Page 34 of Empire's Curse

“Hey! Look who’s awake,” one of the men closest to her wagon said with a loud laugh. He had a long scar running across his cheeks and nose, splitting his face in half and giving him an eerie expression.

Daiyu flinched as he flashed his yellowed teeth and blackened gums at her. “His Majesty’s beautiful whore is awake!”

The other men turned their attention to her and Daiyu wassuddenly in the spotlight of their lustful leers and sneers. Her heart sped in pace and all the hairs on her body stood straight. She brought her bare feet closer to her body, curling herself into a defensive ball.

“I can’t believe this pretty little thing caused you so much trouble, Bao,” the scarred man said to one of the riders, who glared at her from his position a few feet away from the wagon. His hands were bound with gauze and he had a wad of bandages on his neck.

“Bugger off,” the man grumbled.

Daiyu instantly recognized the man’s voice from last night, and she gasped. “You’re the man who attacked me yesterday!”

“Notyesterday.” The scarred man continued to grin at her, and she found herself scooting farther back in the wagon, a cold sweat forming over her body. “It’s been three days. You’ve been out cold thanks to the potion that bastard gave you.” He jerked his chin in Bao’s direction, and the man turned away, sniffing. “We were afraid you wouldn’t wake up, and then this whole ordeal would have been fornothing.”

“The ordeal of kidnapping me?” Daiyu tried to hide the tremble in her voice as she met the man’s amused smirk. “Why would you steal me, of all people? I’m not important to anyone!”

The man tipped his head back and laughed loudly, and it boomed across the valley they were going through. Daiyu shivered, her gaze skating to the mountains in the distance and the woods on the horizon—how far had they been traveling? And where were they intending on taking her?

“You’re precious toHis Majesty,” the man sneered, the mocking tilt in his voice coming off harsh. He touched the scar on his face and it somehow appeared angrier, redder, and uglier. But it must have been the light playing tricks on her eyes, or the twist of his lips that gave that impression. “Drakkon Muyang doesn’t have many weaknesses, and so of course we had to take the one woman who seemed to matter to him.”

Daiyu’s mouth dropped open and she couldn’t believe the words coming out of his mouth. “You … You think I matter to him? He doesn’t even know me!”

“He chose you for a reason.” He narrowed his eyes at her. “We can use you in many ways to get to him,my lady.” He hissed out the last part and gave a short laugh as if he found himself amusing.

All the color drained from Daiyu’s face. These people actually thought they could anger Muyang by stealing her? It was the most absurd notion she had heard in weeks—besides the fact that Muyang had chosen her, for some apparent reason. How far would they go to get a reaction out of him? Would they torture her? Send bits and pieces of her body to him as presents? Wave her battered body on the battlefield as a warning? The more her mind traveled to morbid territory, the more lightheaded she became.

“Y-You’ve made a mistake,” she heard herself breathe. “A terrible, terrible mistake.”

“No, we haven’t.” One of the men chuckled, bringing his horse closer to the wagon so he could peer at her better. He tightened his hold on his reins and grinned. “I wonder what it’ll be like to be with the emperor’s whore?—”

“Are you out of your mind?” Daiyu’s eyes nearly bugged out from their sockets. “I’m not his … hiswhore! I’m to be his wife, not—not—” Tears stung the back of her eyes when laughter filled the space around her. Everywhere she turned, a man was grinning at her salaciously. Like they wanted to strip her down and parade her in their little group. “You fiends! This isn’t how you treat a woman?—”

Another round of laughter, this time heartier than the last.

If she thought being stuck in the palace with Drakkon Muyang was bad, this was infinitely worse. This type of captivity, with obscene men who would do unimaginable things to her, appeared to be a different version of cruelty than Muyang offered. At least in the palace, she had a chance to escape. But here? She glanced at the fields of grass, at the weaponsthe men had, and then at the beaten path toward the mountainside. There were far too many variables to consider with escaping.

Her stomach twisted into a tight knot and she resisted the urge to vomit right then and there, even as waves of nausea rolled over her. First, she had to find a way out of these constraints. Then she could worry about outrunning these men.

Maybe it was better this way, she reasoned. If she managed to escape and run to her family, without notifying the emperor, then wouldn’t that mean she successfully evaded him? He would assume she was either dead or still in the midst of the enemies, and he would eventually forget about her, and she could live her life without worry.

But even with the slim possibility of escaping from Muyang, the idea of fleeing from this group of bandits seemed more daunting and impossible. In the palace, she had Feiyu. But here there was no one to aid her.

Daiyu shimmied her wrists and cringed at the rawness of her skin and the rough material of the rope. “Is there any way you could remove these ropes from me?” she asked no one in particular. “There’s no reason to keep me bound?—”

“There’s plenty of reason,” Bao, the one who had snuck into her room and abducted her, snapped. He touched the bindings on his neck and glared at her darkly. “You’re not as timid as you look. The next thing we’ll know, you’ll try to slit our throats.”

The corner of the scarred man’s mouth lifted. “That’s a great point, Bao. We can’t have her trying to kill us like she almost did with you.”

Some of the men snorted, and Bao’s face purpled. “She didn’t manage to do anything.”

“Doesn’t look that way,” one of them said with another cackle.

Daiyu frowned and tried pulling one of her hands from the constraints. “Where are you taking me?”

“None of your concerns.” The scarred man pulled out a dagger from his belt and flipped it in the air before catchingit quickly. It was only then that Daiyu noticed the dragon curled along the hilt and the ruby eyes.

She inhaled sharply. That was Muyang’s dagger; he had told her to keep it safe, and yet a common bandit was whirling it around his fingers like it was a toy. She could only imagine what the emperor would do to her if he found out she lost his prized possession.

But that shouldn’t have been her concern, she told herself. She had no plans of returning to Muyang, so he would never find out what happened here. He shouldn’t have given his dagger to her in the first place if it was so important to him. He should’ve just kept it to himself.Hewas the naïve one for trusting her with it.

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