Prologue
It takes me two weeks to die, locked in my own dungeon.
Not for lack of trying on my part, mind, but orders have come down from the Dark Lord that the Princess isn’t allowed to pop off early. I found a bit of chicken bone in my soup once, but the spoilsports got to me before I could choke on it.
On the plus side, to the extent that there is a plus side to being tortured to death, I don’t have to see what’s happening out in the city.
I assume it’s bad. It’s usually bad. If I got into therapy and unloaded half the shit I’ve seen, Dr. Freud would take a running leap out the nearest window.
So not having to actually watch is kind of a relief.
I hear Artaxes coming, the clank clank clank of his rusty iron shitkickers. When he opens the door, I give him a little wave with my fingers. This is all I can manage, since I’m manacled to a wooden contraption that raises my arms like I’m in the middle of a cheer routine.
“Morning, chief!” I sing out. “What’s the haps?”
I keep hoping being cheerful will annoy him, possibly enough to rip my throat out, but so far no joy. It’s hard to tell how anything lands with Artaxes, since he wears his iron armor like a second skin.1
“How do you poop?” I ask him. “Just between us. I won’t tell anybody.”
He gives a grunt and steps aside. There’s someone else in the doorway. Tall and gaunt, black robe hanging limp from her bony shoulders, mouth full of long curving teeth. Sibarae. She looks me over and raises her scaly eyebrow bumps.
I’m naked at this point, modesty provided only by a crust of dried blood and matted hair.
For all that matters to Artaxes, I might be a side of beef on a hook.
I mean, maybe he has a raging hard-on inside his rusty codpiece, but I doubt it.
I’ve seen Artaxes serve as the right hand of the Dark Lord more times than I can count, and he always goes about his business with the dumb brute efficiency of a buzz saw.
You get exactly what you expect with him.
It’s comforting, in a way, although obviously not when he’s tearing my fingernails out.
Sibarae is a whole other kettle of snakes.
She’s practically drooling at the sight of my gory tits.
Her tongue comes out, long and forked, to taste the air.
I briefly contemplate what it would be like to get head from a snake-wilder,2 but I have let’s say a premonition that this is not on the agenda.
“Look, clanky,” I tell Artaxes, “I realize you’re worried about not … you know, getting the job done anymore, but you can’t just introduce a third wheel into our relationship without talking to me about it. We have something special together, I don’t want to spoil it.”
“My master worries that you may become accustomed to the conditions of your imprisonment,” he says. His voice is as cold and dead as his armor.
“And I begged him to be allowed a turn,” Sibarae says. “I’ve always wondered what a princess tastes like.”
This is not a sex thing, trust me.
“Sorry, scaly. I only date girls with tits.”3
“Those bulbous mammalian things?” She glides forward. “So soft and … vulnerable. Like the rest of you. Skin.” She pronounces the word with a contemptuous flick of the tongue.
“Remember our lord’s instructions,” Artaxes admonishes.
“Oh yes,” Sibarae hisses. “I’ll be sure to show … restraint.”
He clanks out, shutting the door behind him.
She gets on with the business at hand. Which, let’s not put too fine a point on it, fucking sucks.
You think you’d get used to this shit after a while, but nooooo, when someone bites your finger off, your body’s gotta be all like, oh no, someone bit my finger off, pain pain pain!
I know, okay? I was fucking there, you don’t have to remind me.
So I scream a lot and piss myself, which is breaking character a little.
Cut me some slack. Artaxes at least doesn’t bite.
In between screams, I amuse myself planning how I’m going to kill her next time we meet.
Rusty, jagged metal will be involved. There may be, like, a little corkscrew bit on the end, possibly some kind of barbed flanges. I’ll use my imagination.
Eventually I pass out, thank God. When I wake up, there’s a teenage girl in the uniform of the palace healers, the glow of green thaumite leaking between the clenched fingers of her shaking hand.
A small pool of vomit by the door marks where she lost her lunch at the sight of me.
I wonder what the wilders have threatened her with.
She grows back most of my missing bits, but leaves me with a few open wounds just for shits and giggles.
Dark Lord’s orders, presumably. Fucker likes to twist the knife, figuratively and distressingly literally.
At least when he killed Johann, my poor beautiful himbo boyfriend, he didn’t have time for any of this sadistic bullshit.
Now that I can think without being completely submerged in white-hot agony, I’m getting pissed off.
I know you’re thinking, Davi, just now you’re getting pissed off?
And it’s true, this anger has been building for a while.
It’s taken some time to bubble to the surface, but it’s been stewing down there in the acid swamps of my subconscious.
To put it bluntly: I am about done with this shit. The whole being-tortured-to-death thing, obviously, but also the rest. Finished. Kaput. No more. Fuck every last little bit of it. I have a new plan and it’s time to get started.
Fun fact: Did you know that snakes lose their teeth and constantly grow more, like sharks? Actually I have no idea if snakes do that, what the fuck do I know about snakes, but snake-wilders do. I know this, as of today, because I have one of Sibarae’s fangs embedded in my palm.
The healer has grown the skin back over it, but it’s merely the work of an excruciatingly painful eternity to dig it out with my fingernails.
The fang has a nice curved shape and a vicious point, and I grip it between two fingers and press it against my wrist, right on the artery.
I don’t have much leverage, so the best I can do is work the point back and forth, sawing through the skin.
Hurts like a motherfucker, but sometimes a girl’s just gotta die, you know?
When the artery finally pops, the spatter of blood hitting the floor is like music to my ears.
I keep tearing at the cut, opening it wider, willing my stupid heart to pump harder and get my whole blood supply out before someone notices.
The fang slips through my fingers about the time my vision starts to go gray, but by then I can taste victory. Also blood.
I slip into the sweet embrace of death with a contented sigh. So long, #237. Go fuck a porcupine.
Life #238
“Well now.” The voice is frustratingly familiar. “That won’t do at all.”