Chapter Forty-Four
Avari
My head lolled back on impact, my neck straining to keep it upright as the urge to let it fall took over.
A long cut ran along my thigh, blood pooling beneath the chair in a steady trickle. The puddle made my head spin; by the look of things, I would eventually bleed out.
Every time I tried to move, my wrists tore against something that felt like raw sandpaper. My hands were bound so tightly behind my back I could barely feel my fingers. There was no give, no slack. The bindings bit deep, threatening to cut off circulation entirely.
My mind raced, trying to find explanations for what was happening and ways to escape this rotten-smelling hell. The uneven dark walls were moist enough to grow moss and resembled the inside of a mountain.
I couldn’t deduce much more. With one eye swollen, I looked at the smiling woman before me as she laid out a row of blades on the nearby table.
She would kill me. She planned to. The sharper the blade, the more she watched for my reaction as she twisted them in her hand, making them glint in the harsh fluorescent light above us.
‘What am I doing here?’ I choked out. The dryness in my mouth made me gag as my lips stuck to my gums.
My stomach dipped at the thought of water. I was exhausted and starved too. How much time had passed since I stepped through the portal?
My fire, witchcraft, and even the minuscule shadows were nowhere to be found. Void. Blankness. Nothing answered me. I was completely and utterly empty.
Like she realised that I just attempted to burn through the binds, she laughed hysterically, choosing the smallest of knives. ‘You’re finally where you belong.’
The black-haired woman kneeled in front of me, caressing my thighs like she cared for me. Up and down, her hands moved as she basked in my discomfort. ‘Choose.’
‘What?’
Too fast for me to track, she placed the blade against my cheek, lightly dragging it down. ‘Choose a leg. Or I stab both.’
Cold sweat coated my back, then slid down my forehead. She poked the beads with her dagger, never pricking the skin.
‘Why are you doing this?’ I begged. ‘Why?’
‘Why are you doing this?’ she mocked me, running the blade along my sternum, circling my heart and moving on to my arms. ‘All of your questions are so predictable. Have some originality.’
I screamed. The blade drove into my thigh as she slammed it down to the hilt.
I couldn’t breathe.
Couldn’t think.
The pain radiated throughout my whole body, sending me into frantic, shallow breaths.
I shook the leg, trying to alleviate some pressure, but she held it down with the dagger. The wound bled all over her, and she used droplets to draw the shape of a dagger on her forearm.
She then giggled and admired her work. ‘So weak. So unprepared.’ The woman relished in my agony as she twisted the blade anti-clockwise and more vivid red blood rushed out.
Everything went dark.
I didn’t know whether an hour had passed or if I remained passed out for days. A punch in the face woke me, splitting my lip, filling my mouth with copper-tasting fluid.
I swallowed, allowing it to coat my dry tongue.
‘Wakey, wakey,’ she sang cheerfully. ‘What is so special about you? Tell me and I’ll make it quick.’
One of my eyes wouldn’t open; the other stung like she’d rubbed salt in it. I couldn’t see well, but from what I could make out through the blinding light, she wanted to see my pain.
That woman found pleasure in causing it.
Trying to shift in my seat, to relieve the pressure from my hurting buttocks, I groaned loudly as I realised I could no longer feel my hands and half of my forearms.
My body was giving up. Somewhere around my kidneys, a dull pulling sensation spread.
I needed to escape.
A kick to my ankle jolted me out of my futile plans. Pain shot through my injured leg, tearing fresh drops of blood from the crusted stab wound. It looked infected, the burgundy scab ringed with yellowish crust that itched relentlessly. The urge to scratch was almost worse than the pain itself.
The thought of whether I would survive this made sweat bead across my skin. Shivers skittered down my spine as I tried to anticipate what the sadist might do next.
A hint of a smile tugged at her lips. Whatever she saw in me, she was enjoying it.
She yanked my head up by my hair and leaned in close to my face. ‘You don’t look much like your mother. Genes are a funny thing.’
Pressing her nose into the crook of my neck, she inhaled deeply, dragging a sharp nail along my collarbone. ‘You’re a peculiar thing… a little bit of this, a little of that. Such a little freak. How did something like you even come to exist, hmm?’
She stilled her finger over my pulse point, waiting for an answer. I stayed silent, focusing on steadying my wheezing breaths.
‘Not very chatty today? What a shame.’
Her hand released me, and my chin dropped to my chest, knocking the breath from my lungs.
I struggled to recover as she turned away, toying with dark liquids, mixing, swirling, and letting them slosh against the glass.
Was it poison?
She was going to poison me.
The moment my lungs calmed, she tilted my head and pried my lips open, emptying the vial in my mouth. I couldn’t force it out.
Everything went blank once more. A growing abyss pulled me under, eerily resembling sleep, but it couldn’t be. Ever since she dragged me here, I hadn’t dreamed.
Strong winds carried me across black clouds that cushioned my broken body and shielded it from the pouring rain.
Dirt washed off my skin, soaking into the clouds below, staining them with blood that slowly altered their hue. The more they absorbed, the deeper crimson they became until they began to glow, a blinding light reaching toward me, demanding more.
They kept trying to drag me down, while the black clouds clung to me, holding me in place.
Soon, I would be torn apart.
Then sensations started to come back again.
One eye opened, the other only barely. Two blades stuck in my legs, one near each knee. The left knee worked; the right one wouldn’t budge. She'd hit something important.
The old pool of crimson beneath me had dried to an almost rusty brown. Drop by drop, fresh blood landed on top.
A purple-haired girl walked into my cell and ran a wet rag across my face. I caught the stray drops with my tongue before she let me drink from a bottle.
‘It’ll be easier if you reveal whatever she wants to know,’ she said, pleading. ‘She will at least kill you quickly then.’
‘I don’t want to die,’ I groaned between the greedy gulps.
The girl looked young, a teenager, maybe. She didn’t appear evil as she continued wiping my damaged skin. ‘There are fates worse than death here; you don’t want her angry with you. Whatever you did, just tell her.’
What did I even do?
The effort it took not to allow myself to collapse against the ropes was too much, but whenever I did, they dug into my limbs, causing agony. And as time passed, it was difficult to imagine my body feeling normal again.
I wasn’t leaving this place. The blade-happy woman would murder me. I reached into the deepest reserves of power within me, the part of magic I had only ever glimpsed when the Isles allowed our connection.
They showed me so much about myself and the realm.
Then sobs raked through my chest. There was nothing there. Nothing left.
They were blood witches.
I was as good as dead.