Chapter 31 The Road Ahead Isn’t Always Pretty #2
“Yes, creature, it’s me.” William grabbed hold of the arrow still lodged in Luna’s arm; Luna winced as blood seeped from the wound. “Did you really think I would let you get away with what you did to Diera?”
Lifeless eyes flashed in Luna’s mind and caused her to flinch just as William twisted the arrow. Another spike of pain shot through her, tearing a scream from her throat.
He let out a harsh, mocking laugh. “You thought you could just run away like I wouldn’t go to the ends of this earth to find you.”
He twisted the arrow once more, wiggling it to open the wound further.
She couldn’t think—couldn’t breathe; the pain was all-consuming. She barely heard William as he snarled, “She was everything to me. The only light in this dark forsaken hell, and you took her from me.”
He released her arm, shoving her away from him. She crumpled to the ground, hitting the dirt with a jarring thud that knocked the air from her lungs.
He was wrong. William had it all wrong. She wasn’t the one at fault for Diera’s demise. It was the king’s. He had orchestrated the whole attack, who killed his own people. He was the one to blame, not her.
But I failed to save her. I failed to save any of them. In a way, she did feel responsible for their deaths.
Without any emotion, William commanded one of the guards to take her to the healer. Luna wished for the strength to apologize. To, at least, straighten out whatever story he had been told. But she didn’t have it—she’d lost too much blood. She was simply too exhausted to find the words.
The guard bent, pulling her up by the arm as he kicked at her feet. “You heard him. Get up.”
She didn’t move. Barely noticed the guard drag her inside the healer’s tent.
Her head felt too heavy, her limbs leaden and slow.
Familiarity tugged at her when a middle-aged woman rose to greet them, introducing herself as Tyrina, but Luna didn’t bother responding; it was the woman who’d helped Clyde after Damien’s initial trespassing—not that it mattered.
“Put her there,” Tyrina ordered. The guard obeyed, practically tossing Luna onto one of the blankets lined in neat rows across the ground.
The thin blanket beneath her offered no comfort, meant only to keep wounds clean; though, in its grimy state, it failed at even that.
Pain lanced through her side, but she was barely aware of it.
Staying in the same awkward position she landed in, she stared blankly at the fabric walls of the tent.
From the corner of her blurred vision, Luna saw Tyrina approach, her deep orange robe dragging along the ground behind her.
She knelt beside Luna, her lips curling as her gaze lazily drifted over the wound.
The smile was wrong in every way a smile could be, and Luna had the distinct thought that the healer looked exactly how she imagined a nightwalker would.
Merciless.
Without warning, Tyrina ripped the sleeve right off Luna’s bodice. Cold air hit her wounded arm, and Luna shivered. But she felt no outrage, only numb detachment.
Then Tyrina flicked the arrow.
Pain flared—sharp, sudden—spiking through her arm and into her shoulder, rattling through her very bones.
Luna gasped, the sound feeble as it escaped her lips before she could stop it.
Instinct made her try to jerk away, but her body didn’t follow.
Her arm only gave the slightest twitch, too weak to resist.
“Gift from the high skies,” Tyrina murmured, watching fresh blood snake down Luna’s skin.
Luna exhaled a soft, bitter breath. Her head lolled to the side, too heavy to hold upright. “I’m no gift,” she whispered, her voice barely audible.
“Indeed,” Tyrina agreed, eyes cold, “but plenty useful.”
Her stomach twisted at the words. But before she could process further, Tyrina stood and barked orders at the guard. Something about a needle and thread, Luna couldn’t be sure. Her mind had already drifted, lost to exhaustion and confusion.
Tyrina turned back moments later, holding something pale and powdery in her palm. Luna’s eyes widened slightly. Unicornbane.
Before Luna could react, Tyrina sprinkled it over her. The dust sank into her skin, scorching her like a million tiny fires—burning away her magic, her essence, her very sense of self. Her muscles slacked, limbs as useless as a puppet with severed strings.
Her eyelids fluttered, struggling to stay open as she watched Tyrina arrange instruments carefully beside her.
“I’m sure you understand how valuable unicorn parts are,” Tyrina mused as she picked up a comb and scissors.
The scissors gleamed somberly in the low lantern light. Luna watched without seeing as Tyrina combed roughly through her hair, yanking it back into a braid. Confusion trickled through Luna’s numbness, a quiet fear taking root.
The comb scraped her scalp again. What is she—
Snip. Snip. Snip.
The sound echoed sharply, startlingly loud in the stillness.
Luna didn’t flinch. Didn’t cry out.
Just stared at the floor, eyes wide, unblinking.
She didn’t feel the tug on her scalp or the strands falling away, barely registering the chill crawling over her newly exposed skin. Only the repeated, distant and detached—snip.
Her throat tightened, and the tears came, sliding down her cheeks silently—not for her hair, but for what it meant. For what they had reduced her to.
Here, in this tent, she wasn’t a person.
She was material. Flesh to carve. Magic to mine.
A resource.
A thing.
This couldn’t be real.
“Your tears mean nothing,” Tyrina said coldly, discarding the braid like waste. “You deserve every bit that is coming for you, and more.”
“I didn’t—” Luna’s voice was barely a whisper.
The slap came out of nowhere, snapping her head sideways. The sting registered only faintly, a dull ache blooming slowly across her cheek.
Crouching beside her, Tyrina put down the scissors and reached for another instrument. A small, thin blade. When she reached for Luna’s hand, Luna tried to recoil, but her fingers barely twitched.
Panic fluttered in her chest, from disbelief that this was happening to her swallowing everything else, drowning her senses in quiet, heavy fog.
The blade pressed beneath her fingernail, lifting it with slow, excruciating precision.
Pain shattered the numb haze as it erupted through her, stealing away her breath and her ability to think. Her entire body convulsed weakly, a cry lodged in her throat. She needed to pull away. Needed to move. But her limbs refused; her muscles like stone.
The knife twisted, prying upward, peeling nail from flesh.
She screamed. Pain exploded, searing like lightning, blinding her. Her mind fractured from it.
She had no coherent thoughts. No focus. Just desperation.
Run. Fight. Do something.
But she couldn’t.
The unicornbane dust paralyzed her, burning every shred of her magic, every ounce of strength.
She lay utterly still, caged within her own skin—sobbing quietly, choking on the weight of her helplessness.
With each nail peeled away, Luna could feel herself coming apart, dissociating somewhere far away from the pain . . . from the sickening sound of flesh separating.
Stop. Please.
Someone begged, their voice raw from screaming. Was it her? She couldn’t tell.
“Soon, you’ll look like the monster you really are,” Tyrina mused softly as she flicked the blade again, freeing another nail.
Luna’s fingers throbbed, light dripping from the open wounds, but she barely felt it. The pain was somewhere far away—muted, like a sound underwater.
This body wasn’t hers anymore. It was something she watched from a distance, a shape curled up on a filthy blanket. Bleeding. Broken. Not her, not really.
She was somewhere above it all, floating just beyond reach.
The hand on the floor, twitching. That wasn’t her hand.
The shaking breath. Not hers either.
She tried to focus, tried to come back, but her mind slipped again, sliding along the edges of reality.
A traitorous shell, that’s all her body was. Useless. Heavy. Refusing to move, refusing to fight. Too weak to do anything but lie there and suffer.
She hated her body. Hated everything about it.
From the weakness in her muscles, to the magic that had only ever weighed her down; such helplessness she’d never truly escaped now staring her in the face.
Damien had been right to be wary of her. She was exactly what he feared: a glass doll. Something to protect. Something that couldn’t stand on its own.
So dependent. So disgustingly fragile.
A burden in every possible way.
Finally, Tyrina stopped.
“Pretty sure all he needed from Nina was her horn,” she sighed, her voice tinged with mock regret. “Pity that. I’d love to take yours. So much magic in unicorn horns . . .” She trailed off, as if lost in thought, already planning her next assault.
If Luna had the energy for words, she would’ve screamed enough. That she had a soul. That she was more than this.
But to Tyrina, and probably to all humans, she wasn’t. She was a creature—her existence reduced to what she could provide.
Despair coiled tightly in her chest, weighing her down.
It wasn’t just the loss of dignity, but the realization that, in a human’s eyes, she never had any. Her thoughts, her feelings—they were meaningless, swept aside. The indifference cut deeper than any physical wound, hollowing her.
Humming idly to herself, the healer brought over two glass jars. Luna didn’t resist as the cool glass pressed against her skin, like before she barely felt it.
“I do hope there’s not too much unicornbane dust in your system. If you do, the magic in your blood becomes so diluted it’s almost not worth taking.”
Had Tyrina forgotten she was the one who sprinkled the dust on her?