Page 36 of The Prince's Captive

She grabbed at his hands, trying to pull them away, but the lack of air was making her vision blur again.

Maybe it was hopeless.

Maybe all of her prayer all her life had been to a goddess with different ideas.

And yet… She prayed once more for a miracle.

Chapter13

MARCELLA

Marcella’s vision was completely black when the suffocating pressure vanished. The weight pinning her down was jerked to the side. There was the sound of a voice nearby, but she could not make out the words.

She desperately sucked in as much air as she could despite how much it hurt and how it just left her coughing horrifically once more. Regardless, her vision started to clear. She managed to turn her head. The second she did, it registered that the sound she was hearing could be nothing other than an absolutely brutal physical attack.

It was so dark and the vitae of the silenced Inimicus runes were the only light around, but it was enough to see what she needed to. That gold hair could belong to no one else.

Gavril.

He had the silenced Inimicus on the ground beneath him. The sound was him landing punch after punch on the mage’s face. The silenced Inimicus’ hands were limp on the ground by his face, seeming to have long since lost the strength to hold them up as a shield. Gavril didn’t seem to notice or care that the man wasn’t capable of fighting back anymore. He just kept on attacking him.

Marcella wasn’t sure if this was a miracle or just a slightly less terrible thing.

The silenced mage’s eyes rolled back in his head as blood trickled out of his mouth.

“Gavril?” Marcella choked on the name.

The first time she’d ever spoken it.

He immediately stopped, throwing his bloodied hand out on the ground to catch himself as his hair hung in his face and he panted for breath. He slowly turned and looked at her on the ground, still in the trap the silenced mage had set.

Marcella’s wrist throbbed, and her heart was racing. Although whether it was from the mage attacking her or witnessing Gavril’s brutality in stopping him, she didn’t know.

He was Inimicus. She’d forgotten what that meant. Just because he’d been treating her kindly to pry information out of her didn’t mean he still wasn’t just as capable of ruthless violence as the rest of them.

It didn’t mean he wouldn’t deal with her just as harshly for trying to escape.

He stumbled to his feet, leaving the unconscious Inimicus mage in the dirt.

He didn’t make it more than a few steps before sinking to his knees beside her. She let out a choked, pained gasp, but he just brushed both hands over the rune. His fingers moved and the glow vanished, freeing her from the confines.

She tried to push herself up, but he was pulling her up before she even could. She shrank back, bracing herself for his reaction. Whether it would be yelling or something just as physically violent as what she’d just witnessed, she had no idea.

Her short, pained breath caught in her throat, and she tensed, ready to pull back. His hands brushed over her, but instead of any of the roughness or brutality she’d just witnessed, his touch was as light as a feather as he inspected her. She still stayed deathly still. One hand slid to cradle the back of her head as he leaned in and peered at the fresh injuries on her neck.

He was muttering something in his language.

“—should have known—fault—”

He looked over his shoulder at the unconscious Inimicus with utter repulsion in his expression and shook his head. Then he said in her language, “Not much time. What did he do?”

He wasn’t… furious with her? Also, not much time for what? He’d caught her. It was over.

“It was a trap,” she rasped. Every breath was tinged in pain from the bruises starting to form on her neck, but she pressed on. “I think—He trapped me and pinned me down—maybe he wanted to bring me back as a way to get you to take the runes off his neck.”

Gavril snorted, a dark look in his eyes, and he just shook his head. “Trap, I believe.”

What was that supposed to mean?

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