Lies of Murk by Eva Chase
24
Talia
From when I first woke up in the Refuge of the Murk, I’ve done my best to keep my composure, to hide how terrified I am, to put on a show of resilience. The moment I see the cage, that self-control flies out the window.
My legs stiffen, my heels attempting to dig into the ground to stop the two fae men escorting me from dragging me any closer. My pulse lurches and starts to rattle through my veins. My body shakes with the frantic rhythm.
It isn’t exactly like the cage Aerik held me in. The bars look like steel rather than bronze, and there’s no door, just an entire side that’s folded down to make room to shove me in. But it’s even smaller than that one, only a little bigger than I am. There’ll be no room to pull away from any of the walls, no way to do more than sit in a crouched position.
The cage is set off to one side of the dais. Orion stands over it, grinning eagerly as his men haul me the rest of the way over. Even though it’s still very early in the morning by Murk standards, a couple of his close associates have arrived to stand around him. A few dozen regular Murk have drifted into the throne room after hearing of the commotion.
Not one set of eyes I meet holds a trace of friendliness. Madoc hasn’t appeared—I don’t know if he’s even aware of what happened.
I don’t know if there’s anything he could do if he is.
“In you go,” Orion says briskly with a clap of his hands. “If you can’t be trusted to roam free, we have to make some adjustments to your living situation.”
“I wasn’t going to run away,” I lie, unable to stop my voice from quavering. I’ve tried these arguments before when the king first confronted me in the maintenance room, and he didn’t believe me then, but I can’t give up on the tiny chance that they might sway someone else who’ll speak up for me. “I just missed the fresh air. I only wanted to get a taste of it and then I’d have come right back.”
Orion snorts. No one else makes a sound except the huff of the guards as they toss me into the cage. I sprawl on my hands and knees, and someone shoves the side of the cage up to close it. A lock snaps into place. Orion seals it with a tap of his hand and a few words of magic.
There are bars all around me, everywhere I look. The smell of the newly forged metal clogs my nose. The orange glow of the Murk Heart flickers over me, the quaking pulse of its energy feeling somehow mocking.
I wrap my hands around my knees, my chest constricting. My heart is thumping so fast I’m half afraid it’ll fly right up my throat.
I squeeze my eyes shut, but images of the past flash through my mind regardless. Aerik’s disdainful stare. Icy Cole jabbing me with his sharp fingers and elbows. The stink of my own filth all around me, the endless days without a glimmer of hope. The snap of my warped foot.
I’ve conquered those fears. I’ve held the panic at bay before, getting better at it every time. But since then, I’ve never been thrown into a cage by fae who are my enemies. This isn’t just a reminder of past horrors—it’s the same horror repeated.
It could become even more horrifying. Orion has no reason to care about keeping me alive and reasonably healthy like Aerik did.
My lungs clench tighter. My breath squeezes in and out with a painful wheeze.
“Look at her shudder,” the Murk king says in a mocking tone. “Pitiful little human girl thought she could get the better of us. Of me.” He cackles and smacks the top of the cage, making the bars and my nerves jangle. “What were you using to loosen those bolts, pet? I know those spindly fingers wouldn’t be strong enough on their own.”
Pain pierces my skull like it did when he questioned me before. He’s trying to wear me down—but I’ve already told him the truth. The words tear out of me like they did the last time he raked through my mind. “I made a wrench. I used that.”
The spell he’s put on me doesn’t seem to force me to give more details as long as the statement itself is truthful. And whatever powers Orion possesses to reach inside my thoughts, he hasn’t been able to determine that I am being truthful—or that I used a true name’s magic—so far. Maybe the possibility is so far-fetched to him that he’d never recognize it.
“Made a wrench?” he sneers. “Someone here made it for you or maybe with you, you mean. Who helped you with your little plan?”
“No one,” I say truthfully. “I did it on my own.”
“Then someone’s going to have to pay for not keeping a close enough eye on the workshops, I suppose.” Orion peers over the growing crowd as if he thinks he’s going to spot someone to blame right now. Even in my muddled state, I notice a few of the nearer fae cringe.
I close my eyes again, tuning out the Murk king, our audience, and my panic as well as I can.
Focus on something else,I tell myself. Focus on something better.
The tickling of the sweet-smelling grass in the fields of Hearth-by-the-Heart. The sweep of Corwin’s wings when he carries me through the chilly winter air. August shooting me a smile across the kitchen as we cook together. Whitt, spinning me slowly in a dance during one of the revels. Sylas’s powerful hands caressing my body as he kisses me.
I am more than a pitiful human. I’m more than a pet. I have to hold on to all those other parts of me and not let this setback shatter my spirit completely.
Even if I can’t think of any way I could possibly get out of this.
My pulse evens out enough that I’m no longer dizzy. I draw a breath into my chest and then another. My ribs still feel as if they’re closing around my lungs, but not quite as painfully as before.
When I open my eyes again, my gaze catches on Madoc’s pale hair where he’s moving toward the dais through the gathered fae. When he spots me, the tendons around his jaw tighten. I think he nearly stumbles. His gaze darts from me to Orion, and he walks the rest of the way to the platform even faster.
I doubt he’ll be able to convince Orion to let me out, at least not any time soon, but knowing he’s here, knowing he’s bothered by what’s happening to me, gives me a shred of comfort.
Orion stalks away from the cage across the platform, pacing from one end to the other and back again. He rubs his hands together. A manic gleam has sparked in his eyes that makes my skin crawl in uneasy anticipation.
“I shaped this girl as a tool of our own,” he says, “and it seems she doesn’t appreciate the special role I gave her. But there are other ways we can still use her against our enemies, hmmm.”
“What did you have in mind?” one of his other associates asks with a broad grin.
“Let me see.” Orion comes to a stop by my cage again and taps his lips. “So many of the fae of the seasons have staked all their hopes on this fragile human. They see her as the answer to all their problems, as some kind of blessed being sent by their Heart to protect them. How much do you think it would crush their spirits to watch us crush her?”
Twittering laughter spreads through the crowd. A chill of starker fear seeps through me to pool in my gut. What’s he talking about?
Orion smirks down at me. I get the impression he can tell just how much he’s unnerving me and enjoying every hint of my discomfort.
“Yes, that would be perfect,” he says. “We’ll make a show of it. String her up for them all to see, let them watch as we snap every bone and slice through her skull. It won’t do to kill her, of course, because then they’ll be able to mourn her loss. We’ll leave her paralyzed and lobotomized, a broken shell they’ll still be scrambling to reclaim. And in the middle of their distress, we’ll sweep in and slaughter them as if we’re the wolves and they’re nothing but lambs and lame ducks.”
A cheer rises up, but I barely hear it, I’ve gone so numb with horror.
No. To be locked inside my body even more fully than I’m trapped in this cage, to have my mind cleaved apart so I can barely form a coherent thought—to be made utterly helpless, nothing more than a doll he’s dangling as bait—and for my mates and all the other fae who’ve come to support me to have to watch—to know I’m being used to bring about their doom—
Tears are streaming down my cheeks before I even realize I’m crying. I press my hands to my eyes, but nothing will hold them in. I’m starting to wheeze again with the contracting of my lungs.
Oh, God, maybe I should have slit my own throat while I had the chance. My bracelet is gone now; I’ve got nothing at all here in this cage.
How can I stop this from happening? How will I not go insane waiting for him to carry out his awful plan?
I swipe at my tears and grasp the bars of my cage. “Please,” I say in a ragged voice. “I could help in other ways—there’s so much else I could do—” If I could just buy myself a little more time…
But Orion only scoffs, his yellow eyes offering nothing but vicious amusement. Instinctively, I look to Madoc, who’s come up beside the throne. His pale face has turned almost sickly, but he hasn’t said a word yet. Please, I think at him.
His king follows my gaze. Orion snorts and pats his hand on the top of the cage again, sending another vibration through it. “Looking to my faithful servant for help, are you, pet? Do you really think he gives a damn what happens to you as long as you serve our cause? He did well then, if you fell for his act. Excellent work, Madoc.”
Madoc… dips his head in acknowledgment of the praise. When he lifts it again, he’s focused completely on his king, as if I’m not there at all. The bottom of my stomach falls out.
Orion strokes the top of the cage as if petting a cat. “I choose who stands beside me carefully, little girl. You obviously didn’t realize that. Has he seemed to dote on you, to be there for you when you needed it? Anything he offered you, it’s because I ordered him to win you over. You’re a tool to him as much as you are to me. He doesn’t care about you any more than he does a bar of lead. But illusions are his speciality, and from the expression on your face, he wove quite a good one.”
I try to swallow, but my throat won’t work. There’s a sob lodged in it. Madoc gives no sign that contradicts anything his king said.
And why would I expect him to contradict it? That all makes sense, doesn’t it? Throughout all the kindnesses he’s shown me, he’s never stopped trying to convince me to join their war, to turn against the fae of the seasons and tell Orion everything I can. Even last night, he was encouraging me to betray my mates.
I’m as alone here as I was when I first arrived. I never should have allowed myself to imagine I’d gained even a partial ally.
Despair descends over me again, wrapping around me like a suffocatingly thick blanket. I lean my face against my knees and focus on only the pressure of my arms hugging my legs, the hard floor of the cage beneath me, and the coolness of the air.
In their eyes, I’m nothing, and I’ve never felt more like that’s true than in this moment.
“Well, then,” Orion says, apparently satisfied that he’s traumatized me as much as he possibly can, “let’s leave my pet to reflect on her many mistakes and get to work on finalizing our invasion.”
He steps away from the cage. Footsteps scrape across the dais, and lowered voices fall into discussion at the other side of the room. There’s a rustling and an excited murmuring as the gathered fae go back to their work.
And I’m left with nothing to do but hold onto myself as hard as I can.
