Chapter 55
CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE
FOX
Fox heard Sofia screaming for him as he was pulled away, a dirty cloth shoved down his throat so deep he could barely breathe. Ian’s body disappeared into shadows, his chest rising and falling in sharp intakes. Fox knew what dying breaths looked like.
It made Fox’s heart ache and his eyes burn. He screamed uselessly into the rag in his throat, unable to hold it back.
The battle disappeared.
The last glimpse he had of Sofia was her stabbing a dagger into the side of a soldier as another came up behind her. He screamed for her, but barely made a sound.
The arms grappling with him took no note of his struggle, not caring as he lost his footing. And then he was being dragged, feet scrambling for purchase as roots and brush clawed at him.
A few minutes later, they were breaking out of the trees, the bright lights of the main camp blinding him for just a moment—long enough that he was dropped to the ground and kicked in the side several times before he got his bearings.
“Fucking traitor,” one man said, as another kick came from the side. He rolled, trying to push himself up before another man grabbed him by the neck, picked him up, and threw him to the ground. His hands were wrenched behind his back and tied with coarse rope.
The toe of a boot cracked against his forehead, and he groaned against the cloth, unable to do more than turn his head. Someone’s knee was on his back, holding him down as more boots crashed into him, violent and sharp. He couldn’t catch his breath. He couldn’t think.
In one last show of strength, he bucked up hard against the ground, throwing the man on top of him off balance. He pushed his knees under him, coming up to kneeling so he could at least look the soldiers in the face—Jordi. He grinned down at him.
“Just where you belong,” he said, leaning closer, “on your knees.”
Fox grinned behind the gag, throwing his weight forward and head-butting the man in the balls.
Jordi let out a howl, stumbling back to grip himself.
The punch from the second soldier wasn’t a surprise, and he fell again, doing his best to hide his neck as blows rained down on him.
A hard kick to his side had him gasping as his rib cracked.
He was relieved a few moments later when a loud commotion from behind them brought the soldiers up short, and they fell back, leaving him panting and bleeding in the dirt.
Fox rolled back onto his side, trying to push himself up. A small voice in his mind told him Sofia was coming for him. But then through the shadowed trees, he saw the towering creature, lashing back and forth under the weight of an iron net, and his blood ran cold.
Chalia’s scales flashed in the light as they yanked her from the trees, six soldiers holding her with the net.
A cheer rose from the soldiers behind him.
Fox searched the darkness for Sofia, but saw nothing.
The torches threw shadows and light in equal measure, and his head pounded, disorienting him.
But then he felt Chalia’s presence, and his eyes met hers across the short distance.
“She’s safe,” she said. “She’s gone. Jobin has her.”
Fox let his head fall back, too tired to hold it up. He let his eyes close, the pain from the last hour overwhelming him, his breath catching in his chest and the broken rib throbbing against his lung.
Sofia was gone. Sofia was safe. That’s all that mattered. He let the pain overtake him and felt his consciousness drifting away.
Icy water woke him, the shock of it leaving him gasping, choking on the gag, now soaked with the water. His hands came up to pull out the gag before he could even register they were untied. He opened his eyes, taking in his surroundings from between strands of hair, wet and plastered to his face.
He glared at Harlow, who stood on the other side of a set of bars along with two guards. One was still holding the bucket that had woken him, empty now.
Light filtered in from the open flaps of the tent, illuminating the space and bouncing off the bars of the cage that held him.
He realized with a sick twist that he was in the small cage that Eha’s son had been dragged through the forest in.
Now he was the creature being kept. He also realized it meant they’d put Zuni under Harlow’s thrall. What bone had he taken from the child?
“I thought of trying to reason with you,” Harlow said, drawing his attention.
He found his eyes dark in the shadows. The expression of contrition almost looked genuine, but Fox knew the man too well.
He’d seen true contrition in his face before.
This was a mask—a play act for the men around him.
“But I’ve seen the way you look at the Dragonborn girl. ”
“Sofia,” Fox said through clenched teeth.
“Sofia,” Harlow said, her name acidic on his tongue.
“Yes, I know her name. She’s clearly dug too deep into your mind, like the poison she is.
It’s what the Dragonborn do, you know? Manipulate you.
Lie to you until you’re convinced they can only speak the truth.
You knew better once, but you’ve spent too long with them. ”
Fox choked on a laugh. “I can’t even tell if you’re lying or if you’ve truly convinced yourself of this shit. All this time I thought you acted out of fear, but perhaps I was wrong. You aren’t afraid. You manipulate fear for your own power.”
Harlow watched him, face blank. He turned to the others without responding. “Gag him after you tie him up. I’ll meet you out there.”
He turned on his heels and left without looking back, and Fox hated himself for how much it hurt.
For all the sun cycles he’d spent knowing that even if his father wasn’t proud, Harlow respected him and saw something in him—it had always been a lie.
Harlow had never seen anything in Fox beyond someone he could manipulate to do his bidding.
Three soldiers came in as Harlow exited, arrows aimed at Fox’s chest through the bars.
At least he was still a threat. Not that he could have done much.
Every muscle in his body ached, and his throat throbbed with thirst. He still couldn’t resist elbowing one guard in the gut as he turned him around and grabbed his arms to tie them.
It earned Fox a crack on the head with the hilt of the guard’s dagger.
The pain reverberated through his body, but he only scowled back at the soldiers.
Some of the king’s men he recognized avoided eye contact—Gregorie, Vivor—but Nico glared at him as he kept his arrow steadily aimed, lips pulled back in a sneer.
Fox thought he was taking too much joy in seeing him brought low.
But could he blame him? Hadn’t he been there just a sun cycle ago?
He’d grinned like a fucking idiot the day they’d caught a king’s man sneaking black powder out of the stores before inventory.
He’d been so proud of catching a traitor to the people.
And wasn’t that who he was now? A traitor to the crown and to the king’s men? They had every reason to hate him. They had every reason to fucking smile.
He didn’t fight as they dragged him outside. He blinked, eyes burning under the sun. It had snowed overnight, a fresh dusting of white across the camp, though the soldiers’ footsteps had already marred most of the beauty. The air was sharp with cold.
There was a crowd of soldiers already circling.
They parted for their small parade, jeering as he passed.
Spit splattered across his face, and someone threw a small rock.
It struck him sharply on the temple. He straightened his shoulders, slipping his mask into place.
He kept his eyes focused ahead where Harlow stood in the center of the circle, a whip in his hands.
One man, perhaps Nico, kicked him hard in the back of the knees, slamming him down onto the ground in front of Harlow.
They tethered the rope around his wrists to a ring that had been driven into the ground.
Fox examined it, wondering how long it had taken for them to get it into the frozen soil.
He tried not to look at the whip that rested in his periphery.
The circled soldiers were quiet now, waiting.
He breathed slowly in through his nose and out between his teeth.
He’d endured pain before. If there was one thing his father had trained him well for, it was separating himself from physical pain.
But it had been sun cycles since he’d been whipped, and the last time had only been five strikes for a stupid mistake during training. He didn’t think this would be so easy.
“Fox Ocon,” Harlow said, voice echoing out over the crowd.
Fox kept his eyes forward, not quite focusing on any one soldier in front of him.
But he heard the intake of breath at how Harlow addressed him.
His rank had been stripped. “You’ve been charged with treason, including aiding the resistance, espionage, and conspiracy to commit crimes against the crown.
As well as the murder of a general and patricide.
” A gasp went through the crowd, and Fox kept his eyes pinned to the ground, not wanting to see the reactions there.
His father had been respected—not loved—but honored among the king’s men.
“You will be brought back to the city to face your execution, but you’ll face punishment today for your abandonment of duty as a king’s man. Do you refute the claims?”
It was a stupid question. Fox had seen men argue, and he’d seen men concede their punishment.
It changed nothing. There was no refuting the chief commander’s ruling within the army.
He didn’t speak, giving Harlow nothing. He’d take his punishment, but he wouldn’t be a spectacle for this man. Not anymore.