Chapter 39
Thirty-Nine
Anna
The net was unfurled, and with a flick, I went spinning across the room, crashing into the far wall hard enough to leave a mark. Keiren was on me in a second, pulling a hood over my head and swiftly tying my wrists together with brellwood rope.
“Whoever operates this ride should have their license revoked,” I groaned, my elbow flaring with pain from the impact. “Safety standards are piss-poor.”
“Keep your tongue still, or I will remove it.” The calm promise and utter lack of anger in Keiren’s response was enough to get me to clamp my mouth shut. He didn’t sound like a man making an idle threat.
Whoever wanted me clearly did not care if I could talk or not.
The light through the hood vanished as the hunter left, closing the door behind him without a further word or threat. Whatever was going to happen from here on out did not matter to him.
A moment later, a heavy lock slid across the door, shutting it with cold finality.
“So much for plan A,” I said to the darkness, trying to keep my spirits up.
It was hard. The void inside me where Caz should have been was growing larger by the second.
Maybe the stories are right. Maybe we really are only born with half our souls.
How had I never felt that way before, though? Did it have something to do with the slow stirring of my dragon once it found Caz?
Or maybe it was simpler than that. It was impossible to realize what was missing, if we never had it. Until fated mates were united and had claimed one another, the soul didn’t know that it needed more.
I certainly hadn’t spent a lifetime needing Caz. But now that I’d had him, I never wanted to let go. Never wanted to experience a moment without him. Ever. He made everything so much brighter, so much better. When I was with him, I felt alive.
My dragon growled.
Sorry. When we’re with him, we feel alive.
Mollified, she settled back down again. I did the same, sitting against one wall of my cell, my knees to my chest, thinking. At least Keiren had tied my hands in front of me, so I could sit up somewhat comfortably, thinking and trying not to cry.
I was trapped, and there was no way for Caz to find me.
His presence in my head had faded into nothingness the farther north we went.
I knew we were somewhere near the mountains on the northeastern border, but I hadn’t been able to see much more than that.
The net had been wrapped too tightly, and I could only twist so far.
But Caz was expecting me to show up in Kylma. When I didn’t, what would he do? How would he find me?
“Fuck,” I moaned slapping my hand against the far wall. “Think, Anna. Think!”
Off to my left, something moved in the darkness.
I shrieked and slid along the wall as far as I could go until I was backed into the corner of the room. “Don’t come any closer! I’ve got a—a, um, I’ll hurt you!”
There was a soft groan. “You never were the fighter among us.”
“Milly?” I yelped, recognizing the voice. “Is that you?”
“What’s left of me,” she whispered.
I scrambled across the room on all fours, searching out my best friend with blind hand movements. Even dragons needed a hint of light to see in the dark.
Milly hissed when I encountered something fleshy, and I withdrew.
“Careful.”
I inched closer, wishing fervently for some light. “What have they done to you, Mil? Are you okay?”
She laughed. It was wet and, scariest of all, weak. She didn’t sound good. I inched a finger forward slowly until I found her. I heard some movement, and then her hand found mine.
I gasped at the fragility of her grip. Milly was the tallest and strongest of all of us. The closest to being a non-clippy. But even her dragon wasn’t truly awake. It just manifested itself in her personality, making her feistier. A bit stronger. And protective of Ella and me.
And now it seemed she had paid for that. Her fingers were rail thin, her wrist all bone.
“Oh, orb. Milly,” I breathed as she described the beatings and damages to her body that had been inflicted on her. “Why? Why did they do this to you?”
“They wanted to know who you were and why people were searching for me so much.” She managed a laugh, which told me the Milly I knew wasn’t dead yet, hadn’t given up hope yet.
Always a fighter. “Told them that nobody was looking for me, but they didn’t seem to believe it.
Said I was wrong. Nothing I said could convince them otherwise.
So they took out their frustrations on me. ”
“You were wrong,” I said into the silence that followed. “We have been looking for you.”
“We?”
“Yeah.” I took a breath. “This could take a bit. Are you sitting down?”
Silence.
“Ha. Ha-ha. Ha, ha, haa.” Milly laughed. It still sounded ugly, but the humor sounded genuine. “You have changed, Na. Making jokes in a situation like this? I’ve missed a lot. Haven’t I?”
“Yeah.”
“Start from the beginning. And go slowly.”
I did. I told her everything. About my escape from the market and of Caz showing up. Of the discovery that we were mates. That we had claimed one another. All of it.
Well. Almost all of it.
“Good for you,” Milly whispered, giving my hand a squeeze. “I’m happy for you. So happy for you.”
My eyes teared up at the weakness in her grip. My strong, protective Milly. Reduced to this. It wasn’t fair. None of it was fair! She didn’t deserve this treatment, simply because of the way she’d been born. Nobody did. Blood still flowed in her veins. Dragon blood.
“So now what? Will he find you? Then what? The elite here is a brutal one.”
Just perfect. “Any ideas who it is?” Not that it would help.
“No. But they aren’t afraid to get their hands dirty.” Something clanked against the stone floor. “They put this on with their own hands.”
My fingers fumbled in the darkness until I felt the ring of metal around Milly’s neck.
A slave collar.
Why bother with that, if they were going to keep her locked up and under a constant interrogation? Something was missing from the puzzle. But what?
“We’re screwed. Aren’t we?” Milly whispered. “They’re going to put a collar on you too. We’re never getting out.”
I could hear the hope fade as she spoke, the vitality she’d managed to hold on to slipping away into the ether as it all came crashing down. Milly had held out hope for so long, knowing I wasn’t there, that her captors were still looking for me as long as she was getting beaten.
But now they had me, and Milly had nothing left to hang on to. It was so unlike her, it made me angry. How dare they do this to someone like her!
My lips pulled back in a snarl. “I’m not letting you give up now, Mil. Not after so much.”
Focusing in my head, I sent out a call to Caz. With everything I had. I poured every ounce of energy and emotion into that call, telling him to come now. That it was time to rescue me.
It was time for him to show up.
“How do you plan on getting us out of here?” Milly croaked, slipping her hand from mine. “We’re trapped. This Caz won’t get through the elite’s guards. It’s a death sentence.”
I chuckled.
“What’s so funny about that? You want him to die for you?”
“No, not at all. Though he probably would if he thought it would save me.” I sent another call through our bond. And another. I wouldn’t stop until I was dead. “But I may have left out one tiny little bit about Caz.”
“Yeah, like what?”
“Well, his full name is …”