Page 4 of The Prince's Mage

Vitae burned her side, but she already had so many bruises and burns and cuts into her skin along her vitae paths and her broken wrist, what did she care about getting whipped by vitae anymore?

Either they’d go so far as to kill her and put her out of her misery or they’d give up and leave her to curse herself for not begging Gavril to forget the mission and to stay, no matter how pathetic and shameless it would make her.

If it meant he would be there, she didn’t care.

At some point, a hand sank into her hair, ripping her head up and twisting it to the side so she was forced to look up. Prince Nikias.

“Demon—Mage.Answer. What rock. Do. And when wake. Gavril.”

She didn’t believe him. She didn’t.

But she was dying on this table and she could feel it.

Vivet.

Gavril had said it as softly as a breath, but she was a soldier and she knew a command when she heard one. But she wasn’t his soldier. And yet…

Live.

If this bought her enough time for him to come back…

“I’m tired of fighting.”

“Fighting is not tired of you.”

Asentai forgive her. Although if she survived… the one she really needed to beg forgiveness from would be Hypatia. Still, the promise of Gavril had her resistance unraveling like a ripped tapestry.

What a pathetic soldier she made for her clan. How weak her faith was for her goddess.

Yet, still she found herself obeying Gavril’s commands.

She answered in her tongue, “Not a rock. It’s a relic. A… holy object. It’s useless to you and yours. No better than heathens. It is blessed by Asentai. A mark of her favor for my people and to be a mark and blessing for Desero and Montis at Hypatia’s marriage. You have no use for it. Or me.”

“Agreed,” Nikias sneered.

He dropped her head and it hit the table. He barked something to the heretic behind her.

He didn’t ask anything more, and Marcella scraped together a broken scrap of rejoicing at that. He didn’t even care. He had no idea how valuable it was to her people. It wasn’t just a relic. There were lots of relics. It was the holiest of relics.

Maybe Asentai was still with her even in this darkness. Marcella at least wasn’t given the chance to break and tell him it was the Heart of Asentai.

“—three—rock—truth—kill her.”

Marcella sobbed once more.

Or maybe not. Maybe she’d been forsaken for her weakness and faithlessness.

Of course he’d lied. He’d done it before, and like a fool she’d believed him and she’d fallen for it again. But she couldn’t even find any relief in knowing she’d be put out of her misery.

Not after all this. Not when she wanted to live.

Gavril had made her want to keep fighting. He had given her a reason to live.

Actually, Hypatia had. If she lived, she could capture Gavril and have everything. Dying on an Inimicus heretic’s table was not part of that.

But the thought of capturing Gavril was laughable to her at the moment. How could she capture him now? She’d spent days begging for him with only the thought that if he were there she would be safe. He was the only thing she could think of wanting.

She kicked and thrashed and screamed in agony and fury. And she screamed for Gavril. As though wherever he was, she could somehow scream loudly enough that he might hear her.

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