6. Chapter 6
Arwen
Aloud click snaps through the darkness as the heavy steel door wrenches open. It’s the first sound I’ve heard in twenty-four hours.
Light slams into my eyes, burning my retinas. I hiss and turn my face away as spots burst across my vision, my head pounding as sensation crashes back all at once. For a second, my body forgets how to exist in anything other than nothing.
I’ve spent the last day in Greed’s idea of a sensory deprivation cell.
Greed’s form of torture is… Honestly?
Fucking hilarious.
Sure, it’s boring. Mind-numbing, even. And I would have committed minor crimes for a sip of water. But as far as torture goes, this is laughable. Cushy. Soft. Typical Greed—obsessed with psychological theatrics and utterly allergic to real suffering. Wrath would’ve broken bones by now.
The worst part wasn’t even the silence or the dark. It was the lack of a toilet.
I held it as long as I could, out of sheer stubbornness, until biology staged a coup. When I gave in, I walked as far away from where I’d been sitting as possible and did my business like an animal. Unapologetic.
I wonder who has to clean it up…
I hope it’s Doctor Plinth.
A smile blooms on my face at the thought. Universe; that alone makes the entire experience worth it.
Hands grab my arms, hauling me upright before my legs remember how to work. The room tilts, my vision swimming in nauseating circles as two guards lock their grip, metal gauntlets biting into my skin. I let my weight hang between them, conserving what little strength I have left.
My gaze goes straight to the wall of monitors, scanning frantically until it lands on his cell.
My breath catches. He’s there—alive, no visible blood, no guards crowding him.
But he’s sitting on the floor with his head in his hands, shoulders hunched like he’s carrying the weight of this entire damn facility.
The tightness in my chest eases just enough to let me breathe again, even as something else twists deeper.
He doesn’t look great.
He’s sitting on the floor, back against the bars, head buried in his hands. His shoulders are pulled tight like he’s holding himself together through sheer will.
The sight hits harder than any punishment. More than the deprivation, the hunger, the drugs, or the waiting. Knowing he’s trapped there, powerless, imagining everything they might have done to me these past 24 hours. I’m sure they haven’t been giving him regular updates on my health.
I don’t know when I stopped despising Atticus Willshire. Somewhere along the way, hatred softened into tolerance, and tolerance slipped into something more dangerous.
I care about Atticus Willshire and his safety.
He stood up for me in front of the entire council. Claimed me as his bond without hesitation, knowing what it would cost him. He tried to use his power for me against his own father, and when that still wasn’t enough; he followed me into what was supposed to be my exile.
Atticus has completely altered his life. For me. No one would do that without a reason.
And yet… trust still doesn’t come easily. Not after a year of cruelty. Not after understanding precisely the sting of a bond being weaponized. And especially not after Ryker. But whatever is growing in the cracks of my defenses — I can’t ignore it.
Dr. Plinth performs the same ritual as yesterday once the guards shove me into his hands. The same clipped instructions. The same cold appraisal, like he’s checking the integrity of a tool instead of a person.
Councilor Blaise doesn’t even bother to show up.
That tells me everything I need to know. They already expect me to fail.
I stand in the center of the marked circle again and reach inward. I search for that familiar burn, that violent swell — and find nothing but hollow space. Smoke where fire should be.
Plinth watches without comment as the seconds stretch and snap. When it’s clear nothing is coming, he speaks, voice calm.
“Councilor Blaise anticipated this outcome.”
Of course he did.
He adjusts his glasses, an excited gleam in his eyes.
“He has authorized escalation. All measures short of death to induce manifestation.” His eyes flick up, meeting mine. “According to the Councilor’s observations, your abilities responded when you succumbed to your emotions.”
He steps closer. Too close. I smell antiseptic and something sour beneath it.
Then he leans in, mouth brushing my ear, and whispers, “So let’s make you emotional, shall we?”
His hand clamps around my arm and shoves me forward. I stumble, forced to walk as he steers me toward one of the glass rooms lining the lab. The walls shimmer along the observation area, proving wards are in place. That’s why I’m still uncuffed.
There is a single chair waiting at the edge of the room, bolted to the floor, backed up against the glass wall. Leather straps hang from the arms and legs. Small, evenly spaced holes puncture the wall behind it.
My stomach drops. This won’t be fun.
He slams me down into the chair before I can brace myself.
The straps come next. Wrists. Ankles. Thighs. Chest. One across my forehead, forcing my gaze forward. Each buckle clicks shut with brutal finality, tightening until I can hardly breathe.
The mannequin from yesterday stands mounted on the wall across from me, its head tilted, blue eyes, and blonde hair. A mockery. A reminder of Atticus and the stakes that are in place.
Plinth doesn’t speak as he works. He just watches me like I’m an insect pinned to a board.
When he’s finished, he steps into the glass viewing room. The door seals. His voice crackles to life over the speaker, stripped of even the pretense of humanity.
“Day two of Project Nexus commencing.”
I snort despite myself. Project Nexus. That’s it? All this effort, and that’s the best they’ve got?
“Testing will include electrical stimuli designed to provoke an elevated emotional response, specifically anger.”
Silence swallows the room as my muscles coil, waiting.
I can get through this. I’m a Wrath at my core. Pain is nothing.
The first jolt is small. A sharp pinch at my ribs—more of a quick sting than pain. I flinch, testing the straps. They don’t give.
Then a stronger pinch strikes at the flesh of my neck. A hot, snapping surge that makes my teeth clack together. My skin feels as if someone branded it.
I hiss, breath stuttering, body trying to recalibrate. Trying to adapt.
The third hits my hip like an explosion. I scream as the pain rips through me, white-hot and blinding. Before I can even draw another breath, a fourth slams straight into the center of my back. My skin must be melting.
I arch against the restraints, every muscle screaming for release, for escape, for anything. The chair holds as he straps bite into my skin.
Another strike. My shoulder. Tears spill before I can stop them, sliding uselessly down my temples. My tolerance for pain is pushing to the breaking point.
Again. And again. And again.
My entire body convulses as the current tears through me. I scream until my throat burns raw, until my voice cracks and breaks and keeps going anyway.
I try to summon rage, real rage, but all I feel is pain. Endless, consuming pain.
Another jolt crashes through me and I sob, the sound ripping itself from my chest. I can’t think. I can’t breathe. Can’t remember how to exist outside of this chair.
Keep it together. For your friends. You’ll see them again. For Atticus.
The thought barely forms before the worst one hits—at the base of my skull.
The world detonates as white floods my vision, then turns to nothing at all.
I fall into the dark.
***
Rough, cold cement bites into my cheek.
“Arwen… Arwen, wake up.”
The familiar voice reaches me from far away, warped and echoing.
“Arwen, can you hear me?” Panic sharpens the sound. “Open your eyes. Please.”
I try to move and regret it. Pain flares everywhere at once—my head throbbing, my limbs heavy, my body pinned to the floor. Burns ache all over my body.
“Arwen… please.” The voice cracks.
Something in my chest tightens at that desperation, a thread pulling me back. I force my eyes open again, blinking hard, fighting through the haze. Shapes sharpen until I see Atticus.
He’s pressed against the bars so hard it looks like he’s trying to force his way through solid metal. His face tight with strain and a look of fear I’ve never seen on him before.
Why am I on the floor?
I dig my palms into the concrete and push. My arms shake as I roll onto my side, then onto my back. Every muscle protests.
“Atticus?” I try to say but it comes out wrong. Thick and slurred.
His entire body sags as he leans back against the bars, dragging in a breath.
“Thank the universe,” he exhales. His chest is still rising and falling like he ran a marathon.
“You scared the shit out of me. They didn’t tell me anything when they threw you into the cell.”
I manage to prop myself up on my elbows as the world tilts.
“You’ve been out of it for a full day,” he says, words tumbling over each other. “They took you and then you didn’t come back. I didn’t know where you were, what they were doing. Then—” His voice breaks, raw.
He clears his throat and pauses before continuing.
“Then I felt it. Your pain. Your fear. It slammed into me like a blade, and it didn’t stop. I thought they were killing you.”
The memory flickers, becoming clear.
“They dragged you back here,” he continues, jaw tight. “Injected you with something. I didn’t know if you were—” He swallows hard. “I thought I was watching you die.”
His eyes search my face desperately, like he needs proof that I’m going to live.
“I saw you breathing,” he finishes. “That’s the only reason I didn’t lose my mind.”
“Atticus,” I murmur, the word heavy on my tongue. “It’s okay. I’m here.”
It’s a lie. Nothing is okay. But I need him to breathe. Both of us falling apart will solve nothing.
“I’m here,” I repeat, softer this time, forcing the words through the fog. “You know what I can handle. You know they didn’t break me.”
“Can you move?” he asks softly, like he’s afraid the question alone might hurt me.