Page 77 of Wingless Crow: Part 1

Only a few of the creatures had some clothes on, mostly rags—torn, soiled, and splattered with blood. Red welts and deep gashes marred their bodies. They added more to their wounds by scratching themselves, tearing at their own skin like it burned them and they wished to peel it off.

“Who are these people?” I croaked.

“They’re hardly people, my sweet.” King Tiane petted my nape. “Not anymore. They’re promise breakers.”

“Why are they here? Who did this to them?”

“They did it to themselves,” he said sharply. “They’ve made promises they couldn’t or wouldn’t keep. Now, they have to pay for that.”

The poor wretches threw themselves on the thick bars of the cages, ripping their hair out and bruising their lustrous fae skin. Their howls and screeching made me feel like my brain was being cut in two.

“Oh, please, make it stop,” I begged the king, burying my face in the folds of his ivory cloak.

He gripped the back of my head and forced me to face the cages.

“Keep watching. You’ll see, justice is so satisfying.”

The guards dragged a woman from one of the cages. Smaller than the rest, she appeared to be only a teenager, though it was hard to tell with fae how old they were. Her peach-pink hair was matted, with patches of it missing. The remnants of her clothes dangled off her slim frame in frayed, soiled strips.

She screamed incessantly, lunging on the guards as they dragged her out of the cage. Foam dripped from her bared teeth. A guard’s arm happened to come too close, and she threw herself on it, sinking her teeth into his sleeve. He punched her in the head, sending her to the ground. The other guard grabbed her by her neck, forcing her to stay down.

Her wings were broken and plucked, with only a few pale gray feathers dangling from the thin bones. She rolled on the ground, snapping a wing off completely. With a pained howl, she withdrew the remaining mangled wing into her back.

Even in her madness, she felt pain. Compassion pierced my heart at the sight of her torture. Hot tears streamed down my face, cooling off instantly in the biting wind.

“Oh, God, please,” I sobbed. “What did she do to deserve this?”

“She broke a promise, just like the rest of them did.” The king’s voice was void of either the horror or compassion that wrecked me. On the contrary, there was glee in his tone that urged me to look up at him.

The royal court was somber. Most of them observed the scene below with some degree of disgust. A few remained impassive.

The king leaned forward, his eyes glued to the poor tortured woman with anticipation. He made a small gesture with the hand that wasn’t on my neck.

The guards held the curse breaker down on her back and spread her legs. Four of them stayed on top of her, while two others lifted a long wooden spike from a pile of them nearby. The spike was at least twice as long as the woman was tall. They placed it on the ground between the woman’s spread legs, the sharp end aimed at her core.

“No…” I whispered.

Horror spread through me with a swell of freezing cold at the realization of what they were about to do to her.

“No…” Blood rushed out of my legs and arms, leaving me trembling.

My stomach churned at the first slam of the giant hammer. They used it to hit against the dull end of the spike, forcing the sharp end to tear into the woman’s flesh.

Sliding off my pillow, I hit my knees hard on the stones of the patio, but I barely noticed the pain. Scraping my knees and hands, I crawled to the low parapet at the end of the terrace, bent over it, and retched.

“Sparrow!” Voron’s hands grabbed me, possibly stopping me from falling over.

He gathered my hair, wrestling it from the wind strand by strand, as I kept expelling the contents of my stomach until there was nothing but bile left. It rose to my throat, burning my insides.

“Baby chick, you’re disgusting.” King Tiane held a silk handkerchief to his nose, looking at me like I was a pile of vomit myself.

“Here. Take this, Sparrow.” Voron yanked a piece of cloth from his wide sleeve, his handkerchief.

I grabbed it with trembling fingers, wiped my mouth and blew my nose in it, irreparably ruining the silky material.

He raised a hand, calling one of his men over to us.

“Take her back to her room, Farion.” He handed me to his personal guard.

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