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Thalon still hesitated.

“Again,” Garrik commanded. His voice controlled but rough. The only inclination of how the first stripes must have felt.

No sooner did his word roar, the whip collided again. Leather striped across his scarred skin, scourging the High Prince’s back. Over and over, Thalon laid the thick fringes across splitting flesh.

Blood sprayed to the dirt when he pulled back. And wet thuds echoed in the air when the punishment connected across raw wounds.

Crack. Jade flinched.

Crack. Eldacar breathed a distressed whimper.

Crack. Alora’s limbs felt empty of blood.

Shouldn’t she be pleased that he was suffering what he deserved? Shouldn’t she be smiling, elated that the demon prince was punished so horribly? Her eyes should be delightedly drinking in the scene with a wicked smile peppering her face.

Instead, she felt the opposite—wracked with uncontrollable guilt that bordered on self-loathing.

Crack.

The lashes continued. With every swing, Thalon released grunts of protest, but Garrik still had barely moved. Not even a sound.

The sea of Dragons stood silent in reverence and recognition of what their High Prince endured. Their faces didn’t turn as lash after lash was laid upon his back. More than a few flinched with each crack of the whip. Perhaps they felt sickened by it, too. But it had to be done. It was a lesson, a bloody one.

Crack.

Long streams of crimson dripped as Thalon concluded his last lash. He hurled the whip to the side of the dais; the fringes’ watery slap hit the wood as they pooled in a heap of leather andblood. Thalon cursed under his labored breath before placing his hands on his hips, bowing his head low in regret. Broken in spirit and heart.

Then Thalon moved, speaking to Garrik privately as his hand hovered near the High Prince’s quivering shoulder.

Garrik lifted his hand in a sharp wave, dismissing him. Not one sound was made as he rounded on his feet and wrenched the sword from the floorboards. Not one whisper when he straightened and dragged the tip of his sword across the floor before reaching the edge of the dais.

Everyone stood deathly still. Eyes locked on the blood pooled on the dais.

At their High Prince, whose face remained unyielding of any pain as he sheathed his sword to his side and jumped to the ground below.

It was impossible how he carried himself. The lashings should have reduced him to unconsciousness. No faerie could withstand a beating so gruesome and walk away.

Instead, he breezed along with perfect posture as if he’d simply been brushed by a feather. And Alora watched—searched—for signs of pain or discomfort oranything. They simply didn’t exist.

The High Prince rasped as he parted the crowd and left, “Report to your generals for orders.”

It had taken every ounce of strength not to collapse before his tent closed behind him.

Through the haze, Garrik stumbled. Double vision impaired him enough that his hand lurched in slow motion for the chair only to topple it and slam his shoulder into the center wooden pillar.

He panted—choking on agonizing, skin-splitting breaths. Weathering ruthless spikes of pain that were pulsing down his spine and pebbling his skin. Stretching the festering flesh to yield more and more and more of his blood until he could taste the iron in the air.

He deserved it—all of it—not justthispain.

Garrik forced his eyes closed.

He had to feel it. Had to endure it for everything—everythinghe had done.

With wave after wave of searing, rippling agony, Garrik strained to keep himself upright. Somehow he managed to push himself from the pillar, clutching his chest over the normal heartbeat unworthy of pulsing, as step by staggering step, he cursed the High King’s name…

Cursed his own.

Garrik’s trembling palms flattened against the bedside table. His arms nearly buckled the instant his clammy hands and rings scratched the wooden surface, scraping against the galvanized steel of a water basin that had fallen frigid in the night.