Beneath Shadows and Secrets

♔ 𝔉𝔦𝔣𝔱𝔶 - 𝔖𝔢𝔳𝔢𝔫 ♔

I'm backkkkk! Have you missed me?

I have to apologise for being MIA for so long. This particular chapter here stumped me like crazy, it had 3 rewrites and I still wasn't satisfied. On top of that, I just had an insane amount of shit going on personally that I just took a longer break that I anticipated.

That said, thank you all for persevering with this pause, and I appreciate you more than you'll ever know. This chapter is nearly 5000 words of my atonement (and it needs an insane edit and clean up but I know how long you've waited) and I hope you feel you can drop right back into it.

I'm finishing the next chapter tomorrow and should have it up ASAP, and the following 2 are pretty much already written, so they won't be long after.

Thank you so much guys, I love you!!

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♔ 𝔑𝔦𝔯𝔞 ♔

I remember little from being stood opposite Zaire and my brother, to being laid across a cold, hard table. Calix must have Scered us, for the grasp on my consciousness is so fickle I doubt I could have walked.

The pain has transformed from agonising to something worse than that. Flashes of searing hot heat that makes me writhe uncontrollably, despite the two pairs of hands that hold me down. The power in my body is fighting the venom – it is what has kept me standing so long – but the toxic bite of the Selkie is slowly winning this battle. Between that and the assault my body has faced from this first task, I am not sure how I am supposed to survive three more.

"Hold her still!" Calix seethes, pulling at the cloth of my attire which has started to stick to my skin with the poisoned blood. He is not gentle, and I scream when his fingers drag over the wound, reaching out an arm to slap him away. He catches my wrist easily and lowers his body over mine, a fearsome seriousness written into his features. "I will not let you die, even if you wish it. Your life is tied to mine, Viper. Let me help, and do not batter me while I do so."

"Your words," I grit my teeth to bury a scream when he peels the upper half of my clothing from my torso, "They truly make my heart stutter."

"I didn't think your heart beat at all." Libitina chuckles, wrestling my shoulders down against the table.

"I did not think she had one to begin with." Calix retorts, and for that comment, I lift a leg to knee him in his side. "It is what I like most about her."

Tynan smirks, his face blurring as my vision begins to fail. "I didn't think you had the facilities to like anything other than yourself."

My laugh is more a breath than a noise, but it lightens Calix's stern features, nonetheless. With his hands coasting over the skin at my side, he surveys the bite. "Last time – how did they treat you?"

"Something about a broad antidote. I was still fevered in bed for days after." He hums, and looks over me towards Libitina. "What?"

"She won't like it." She says, and something in her tone sets me to panicking. I fight against the restraint of Tynan and Libitina and begin to scream. The weight of Calix's stare bears down upon me, and I can barely form the refusal upon my tongue before he begins.

His magic, an extent of it I have never seen, is torturous. He intrudes my body, beginning at the wound, and spreading it through my entire being. I feel the way it swarms my blood, and surrounds my organs, and infiltrates my mind. It burns, a debilitating sort of pain that has me arching away from the table in a fitful attempt of escape. "Stop!" I scream the word over and over. I do not know what it is he is doing to me, but I plead with him to show me mercy.