A pain tearing through my flesh as if every bone in my chest had been shattered and mended in secret.
Yet, as terrible as this agony was, it was nothing compared to the brutal beating I remembered, lying side-by-side on the frozen stone floor while the whip cracked down. I strained my mind, trying to grasp the shadow of that memory. Who was that friend? Why were we beaten? The moment I tried to force the past into focus, a terrifying spike of agony tore straight through my skull, far worse than my broken ribs. My brain throbbed with a blinding headache, the memory slipping straight into fog every time I tried to grasp it. Trembling, I pulled back, unable to remember his face.
Unable to move my neck, I shifted my eyes to the left, where soft torchlight spilled across the rough-hewn stone of the underground chamber.
Resting her head on the edge of the crude wooden cot was a girl. I recognized the radiant cascade of her pink hair anywhere. As I stared at her, a strange, heavy weight settled in my chest. A cold, commanding detachment began to muffle the raw panic I should have felt. She belongs to me, a quiet, arrogant thought slipped into my mind, smooth and effortless. A vessel of absolute grace. I frowned faintly, the name 'Jim' feeling distant and thin, like a suit of clothes that had begun to shrink away from my growing frame. I kept my memories, yes, but they felt like a book I had read long ago, written about a stranger.
Her breath hitched, and her eyes fluttered open. The moment she saw me conscious, her face lit with a tender, desperate relief. She leaned over, wrapping her arms around me with a soft grace that treated my broken body like spun glass.
"Stop... leave me be," I rasped, my throat raw. The words came out sharper than intended, laced with an innate coldness I hadn't practiced. "What happened? The last thing I remember was Yeh-KOON... That angel stood over me... he said he was going to kill me first, and then he was going to kill you. Then everything went black. How are we alive?"
She pressed her palm to my cheek, her eyes glistening. She opened her mouth, but no sound came. She simply looked down at me, her silence absolute. I stared blankly into her pink eyes, feeling an inexplicable pull of authority. A look of profound heartbreak washed over her face, and she pulled away as an old camp doctor stepped inside the dim cavern alcove.
The old man grumbled under his breath as he smeared a crude, burning herbal paste across my dark bruises. "You'll have to endure the sting, boy," the old man grunted, binding my chest with coarse linen. "We're trapped deep in the lower veins, cut off from everything. We are forced to mend with bitter field weeds."
When Nea returned carrying an earthen bowl of clear broth to feed me by hand, the memory of Yeh-KOON's final threat rushed back to haunt me. I turned my face away from the spoon, my jaw tightening with a hard, unyielding pride. "Don't feed me. I failed. I almost let him kill you... people are suffering outside these tunnels because of my weakness. I should have just let him end me."
A single tear spilled over Nea's lashes, followed by a silent, trembling sob. Seeing her break pierced through the cold armor settling over my soul. Gritting my teeth against the blinding agony tearing through my spine, I forced my upper body off the mattress, wrapping my stiff, aching arms around her waist and pulling her tight against my chest.
She buried her face into the crook of my neck, her silent tears wetting my skin as I held her. I tightened my embrace, whispering into her hair: "I'm sorry. I promise... I'll never make you cry again, I promise."
Before the moment could linger, heavy boots echoed outside the stone archway. A man in tailored silk robes that felt entirely out of place in the damp mine—bearing the subtle, jagged insignia of the emerging cult—walked into the room.
He dropped into a deep, formal bow before Nea, his forehead nearly touching the dust. "Divine Lady, your presence is requested at the shrine."
Nea immediately shook her head, refusing to move from my bedside. She clutched my hand tighter, her face tight with worry.
"I have just spoken with the camp healer outside," the nobleman added gently, addressing her reluctance. "He assured me that Lord Amaduce is recovering remarkably fast. His wounds are severe, but his life is safe; he is out of all immediate danger."
Hearing that name—Lord Amaduce—sent a strange, satisfying resonance through my blood. It felt more right than the desperate, whimpering boy I used to be.
Only after hearing that explicit guarantee did Nea relax her posture. Relief washed over her, mixed with a deep, lingering sadness at having to depart. I blinked, watching the nobleman's absolute reverence toward her. Even with her following still small and fragile, her aura carried a supreme, sacred weight in this dark place.
Nea gave my fingers a final, reluctant squeeze, offering me a sad, lingering look before turning and stepping out toward the shrine room where the cult's blood altar used to stand—now replaced by a rough, emerging stutche of Nea herself.
Once the door closed behind her, the nobleman turned toward my bed. Feeling the weight of his sharp gaze, I instinctively adjusted my posture, my chin lifting with an aristocratic stiffness that felt entirely natural, despite the searing ache in my shattered ribs.
He noticed the change and offered a smooth, fluid sweep of his hand, a gesture of refined court etiquette before resting his palm over his heart and inclining his head.
"Rest easy, Lord Amaduce," he said smoothly. "I am Valen of House Valor. I am at your service." He paused, looking over my bandaged frame. "Is there anything you require? Attendants, fresh water, a warm draft?"
He had pristine slicked dark hair, sharp eyes, and manicured hands adorned with a silver signet ring—a stark contrast to the rough tunnel walls.
I swallowed hard, my raw throat tightening as I looked up at him. Seeing a noble of House Valor bowing to a cult shrine dedicated to Nea deep in a mining shaft left a foul, uneasy taste in my mouth. "The mines..." I rasped out, fighting through the haze in my brain. "What happened back in the mining pits? What happened to the other kids who were trapped there with me? And... Yeh-KOON?"
Valen offered a polite, measured tilt of his head, his face an unreadable mask. "I am afraid I do not have information regarding those matters, my lord. All I know is that when you arrived here, you were in remarkably bad shape, and my duty is simply to see to your needs. We all have our roles to play, Lord Amaduce."
Valen walked slowly over to the narrow tunnel opening, gazing down at the torchlit camp below. "I never thought she would actually leave your side," he said softly, a hint of fanaticism in his voice as he glanced toward the makeshift shrine outside. "She stayed by your bed night and day, refusing even to leave for a meal. I must admit, Lord Amaduce... I am quite devoted to her light. Watching her devotion makes me think you are a god walking among us."
The day passed in agonizing isolation. Nea remained away at the shrine, leaving me alone in the silent stone alcove as my fractures slowly began to knit together. I spent the quiet hours staring at the low ceiling, feeling the remnants of Jim wash away like dirt in a stream, leaving only the cold, towering presence of Amaduce behind.
The heavy wooden door creaked open, and a remarkably tall, breathtakingly beautiful woman with radiant bronze skin stepped into the quiet room. She wore so little silk that she was nearly naked, her striking features glowing in the torchlight.
Immobilized in bed, I watched her cautiously, though my eyes no longer held the confused terror of a slave miner.
She didn't grab a basin or towels. Instead, she glided straight to the side of the mattress, a slow, alluring smile on her face.
"I heard a lord in this room was in need of entertainment while he recovers," she purred, her voice low and smooth.
"I... I think you have the wrong room," I grunted, the old defensive reflex trying to flare up before Amaduce's cold dominance forced it down.
She only chuckled, sitting right on the edge of the bed. "I may not be a healer, my lord... but perhaps I can take care of you in a different way."
Her fingers reached out, trailing warm sparks gently across my bare chest. Before my slow brain could process what was happening, she swung one leg over my waist and climbed directly over me, leaning down so close I could feel her breath against my neck.
She smoothly grabbed both of my wrists, pinning my hands against the headboard. Straddling my chest with effortless strength, she looked down at me with a teasing, sultry grin.
"Shred me like Rosalie Colony," she whispered in my ear, her voice a dark, seductive purr. "Give me all your pain... show me your anger."
Before I could answer, the door swung wide open.
Nea stood on the threshold, frozen dead in her tracks, her eyes widening in pure, furious shock as she locked sight on the bronze woman straddling on top of me.
Salve first. Wormwood and rendered fat, and beneath both of them something that stung the back of the throat—the smell of a body being argued out of dying.Then the linen, damp and cold along my ribs.Then the trumpets. They came in through the ragged opening of the mine shaft in long golden rolls, one after another, the fanfare Heavenport kept for weddings and executions. Somewhere above, the heralds were telling the city a story, and the city was cheering. None of it had happened.Aura exhaustion is not pain. Pain would have been a kindness; pain tells you where the damage lies, points at it, insists. This was the reverse. A hollow that went down past the muscle into the marrow, as though something had gone into the cellar of me with a bucket and come back up scraping stone.Nea sat in the chair. She had not moved it. Its legs still stood in the four dents they had pressed into the dirt, and by the depth of those dents she had been there a long time. A bowl of water had skinned over on the stool beside her, and the bread had gone a day old without being touched. Her hair—that pale, improbable pink, the colour of the inside of a shell—had come loose from its tie on one side, and she had not bothered with it."You're awake," she said."Debatable."Valor filled the doorway a moment later. His blue-and-silver plate had been through arena duty and not through a polish since; somebody had bled on his gauntlet and he had not noticed. He shut the door with the heel of his hand and stood with his back against it."They wrote it down," he said. "Wrote what down.""A draw." I let the word sit in the damp air of the mine. Draw. As though the two of us had come to our senses in the middle of it, set our steel down, and agreed to be reasonable."They took Volger Cathie out of the rubble in a litter," Valor said quieter now. "Her shield came out in three pieces. They had to carry them separately." He lifted his chin toward the light outside. "Draw." "Say the other thing.""She lost." Jim mobilized his forces, leading his army on a march directly toward the Rosalie Colony. The journey was long and fraught with the heavy tension of a shifting war, but the destination loomed closer with every league. During the journey and the surrounding unrest, the bunny-bow got attacked by a cult near the Rosalie Colony. Jim and his men moved swiftly to save them, turning the tide of the ambush. In the aftermath, deeply grateful for their lives and the display of strength, the bunny-bow pledged their allegiance to Jim. Without hesitation, Jim placed them directly under his command, integrating their sharp senses and swift agility into his expanding army. When Jim's army finally arrived at the Rosalie Colony, they made camp in an abandoned building to rest and plan their next moves. But the safety was shattered almost immediately. An assassination attempt happened right there in the dark by a group of assassins disguised as the royal guard, led by a man named Brask. Blades flashed through the shadows as Jim and his men scrambled to meet the threat, turning the ruined halls into a desperate box of steel and blood before they managed to beat back the disguised killers.