Scorched Treachery (Imdalind, #3)(22)

Kill? Die? This was a dream? Wasn’t it? They couldn’t kill us. They needed us. Bargaining chips, just as Sain had said. I looked toward Sain in a panic, desperate for answers, but he was focused on Joclyn, his body still as he studied her. “Who do you choose, Joclyn? Who do you want to watch you die?”

I fought harder as Joclyn looked between us, barely registering when her eyes met mine. If I had been on my own, I would have pleaded with her for answers, but my only goal now was to reach Talon. I didn’t care if this was a dream. I didn’t care that the deaths we were enacting were fabricated. I needed to be with Talon. I needed to feel the touch of his skin against mine.

“My father,” Joclyn said, her voice quiet to my ears. “I choose my dad.”

“It’s okay, Joclyn. I understand,” Sain said, his soft voice almost gobbled up by my frantic attempt to get to Talon’s side.

“Wonderful!” Cail said, his voice joyful. “She’s made her choice, dispose of the rest.”

I didn’t hear Cail, but if I did, I might have chosen my actions differently. The hands that had restrained me dropped, and I took my chance. I lunged toward Talon, my body falling hard on the forest floor as I clawed my way toward him, my fingers outstretched. I was inches from reaching his hand, his body still limp and unresponsive, when I saw the glimmering blade descend on his chest.

I didn’t register when Joclyn yelled out; I only heard the static in my ears as I watched the sword plunge itself into the body of my husband, my own flesh separating as an identical blade severed me in two at the same time. I screamed at the pain, my body writhing as it racked through me, my muscles seizing before they began to relax.

Talon didn’t even flinch at the impact. I continued to scream as I reached for him, my fingers uselessly clawing through dirt before my body gave out, my vision fading to black as the dream ended and my own hideous reality returned

.





Chapter Six





Ryland was screaming again.

All he did was sleep and scream. After we had all been released from the blood magic, we had been bound alone in our cells. Sain sat still in silence, Talon remained unconscious, and Ryland transferred between periods of waking and sleeping, his waking moments spent screaming in agony about Joclyn, even strangling the bars of the cell as he attempted to kill her. What little he was awake, and not screaming, he always sat, rocking back and forth, as he mumbled promises to himself to both kill and protect Joclyn.

It had only gotten worse after the last time they had forced Sain and Ryland to open up a blood connection. Ryland had spent two hours muttering that he didn’t love her anymore, the she didn’t love him, before he had finally given in to the torture Timothy had forced him to endure and became silent.

Ryland had been driven mad by torture, the Vym?zat, and Cail’s manipulation. If it wasn’t for Sain and his support, I was sure Ryland would be much worse. They had been imprisoned together for over three months. Ryland had only been let out when Edmund needed his magic to track Joclyn, when he needed him as a weapon. And Sain – Sain’s magic was weakened to nothing by years of Edmund withholding the clay mugs. Without the mugs, Sain could not produce Black Water. Without the lifeblood of his magic, he was left weak and useless.

We all were in the dark, both literally and figuratively, confined in small spaces, food never provided, a bathroom a thing of the past. The only luxury we knew anymore was the daily glass of water. One glass of filthy water and I dreamed of it as if it was wine.

The whole room smelled of vomit, human excrement, and the heavy mildew smell I had noticed on my arrival. The combined odor hung in the air, heavy and physical. It seeped into our tattered clothes, our hair and lingered in our nostrils. I would like to say I never smelled it, that I had become immune, but the smell stuck to me. I had given up begging for water and food. I had given up begging for a bathroom. Each time I opened my mouth my father would appear, the back of his hand at the ready and my query forgotten.

We were in the middle of another of Ryland’s fits, and I could hear Sain whispering through Ryland’s screams as he tried to calm him, to silence him before someone would come.

“Shut him up, Sain,” I hissed, my eyes peering through the darkness in their direction and then back to where I knew the staircase was, my ears perking in the fear of hearing footsteps.

Sain whispered more, and I shifted my weight, the chains of my shackles rattling as I turned my body toward Ryland’s cell.

“Shield him,” I hissed, but Sain said nothing. It was a foolish idea anyway. They had already heard him, and if they found out Sain still used what little magic he had left, we would all be in trouble.

“Ryland,” I whispered, my voice joining Sain’s, “it’s okay. Joclyn’s okay.”

Ryland only howled more, and my heartbeat froze. Footsteps sounded on the stairs, the pace fast and quick. I shuffled back to my wall, my hands directly above my head, as a blue light floated down the stairs. Cail came rushing into the room, his face hard and angry.

“Shut up, dog!” he yelled, the door to Ryland’s cell swinging open without Cail having even touched it. Cail blinked once, and Ryland began to scream in agony, the magic attacking him from the inside. I looked away, not wanting to see the physical blows that were sure to come. They always did. We all had our fair share of bruises and broken bones, and with no magic to heal us, we sat, useless and mortal in the dark prison.