Page 14 of Claimed By Shadow and Blood
Lilies. The king had saidLiliesin the garden, and the one in this vision hadn’t. He’d said nothing and managed only to make that horrible gurgle.
I grabbed onto that memory. This wasn’t real. Each time Douchewaffle showed me the false scene, I went over all the parts of it that were wrong. If the king had fallen, he would have had a head wound. My hand had been bound to the knife by rope when I’d woken beside him.
“Tell me what happened,” he whispered. “Just a few short sentences, and I’ll give you a break.”
I clenched my jaw and summoned every ounce of strength I had left. "I already told you—I didn’t kill the king. I see Ember and my pack running in the woods." This was part of what grounded me, too—to answer the same way as before, even though the sulfur made me nauseous and caused my head to throb even more.
“Is that what you see?” His eyebrow arched, and there was something cruelly playful about the way he spoke. “All I have asked is for you to tell me what you see. I am not asking you what happened anymore.”
I wanted to spit at him, but I didn’t have enough saliva in my mouth. Instead, I shook my head and glared at him. My wolf paced anxiously within me, hackles raised.
He hummed as he stepped back. “Do not think your strength will serve you. If anything, all it will accomplish is bringing you more suffering.”
A snarky response rose at the back of my mind, but my mouth was too dry to say it. So I said what I could, something I had heard Thalen and others say hundreds of times. “Go jump in the void.”
He smiled, and the ice of it froze his murky eyes. “Far stronger than you have broken within these walls. It’s only a matter of time, and we have that in abundance. No one is coming to help you. The prince has cut you off. The next time you see him will be at your execution or internment, if the Aureline Council decides that you should not suffer a simple death.”
Those words stabbed me like poisonous blades. Cold spread through me as I envisioned seeing Vad again in those circumstances. My heart pinched so tight I couldn’t breathe.
He stepped back and motioned to someone behind me. The door scraped open, and heavy footsteps strode toward me. His dull eyes slid once more to my face, and that sickening smile curled the edges of his almost nonexistent lips. “I think you’re ready for a little soak. If you survive until tomorrow, we’ll resume our conversation. And if I am not satisfied, I will put you in a very special place—a place so quiet you’ll hear your own blood flow. No one has managed to stay in there more than five hours without going insane. Sometimes sooner. I’ll keep you in there at least three hours. Maybe longer. If you don’t like that idea, I’d recommend you take very, very deep breaths while you’re soaking.” He guffawed as the gray-armored guards appeared on either side of me. They stooped and unfastened my bonds.
My wolf surged forward, longing to spring toward the door and run free. But my feet and wrists throbbed and stung as pins and needles exploded through them. When I tried to stand, I crumpled, barely able to break my fall.
With annoyed grunts, the guards hauled me through the door and into the hallway. My legs dragged behind me like wet sandbags. The spinning in my head intensified, and my wolf tried to push forward again to help me move, but everything felt heavy and wrong. Down the hall we went, past three more doors. Then the guard with the bear engraved on the back of his glove shoved a metal door open.
The stench hit even before they pulled me over the threshold. Rot. Mold. Rusted iron and something worse—something dead and long forgotten. This room held more of a chill than the hallway, the walls slick and the air damp like a forgotten basement after a flood. In the center sat a container of black, stale water.
Knowing I needed to get out of here as quickly as possible, I lifted my legs, allowing the two guards to carry my entire weight, and kicked out. My rubbery limbs didn’t obey. I missed the guard on my left completely and managed to knee the guard to my right in his thigh.
The one I hit grunted and glanced at the other guard. They both shoved me backwards and let go of my arms, and I slammed onto my back on the stone floor. My head and elbow cracked against the stone, and pain exploded in my lower back. After all the mental torture, I could only groan hoarsely.
I pulled strength from my wolf and clawed at the stone, trying to scramble away. But the two guards grabbed me again even harder. I punched out with my right hand, missing the guard I’d hit in the thigh but managing to clip the other guard’s helmet. Pain radiated up my arm. Before I could jerk back, Thigh Guard’s fist crashed into my ribs, and I collapsed.
The world dulled, and my blood thundered in my ears. Thigh Guard fisted my hair and hauled me to the edge of a massive tub. Panting and uncoordinated, I dug my feet against the stone again and tried to pull back as the horrid scent of the water hit me–sulfur. It smelled almost identical but somehow stronger than what a person smelled of when they lied.
I couldnotbathe in that.
I scrabbled against the floor, the bottoms of my feet now so raw it felt as if they’d been skinned, but my efforts did nothing.
Thigh Guard yanked harder on my head, and tears spilled down my cheeks. They tossed me into the tub as I screamed.
My entire body submerged in the nasty water.
My head went under, and the world darkened. Water filled my mouth, tasting worse than it smelled—like rotten eggs, rust, and disgusting lake water. My stomach roiled. The water filled my ears, and my lungs burned as I fought to hold my breath.
Douchewaffle’s taunt echoed in my mind.Worse is waiting for you, so just inhale.Fuck him! I dug my metaphorical heels in again and fought as the burn intensified. I wasn’t going to die in this place. Not smelling like this, and not right now.
My ears buzzed, and the pressure had become almost unbearable when hands gripped my shoulders and yanked me upward.
Cold air hit my face as my head rose inches above the water. I gagged and choked, spluttering foul liquid. My stomach finally lurched, and I leaned over the edge of the tub and vomited disgusting water and bile. I hadn’t eaten in over twelve hours. Some of the liquid hit both the guards’ boots, and my wolf pranced a tad bit at the little bit of justice we’d served.
I spat out more water and glared at them even through the pieces of hair that clung to my face. They didn’t look like doing this affected them at all. Their eyes—cold blue and ice green—betrayed not even a fragment of emotion.
As I took a deep breath, they shoved me under again, and I sucked some water into my lungs.
The nightmare resumed, and it seemed never-ending. They held me under until my lungs throbbed and my throat spasmed...until I felt death right at my door.
My wolf cried, but she was as helpless to fight back as I was.
