Chapter Seven - Karmia
The guards haul me from the cell with rough hands at my elbows, their boots thudding against the stone as they lead me through a corridor that climbs upward.
The air changes gradually—the damp chill of the underground giving way to something warmer, perfumed faintly with polish and flowers. It’s almost enough to make me stumble; the abrupt shift feels unreal, like stepping out of a nightmare only to fall into another dream I don’t trust.
They push open a pair of double doors and usher me inside. The shock almost knocks me flat.
Velvet drapes hang heavy at the windows, bloodred and gold trimmed. Chandeliers glitter above, crystal droplets scattering warm light across polished wood floors and plush carpets so soft my bare feet sink into them.
The furniture gleams with gilded accents, intricate carvings crawling across tables and chairs like vines frozen mid-climb. It’s opulence I’ve only ever seen in magazines, the kind of wealth meant to dazzle and intimidate in the same breath.
My breath catches. After the freezing dark of the cell, the room feels too warm, too soft. The contrast is dizzying, mocking. It makes my head spin.
I drift forward a few steps, dazed, fingertips brushing the edge of a velvet chair. The fabric is thick, decadent. My skin half expects it to vanish under my touch, dissolve like an illusion. What is this? A reprieve? A manipulation? Am I being released, or toyed with before something worse?
The click of heels breaks the silence. I jerk toward the sound.
A woman enters, her posture straight, her expression unreadable.
She carries a clipboard in one hand, papers clipped neat and precise.
Her dark hair is pinned back, her uniform immaculate, every gesture efficient.
She looks like she could have walked out of an executive boardroom rather than a Bratva mansion.
“Miss Karmia,” she says, tone flat as stone. “You are to prepare for a wedding.”
The words leave me choking in disbelief.
My stomach hollows. My throat locks. For a second I think I’ve misheard, but she continues, her voice as calm as if she were reading off an agenda.
“You will need to select a dress. The ceremony is being arranged. Preparations begin immediately.”
I can’t breathe. Wedding. Ceremony. The syllables slam against my skull like fists. My chest seizes, panic rising so fast it steals my voice. A wedding?
I shake my head violently, stumbling backward. “No,” I whisper, the word ragged and broken. Then louder, desperate. “No. No, no—”
The room contracts around me, gold and velvet turning into bars tighter than the rusted cell below. At least the cell was honest in its cruelty. This is another kind of prison, gilded and smiling, with chains I can’t hack or break. A vow is stronger than a lock, harder to escape.
The woman doesn’t flinch. She gestures, and other women appear—maids, assistants, whatever they are—carrying hangers draped with white silks and lace gowns. They fan them across the room, an array of glittering cages masquerading as dresses.
Their hands reach for me, gentle but firm, as though they’ve done this before, as though resistance is expected and meaningless.
I stumble back until my shoulders slam against the wall. “No!” My voice cracks into a scream. My chest heaves, heart pounding against bone until I think it might break free.
Hands close on my arms, tugging me toward the wardrobe. The rustle of silk grows louder, suffocating, the smell of pressed fabric filling my nose until I gag.
Something snaps. Panic combusts into raw desperation.
I shove one of them away, hard enough she stumbles into the rack. My hands lash out blindly, knocking over a line of hangers, dresses collapsing in a tangle across the carpet. The crash of the rack echoes through the chamber like gunfire.
Before they recover, I bolt.
My bare feet slam against polished wood, carrying me through the doorway and into the hall. The cold from the stone cell still clings to my skin, but adrenaline lights me from the inside. My lungs burn, my pulse deafening in my ears.
I don’t look back. I run.
The corridors stretch endless before me, marble floors gleaming under chandelier light, oil paintings staring down with frozen, judgmental eyes.
My bare feet slap the stone, stinging, but I barely register the pain.
Adrenaline burns hotter, urging me forward, every step an act of desperation.
My hair flies loose around my face, my breaths come in ragged gasps, each one tearing my chest open wider.
Behind me, footsteps explode into echoes—shouts, commands, the frantic cries of staff calling after me.
I can’t make out the words, can’t separate Russian from English, because my heartbeat drowns everything.
The corridors blur, gilded halls repeating like a maze, each one identical, designed to confuse.
I don’t care. I just run, wild and blind.
I slam into a set of double doors, the impact rattling through my shoulders. I shove them open with all my weight, stumbling into a room thick with smoke and silence.
The air changes instantly. It reeks of cigars and vodka, of power steeped into wood and leather.
Heavy curtains keep the world outside, while chandeliers glimmer low, throwing shards of light across polished surfaces.
The smell of him—cologne threaded with smoke—hangs here heavier than anywhere else.
Men lounge inside, leaning against desks and chairs, glasses of vodka in hand, their laughter dying the instant they see me. Silence slices through the haze.
Every eye finds me. Their gazes drag over my bare legs, my thin shift, the panic painted across my face.
I feel stripped without a single hand touching me, my humiliation scorching hotter than the cold floors underfoot.
My pulse hammers against my throat, but I stand frozen, trapped in the weight of their stares.
And then his voice cuts through.
“Out.”
Just one word. It slices sharper than any blade.
Rostya sits behind his desk, posture relaxed, but power radiates from him like cold from ice. His gaze sweeps across the room once, chilled and commanding, and every man obeys instantly. They scatter, no questions, no protest, the scrape of chairs and shuffle of boots vanishing toward the door.
The heavy silence left behind feels worse.
Now it’s only him, and me.
My body is trembling, every muscle buzzing from fear and adrenaline, but fury cuts through it sharp. My throat burns where his fingers bruised me earlier, and still I force the words out, spitting them like venom.
“I’ll never bend to you!” I snap, my voice cracking on the edges but steady at its core. “I’ll never belong to you.”
The air thickens between us. My heart stutters, but I hold his gaze, refusing to drop my eyes. Fear claws at me, yes, but I let rage wrap around it like armor.
Rostya rises from his chair. Not fast, not dramatic. He doesn’t need theatrics. The scrape of wood against stone as he pushes back from the desk is enough to make my pulse slam harder. He moves unhurried, each step precise, deliberate, like a predator circling prey that has nowhere left to run.
He doesn’t shout. He doesn’t need to. Silence is the rope he winds around me, pulling tighter with every step. His eyes never leave mine, and the longer I meet them, the smaller I feel, like I’m shrinking under a weight I can’t fight.
Then, without warning, his body shifts. A swift, brutal motion. His boot snaps out, striking behind my knee with perfect precision.
Pain sparks, and my leg buckles. I crumple, knees slamming against the polished floor so hard the shock rattles up my spine. The sound echoes in the cavernous office, cruel punctuation to my collapse.
His shadow looms over me. His voice drops low, cruel, murmured just for me. “Look at you now.”
I freeze, every nerve raw, his words cutting deeper than the strike. His tone is quiet, but it coils in my ears, venomous. He leans just enough for me to feel the cold weight of his presence, his breath brushing my ear as he adds, “Already bent before me, whether you admit it or not.”
Heat surges to my face, searing hotter than fire.
Shame claws under my skin, worse than the pain in my knee, worse than the bruises on my throat.
The humiliation is unbearable. The men may be gone, but their eyes still cling to me in my mind, their stares crawling across my bare skin, drinking in my collapse.
I squeeze my fists against the polished floor, nails biting into my palms. My body shakes, my throat convulses with the sting of unshed sobs, but I bite down hard, swallowing them. I refuse to give him that. I won’t cry, not for him, not now.
The floor is cold against my palms, slick with polish, the chandeliers above reflecting in its surface. My reflection trembles in that shine—a girl on her knees, stripped of pride, stripped of control. His shadow covers it, erasing me piece by piece.
My breath stutters, but I lock my jaw, keep my eyes on the floor until I can gather enough strength to look up again. If he wants to see me broken, he’ll have to wait longer.
Even so, the shame doesn’t leave. It burns in my chest, heavy, unrelenting. A reminder of what he can take with a flick of his boot and a few quiet words.
The polished floor bites into my knees, cold enough to seep through skin to bone.
My throat still throbs, bruises blooming where his fingers had pressed, every swallow raw and sharp.
Dignity hangs shredded around me, scattered like scraps no one bothers to pick up.
On my knees, cornered, I feel the crushing weight of what I’ve become in this place: not a hacker, not even a woman with her own name, just a thing stripped of choice, forced toward a role I cannot accept.
Yet, deep inside, an ember refuses to die. Stubborn, small, but alive. I grip it with everything left in me, whispering inside my head that I won’t break. Not here, not like this. He can bruise my skin, steal my breath, drive me to the floor, but he cannot burn that last ember out of me.
He watches. I can feel his eyes drag across every trembling line of my body, but when I finally raise my gaze, he’s not gloating, not shouting.
His stare is colder than that, studying, dissecting.
He sees the shake in my shoulders, the uneven rise of my chest, but he also sees the fire I refuse to smother.
It unsettles him. Or maybe it amuses him.
A faint curve touches his mouth, not a smile exactly, but something close—something cruel.
My rebellion irritates him, yes, but it intrigues him too.
I can see it in the way his gaze lingers.
He enjoys this—the fight, the resistance, the humiliation he can layer on top of it.
To him, my defiance isn’t a wall. It’s a game board. I’ve already been pushed into play.
The silence stretches. The office shrinks around us, walls pulling tight, chandeliers glaring down like witnesses to something that can’t be undone. Smoke clings in the air, heavy as chains. Neither of us moves.
The tension is thick with everything unspoken—threats curled sharp behind his lips, promises twisted enough to choke me. Each second draws itself out, pressing down like ink across parchment. I can almost feel it writing itself onto me, etching a future I don’t want into my skin, stroke by stroke.
To me, this moment is suffocating certainty. My future narrowing to a cage I can’t code my way out of, no escape routes left to trace. I feel it sealing around me with each breath, the inevitability of something I can’t refuse.
To him, this is the perfect beginning. His victory isn’t in forcing me to kneel—though he did—it’s in knowing I’ll rise only when he allows it. It’s in watching me resist and planning how to bend me, slowly, until defiance is as natural to him as silence.
His silence feels like triumph. Mine feels like a noose.
I want to scream, to shatter the air, but my voice locks in my throat. He doesn’t need words; his presence is enough. And maybe that’s what terrifies me most—that silence can carry more weight than violence, that his patience is more dangerous than his rage.
I breathe, shallow and ragged, and in that breath I understand something I’d been too frantic to see before: I am no longer just a prisoner. To him, I’ve already shifted into something else.
His eyes tell me what his lips don’t: I am already his bride.