Megan
The overwhelming scent of ash and spiced wine drags me from sleep.
For a disorienting moment, the architecture of the room escapes me. The mattress beneath me is impossibly massive, the indigo silks pooling like a dark ocean around my waist. The dull, persistent ache pulsing between my thighs serves as a vivid, undeniable reminder of the night.
Dragging a hand through my tangled curls, the memories strike. The ruined study. The ancient, damning ledgers. The staggering desperation of the High Sovereign burying himself inside me, claiming me against the obsidian wall.
A flush of chaotic heat burns across my cheeks as the cavernous, temperature-controlled sanctuary of his master wing comes into focus.
Zhetrin is gone.
The thick, dark linen sleep-shirt swallowing my frame belongs to him. The hem falls past my knees, the collar slipping easily off my shoulder. The fierce dark elf who executed a trafficker without a blink had carried me through his estate, bathed me, and tucked me into his own bed while I slept.
Terrifying vulnerability grips my chest. I allowed the boundaries to shatter.
I let the warlord in. We are tied together in the war against the Patriarch, but I am still a human occupying the epicenter of a Khuzuth stronghold.
I cannot face the day—or his elite guards—wearing nothing but his oversized sleep-shirt.
Sliding off the mattress, the cold stone floor bites into my bare feet. I require my own clothes and the familiar walls of my suite in the eastern corridor.
Pushing the massive oak doors open, I breach the threshold.
The corridor outside is completely devoid of life. The suffocating presence of the elite guard from yesterday has vanished. Even the Zagfer servants carrying morning linens are entirely absent. The flickering alchemy lamps cast long, jagged shadows against the marble.
Pulling the thick linen tighter around my body, I step into the hall.
The temperature drops halfway down the grand corridor. The hair on my nape stands on end, triggering the primal instinct forged in the Lowtown gutters—the dense, static warning that the alley is not empty.
Three dark elf guards detach from the carved pillars.
They wear the silver and crimson armor of House Thosti, but their faces are entirely foreign.
They lack the lethal, rigid discipline of the elite Miou warriors.
Their armor is severely scratched, their postures loose and predatory.
The unvarnished hostility radiating from their forms confirms the threat.
Mercenaries.
"The Warlord’s pet is wandering the halls.
" The largest of the three rests a gauntleted hand casually upon the pommel of his longblade.
He tracks the empty corridor, a wicked smirk twisting his scarred face as he confirms our isolation.
"Lady Seredryl said we would have to breach the eastern suite to drag her out.
It seems the mud-dweller is eager for the slaughter. "
My blood turns to ice.
By leaving the master wing, I walked directly into the blind spot of the compromised interior rotation.
Fuck it.
I do not ask questions, nor do I scream for help. Khuzuth walls are impenetrable, and the mercenaries are already drawing their steel.
Pivoting toward a wrought-brass table resting against the wall, I lock my focus onto a massive, unlit candlestick. The thick base possesses enough density to crack a skull. Wrapping both hands around the brass stem, I heft the weapon and square my shoulders against the approaching threat.
"Take her alive." The lead mercenary draws a hunting knife, his boots scraping the marble. "Seredryl wants her breathing when she reaches the flesh-brokers."
The first mercenary lunges, his massive hands reaching to tangle in my hair.
Dropping my center of gravity, I duck swiftly beneath his sweeping arm. I swing the brass candlestick with every ounce of kinetic strength in my shoulders, bypassing his armored chest to strike the unprotected joint of his knee.
The metal connects with bone. A sickening, wet crack echoes through the corridor.
Roaring in agony, his leg buckles instantly, sending his massive frame crashing to the marble floor.
Refusing to stall my momentum, I spin, raising the candlestick to parry the second dark elf.
The profound discrepancy in our physical mass becomes a fatal flaw.
The second mercenary backhands me before I can brace.
The sheer kinetic force knocks my bare feet entirely out from under me.
Stumbling backward, my shoulder collides violently against a stone pillar.
The candlestick flies from my numb fingers, clattering uselessly across the floor. White stars explode across my vision as the sharp taste of copper floods my tongue.
Scrambling to my hands and knees, I spit the blood from my mouth, refusing to yield to the stone.
A steel-toed boot strikes me squarely in the ribs. The brutal impact flips me onto my back, driving the oxygen completely from my lungs. The third mercenary drops his armored knee directly into my stomach, pinning me helplessly against the cold marble.
I thrash with feral desperation. Clawing blindly at his face, my nails dig into the soft flesh beneath his eye, tearing downward until hot blood coats my fingertips. Cursing violently, he seizes my wrists and slams them brutally against the stone.
"Hold the beast still!" Limping toward us, the lead guard pulls a thick, dark cloth from his belt. The fabric reeks of crushed bitter-root and foul alchemy—a highly potent, paralytic sedative utilized in the slave markets.
Twisting my face away, I kick my legs wildly, but the mercenary pinning me applies his full, suffocating weight to my chest. My bruised ribs groan under the pressure. The foul cloth clamps forcefully over my mouth and nose.
I lock my jaw shut, refusing to draw breath. The mercenary pinches my nose with vicious force, physically prying my lips apart. The acrid, burning fumes rush aggressively down my throat.
The adrenaline drains from my muscles instantly. The polished ceiling of the corridor violently spins as the faces of the traitorous guards blur into dark, looming shadows. Attempting to drag my nails across the stone, my fingers refuse the neurological command.
The world collapses into absolute black.
Damp stone. The suffocating stench of rotting water and raw sewage.
A fragmented sliver of consciousness pierces the void.
My head rolls limply against the cold, wet ground.
The paralytic sedative remains a thick sludge in my veins, rendering my limbs completely useless.
Peeling my eyelids open requires monumental effort, the weak ambient light stinging my dilated pupils.
The immaculate architecture of the estate is gone. Freezing drafts carry the unmistakable, foul stench of the Undercity drainage infrastructure. The lower servant tunnels.
Dragged backward by my arms, the heels of my bare feet scrape mercilessly over the rough, uneven cobblestones.
"Throw her in the cart." The sharp syllables drip with aristocratic venom.
Blinking rapidly, I force my vision to stabilize. Illuminated by the sickly green hue of a sputtering alchemy torch stands Seredryl. Wearing a dark cloak over her crimson gown, the thick silver beads woven into her midnight-blue hair click softly against the damp draft.
Hauling my dead weight upward, one of the mercenaries tosses me brutally onto the splintered wooden bed of a covered smuggler’s cart.
My injured shoulder strikes the timber. A weak, pathetic groan escapes my lips.
Bridging the distance, Seredryl twists her long, elegant fingers directly into the honey-blonde curls at the nape of my neck. She yanks my head back, physically forcing my focus up to meet her plum-colored irises.
"Look at you." Seredryl's upper lip curls in sheer revulsion, her dark focus sweeping over the Warlord's sleep-shirt currently swallowing my frame. "You actually believed you had secured a place in this house. You truly believed a mortal could stand beside the Khuzuth."
Fighting the sedative, I attempt to force the words from my throat—to tell her that her bloodline is a rotting lie and Varynth is a butcher. The paralytic root freezes my tongue, yielding nothing but a fractured gasp.
"Zhetrin thought he could protect you," Seredryl whispers, the syllables laced with vicious venom. "He was so blinded by his obsession with a surface stray that he failed to account for a simple truth. A beast will always wander, and there are people willing to betray him for the right price."
She releases her grip, letting my skull strike the wooden planks with a dull thud.
Pivoting away from the cart, Seredryl addresses the shadowy figures lurking near the draft beasts—rough, scarred men wearing the unmarked leathers of the Dark Market flesh-brokers.
"Lord Kryven's bounty has been transferred to your accounts." Her tone hardens back into the cold superiority of her caste. "Take her deep into the merchant routes. Bury her in the market where my cousin will never find her."
"It will be done, Lady Seredryl." The lead broker climbs onto the driver’s bench, adjusting the leather reins.
Retreating into the gloom of the tunnels, Seredryl vanishes.
A thick canvas tarp is thrown over the back of the cart, sealing me in absolute darkness. The iron-shod wheels grind harshly against the stone. Lurching forward, the transport carries me deep into the merciless, suffocating belly of the Undercity.