Chapter 3
He agreed to let Esquire Audrey Doe pursue his parole.
Not that he believed anything would come of it, but declining the chance would have made him a fool, and Gunnar wasn’t that.
Change came as soon as he signed the paperwork.
They took him to shower directly from the visitation room, the first time since his arrival. Cut him out of his coveralls so they didn’t have to remove his bindings and let him walk in alone.
It hurt at first, the warm water pelting his bare skin. He’d cowered under the spray in his chains, acclimating for what felt like hours, drinking the water as much as bathing. He’d been tossed a cloth and a thin bar of soap. Then they shut off the lights, and no one rushed him. Gunnar wondered if they’d just leave him here drenched if he refused to move. The sound was too loud at first but then became steady, like breathing and his own heartbeat, and he welcomed it. The patter against his skin ceased stinging. Sedentary years—hells, ten fucking years?—falling away from his aching muscles. The sensations and the warmth helped coax his body further from torpor. By then, being wet—which started out novel and shifted to cathartic—lost its appeal. Dry and clean sounded better, so he signaled the guards he’d finished.
They dried him in dim light and clothed him with enchanted fabric. Only thing that made sense, given they never unchained him to put it on.
Afterwards, they ushered him to a prison wing one level down. Another solitary confinement, but geared for sensory deprivation treatment. His new cell was dim, verging on dark instead of bleak, impenetrable blackness. A bed, an actual toilet, a sink with a small mirror above it. A table with one chair.
“You need to stand still as the chains release, then move immediately five steps forward. Do not turn, do not raise your arms. Do you understand?”
When Gunnar nodded, everything but the collar rattled to the floor as the guard whispered a release command. He stepped forward, unwilling to risk this fresh, clean space. The doors slammed as soon as he was five steps in, locks slotting into place, magical wards whirling to life.
He stood in the room’s center—larger than his previous cell three times over—and stared at nothing in particular as he rubbed his wrists. Behind him, the door slot opened, closed again. Gunnar turned, canting his head at the tray on the floor. Water, a slice of bread, and a few thin strips of what smelled like cooked chicken.
No sustain potion.
Gunnar ran a hand through his tangled beard, damp from the shower, and took in the room again. He savored the scent of soap on his skin, the starched linens on the bed. Clean toilet water. Circulated air, stale from conditioning but crisp and dry. Yeast in the bread, the faintest whiff of the charcoal they’d grilled the protein over. The almost acidic tang of magically warded steel.
Goosebumps broke out over his arms; he could hear the ceiling lights, the electricity humming, more sounds than his own breathing and heartbeat. Distant movement—other prisoners in this row or guards walking their rounds.
Hesitantly, he removed the mask, squinting in the near dark as he set it on his pillow. Then he sank onto the bed and put his head in his hands, unable to stop trembling.
For the next week, Gunnar’s surroundings shifted in measured increments. The light cycle reached a set pattern: twelve hours of light, twelve of dark. A touch panel on the wall let him adjust the brightness during the daylight hours. His food intake increased to portions more fitting for an adult male.
After the first week ended, Gunnar had the energy for light calisthenics. It felt good to move, better to sweat.
Every three days, they granted him shower access. The rotating hallway opened directly into the single shower stall from his cell. When he went back to his room, the doors shut, the wards hummed, and he barely felt the chamber move back to its designated place. He wondered how it worked—magic, technology, or a combination of the two.
This, Gunnar mused, was humane solitary confinement. Efficient, with little danger to the guards, and no chance for escape. Isolation with a heart.
He snorted.
As he finished a round of pushups, he thought about his little lawyer again. Gunnar wondered if she’d given up already or if he’d get to see her for real. Get to smell her, so he could know if she was lying, if this was all some sort of bullshit game with rules he didn’t understand.
No one cared what happened to vilebloods. Why should she? A human woman, of all things, even if she really was that girl he’d saved.
The uncertainty of it all made him wander—two steps in each direction, then back again and repeat. Over to the sink in the room’s tight corner and the mirror he’d avoided since his arrival. He couldn’t put off looking at himself forever.
It wasn’t arrogance to consider himself handsome; the Vilestars descended from Lucifer Morning Star. Of all humankind’s imaginings spawned during the Aperien Event, few things were more beautiful than angels.
The gaunt face staring back at Gunnar looked like festering shit.
His naturally pale skin carried a sickly undertone, stretched over his bones like yellowed paper. His lips had healed some, but trenches were smeared under his eyes. Like all vileblood, his irises were as black as his pupils and large enough to nearly overcome the whites. What did show was bloodshot with thick, dark lines, as vilebloods had black blood to match their eyes—and their souls, as it went.
Lifting a thin hand, he scratched at his obscene beard. Not a good look.
He spent the next ten minutes scraping and pulling the coarse hair off and tossing it into the toilet. His raw skin would heal fast enough. It wasn’t perfect, but at least he looked something like himself now. His cheekbones cast razorblade shadows under the dim overheard lights, his once statuesque marble face a memory.
Gunnar smirked. Truth be told, he was arrogant. He’d look better than this skeleton after a few more weeks of proper food. The torpor effects were largely gone now, but he’d been down so long, everything felt dull.
With nothing better to do, he set to work on his matted hair next. Black as sin, or so he’d been told. He tore at the matts and tangles, ending up with an uneven mop a few inches above his shoulders. After all the work, it was nice to drag his fingers through it without snags. A gift to be clean.
The lights cut off.
Gunnar went to bed, waiting for what might come next.
He tried not to hold his breath.