Page 47 of A Trial of Fate

The crashing sound of weapons vaguely entered my semiconscious state as Tiny barreled into the chamber. “You’re not done with her yet?” he exclaimed.

“I’ve been busy. Look at what carnage this weapon can cause! The iron tips slow the healing process while carving out chunks of flesh.” The mage’s joyous voice was so psychotic I think it even made Tiny hesitate. The mage was a sick, twisted excuse of a human who did not deserve to live. I prayed for the gods to serve him justice someday, even if I would not be around to witness it.

Another blast of a horn sounded, and I felt the chains on my wrist release my weight. I collapsed lifeless onto the ground, unable to move or even try to escape. The cold stone was drenched in my blood, and I forced myself to turn my head to the side to not drown in it. Drowning in my own blood was not the way I intended to go…

“Heal her enough so I am not drenched in her blood when I move her.”

The mage grumbled but obeyed Tiny’s wishes and waved his magic across the open wounds on my back to close them. He didn’t completely heal them, of course. He did not mend the damage beneath the skin or replenish the blood lost on the floor.

I was dying.

I could feel the heaviness in each breath my lungs dared to take, in the weakness of my limbs as I tried to move, but was unable to even flinch. I strained at the effort it took to keep my mind alert, to listen to their words, or to try to piece together what was happening. I searched for the natural babbling trickle of water in the chamber, but even that was proving difficult to find.

Tiny grabbed me by the arm and hoisted me off the stone. “Leave using the escape routes,” he said to the mage. “I have been sentto see you to the kingdom safely by Istar’s direct order. Go, and I will meet you.”

“Leave her here!” the mage yelled. “That was the second horn. We do not have the time to dispose of her in the cell. We must escape now!”

Was that panic in his voice? Why? What was the rush? Didn’t he want to see how his experiment ended?

Tiny nodded and lazily tossed my body against the far wall.

“Ouch,” I managed to grunt as I rolled onto my stomach. Tiny was so panicked that he didn’t acknowledge my grumbling or leave me with his traditional farewell beating to really seal in the torture. Instead, he rushed out with the mage and slammed the door shut.

My mind was screaming to move, to get up and escape, but my body would not listen. Even my animal was strangely quiet, succumbing to the fate that was now knocking at our door. After the repeated bodily torture and these final bouts of lashings, I was done. Breathing felt like an impossible task, similar to pushing a boulder up the side of a mountain.

I felt guilty that I wasn’t going to be strong enough to survive this, that I would not uphold my vow and enter the trials. And then, a deeper pang of regret and guilt tugged at me, knowing Neera or someone else would likely be forced to take my place. I had failed.

The wounds on my back might have been closed, but the damage underneath still tore through me. I wheezed out a breath, tasting a metallic twinge of blood on my tongue. It wouldn’t be long now. The mage was right. This was my final test. His final experiment before I would meet my welcomed end.

As my heartbeat slowed and my vision faded, I imagined what death would be like. To my surprise, I no longer felt afraid. A tranquil peacefulness washed over me while I relaxed my broken body on the dark stone floor, finally hearing the babbling waters trickle as whimsical musical notes. I might not have trained with our healer Latte for long, but I knew what death looked like. This much blood loss would eventually shut my body down. Each second ticked by in agony and felt like hours or even days.

Wait… Why was I fighting this?

Why was I continuing to linger on like this when the salvation of death was waiting on the other side? Honestly, anything would be better than struggling to breathe in a dark, endless prison with only your thoughts and dreams for company.

“Skylar!”

Ha!I laughed to myself. Nice try, imagination … but this is it.I smiled to myself as my heavy eyelids fluttered.

“Skylar!”

Wait, was that my name being called?

I couldn’t focus enough to decipher the other sounds bouncing through the cave hallway leading to the mage’s torture chamber. I was broken and battered on the floor of the hunters’ prison. A captured shifter-human who endured endless torment simply because of who I was.

But, that voice.

“I’m sorry,” I whimpered as my eyes finally fluttered closed.

In a flash, I saw myself lying on the cold, hard stone of my own personal hell. My naked, lifeless body was sprawled out in the open with the evidence of my floggings on full display across my back. The sight of my injuries forced a silent cry to emerge from the depths of my soul.

From the abyss surrounding me, a deep, thrumming call pulled at my senses.

It was like a tether—a vibrant connection that went deeper than the wounds on my back and the knife marks that sliced through my flesh. This call sang to my animal, and I could not ignore or turn away from the primal pull to answer. The melody healed me in places that I didn’t even know were damaged. An icy-cold sensation coated my back and filled the holes under my skin with liquid fire, slowly bringing life back into my body. Magic flowed through me, repairing what was broken, giving me the strength to turn away from death’s embrace and once again see the light.

I was jolted back into my body as my chest rose and fell with a full, steady breath.

“Spitfire!” The voice I had heard in my dreams spoke to me, using his unique nickname that I chose for myself when I was first brought here. And this time, he was real.

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