Page 174 of Of Sins and Sacrifice

“Are you…serious?”

“Very.”

“You think they won’t check the coffins before they take them out?” I roll my eyes at him.

“Oh, I’m sure they will. But you will use your magical pin and make it so they don’t see us. You can do that, no?”

“I can but?—”

“It’s settled. Now we just have to find the perfect time to leave the cell.”

A little more back and forth, and it seems his plan is the only viable one, so we wait until everyone is asleep before we use the key to get out of the cell. I borrow some energy from the pin and cloak our presence as we walk down the hallway.

The conditions of the prisoners in the cells are appalling to see. All of them are beaten and starved, moaning in pain and barely able to move. They are one step away from dying, and I assume that’s what the guards are waiting for. And if they don’t die by the time they’re supposed to, they’ll apply the same treatment they did to the other prisoner.

Disgust rolls in my stomach. If I hadn’t seen this firsthand, I would have never believed the militia to be capable like this. And this begs the question: who allows them to do so?

I am sure Commander Azerius would be against it. Not for any moral reason, but because it goes against the law.

Yet the only reason why the laws are not as enforced here is because these people are s’Aperiotes, not Aperites with divine origin. They are just a stepping stone for those in power.

I’d known the system to be broken—my forced betrothal to that clown being a prime example for it—but I never thought the situation would be so dire.

We are not allowed to interfere with mortals’ fates, but what about s’Aperiotes? Aren’t they mortal, too? Aren’t these soldiers who kill them descendants of the Primordials, too, even if far removed? It is a conundrum, and once I get back my powers and resume my position, I aim to get to the bottom of this.

Mine holds on to my hand as we carefully walk the long, windy hallway that’s littered with darkened cells. It’s like a never-ending maze as we turn right and left, only to find more cells, more dying people.

He doesn’t seem too happy about it, either. His face is screwed up in disgust, his nostrils flaring every time a shout of help resounds through the hallways, followed by the incessant moans of pain.

By chance, we stumble onto the door that leads to the exit. But now it’s a matter of finding the morgue where they prepare the bodies to take them outside of the jail.

“This way,” Mine suggests. With no idea where to go, I follow him. Turns out his luck is still going strong today because he leads us straight to the morgue.

The moment we enter the room, the smell of rotting flesh assaults us.

“Good Lord, I hate the smell of putrefied flesh,” he mutters as he covers his mouth and nose.

I purse my lips. The smell is indeed a bad one, but this is not the time to mind his sensibilities. I’ve noticed he’s not very good with strong scents, and it makes me wonder how he managed to last so long in the military—after all, no matter the world, soldiers end up doing the dirty jobs, more often than not in dirty conditions too.

“Stop complaining,” I mutter in annoyance.

“If you give me a kiss, I’ll be able to keep my mind off it,” he mentions shamelessly with a wiggle of his brows.

I give him a deadly glare.

“This is not the time for jokes, Mine. We need to get out of here. Now.”

“Fine, fine.” He lets out a disappointed sigh. “It was just an idea.”

“Get an idea about how we’re going to fit in one of those.” I point to the rows of wooden caskets.

They aren’t very big and Mine is a very tall male, taller than most s’Aperiotes, in fact.

He scrunches his nose in disgust.

“Are they all going to be taken outside?”

“All the ones with bodies inside.”

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