Chapter 48 #2
Footsteps retreated, though Tedric didn’t move.
A moment later, a guard delivered a basin of hot water and a stack of rags.
JingYi placed her medicine chest beside her and set to work.
She rinsed the sores clean, swabbing the girl’s cracked lips with healing salve.
The same steps had saved Daan and Annett, but their exposure had been lighter, mere brushings against the poison.
This Omega’s body had been bearing the full assault.
This would take more than a quick purge.
JingYi looked up at Tedric. “I require privacy.”
His brow lifted, amusement shining in his eyes. “You think I’d trust you with her alone?”
She straightened despite the ache in her leg. “Since you’ve done this to her, the least you can do is grant her some dignity. Shield her from your men’s eyes.”
Tedric scoffed. “We’re all Beta men here, Princess. Unlike Alphas, we’ve no interest in Omegas.”
Her fists curled, nails biting into her palms. “I don’t care if you’re a pack of monkeys with tails between your legs,” she hissed. “You brought me here to heal her and the others. You will give me what I need to accomplish the task, starting with privacy.”
Tedric’s gaze lingered, as if cataloguing her: a captive, or an animal who’d snarl even when cornered. The silence stretched until the drip of water in the corner became loud enough to count.
“Clear the gallery,” he ordered without looking away from her.
The masked guards obeyed, boots scraping the floor as they filed out. The door shut with a solid thud, sealing her in with him.
“There. Privacy,” Tedric said mildly, as if granting her a whim. “But you’ll need someone to fetch what you ask for, won’t you?”
JingYi turned back to her patient, her mind already sorting through what she would need, and not only for the treatments.
“I need dried redthorn berries, willowbark powder, star-anther pods, honeysuckle petals, and . . . goldenroot.”
She let the last ingredient fall casually into the list as though it was just another herb.
“If you don’t have fresh ones, dried will do. And make sure the root is whole, not cut off. I need its heart intact.”
Tedric tilted his head. “That’s quite a list.” He stepped closer, close enough that she caught the scent of smoke on his coat. “Do I look like I keep an herbalist’s pantry under the stairs?”
She glared at him over her shoulder. “Send your men to fetch them from the market. Niewberg is a port city, isn’t it? Its market should carry items from all over the Nine Kingdoms. I’ll write you a list.”
He leaned down until his shadow swallowed hers, eyes narrowed. Jing Yi’s hands clenched at her sides. She stared up at him, refusing to look away, refusing to show how much she needed him to say yes. Please. Just say yes.
“You’d best pray it’s worth the trouble, Princess,” he muttered. “Because if I send my men to fetch your precious roots and they don’t work . . .”
He let the words trail off and straightened. JingYi turned back to her patient, willing the tremor from her fingers. Tedric strolled to the door and slipped out, though she could feel him just beyond the threshold, leaning against the wall, listening.
A deep breath steadied her. She unrolled her needles and cleaned them with three quick wipes with distilled rice wine.
She laid the Omega flat. A hand to the girl’s sternum to feel the faltering rhythm, then the first needle slid in above the heartline, angled to stir the blood.
The second, at the hip’s juncture, where toxin-heavy fluids often pooled.
The third, beneath the ribs, to prod the sluggish liver into work.
This was no cure. It was a summon to the body itself—a demand for it to fight and flush out the poison bit by bit.
By the time she placed the last needle, a sheen of sweat had gathered along the Omega’s brow—a promising sign, but it would take at least an hour for the treatment to reach its full effect.
“How many Omegas are here?” she called through the doorway.
“Eight, at present.”
Her pulse stuttered. “All of them are sick?”
“To varying degrees.”
She looked down at the woman before her, needles bristling from fragile limbs, then lifted her gaze to the dim cells beyond—pale faces watching from the shadows, eyes and cheeks sunken. The sight pressed against her skull until her pulse pounded behind her eyes.
She stepped out to face him. “You are a monster.”
Tedric laughed. “All the men who ever tried to change the world are called that.”
He tilted his head toward the corridor leading away from the central clearing. “Come eat with me. You must be starving.”
The thought of sharing a meal with him curdled her gut. Every instinct screamed to spit in his face, claw the smirk from his lips, but her training insisted on a harsher truth: a healer who collapsed couldn’t save anyone.
JingYi picked up her medicine chest and followed. Tedric’s stride was relaxed, hands clasped loosely behind his back, as though they were strolling some nobleman’s terrace instead of walking the gallery above a pit of cages.
A sharp clang echoed from the second-floor gallery halted their steps.
“You vile, gutless bastard!” The voice rang with the authority of someone who’d been raised to command. “Release me at once, or I’ll see you swing from the palace gates before the week is out!”
Her gaze lifted. A woman gripped the bars of her cell—generously curved, auburn hair loosened from its braid, green velvet riding dress torn at the shoulder. Captivity hadn’t seemed to dim her spirit. If anything, her eyes burned brighter for it.
JingYi’s eyes widened.
Didn’t Tedric say the king’s sister was taken during her morning ride? Then, could this woman be . . . Princess Adelise?
Their eyes met. For a heartbeat, the princess’s lips parted in surprise. “You—” she began, then stopped, frowning as though in recognition.
Tedric’s low chuckle cut through the charged air. “Your Highness,” he drawled, “such language from a future empress. Imagine what your betrothed will think.”
The princess scowled, fingers curling around the bars. “You’re not worthy of talking about him!” she shot back. “He’ll have your head on a spike before long, you maggot.”
Tedric tipped his head back to look at her, grinning wider. “Save your thunder, Highness. Stones make a poor audience.”
The woman pressed her cheeks against the bars and hissed with pristine enunciation, “Rot in hell, prick.”
Tedric only laughed and led JingYi through a groaning door into a hollowed chamber of damp air and rough stone.
At its center stood a scarred wooden table, its surface warped with age but laid with silver goblets, porcelain plates, and gleaming cutlery—plunder from a softer world.
The chairs’ upholstery had faded and frayed, the floor gritty with sand and stone dust, yet everything on the table gleamed with civility. It jarred against the gloom.
He poured the wine without asking. She didn’t touch it.
“I won’t heal another Omega,” she insisted, “until you tell me what you’re doing here.”
Tedric carved a slice of meat. “We’re cutting the leash.”
Her stomach twisted. “By poisoning them with purple limyerite?”
“By stripping away the instincts that keep them bent to an Alpha’s will.” His tone was maddeningly calm. “Heat. Scent. That reflex to surrender when an Alpha enters a room.”
Her pulse hammered. “But . . . those traits are part of who they are. You’re cutting pieces out of people and expecting them to still be whole?”
He scrunched up his nose, and for a moment, he looked like the careless, playful, humorous old Tedric again. “Do they have to be whole?”
Jing Yi opened her mouth. Nothing came out. She couldn’t find a single word that wouldn’t crack under the weight of her fury.
He took a sip of wine, watching her over the rim of the goblet. A distant clang of metal echoed down the tunnel, followed by a muffled shout. JingYi’s eyes darted toward the sound. Tedric didn’t even glance away.
“Tell me, Princess. Your so-called goddess didn’t intervene when Alphas tore your kind apart in their most defenceless moments. Why insist on a system that protects Alphas yet sacrifices the rest?”
Her throat closed. “No matter the reason, what you’re doing is wrong.”
“Is it?” His brow arched, a challenge.
Wasn’t it?