Chapter Four
I surface slowly, dragged upward through layers of dark that cling and resist. My body follows after, piece by piece. First the weight of it. Then the ache. Then the pain.
It comes back in fragments.
A pulse in my leg, deep and wrong. A burning along my scalp where hair was torn free. The tight pull at my wrists. The sour scent of the barn settles into me last—hay, damp wood, old sweat, something metallic beneath it that clings to the back on my tongue.
I try to move, but the attempt breaks apart before it begins.
My eyes open with effort, the lids heavy and swollen.
Somewhere close, a candle offers the only light, its flame wavering just enough to make the shadows breathe along the walls.
For a moment everything swims, shapes blurring into one another, until a small, still figure steadies at the edge of my sight.
Ilinca crouches before me.
Her face is half-shadowed, the candle catching only the line of her cheek, the shine of her eyes. She looks smaller than I remember, as though the darkness has pressed her into something quieter.
Her hands move to reach for the cloth at my mouth, fingers working gently until the knot loosens and the pressure releases. The gag slips free, soaked and heavy, falling against my chest.
Air enters.
I gasp, the breath catching and breaking as it fills me too quickly. My throat protests, the dryness flaring into pain, but I pull it in anyway, greedy for it.
Ilinca does not flinch.
She lifts a small cup to my lips.
Milk. The scent of it reaches me first—faint, sweet in a way nothing else in this place has been.
My mouth parts without thought. She tilts it carefully, just enough, letting me take it in slow sips so I do not choke.
It coats my tongue, my throat, softening the rawness there, easing something I had not realized was clenched so tight.
I swallow.
Again.
My body leans toward it, seeking more.
Her fingers steady the cup, patient, unwavering, waiting for each breath before offering the next. When it is empty, she sets it aside and reaches into the fold of her apron.
Bread.
A small piece. Coarse. Torn by hand.
She brings it to my mouth.
It takes what her fingers give, biting carefully, the texture rough against my tongue, grounding in a way the pain is not. She watches closely, breaking it smaller when I cannot manage more, guiding each piece with the same quiet care.
Crumbs cling to my lips; she brushes them away without thinking.
She watches me as though nothing else exists, her brow drawn faintly with concentration, her mouth parted slightly as if she might speak if only she could.
The candlelight flickers across her face, catching in her eyes, making them shine.
There is no fear in them.
For a moment—only a moment—the tightness in my chest loosens. The pain does not vanish, but it recedes, just enough to let something else exist beside it.
I breathe.
Ilinca’s hand remains near mine, close enough that I feel it there.
Her eyes move from my face to my bound hands, then lower, hesitating only a fraction before settling on my leg. I see the moment she understands more than she had before.
She reaches for the rope with trembling fingers.
Small hands against coarse fibres, pulling, worrying at the knots with a quiet urgency that makes my breath catch.
She tugs again, harder this time, her shoulders straining with the effort, her breath coming faster though no sound escapes her.
The rope does not give. It only bites deeper into my skin, unmoved by her insistence.
I shake my head faintly.
"It will not," I whisper, my voice barely more than air. Each word scrapes my throat raw. "Ilinca… it will not."
She does not stop.
Her hands move again, searching for some weakness in it, some place where it might loosen if she only tries hard enough. The candlelight flickers with her movement, shadows trembling along the walls. Her face tightens, something desperate passing over it.
My leg throbs beneath the iron. The smell of blood has thickened, heavier now. Even if she could free my hands—
"Listen to me," I breathe.
She stills. Slowly, she lifts her head.
"You must go. Now." The words come in fragments, forced through pain, through the weight pressing down on my chest. "If they see you… if they know you came—"
I swallow, the motion strained and difficult. "They will hurt you."
Her eyes widen as she shakes her head, a small, stubborn motion.
"Yes," I insist, more firmly than my body wants to allow. "You must go back. Do not make a sound. Do not let them see you."
My voice falters, softening despite myself.
"Please."
She hesitates.
For a moment she looks as though she might refuse, her hands still resting against the rope, fingers curled as though they cannot quite let go. The candlelight catches the wetness in her eyes.
"Go," I whisper again, my breath trembling now. "Please, Ilinca."
The word seems to reach her at last.
Slowly, her shoulders lower. Her hands fall away from the knots, the fight leaving her in a way that feels heavier than anything before.
She nods, once, her lips pressing together as though holding something back.
Her fingers rise to my face instead, brushing away the tears I had not felt falling.
I close my eyes for a moment, leaning into it without meaning to.
Then her lips press softly against my cheek. The contact is brief, warm, gone before I can hold onto it.
I do not resist as she ties the cloth back over my mouth, careful not to pull too tight, as though she might undo some part of the harm simply by not adding to it. The fabric settles into place, muting the breath I draw, sealing me back into silence.
The candle lifts.
Light shifts with her as she rises.
For a moment she stands there, looking at me, the flame trembling in her hand. Then she turns.
The barn darkens with each step she takes, the circle of light shrinking, pulling away, until it slips through the door with her and vanishes.
I am left in the obscurity once more, my eyes straining toward the place where the light disappeared. My chest tightens, a silent, urgent prayer forming without words.
Let her be safe.
The dark does not answer.
***
Hands pull me into consciousness again.
They hoist me upward without care, the rope at my wrists tightening as my weight shifts. My leg drags uselessly behind me, the trap clanking against the ground, iron striking dirt and stone in uneven rhythm.
I wait for the pain.
It does not come the way it did before. It is there, somewhere, but distant now, swallowed by something larger, something that dulls everything. My body moves without me.
The door opens, and light strikes. It floods my eyes so suddenly I flinch, my head turning away on instinct, but the hands holding me do not slow. I blink against it, vision swimming, shapes forming and dissolving as I am pulled forward into the square.
Voices surround me, too many of them to make out the words.
My feet stumble, fail to find the ground properly, and I lurch between them, held upright only by the grip on my arms. My breath catches against the cloth still bound across my mouth. I try to speak. Nothing comes.
Then I see it.
A post stands at the centre of the square, driven deep into the earth before the church doors. The wood is fresh, pale where it has been cut, the base darkened already by soil and shadow. The ground around it is bare, cleared. Waiting.
No.
Understanding slams through me, louder than anything else.
My chest seizes. A sound forces itself against the gag, trapped, choked. I thrash without thinking, my body lurching violently against the hands that hold me.
They tighten.
"Hold her—"
"She knows—"
"She must not break free—"
I twist, kick, clawing at the air, at them, at anything, but my strength is not enough. The post grows larger, nearer, real, and my limbs are dragged back into place no matter how much I fight.
For a moment, the rope is cut from my arms. I wrench free in a single heartbeat, my body surging forward on instinct alone, a broken, desperate attempt to run, to reach anything beyond this place—
A hand strikes my face.
My head snaps to the side with the force of it. Light bursts behind my eyes. My body stumbles, collapses back into their hold before I can catch myself, the taste of blood flooding my mouth.
"Enough," Radu’s father snaps, his voice calm in a way that chills more than anger would.
Hands close on me again, and the wood is at my back before I can resist, rough and splintered where it presses into my skin. They force my arms behind it, higher than they should go, pulling until my shoulders strain, until something in them feels as though it might give.
Rope winds around my wrists again. It bites deep, cutting into already broken skin, binding me to the pole with no space left to move.
I gasp, my breath shaking.
The trap still hangs from my leg, heavy, streaked dark with blood that has begun to dry.
No one looks at it. No one looks at me.
They step back, one by one, leaving me bound there in the centre of the square, the shadow of the church looming behind, the sky wide and merciless above.
Popa Dorin steps forward.
The crowd stills around him, murmurs folding inward as though drawn by his presence. I try to steady my breath.
This will stop. Someone will speak. Someone will laugh, perhaps. Tell me to step down. Tell me I have misunderstood. This cannot be—
"We have witnessed," he says, his gaze passing over the crowd before settling somewhere near me, not quite on me, as though I am already something else, something set apart. "What has been revealed among us."
The words reach me as though through water. My head feels too light, my body too far away. Faces I have always known blur, then resolve.