Page 14 of The Prince's Captive

Out of the corner of her eye she could see his fingers moving and his rune lighting up the air once more. She twitched and couldn’t help but shift as she could feel her skin knitting back together in another itchy, disconcerting process.

She also couldn’t help the bile rising in her throat as the question rose to her mind. How many of her people had burned to death in the process of the heretics developing a rune that could heal a burn instantly?

Once the glow faded, she immediately reached for her peplos and tied the fabric back together to cover her exposed side as best she could while he stayed hovering over her. She turned and her back was pressed into the table as he stared down at her. He said, “See? No harm. Respected. Was that so hard, demon?”

She bit her tongue. If she opened her mouth, she couldn’t guarantee she wouldn’t burst into angry, wretched sobs.

“Hypatia. Demon. Nothing to say for self?”

At least he was convinced she was Hypatia.

“Not to you,” she spat out before the sob could fall out of her mouth.

“Despite crimes, treat well. No filth. Heal. Want to return you. Even though deserve death.”

Marcella had no idea what crimes he seemed to have taken so personally. Or what could warrant revenge. As the heir to the clan, Hypatia hadn’t led many missions herself, only a small handful. None of them Marcella had been on, and none of them had she heard enough about to know what he meant. But it was war. Of course Hypatia had killed Inimicus soldiers. Marcella had killed Inimicus soldiers.

How many of her people and the other clans had this commander killed and yet he expected her, or Hypatia, to grovel at his feet and be grateful for the scraps of decency he was only showing her in order to manipulate her?

“Ask yourself what you deserve first. Just your heretics alone should have you throwing yourself into the Abyss,” Marcella snarled, but she couldn’t stop the tremble in her voice.

Maybe she was more like Hypatia than she thought. Other than her fear.

Hypatia hadn’t felt fear a day in her life.

“Some say your people will do that for us. Insult as you want. See treated well in spite. And live with what you’ve done.” He shifted back, but not as far back as where he’d been sitting when they’d started. He caught her gaze and said, “Hunger?”

So they could drug her and just take her right back to their heretic to experiment on her while they waited for her people to reach out to negotiate her freedom that would never come?

No thank you.

Marcella had been taught well. Never take food or drink from an Inimicus. They etched runes into their waterskins and glasses and plates in order to drug and manipulate people. She lifted her chin higher and rested her manacled hands in her lap.

He sighed, then he studied her for a moment. He gestured to himself. “Gavril.”

She couldn’t stop her eyes from widening. That was the word the Inimicus had been saying after ‘commander.’ That was his name.

He waited in silence. What was he expecting? Was this some sort of offer to start over?

Like she was that naïve.

“Gavril,” he said it again, speaking slowly at her like she somehow hadn’t heard him the first time. He then gestured to his face. Was she… supposed to know him?

Oh no. Had Hypatia encountered this commander before?

She just raised an eyebrow and hoped she had become a better liar than when she’d been caught pretending to be Hypatia so she could steal an extra dessert as a child. She repeated the same lie she had that very day too. “You know very well who I am or else I wouldn’t be here.”

His brow furrowed for a moment before he let out a soft huff that might have been a laugh, and Marcella desperately wished she knew what exactly was so amusing about her kidnapping to him.

“But now you know my name,” he said.

What was this about? If Hypatia had encountered him before in passing on the battlefield, surely he couldn’t expect her to remember him. At least Marcella prayed this hadn’t blown her cover.

No… If Hypatia had seen him before surely she would have recognized him in the visions and told Marcella where she knew him from to at least help her keep her cover. Hypatia might be a lot of things, but she didn’t want Marcella to have no chance of escaping.

This was all just a scheme.

Bark some orders in the language she couldn’t understand, but tell her in his butchering of her language, he means her no harm. Then his men follow through on his orders, but he gets to swoop in and pretend like he was on her side by offering to heal her wounds himself and try to be charming and get her to lower her guard so she’d start spilling.

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