Chapter 3 #2
The first course—some sort of creamy soup Araya was afraid to try and eat with her shaking hands—came and went. Belanis set a second plate down in front of her, whisking away the silver lid to reveal an herb-crusted cut of lamb nestled in a buttery bed of new potatoes and spring peas.
“You’ve barely touched your food,” Jaxon murmured, his breath hot against her skin. “Eat something.”
Araya forced herself to cut a bite of the lamb. The meat was so tender it practically melted on her tongue, but she could barely taste it. She speared another, raising it to her lips as the conversation flowed around her.
“—but I barely see Kai anymore,” Caylin complained. She jabbed him in the side, making him jump in his seat. “You’re always working or holed up with your research ever since we got back from Eluneth.”
“Really?” Rian’s head jerked up. “What have you been working on?”
“Oh—” Kai cleared his throat. “Just working through some of our staple runes from the ground up, looking for ways to make improvements, Father. Nothing you’d be interested in—”
“I’m always interested in your work,” Rian protested. “You have a brilliant mind, Kai. You just need to take the opportunities for research as they arise. Like tonight, for instance—”
“Tonight?” Kai straightened, staring at his father. “What’s happening tonight?”
“Well—” Rian glanced at the head of the table, his face brightening when Garrick lifted his glass, nodding slightly. “I recommended you,” he continued in a rush. “To complete Miss Starwind’s runework. It’s a once in a lifetime opportunity, considering her bond mechanics—”
Kai put his glass down too hard. “What runework?”
“Sor’vael,” Rian continued, grinning widely. “I know, it’s absolutely unprecedented. The research you’ll be able to publish—”
Kai’s tanned face paled, turning sickly. “But we don’t use compulsion runes anymore.”
“Not in standard cases,” Rian agreed. “But in this one? I’d call her an ideal subject.”
Araya’s fork slipped from her fingers, clattering against the plate.
Sor—it meant will. Vael—submit.
They were going to carve obedience into her skin. No, Kai was going to carve obedience into her skin. Take the only thing she had left and tear it out of her like a weed from a garden.
Araya shoved back from the table. Her wineglass toppled, red blooming across the white linen like blood. The iron collar burned around her neck as she lurched to her feet, stumbling back. She couldn’t let them do this. Couldn’t let them take this last thing from her.
With no other options left to her, Araya turned and raced for the door.
She didn’t even make it out of the dining room.
The guards from earlier grabbed her by the arms, laughing as she thrashed and twisted against their grip. Araya lashed out, her bare foot connecting hard with something—and then one of the guards struck her across the face, the open-handed blow landing so hard that the world spun, her ears ringing.
“No fucking kicking,” the other guard snapped, rubbing his side.
She refused to walk so they dragged her. Down the hall and through the familiar iron door, the rough stone stairs biting into her bare feet and the air growing colder with every step they descended.
It shouldn’t have surprised her that Garrick Shaw had a dungeon under his home.
She’d always known who he was—what he had done.
But after he’d welcomed her as Jaxon’s bond, she’d struggled to reconcile his kindness with the man known as the Architect of the New Dominion, the ruthless Arcanum official who had toppled the fae monarchy and built a world carefully calibrated to grind her kind beneath his boot.
She didn’t struggle to recognize him now.
“We set it up to your specifications,” Garrick said somewhere behind her. “The runesmiths in the camps don’t have anywhere near as exacting requirements.”
Someone—Rian, maybe—chuckled. “The runesmiths in the camps are butchers. Kai is an artist.”
“No.” Araya jerked against the guards’ grip again, her bare feet scrabbling across the cold stone. “Jaxon. Kai—” his name tore from her throat before she could stop it, desperate. They were friends. He didn’t agree with this—he’d let Eilwen go. He wouldn’t let them do this to her. “Please—”
No one came to help her.
The guards forced her down with rough hands, leather straps closing tight around her limbs. If she hadn’t been bound in iron, maybe she could have fought her way free. But the cold metal around her wrists and neck depleted her magic and sapped her strength.
She never had a chance.
Tears poured down Araya’s face as they moved around her, unfamiliar hands checking her restraints and stroking across her skin.
“Let’s get rid of the shift,” Kai’s father said. “He’ll need better access.”
“I’ll do it.” Caylin’s sneering face appeared above her, a sharp set of shears gleaming in her hand. “Pathetic. Crying like a little baby—”
Araya cried out, flinching as a sharp blade scraped her rib. The thin shift parted like tissue paper, the snick of the shears slicing through the fabric too loud in the dark room. Cold air rushed over her skin, the ruined shift falling open and exposing her to their scrutiny.
An unfamiliar hand dragged across her skin, calloused fingers brushing the edge of her breast. “Such a lovely canvas,” Pryce murmured, his breath hot on her face.
“Don’t fucking touch her,” Jaxon snapped.
“Jaxon—” Araya twisted as far as the straps would allow, craning her neck to try and look at him. “Please don’t do this—”
“I think we should gag her,” Rian Sterling said somewhere off to the side. “This begging can be very distracting for everyone involved. Yes, right there—thank you Jaxon. Secure her head too. Anything we can do to keep her stress level down will help in the healing process as well.”