Chapter 76
Westley was engulfed in unbearable pain. Pain he was intimately familiar with, because these screams still haunted his nightmares.
The water taunted him, so close but so out of reach, haunting his powerless body. His parched throat screamed, but that was the least of the pain. He felt every lash Solveig had taken from Booth.
Every burn, every slice, every strike her body had endured was now unleashed on him.
There was no way out of this godsforsaken place, but he deserved it. He deserved to feel it. Though he’d witnessed it, he never truly understood what she went through until now.
The sting of the dagger—her dagger—as Booth dragged it down her face, her bones snapping, skin shredding. Over and over again without reprieve he experienced them all, lying on his side, tears running down his face.
He drowned in this eternity of pain until a whisper on the wind reached him—even in his agony, he would know that voice.
What fresh Hel was this?
Enduring her pain hadn’t been enough? Now he had to listen to her voice as well? He couldn’t do it.
“West.” His name reached him again, soft like the rustle of sheets in the night. It was another form of torture, because he didn’t deserve it. Didn’t deserve her.
Again and again, his name called out to him from her lips. He settled into the sound and let it ground him as he suffered wave after wave of pain.
“Westley Erikson, turn over and look at me, you fucking stubborn prince,” the voice barked. That was strange, usually she was nicer in his dreams.
“So help me goddess, if you do not turn over right now, I will die just so I can haunt your every waking moment.”
She already haunted his every waking moment, but he smiled anyway. Unable to resist any demand from her, he struggled to turn over.
Wait.
She wasn’t dead?
His eyes sprung open, and there she was, standing like a rising sun against the bleak backdrop of Hel. He watched for the shimmer, for a ripple of shadow, anything to show she was dead.
But she stood solid, glaring in his favourite way.
“Solveig,” he whispered. The fog of his breath lingered in the air above him.
Her gaze softened, though she didn’t smile. She also didn’t come closer.
“Get up,” she ordered.
Right, he had to stand. Pain lanced his spine, but he wouldn’t show her—she had endured it silently and so would he.
Westley got to his feet, painstakingly slow, surprised his legs didn’t give out. He swore they’d been broken a moment ago. He tried to reach for the bond, knowing he wouldn’t feel it but desperate for it regardless.
She shook her head, holding his gaze, as though she knew what he was doing. An answer to his unasked question. She couldn’t feel him or hear him either.
He hated it.
Once, he’d wished their bond would disappear, had wished he couldn’t hear her or feel her. Now he’d do just about anything for her presence to fill his soul.
Why wasn’t she coming closer? His confused thoughts must have been written on his face because she laid her open palm on an invisible wall, showing that she couldn’t get through.
Understanding dawned as he took in his punishment, his isolation.
How many souls had been lost to this lake of legend? His muddled thoughts conjured up any scrap of buried knowledge of Nastrond, any way to escape its power.
The only way to stop the endless suffering was through forgiveness. Solveig had to forgive him, and he had to forgive himself. Or maybe she already had. She could see him, after all—the lake showed him to her and she was there, entreating him to go on.
Taking a deep breath, he placed one foot in the water. It was cold, near the point of freezing, soaking into his boot. He took another step, and as soon as both feet were planted in the lake, the pain of shackles dug into his wrists and ankles, the short chains preventing him from moving forward.
He dropped to the ground on all fours under the weight. Phantom blood dripped from where the irons dug into his wrists. Assuming it was all in his mind, as with the other injuries he’d endured so far, he lifted his hand to his face to make sure.
His eyes widened at the sight before him.
Blood poured out of him, streaming from his wrists and ankles. And then the lashing began.
Each crack of the whip lanced his back with white-hot pain as he struggled to keep moving forward. The lake devoured his blood and screams—accepting the payment for his sins.
Solveig banged on the invisible wall, her eyes wide with horror as she watched his suffering—as he had done nothing but watch hers.
Westley wanted to laugh at the punishment, but with the onslaught of the whip, he could do no more than cry out at the unbearable pain. His resolve to keep quiet in case Solveig could hear snapped. There was no way to endure this kind of torture in complete silence.
Tears flowed freely down his face as he struggled to move forward.
The lake was shallow, only engulfing his hands and wrists as he crawled towards the one he’d hurt the most. His heart’s promise—the one his soul knew before he was even born. He broke her, and fate was punishing him for it.
He committed every lash, every moment to memory.
An eternity of pain passed, but he did not stop moving—he couldn’t.
He crawled to where she waited for him, crouching behind the invisible wall, never moving, never taking her gaze away. Westley knew on a physical level, the pain of her torture was much worse, but seeing the agony in her eyes as he suffered—that was nearly unbearable.
At one point she must’ve realized what was happening. It was when he felt the blood drip from his face, the sting of a blade slicing down his cheek. She reached her hand up to touch her scar as recognition and fresh horror seeped into her expression.
He could see it, the guilt. And even without the connection between them, he knew that as much as she had hated him for the cave, she loved him now. Even if she hadn’t said it out loud.
She did not want him enduring this.
But he would. He would do it because it was the only path to redemption—the only way to her. This was the legend of Lake Nastrond.
A life for a life, pain for pain. Justice demanded a price. One he would gladly pay.
The perpetrator must pay for their crimes, even if those debts took centuries, an eternity, to repay. Though he felt as though he deserved a longer sentence, the lake was letting him move towards her.
He bore the marks of every single scream on his skin, so he knew he was almost done.
She braced her hands against the barrier, ready for it to disappear, ready to go to him.
There was only a small gap between them now. All it would take was one more step. He reached out his hand, but just before his fingers grazed hers, his mind was overcome with darkness and such pure, unending terror that he screamed.
The ringing of his screams echoed through the cavern—the jagged rocks that hung overhead rattled with the billowing sound.
Fear, pure, unadulterated fear seized his body, locking his muscles so he couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe.
Blackness surrounded him as he succumbed to the terror, his eyes remaining open as he saw and felt what wasn’t there.
His own back faced him at the mouth of that gods damned cave.
Booth walking towards him.
Brenna placing her hands over his mouth and nose to suffocate him into sleep.
Noren’s venom, his indifference.
Even Viggo’s kindness tortured him.
He saw it all through her eyes.
Saw the faceless black figures who only existed to haunt her every moment, waking or sleeping. The terror of her magic awakening—the alarm and fear that possessed her whenever Fear took his seat at the mouth of the cave, whenever he helped Booth with her chains. The smell of rain on his shirt.
In those moments, Westley forgot he was looking at himself. He could find no recognizable quality, just a demon of darkness—her demon of darkness.
He didn’t know how long he lay there in the frigid water just out of her reach, the cold liquid moving over his body like it was dying to usher him in, take him to her depths.
And he would’ve gladly let the lake claim his soul were it not for warm hands that graced his face. For the strong arms that dragged him out of the water. The solid, familiar body that held him while he wept, while he stared blankly into the abyss of her fear.
“I have you.”
She got him out.