6. Zuirvih
ZUIRVIH
The heat of her body radiates through the sheer emerald silk, pressing a jarring, fragile warmth against my side.
I steer her away from the garden’s sneering elite, my arm clamped securely around her waist. My fingers splay over her ribs, the thin fabric offering zero insulation between my leather gloves and her skin.
A fine, ceaseless tremor wracks her frame.
She vibrates like a plucked string, running on the fading adrenaline of a prey animal surviving the jaws of a predator.
Yet, she refuses to bow.
Her chin remains locked at a sharp, defiant angle.
She walks through the winding, open-air corridors of the Tagnadaet estate with a rigid, unbroken stride.
The Khuzuth nobility watch our retreat. They whisper behind their jeweled goblets, mapping this display of blatant possessiveness.
A Khuzuth lord dragging his new human mistress away, her throat marked by his gold, her defiance shielded by his shadow.
My uncle’s spies will carry this exact image back to Zatori before the sun sets. The political chessboard of Vhoig demands this spectacle.
We enter the western wing. The polished black marble reflects our mismatched rhythm.
Her thin leather sandals slap the stone; my boots eat up the distance with long, unyielding strides.
Kalan scrambles to keep pace, his tiny fists gripping the trailing green fabric of her gown.
The boy's silver hair catches the ambient light, a glaring beacon of my late brother's bloodline.
The towering iron doors of my private study wait at one end of the hall. I lift two fingers from her waist, a slight, silent decree.
Commander Jarek and the Miou perimeter guards halt as one. They melt back into the darkness of the antechamber, their eyes averting from the coming discipline. The strict hierarchy of Vhoig demands nothing less. A lord’s wrath is an intimate, brutal affair, not meant for the warrior caste.
I shove the doors inward and propel her over the threshold.
Releasing her waist leaves a biting chill against my ribs.
I turn my wrist, drawing a thread of raw magic from my core.
Purple static snaps across my knuckles, stinging my own skin.
The energy arcs through the air, striking the iron deadbolts.
The mechanisms shriek, sliding home with a violent, resounding clang that seals us inside the windowless, shadow-draped room.
Esme immediately steps backward. She snatches Kalan by the shoulders, shoving the boy behind her thighs. Her gaze sweeps the study, mapping the obsidian desk, the velvet chairs, the locked exits. Calculating. Always calculating.
"Do you court the executioner's blade, Esmeralda?" The words leave my mouth in a quiet, mocking drawl.
I cross the room, my boots soundless on the woven rugs. The air pressure drops, the metallic scent of ozone sharpening as my irritation bleeds into the atmosphere. My shadows detach from the floor, creeping up the stone walls to form elongated, menacing shapes.
She does not retreat further. Her stance widens. She raises her hands, fingers curling into a fighter's guard, ready to strike a lord of Vhoig. The gold collar flashes in the dim light, a stark reminder of her place.
"I will not let them touch him." Her voice rings out, remarkably steady, though a fine sheen of sweat coats her brow.
"Lord Vane serves The Serpent." I pause just out of her striking range, letting the oppressive weight of my presence bear down on her.
"He strips the flesh from insubordinate servants for mere sport.
A human standing up to a noble, issuing commands in a public forum, is usually slaughtered on the spot.
You insulted him in front of the entire court. "
"Then let him send his executioners." Her chest heaves, the pale, jagged scar over her ribs stretching beneath the silk. "I will take their eyes before they take my son."
I tilt my head. "Your son." I repeat the word, letting the syllables roll over my tongue. "My brother’s blood runs through his veins. That alone makes him a target. Your defiance makes you a liability. I cannot stop Zatori's allies from tearing you apart if you openly provoke them."
"You stopped him today."
"I humiliated him." The correction leaves my lips as a freezing whisper.
"I warped his reality and choked him with his own fear to establish a boundary.
Vhoig respects violence and possession. You belong to the Tagnadaet house.
Therefore, Vane cannot touch you without declaring open war on my estate.
But if you provoke them, if you give them a legal reason to strike down a feral human, I will not be able to interfere. "
"I am a prop in your political war." She glares up at me, the hostility in her eyes burning bright.
"You are breathing."
I study her face. The Deceiver is my patron; the art of the lie is my native tongue.
I search the tense lines around her mouth, the white-knuckled grip she keeps on the child, the flaring of her nostrils.
I look for the micro-expressions of deception, the subtle flinch that betrays a falsehood.
A human from the Lowtown claiming the Tagnadaet heir as her own flesh and blood defies logic.
The biology alone makes it nearly impossible.
Yet, there is nothing but raw, unadulterated maternal fury blazing in her eyes.
Her protective instincts are flawless. She would burn Vhoig to ash to keep this child breathing.
The conviction staggers me. It is a devotion foreign to the cutthroat halls of the high-tier courts.
She is telling the truth, or she is the greatest liar on Protheka.
A jagged hook of agony sinks into my chest.
The toxic reacts.
The exertion of channeling the shadow-warping illusion to choke Lord Vane in the courtyard was a reckless expenditure.
The necrotic poison coiled around my magical core feasts on the drained energy.
A white-hot fire erupts beneath my ribs, turning the blood in my chest to boiling pitch.
It feels as though crushed glass is circulating through my cardiovascular system, shredding the arteries from the inside out.
My jaw locks.
The seamless, localized glamour painting my face shatters.
It dissolves into a mist of fading purple sparks.
The healthy, aristocratic complexion drains away, replaced by a ghostly, sickly ash.
Beneath the collar of my tunic, veins bulge against the inner lining of my skin.
They turn a putrid, unnatural black. The necrosis spiderwebs rapidly up the sides of my neck, creeping toward my jawline.
I stumble backward. The room tilts violently.
My hip strikes the obsidian desk. I grip the polished stone, the leather of my gloves creaking as I fight to remain upright.
The pain is a tearing thing, shredding my internal organs, a relentless reminder of the ticking clock measuring my life.
I sink into the high-backed leather chair, my chest heaving in shallow, ragged hitches.
The scent of ozone sours, turning into the stench of rotting magic.
Cold sweat beads on my brow. My vision narrows, the room blurring into a dark, suffocating tunnel. I fight to draw oxygen into my burning lungs, each inhale rattling with a wet, sickly wheeze.
Esme does not run. She does not scramble for the locked iron doors.
She watches.
The feral hostility in her eyes shifts, morphing into a sharp, calculating vigilance.
She takes a slow step forward. Her bare feet make no sound on the rugs.
Her gaze drops to the black, poisoned veins pressing against my throat.
She dissects the scene, mapping my vulnerability with cold precision.
She observes the monster bleeding out in his own chair.
"Get out." The command tears from my throat, a bitter rasp devoid of any smoothness.
I wave a trembling hand toward the adjoining chamber door, refusing to meet her eyes.
The humiliation of this weakness burns worse than the poison.
"Take the boy. Do not come out until the Zagfer brings your evening meal. "
She hesitates. The silence in the study stretches, taut and dangerous.
I close my eyes, resting my head against the back of the leather chair, focusing every remaining ounce of energy on locking the chaotic sparks radiating from my chest into a tight, controlled sphere.
If the magic backfires now, the resulting explosion will vaporize the entire wing of the estate.
I grit my teeth, the taste of copper flooding my mouth as I battle the decaying core.
The rustle of silk breaks the quiet. She scoops Kalan into her arms. Her footsteps retreat across the marble floor, but they pause at the adjoining door.
I crack an eye open. She lingers in the archway, her eyes noting the violent shaking in my hands, locking onto the dark necrotic magic radiating from my chest.
She absorbs the truth. The master of Vhoig is rotting from the inside out.
The adjoining door opens, then clicks shut, leaving me alone in the shadows. The game of masks is unraveling, and the poison advances with every spell I cast.