Chapter 13 Thorrin
THORRIN
I've been crouched in the same position for hours, muscles locked in perfect stillness while my heart hammers against my ribs.
The bone cathedral looms before me, its skull-decorated entrance yawning like the mouth of some primordial beast. No sound has emerged from those depths for what feels like an eternity—no screams, no voices, nothing but the whisper of wind through empty eye sockets.
Lyssa is in there. Somewhere in that monument to death, they have her.
Every fiber of my being screams at me to move, to charge through that entrance with claws extended and heart-light blazing.
The Hunger gnaws at my gut, feeding on my rage and desperation, begging to be unleashed on whoever dared touch what's mine.
But centuries of experience hold me frozen in place.
Patience has kept me alive when younger, more impulsive Waira have died. Patience might be her only chance.
But patience feels like cowardice when the woman I've sworn to protect is trapped in that charnel house.
I think of Kaerith, and bile rises in my throat.
He would calculate the odds. Weigh her life against his own survival.
Probably conclude that rescue carries too much risk for too little strategic gain.
That cold, tactical thinking that's consuming him would let him walk away from this cave with barely a backward glance.
I am not Kaerith. I will never be Kaerith.
The silence stretches on, broken only by the distant crack of settling stone and the ever-present wind. My muscles ache from motionlessness, but I don't dare shift position. One wrong move, one careless sound, and we're both dead.
When the silence has stretched so long I'm beginning to fear they've already killed her, I move.
Each step is calculated, placed with the precision of a predator who knows that noise means death.
The entrance swallows me into darkness that would blind a human but poses no challenge to Waira eyes.
The smell hits me immediately—blood and sex and rot so thick I can taste it on the back of my tongue.
My stomach churns, but I force myself forward.
The bone architecture is worse up close.
Femurs and ribcages form twisted columns that stretch up into shadow, while thousands of skulls stare down at me with hollow accusation.
Human, Waira, dark elf—an entire graveyard's worth of death crafted into obscene art.
Each one was someone's mate, someone's child, someone's hope for the future.
All of them failed to escape this place. All of them died here.
I won't let Lyssa join them.
The tunnel branches, splitting into multiple passages that honeycomb the mountain.
I pause, testing the air for her scent, trying to separate her familiar warmth from the overwhelming reek of death.
There—faint but unmistakable, leading deeper into the cathedral's heart.
I follow it like a bloodhound, every sense straining for signs of guards or traps.
The architecture grows grander as I penetrate deeper, bone pillars giving way to vast chambers carved from living rock.
Ancient Waira craftsmanship mixed with recent additions—fresh skulls mounted on walls still wet with blood, new bones incorporated into existing structures.
This isn't just a stronghold; it's a living temple to death itself.
The passage opens into a massive chamber, and my heart stops.
She hangs suspended in a cage of black iron, chains keeping her prison elevated twenty feet above the ritual chamber floor.
Even from this distance, I can see she's alive—the slight rise and fall of her chest, the way her head turns at some sound I can't hear.
But she's naked, vulnerable, trapped in a position that turns rescue into a nightmare.
The chamber below is a killing floor. Stone slabs stained dark with old blood, carved channels to direct the flow, altars positioned for maximum suffering. This is where they bring their victims. This is where education happens.
Getting to her means crossing open ground under the cage. No cover. No concealment. And even if I reach her, getting her down will take time—time we won't have once they discover the breach.
I could retreat. Find Kaerith and Elira, convince them to mount a proper assault with better odds. It's the tactical choice. The smart choice. The choice that might actually succeed.
It's also the choice that abandons Lyssa to whatever they have planned.
Kaerith would weigh the probabilities. Calculate acceptable losses. Choose the path that preserves the most valuable assets—himself and Elira—while cutting away dead weight. He's become that kind of creature, capable of cold equations that balance lives like numbers.
I look up at her cage, at the woman who chose to bind herself to a monster like me, who trusted her life to my protection, who never deserved to pay the price for my failures.
The choice isn't really a choice at all.
I'm going to die here. The odds of getting her out alive are minimal, and my own survival is essentially zero. They'll hunt us through these tunnels, and even if we reach open ground, we'll be pursued by creatures who know this territory better than we do.
But I'd rather die trying to save her than live with the knowledge that I abandoned her.
I move with the fluid grace of a lifetime predator, flowing from shadow to shadow as I approach the chamber's edge.
The cage hangs directly above the central altar, suspended by chains that disappear into darkness overhead.
Getting her down will require climbing those chains—exposed, vulnerable, making myself a perfect target for anyone who enters the chamber.
Up close, I can see the damage they've done. Bruises mark her skin, and there's a hollow look in her eyes that speaks of horrors witnessed. But she's whole. She's alive. And when she sees me crouched at the chamber's edge, hope flickers across her features like candlelight.
I raise one finger to my lips, and she nods understanding. No words. No sound that might carry to whatever guards lurk in the passages beyond.
The chains are old iron, worn smooth by age and use. They'll hold my weight, but climbing them will take precious seconds—seconds where discovery means death for both of us. I test the nearest link, feeling how it takes my weight, calculating the best route to her prison.
The lock on her cage is simple—meant to contain a weakened human, not stop a determined Waira. I could break it easily enough, if I can reach it.
If I can reach it without getting us both killed.
I gather myself for the leap, muscles coiled like springs,once I leave this ledge, there's no turning back.
Lyssa watches me with absolute trust, and I realize that whatever happens next, whatever the cost, I'm still the creature she bonded with. Still the protector she chose. Still worthy of that faith, even if it kills us both.