Page 130 of Elas

Quiet footsteps pad my way, and I tense as the door slips open. Voices and movement quieted hours ago, telling me it’s the middle of the night, and a midnight visitor never bodes well.

“Fucking hells,” someone wheezes through a cough. “Holy fucking shit, it stinks in here.”

“Fuck you,” I rasp, refusing to let them take the last of my dignity. They don’t get to judge me for the position they forced me into.

Clicks and whirs hammer in my ears as that voice mutters, then all at once, the shroud surrounding my cageis ripped away. Faint moonlight cuts through the room and, even though it’s a dim night, it assaults my senses with a sharp stab through my brain. I groan, squeezing my eyes shut and covering them with my palms.

“Dear gods,” that same voice breathes in a horror-stricken whisper. “What have they done to you?”

Wincing, I try to force my eyelids open, fighting through the throbbing pain as my vision struggles to clear. For a few moments, the room is blurry—a jumble of dark colors and indistinguishable shapes. The muscles in my eyes ache as they focus, and finally, a face comes into view.

The last face I wanted to see.

“What are you doing here?” I snarl weakly, baring my teeth in a pathetic display as Xeni stands there, staring down at me. His hair is pulled into a ponytail, which makes the patch covering his right eye even more prominent. I manage a satisfied smirk. “Come to gloat at your handiwork, or did you just want to experience the atmosphere?”

“Go on then, Elas,” he seethes, all traces of sympathy gone. “Get it out of your system. All the smartass remarks, all the insults. I’m sure they’re all brewing down in there, so fucking get them out now. Stubborn fucking idiot.”

“You put me here!” I shout, and he hisses at me.

“And you took my eye for it!”

“Fucking right I did! If I’d had more time, I would’ve taken your head, and I would’ve worn it like a fucking trophy around my neck.”

“You’re sick,” he snaps.

“Maybe, but at least I’m not a traitor.”

“Aren’t you, though?”

“Not tohim,“ I snarl, and for the first time, the fury on his face slips. “You’re the reason we’re here, and why they’ve done all those awful things…” I try to swallow through my bone-dry throat, but it’s like swallowing sand. “You’re the reason August is in pain.”

Something crosses his expression then—regret, or something adjacent to it. “Things weren’t supposed to work out this way.”

“No?” I challenge, coughing when my vocal cords rebel against the use of my voice. “How did this play out in your head, Xeni? You and August running off into the sunset together? Was all of this vengeance because he chose me?”

“Of course not. If I realized you were mates, I would never have even tried,” he hisses. “Do you want to know why I was drawn to August? His eyes. His fuckingeyesthat were so much like…“ He stops himself and swallows roughly, glancing away.

“Oh,dogo on,“ I drawl, and he pulls his lip up as his eye snaps back to mine with fresh venom.

“You knownothingabout me, Elas.”

“You used your persuasion on him… used your fuckingmagicto trick him into being with you. I know you tried to take what is mine.”

He seethes, chewing on his lips as his breathing comes out in angry huffs of air. “That was a mistake.”

“A mistake,” I scoff, but another coughing fit overtakes me.

Xeni glances over his shoulder again. “We’re running out of time, and the longer you talk, the more I regret coming to help you.”

“Is that what this is? Help? Thanks, but it was your help that got us here to begin with.”

“You were supposed to be gone!” His voice rises to a near shout, making his shoulders tense as he pauses to listen intently before continuing. “Youleft, Elas! You took August, and you fucking left! They never would’ve found you. You were never supposed to come back!”

“But why turn us in? Why say anything at all?”

“They were asking too many questions. I didn’t exactly hide my… interest in August.” I growl, but he only rolls his visible eye. “Khors was fucking furious. He killed two other medics who couldn’t tell him anything. Hung them outside the clinic as anexample, and when it was my turn to sit in that interrogation room, I had something to offer. So I did. I told him you were mates.”

“So you did it to save your own neck, then?”

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