Page 16 of A Wrecking of Salt and Fire

“Oh? And what is that?” Katrin took a step closer to him.

“This…” He closed the gap between them, walking them back toward the tree the horses were usually tied to.

Kohl took Katrin’s chin between his fingers, bringing her lips to his. Parting the plush pillows he dreamed about as he swept his tongue passionately in her mouth. Her eyes closed as she laced her hands behind his neck, grabbing at the hair that fell out from his bun. He slowly shifted his lips down to her neck running one hand behind her waist and the other to the spot between her legs.

“Kohl—” she barely panted out, her head shifting back toward the tree behind them, opening her neck up more for him to devour. His hand slid to the laces of her pants, pulling at them until they were loose. “What are you doing? I am absolutely disgusting after that run.”

“Just finishing what we started last night,” he purred in her ear.

He could feel himself harden as he took in the look of anticipation that sparkled in Katrin’s widened eyes. His lips met hers again and he let her fingers wander back to where they came from. She let out little pants of breath as his thumb circled outside her trousers over and over again, causing him to only lean more into the kisses. Soon he would have those off her, would bend her over and see what glorious site begged for him to slip inside.

“Please, Kohl…” her voice cracked, “stop…please.” He knew she didn’t mean it, that she wanted him this much too.

“Do you like that, Princess?” Kohl whispered into her ear. He could hear her quietly swallow down a word. Katrin’s eyes glazed over as she screamed.

Kohl stumbled backward clutching his shoulder. Blood seeped down the once white cotton shirt. His voice was completely stripped from his body with shock. One second they were kissing and the next he was stabbed with a dagger. And not just any dagger, but one Kohl specially commissioned.

When Kohl finally recovered from the initial shock, Katrin was gone.

Chapter Ten

Katrin

The boat continued to rock back and forth with the seas. The sides of the chamber she was in shook with each smack of the waves against the ship. Two weeks. She was locked in this room for two weeks—at least, she thought it was that long. The room was barren except for a small cot with itchy wool blankets and a quite outdated bathing chamber.

She counted the meals they gave her, a small rip of bread and old cheeses and a glass of water each day. Enough to keep her alive, but barely. Although there was no mirror, Katrin could feel her ribs begin to jut out from beneath the simple white shirt they kept her clothed in.

The sun rising and setting through the tiny hole they called a window was the only way she knew that days passed. And even then, she sometimes wondered if she dreamt them. If she really was somehow in one of the deepest caverns of Aidesian, where even Aidoneus himself could not find her. If her mother also would never find her.

A knock came at the door and Katrin’s stomach dropped. It would be the old woman. She knew it. Each day it was the same. The woman would come in, drop off her food, replace the wash basin, change her into the lace robe that he liked.

The man entered after, as he did many times before. His blood-red eyes causing chills down her entire body, still making her wretch every time he left. The way the color trickled out of the iris in the middle like serpents writhing through the brush.

He slithered over to her, his hot breath at her ear.

“I wonder what he would think knowing you’d be on your knees for me girl.” That laughter filled her head. The same one from the first day. The same one that tormented her dreams.

The man pushed her onto the bed, easily pinning her hands up behind her. She was so frail at this point she thought they might snap beneath his large palms. His pale skin was muscular underneath his linen shirt and leather breeches. She knew even if she was at full strength he could hold her down. He did that first day—and every day since.

He slipped the other calloused hand down her front undoing the rope that held that flimsy robe together. It traveled down her body as he pressed against her, his breaches already unlaced.

When he entered her it was always hard and without regard. The first time, she bled on the sheets. The old woman never replaced them. A stark reminder that he took the one thing she had to give. The one thing that was meant for another man. At this point, she doubted that mattered. Katrin doubted she would ever see the sandy beaches of Alentus again.

Each time he would lean into her, his sweaty body dripping onto her skin, his hot breath whispering vulgar curses in her ears. How she was a whore, how no prince could ever love her. How one day she would learn to love it, learn to beg for him.

Some days, when she ate little food or water, she wondered if she would. If somehow, some way she would actually want this. Learn to need this as a break for the silence that filled the rest of her days. Katrin tried to push back those thoughts again and again.

But silence was the true curse. The waiting game. Would food come? Would they reach land? Would a storm wreck the ship and send her to the bottom of the seas in a lifeless heap? And the constant that never proved true—would someone come for her?

She tried to fight back the first few times. Not anymore. It was not worth it. She had kicked and screamed and bit him. All it did was make him want more. After the first time, he finished himself on her stomach and then beat her for her disobedience. Her black eye still crusted over, a split lip only partially healed even weeks later.

The second time he took his belt and slashed it across her back again and again. Those scars, those may never truly heal, the object laced with some poison even a god's blood could not cure. With each whip she could hear him touching himself, getting off to her pain. Once he was done leaving her skin in tethers he palmed one hand around her neck, slamming her face into the cot, entering her from behind.

He left her there after, crying and bloody, shaking on the floor. After the first few times she learned it was easier to just let him do what he wanted and leave. Let him whisper, “Do you like that, Princess?” into her ear.

Kohl did nothing wrong. She tried repeating the words over again in her mind, whispering it out into the world for no one to hear. He said those words, his hot breath against her ear and she spiraled. There was something familiar in his eyes, unlike Kohl, but still noticeable. Like she saw the look in another. In a trance she reached for the dagger, begging him to stop touching her. Then Katrin sliced the blade into the soft part between his shoulder and collar bone and she took off.

It was second nature, running through the hills, the groves that lined the base of the Triad. Salty wind flushed her cheeks as she leapt over vines and roots and she tried to forget what she just did.

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