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Survival’s funny. Some wear it like a whisper, others like a scream. Mine’s a scorched skeleton of flame-forged rage that keeps me upright.
The Other does not pay them heed. She holds no ill blood over those who kill to survive, to feed, or to protect their young.
She wears pain like a safety net—
“You do have an imagination. Clever boy.”
“She took out an entire unit in the Undercity. Collapsed the lungs of seven soldiers before she even began tossing her blades. She slaughtered another twelve in ways that would make your insides wither, forged a cleft in the ground that took another six, then bit off the finger of a prestigious bounty hunter employed by the Crown.” Well. Good for me. I’d pat myself on the back if my skin wasn’t flayed. “Wanna tussle?” I ask the King,
Obsessed with her
I cut a glance at the leering Nobles. “Apologies,” I say, my voice echoing through the vast space. “Forgot to bathe for our very important date.” Silence. “Never mind, Prisoner Seventy-Three,” I mutter in a forged baritone. “We know you’ve had a lot on your plate.”
He smelled good. I fucked up. Let’s not dwell on it.
“Spend your life alone, forever wondering why you scream in your sleep. Calling for that very Moonplume I’ve spent the past twenty-three phases piecing back together, hoping it would bring your spirit peace. All because you loved that beast so fucking much,” he utters, shaking my head, “I knew it would break you to know she was scattered all over the world after scavengers raided her impact zone.”
“Fine,” he growls, probably knowing I’d do it without his blessing but that it’d hurt me more than it’d hurt him. Love him for that.
This place isn’t the relic of somebody else’s love . . . It’s ours.
I pinch the tip of his finger, peeling it from my arm.
She shivers against me in the way she always did, deepening my grave with another shoveled scoop.
She’s probably picturing me on my knees, and perhaps that should bother me. It doesn’t. I’d spend eternity looking up at her if she’d only fucking let me.
A bangle with a hidden spike I used to poke both my finger and that of the female now bound, gagged, and unconscious in a cupboard in the servants’ quarters on the ground floor. With a pillow under her head—because I’m nice like that.
