Page 75 of Caged

“Waiting area,” Axel growls as I roll my eyes. “You don’t get to see anywhere else until we know who you are.”

“And while we’re doing this…” I wave my arms at the walls. “Sylas is in trouble. He needs help. He needs me.” I hiccup on the last sentence and attempt to get myself together. “He needs to be free.”

“Freedom is what we do,” Axel says, as he withdraws, shutting the door behind him.

“Freedom is what we do.” I mimic him as I pace across the room. “Seems like you do the exact opposite,” I mutter to myself.

It’s fifteen paces across the room and fifteen back. I feel like death warmed up. I’m cold, I’m miserable, and I miss Sylas with the force of a thousand hearts. He’s become so much a part of my life since we met all those nova-weeks ago, I can’t remembera time without him. His spicy cinnamon scent, the rustle of his feathers, his low, sinful voice which makes me tingle all over.

Except I can remember what it was like without him too. Being alone, being scared, not knowing what the future held. I don’t want to be that person anymore. I want to be with Sylas. I want us to be together, to be free, to raise our child as a family.

I love him. I love every inch of my scarred gladiator, with his burning, beautiful eyes and ability to make my knees weak with a single touch of a feather. I love Sylas. Why didn’t I tell him?

And I’m never going to see him again. All I’m ever going to see is these four walls. I spin and hit one with my back, sliding down until I’m sat on the floor, my arm over my abdomen and my legs splayed in front of me. I feel sick and I feel alone.

The door opens and the furry head of a Cirmos pokes around it, all whiskers and ears.

“It’s you!” Haxrix exclaims. “When they said there was a human seeking a gladiator, I was confused, especially after you paid so much to be taken to Chohan.”

“Haxrix!” I scramble to my feet and race to the door, throwing my arms around her and this time not even bothering to stop the tears. “I’m so pleased it’s you! They’ve got Sylas. I don’t know what they’re going to do to him, but I don’t think it’s going to be anything good.”

“Hey.” Haxrix is rather rigid under me. “You’re getting my fur wet.”

I release her with an apology, but her face is soft and her eyes kind.

“Start again, from the beginning,” she says, holding my hands. “Slowly.”

“We were in Chohan, and everything was fine until I got sick and Sylas found out the reason he wanted to go there was because he’d been before as a prisoner of the Zavaro, before he was sold to the dome as a gladiator. But finding this outsomehow led them to him and got him captured. They’re taking him to the dome again and this time I don’t think they’re going to let him leave.”

“There’s plenty going on in the dome,” Haxrix says. “The resistance has been attempting to gain access for a long time.”

“And you’re part of this resistance? You could have said,” I say accusingly.

“It’s on a need to know basis, and I didn’t think you needed to know,” Haxrix says coolly. “I took you to where you wanted to go.”

“It would have helped.”

“Not if you’d got away and never come back,” Haxrix says, her hands tightening around mine. “And the rest of them didn’t need to know where Sylas went,” she adds.

“I wish we had been able to, I really do, but Sylas knew he was missing memories. It was only a matter of time,” I reply as more tears fall. “I need him, Haxrix, and he needs help. Can the resistance do anything other than blow up parts of the dome? Can they help us? Can they help him?”

Haxrix looks over her shoulder at the door behind her. “I’d like to think we can, but the others will need to know more.”

“I don’t know any more than what I’ve told you, and I thought I had to do a test to prove myself worthy to the resistance,” I say with a twist of my mouth.

“Did Axel bring you here?” Haxrix asks. “Big, toothy, acts like he knows the gods personally?”

“That’s him, yes. He brought me here.”

Haxrix hisses under her breath. “There’s no test. He’s got fur for brains, that one. We were notified of your release by someone we trust within the dome’s hierarchy. He was sent to get you.”

“No test?”

“No test.”

I feel my shoulders relaxing and my legs wobbling.

“Is there any chance of a seat and some water? I’ve had a time of it,” I say.

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