisfied with his Sabersythe tusk and that he wasn’t instead fed to whatever beast it previously belonged to.
I’m not stupid enough to believe this scratchy gift I’ve been given comes without caveats, too. Few folk help others in this world without expecting something in return.
There’s a reason I was coaxed to that room. I’m just yet to work out what it is.
Easing my tunic down, I reach back to finger the goo Bhea stuffed in the hole punched through my shoulder blade, frowning at the acrid stench.
Now I get to die smelling like fermented eahl eggs barely softened by a herbal twang.
Lovely.
At least it seemed to finally quench the King’s strange, almost compulsive desire to take my pain away.
I frown.
Perhaps it has to do with the one I remind him of? Perhaps healing me assuaged him somehow? Made him feel better about himself?
That must be it.
I breathe a sigh of relief, thankful I worked out the riddle. I did not want to take that question to my gnawing end.
A drop of mildew lands on my nose, dashing my relief. A splatting reminder that I’m in a cell. Waiting for death.
That these are my final moments.
Fuck.
Scanning my surroundings, I take in the resting forms of my cellmates, envying their deep, languid breaths …
Sleep would be nice right now. I could exist elsewhere for a little bit.
Anywhere but here.
But I can’t summon the urge to snuff myself into oblivion. I’m too wound up inside, like there’s a lightning storm caught in my chest, zapping me every time I even think about closing my eyes. For all I know, the guards might be charging down this very moment, ready to drag me to my fiery doom.
My insides knot.
I bat the thoughts away, but just like Nee used to, they keep bumping against me. Nuzzling me.
Loved that.
Hate this.
I pull my chest full of air and slowly blow it out, picking at the skin down the side of my nail.
Don’t think.
Don’t think.
Don’t think.
I close my eyes, tapping my foot to the quiet, calming tune lilting in the back of my mind, timing the beat to the splats of moisture falling from the ceiling.
Splat.