Vérzavar Ház

Chapter 10: The Only Thing You Are

Pollux snorted. "Some females say no when they want it. It's a game for them."

-House of Sky and Breath, pg. 249

Ruhn's head rested against the wall, the steel cot hard under his rear. His cuffed hands turned an empty water bottle over and over, the plastic cracking and popping. He'd been suspicious about the shackles before, but now he knew that they'd definitely been switched. His wounds were still red and angry, but they had closed, and the bruises to his ribs were already yellowing.

Piglet hadn't come to pick up his emptied lunch tray yet. The prince had been lucky that the shifter had deigned to release the chain from its anchor the day before. Of course, he'd taken the Hind's discarded dagger before doing anything, much to Ruhn's disappointment. He'd had some plans for that blade, some thoughts about where he could bury it.

The Hind had left in a hurry, leaving him swaying from the ceiling with crimson life dripping down his body. Starlit blue eyes gazed straight through the plastic, the gleaming floor fuzzy through the disposable lens. Not for the first time, Ruhn took mental inventory of every interaction - every poisonous word he'd spat in the direction of the golden-haired deer shifter and each reaction he'd been given in return. Every flinch, every twitch of that muscle in her jaw, every shadow that tarnished the gold in her eyes and every sparkling diamond of moisture that flooded them, threatening to fall.

She had never left him like that before.

The Hawk had. Castor Scelus had beaten him senseless and left him on display for no one to see, his body battered and crusted with sweat, blood, and more unsavory things. It had been the Hind that had ordered him let down and cleaned, who had cursed the name of her ally.

His thoughts shifted, unbidden, to the way she'd hissed in pain when she'd been snatched away from the midnight bridge. The brief glimpse of her desperate thoughts as she endured the Hammer's desires, and the anguish that had painted her expression when he'd had the audacity to ask if she liked when Pollux hurt her.

Because he had hurt her, likely more than Ruhn could fathom, and the tattooed fae had twisted her vulnerability into a dark, malicious weapon. A blade that he used to skillfully carve her open. Everything had been laid bare in the way the color drained from her face.

Booted footsteps echoed from the corridor, and his spine straightened. Not the graceful, light footfalls of the deer shifter. Brows furrowing, he tried to listen more closely. Two sets of footsteps - one heavy and sure, one that seemed to be fumbling and dragging against the stone floor.

Dread pooled in Ruhn's gut. Something wasn't right.

He didn't dare look toward the door, lest he give away even the smallest hint of anxiety. Any flinch would be a weakness for them to exploit. But nothing in the world would have prepared him for what was about to happen. The cell door groaned as it swung open.

"Get in there." It was a low growl, but the Valbaran prince instantly recognized the smooth tone of Pollux Antonius. Someone stumbled into his cell before the door clanged shut again, and Ruhn finally allowed himself to shift his attention in that direction.

The Hind was on her knees, arms wrapped around her middle, panic-widened eyes shimmering above the blooming purple of bruises that had not marred her cheeks and jaw the day before. His brows bunched in confusion, a silent question, but the loose tendrils of hair drifted across her face as she only shook her head.

The crank clicked ominously, quickly and brutally. Pollux must have been turning it with all of his might, as it jerked Ruhn from where he sat and to the middle of the room. To his surprise, he wasn't hanging when it stopped. Instead his arms were only raised above his head, but he was comfortably on the ground. That sense of foreboding grew, and even more so as his gaze drifted again to the shifter and found her amber eyes focused squarely on the angel as he entered the cell.