Chapter 2
Alette
The sound of their cries tears at me, each one sharper than the grinding of the blades that inch higher and higher.
I watch the blood start to drip from their bodies, thin rivulets snaking across the etched lines in the stone floor, pooling in the basin at the center of the room.
My stomach churns as I see it, red and glistening, every drop a reminder of the lives hanging by a thread.
And that time is ticking away.
It feels unreal, like I’ve stepped into a nightmare I can’t wake from.
The smell of blood is too strong, coating the back of my throat, forcing me to understand that this is happening.
This is real. They are bleeding. They are being carved apart slowly, deliberately, and if I don’t do something right now, they are going to die in front of me.
“Hold on!” I whisper fiercely, though I’m not sure who I’m saying it to, them or myself. My voice shakes anyway, betraying me, thin against the relentless grinding of the mechanism.
My gaze snaps between them, panic surging higher. “Can’t you use your powers?” The question breaks out of me before I can stop it. A question that I should’ve asked a long time ago, but a question I already think I know the answer to. “Burn it, break it… anything!”
Cassius’s head jerks slightly, his jaw tight with pain. “No,” he grits out. “There’s too much iron.”
My stomach drops.
“The structure,” he forces out, breath hitching. “It’s threaded through the stone… and the chains. It’s suppressing everything. We can’t access enough power to matter.”
The words hit like a blow. So, this is really all up to me.
My legs carry me to Sylvian, who’s the closest, his usually serene expression now twisted by pain and desperation.
Seeing him like this makes something inside me crack wide open.
He has always been stable, always been the one who holds everything together, and now he looks like he is barely holding on himself.
I can almost hear the thud of my heart against my ribs as I reach for the dagger at my side, my fingers closing around the hilt.
The moment I draw it free, the blade hums faintly, glowing blue…
and then it grows. Metal lengthening in my grasp, stretching, reshaping until it becomes a full sword, the silver catching the light in a sharp, deadly flash.
The weapon feels solid in my grip, reassuring in its familiarity and terrifying in what it represents.
I start hacking at the thick chains binding Sylvian’s wrists, and the clang of metal against metal echoes in the chamber like an alarm bell, ricocheting off the walls and amplifying my panic until it feels like it might swallow me whole.
Each strike sends shockwaves through my arms, rattling my bones, and I grit my teeth against the ache, forcing myself to keep going even as my muscles begin to burn.
I can’t stop. Not now. Not when every second matters.
It feels like forever, like time has stretched thin and cruel, but finally the links begin to give way. The smallest shift sends a surge of hope through me, sharp and fragile. I hit it again, harder, faster, until one wrist breaks free. Then I move to the other wrist and do the same.
The moment his hands are free, Sylvian jerks forward, twisting sharply, dragging his arms clear and shifting his weight off the blades as much as he can.
He angles his body away from the mechanism, muscles straining as he pulls himself just far enough to keep the daggers from pressing deeper into him.
“Good,” he breathes, rough and strained.
I move to his feet, my hands slick with sweat and shaking so badly I can barely keep hold of the sword, my grip slipping as panic claws its way higher.
“Too much time,” I mutter, the words catching in my throat as dread tightens around my chest.
The blades are already pressing deeper into the others, and I can see their blood streaking down their legs, soaking their clothes and the stone beneath them.
The sight turns my stomach, bile rising hot and bitter, but I force myself to look away before it paralyzes me.
To keep hammering my sword into the chains at Sylvian’s ankle as I briefly glance at Cassius, who’s the farthest away, pale and barely holding himself together, his head bowed as though the weight of it all is dragging him down.
How much longer can they last?
Sylvian gasps as the last shackle breaks and his legs give slightly beneath him, but I’m already grabbing his arm, hauling him forward.
He stumbles with me, teeth clenched hard enough I can hear it, but he doesn’t argue.
He forces himself to stand, blood still running down his body, his weight heavy against me before he steadies himself.
Our gaze holds for half a second, but then I continue, turning to look at who I should free next.
As our eyes meet, Cassius says, “Help me last.”
The words cut through my heart.
Even now, even with blood running down his body, even with the blades carving into him, he looks grounded. Controlled. Like he’s already decided this.
“But, I–”
“Do it,” Cassius says, quieter now, but no less certain.
Oberon lets out a low, furious sound, his entire body rigid with pain. “No, help me last.”
My stomach drops.
There’s a strained, breathless laugh. “Yeah,” Ashton manages. “Same plan. I’ll live. Probably. Take care of them.”
Something buried deep inside me fractures wide open. They’re serious. They’re not even fighting about it. They’re choosing this. Choosing each other, even if it costs them.
“You’re all… too sweet,” I whisper, but my voice is weak, shaking, because part of me understands exactly why they’re doing it.
I don’t stop moving. I can’t think about who needs it first, who needs it most. If I let myself make that choice, I’ll break.
So I don’t choose. I go to the one closest to me, to Oberon, and bring the sword down hard on his chains. Metal rings out, loud and sharp, the sound swallowed by the grinding of the mechanism.
Sylvian is beside me a second later, breathing hard, his own sword already in his hand. He doesn’t say anything. He just brings it down hard against the other chain, adding his strength to mine.
Oberon grits his teeth as the blades press deeper into him, a rough sound tearing from his throat that he tries and fails to hold back.
“Faster, or the others won’t make it,” he whispers.
“I am,” I choke, striking again, harder, my arms already burning.
The chain doesn’t give.
I hit it again. And again.
The rhythm turns frantic, desperate, every strike fueled by the sound of their breathing, by the sight of blood dripping faster now, feeding the carved lines in the floor. Sylvian slams his sword down beside my blade, over and over, his movements just as desperate, just as relentless.
“The knives… are getting deeper,” he says tightly.
“I know,” I whisper, even as my vision starts to blur.
Oberon lets out another strained breath as the blade digs deeper, and this time he doesn’t manage to hide it. Panic surges, sharp and suffocating. I hit the chain harder.
“Come on,” I mutter, the words breaking apart as I force everything I have into the next strike.
The metal cracks. Hope flares inside of me.
“Again!” Sylvian snaps.
I swing. The chain breaks. One wrist drops. Then the other.
“Almost,” I breathe, dropping lower, my hands shaking as Sylvian and I go for the shackles at his legs.
The blades are higher now. Too high.
“Hurry,” Oberon grits out, trying to shift himself off the blades beneath him, and there’s no hiding the pain in his voice.
“I’m trying,” I whisper, my voice breaking as I strike again, and again, each hit weaker than the last, my strength draining too fast, but Sylvian works on the same chain, taking turns with my blows.
Sylvian raises the sword and brings it down with everything he has left. The chain shatters. Then, with more effort, the other one around his ankle falls too.
Oberon collapses forward with a rough, broken sound, a ragged gasp tearing from his throat, and for a split second I catch sight of his back and legs, soaked in blood, the wounds deeper than I had allowed myself to believe.
My chest tightens painfully, something close to grief threatening to rise, but there’s no time for it.
He forces himself to his feet anyway, jaw clenched, pain and fury warring in his expression.
“Now Ashton,” Oberon says through gritted teeth, motioning for me to move, urgency sharpening every word.
The three of us split up, working quickly on his chains, our hands moving with desperate urgency as time slips further and further out of reach.
I hack at Ashton’s chains, each strike jarring through my arms as I fight to keep control, to keep focus.
Blood loss has drained the color from his face, and he sways slightly, but he doesn’t complain, doesn’t waste breath on it, his strength holding even as his body threatens to give out.
When we finally get him free, Oberon slips an arm around his waist, catching him as he stumbles.
“Thanks,” Ashton mutters, his usual cocky tone dulled by exhaustion, the weight of everything pressing down on all of us.
But there’s no time to stop. Cassius is next.
And the moment I look at him, dread twists deep in my stomach. He is barely conscious, his head lolling forward, his body slack against the chains in a way that feels wrong, too still.
“Cassius!” I call, my voice breaking as fear claws its way up my throat.
He doesn’t respond.
“Move!” Sylvian barks, shoving me aside as he steps in, his urgency snapping me out of it.
I glance at Oberon, who nods once, sharp and certain, before turning back to the task. Together, we work, the blades rising dangerously deeper into Cassius’s body, each tick of the mechanism echoing like a countdown in my skull.