Chapter 29 Of Chaos #2
He reached out again as if to touch my face, fingers hovering just above my skin.
I felt the heat of him—not the divine furnace of Valen’s touch, but something more volatile, unpredictable.
Like standing too close to lightning, knowing it might strike anywhere, anytime, obeying laws too chaotic to predict.
“Don’t.” The word emerged as a command.
I wouldn’t beg. Not from him. Not from anyone.
His hand paused, then withdrew, but the smile remained. “As you wish.” He stepped back, gesturing toward the door. “Unfortunately, I didn’t come here just for pleasantries. You and I, pretty wreck, we have places to be.”
“Where?” I asked, even as the guards—not my guards, I noticed—approached with a ring of iron keys.
“Vharok has plans for you today,” Kassimir replied. “Special plans. But don’t worry. I’m sure you’ll survive... Mostly sure.”
The cell door groaned open, and Kassimir stepped inside, extending a hand as if he were a gentleman caller rather than my newest jailer. “Shall we?” Kassimir asked, gesturing toward the open door with exaggerated courtesy.
Ignoring his hand, I stood.
“If she is harmed,” Death’s voice came from his cell, soft as falling snow yet somehow filling the entire dungeon, “I will find the crack in every realm and pull you through it, Kassimir. I will shred your essence so thoroughly that not even the memory of you will remain.”
The threat hung between the three of us, terrible in its quiet certainty. This was a promise, delivered with the calm assurance of one who had the power to fulfill it, regardless of chains or walls or divine limitations.
For the first time since his arrival, Kassimir’s facade faltered.
A muscle in his jaw tightened, his posture stiffening almost imperceptibly.
The amber of his eyes seemed to flicker, like flames disturbed by an unfelt wind.
Then, as quickly as it had appeared, the moment of vulnerability passed, sealed beneath layers of practiced nonchalance.
“Bold threats from a chained god.” He took my arm, his grip surprisingly gentle but unbreakable. “Besides, why would anyone damage the king’s favorite toy?”
As I crossed the threshold, I glanced back—not at Kassimir, not at the guards, but toward the wall that separated me from Death, desperate for even a glimpse of my harbinger.
Kassimir noticed the direction of my gaze and deliberately stepped between us, his tall frame blocking my view of Death’s cell. “No fond farewells, I’m afraid,” he said, his voice laced with mock regret. “We’re on a rather tight schedule.”
Death struck the bars then, the sound making me jump after the quiet rumbling from before.
“Come along, Princess,” Kassimir said, his voice deliberately light. “Let’s leave him to his tantrum.”
I took one step, then another, each carrying me further from the cell that had been my world for weeks beyond counting. Kassimir’s fingers circled my wrist like a manacle of warm flesh, his grip deceptively gentle as he led me through the winding corridors of my prison.
And in each step, Death’s presence receded.
That strange, comforting weight growing fainter, the connection between us stretching thin until I could barely feel it at all.
His final threat to Kassimir echoed in my mind, a promise of violence so absolute it transcended the boundaries of mortality and divinity alike.
If she is harmed, I will find the crack in every realm and pull you through it.
We climbed stone steps that spiraled upward, each one taking me further from the damp darkness I’d come to know as home.
My legs trembled with the effort, confinement having weakened muscles once accustomed to daily rides and long walks through the palace gardens.
Kassimir slowed his pace without comment, his thumb absently stroking the pulse point at my wrist—not out of kindness, I suspected, but to feel the flutter of my heartbeat, to measure my weakness.
“Almost there, Princess,” he said, voice lilting with amusement. “Has it been so long that you’ve forgotten the way?”
I had not forgotten. But the route felt foreign now, as if I were walking through the memory of a place rather than the place itself.
The stone beneath my bare feet gradually gave way to marble, cold and smooth.
The air changed, too. No longer thick with mildew and despair, but lighter, scented with beeswax and the lavender that had always been burned in the palace corridors.
Light assaulted my eyes as we emerged from the servants’ stairwell into a sunlit hallway. I flinched, raising my free arm to shield my face from the brightness streaming through tall windows. After the perpetual twilight of the dungeon, daylight felt like violence.
“Ah, yes,” Kassimir said, watching my reaction with clinical interest. “The sun. I imagine that’s quite shocking after your little sojourn below. Don’t worry, your eyes will adjust. The mortal body is remarkably adaptable, isn’t it? Even to the most extreme circumstances.”
I did not deign to answer him, lowering my arm gradually and squinting against the light as we continued down the hall.
Guards posted at intervals barely glanced our way, their expressions carefully blank.
I recognized some of them. These were Vareth men, wearing Valen’s colors now.
I wondered how many had witnessed my father’s execution, how many had watched as Valen slaughtered my half-siblings.
The corridor narrowed, then opened into the eastern wing of the palace—my wing, where my chambers had been since childhood.
Something twisted in my chest as Kassimir stopped before the familiar carved door.
It felt like a lifetime since I had been here, a different person last passed through this entrance.
Kassimir pushed the door open without ceremony, gesturing for me to precede him. “After you.”
I stepped inside and froze, disoriented by the preserved perfection before me.
Nothing had changed. The same pale silk draped the windows, the same books lined the shelves, the same silver brush sat on the dressing table where I’d left it the morning of my wedding.
It was as if the room had been suspended in time, waiting for a mistress who no longer existed.
“Uncanny, isn’t it?” Kassimir closed the door behind us, leaning against it as he watched my reaction. “Vharok ordered it kept exactly as you left it. Personally, I found that rather sentimental, but our king has his... peculiarities.”
I moved toward the dressing table, drawn by the familiar objects there. My fingertips, filthy and broken-nailed, hovered over the silver brush. I couldn’t bring myself to touch it, to contaminate this pristine relic of my former life.
“Why am I here?” My voice sounded strange in this room. Too rough, too hollow for these delicate surroundings.
Kassimir pushed away from the door, drifting further into the chamber with the casual ease of someone entirely comfortable with invasion.
“There’s to be a feast tonight. Quite the grand affair.
Vharok is formally presenting himself to the nobles of Vareth.
At least, those who survived his initial. .. restructuring.”
Barely stoping myself from wincing at his words, I watched him run a finger along the spines of my books, seemingly fascinated by the mundane details of my previous life.
“You’re to attend, of course. Hence—“ He gestured toward a doorway where steam curled invitingly into the room.
“A bath has been prepared. I suggest you make use of it. You smell like shit.”
The bluntness of his assessment didn’t sting.
In fact, it almost made me laugh, but I held it back as I moved toward the bathing chamber, drawn by the promise of warm water against my skin.
After a week of being wiped down with damp cloths by guards too embarrassed to meet my eyes, the thought of true cleanliness was intoxicating.
The large copper tub dominated the small room, filled with steaming water.
Beside it, a table held soaps, oils, and cloths—the familiar tools of a ritual that once marked the beginning and end of my days.
Now they seemed like artifacts from another life, belonging to a woman who had died the night Valen revealed his true nature.
Without hesitation, I reached for the hem of my filthy shift and pulled it over my head. Nakedness had lost all meaning in the dungeon. My body was no longer a private sanctuary but a canvas for Valen’s cruelty, displayed and used at his whim. Why should I care if Kassimir saw it now?
I dropped the soiled garment to the floor and stepped into the tub, gasping as hot water enveloped my legs.
The temperature bordered on painful, but I welcomed it, sinking down until the water reached my shoulders.
Heat penetrated my skin, seeping into muscles that had been cold for what felt like forever.
The scent of jasmine rose with the steam—apparently my mother’s preferred fragrance, according to my nursemaid.
A fragrance I adopted. The familiarity of it struck something raw within me, a wound I’d thought cauterized by suffering.
I closed my eyes, inhaling deeply, trying to recapture some fragment of the woman I had been.
“I wouldn’t try anything foolish.” Kassimir’s voice startled me. I opened my eyes to find him leaning against the doorframe, watching me with that same detached curiosity. “The Blood God was quite specific about delivering you intact for tonight’s festivities.”
I met his gaze steadily. “I have nowhere to go.”
Something like disappointment flickered across his features. “How depressingly pragmatic of you. I was rather hoping for some futile act of escape. Those are always entertaining.”