Page 8 of Bought by the Broken Beast
VOTOI
L yra leaves, taking her storm of anger and grief with her, but the truths she delivered remain, poisoning the air in the small, dusty room.
The Zusvak is dying. Not of age, not of sickness, but by a traitor’s hand.
A slow, methodical assassination unfolds in the center of the kingdom, and we are the only ones who know.
The knowledge is a pressure in my chest that mimics the phantom sensation of the executioner’s hood.
As a Vakkak, my life, my honor, my very soul, is sworn to the defense of the throne.
It is the first vow a Saru male takes, the words branded onto our hearts before we are old enough to wield a blade.
And I fail. While I rot in the arena, consumed by my own shame, the kingdom I am sworn to protect bleeds from within.
Malacc has not only stolen my name; he uses my disgrace as a smokescreen to orchestrate the downfall of a king.
The rage that follows is a cold, clean fire, burning away the last vestiges of my self-pity. My own suffering is a trivial thing compared to this. My honor is not a title to be reclaimed, but a duty to be fulfilled.
I turn from the door, my gaze falling on the human.
Bella. She sits on the floor, methodically breaking the loaf of bread Lyra left into two equal portions.
Her movements are precise, efficient, her expression a mask of calm concentration, as if she is merely balancing another ledger.
She does not seem to understand the gravity of what we have just learned.
Or perhaps, I realize with a jolt, she understands it so completely that this is the only way she can process it: by imposing order on the chaos, one small, deliberate act at a time.
“The ledger page you took from Kairen’s study,” I say, voice a low rumble in the quiet room. “I must see it again.”
She looks up, her dark eyes sharp, questioning. She does not speak, but her gaze is clear: Why?
“The lies that condemned me,” I explain, the words tasting like dirt in my mouth. “They are connected to the lies that now threaten the King. I feel it. A serpent uses the same venom for all its prey.”
She gives a slow, deliberate nod, her analytical mind accepting the logic of my instinct.
She reaches into her bodice and produces the folded, slightly crumpled piece of parchment.
She does not hand it to me. Instead, she holds it, waiting.
The power dynamic, subtle but undeniable, has shifted once more.
I need her skill, her ability to decipher the script that is, to me, little more than meaningless squiggles.
“Tell me of your trial,” she says, the sound of her voice soft but firm. It is not a request. It is a demand for information, for context. “Tell me of the evidence Malacc used against you. I cannot find a pattern if I do not know the shape of the original weave.”
Speaking of it is reliving it. To tear open a wound that has never truly healed. I look away from her, my gaze fixing on the grimy window, on the sliver of dirty sky beyond.
“There was a trade delegation from the Yacarres Isles,” I begin, my voice a low, gravelly thing.
“I was tasked with overseeing the security arrangements. It was a routine assignment.” The memory is a vivid, painful thing.
The grand halls of the Senate, the scent of sea salt and expensive wine, the feeling of my ceremonial armor, heavy and reassuring on my shoulders.
The feeling of being Votoi Saru, a Minotaur of purpose and honor.
“Malacc was the lead negotiator. He praised my diligence. He called me a credit to my house, a true son of the Vakkak.” The memory of his charismatic smile, the false sincerity in his eyes, is a fresh betrayal. “He used my trust, my honor, as a weapon against me.”
I pace the small room, the floorboards groaning under my weight.
“The evidence was… perfect. Shipping manifests, signed with a flawless forgery of my own seal, detailing a secret agreement to trade Minotaur steel for forbidden Dark Elf artifacts. A crime so heinous, so unthinkable, that no one would dare question it.” I stop, my fist clenching at my side.
“There were letters, written in my own hand—or a perfect imitation of it—implicating my father, my entire house. He threatened to release them if I did not confess. To spare them the shame, I chose the arena.”
My voice drops, becoming a raw, ragged thing.
“But it was not enough for him. My father, a proud man who sat on the Zu Kus for fifty years, refused to be silent. He began his own investigation, using his influence to ask questions Malacc did not want answered. A month later, he was dead. A hunting ‘accident.’ A convenient tragedy that no one dared to question.”
I turn to face her, letting her see the raw agony in my eyes.
“Now, my mother is a prisoner in her own home, our name is dust, and Malacc’s watchdogs circle our estate like vultures.
He has not moved to extinguish my line completely, not yet.
To eliminate an entire Vakkak house, especially one as old as Saru, would be an act of open rebellion.
The Zusvak, even weakened, would be forced to act.
So Malacc waits. He waits for the King to die, for the last of my family’s protection to vanish.
I did not just lose my honor, human. I lost everything. ”
The silence is heavy with the weight of my confession. I have never spoken of this to anyone. Not to Lyra. Not to the few arena fighters who have shown me a measure of respect. To speak of it is to give it a reality I cannot bear.
“The manifests,” Bella says, her voice a gentle, prodding thing, pulling me back from the edge of the abyss. “What did they detail? What were the shipping routes?”
I close my eyes, forcing the images to the forefront of my mind. The trial. The prosecutor, one of Malacc’s cronies, holding up the forged documents for the entire Zu Kus to see. My father’s face, a mask of stone, betraying nothing of the agony I know is tearing him apart inside.
“They were complex,” I recount, the words a bitter litany.
“A series of small, untracked vessels. They were to leave from the western docks, bypass the main shipping lanes, and rendezvous with a Dark Elf corsair near the Serpent’s Sea.
The routes were… specific. They mentioned a series of coastal landmarks.
The Widow’s Peak. The Sunken Temple of Zukiev. The Eastern Watchtower.”
I open my eyes. Bella is staring at the ledger page in her hand, her brow furrowed in concentration.
“Read it,” I command, my voice rough. “Read the routes listed on that page. Aloud.”
She begins to read, her voice a clear, steady counterpoint to the storm of memory raging within me. “‘Cargo to be transferred from the vessel Sea Serpent at the western docks, to be moved overland via the Old Coast Road…’”
The words are different, yet… familiar.
“‘…past the aqueduct checkpoint at dusk,’” she continues, her finger tracing the script. “‘…then through the northern merchant gate, to be held at the warehouse district until the first bell of the festival.’”
I stand frozen, the world narrowing to the sound of her voice.
I am no longer in the dusty room. I am back in the war room of the Vakkak Citadel, studying the massive, detailed map of the capital that covers an entire wall.
I am a young warrior, my father’s hand on my shoulder, his deep voice explaining the intricacies of the city’s defenses.
“The honor guard is the King’s lifeblood, Votoi,” he had said, his finger tracing a path on the map. “Their patrol routes are the arteries that protect the heart of the kingdom. To know them is to know how to defend them.”
The aqueduct checkpoint at dusk. The northern merchant gate. The warehouse district.
They are not just locations. They are waypoints. Checkpoints on a patrol route.
My breath hitches. The pieces of the puzzle, separated by years of shame and a web of intricate lies, slam together with the painful force of a physical blow. The room tilts, the floor seeming to fall away beneath me.
Malacc did not just frame me. He used my disgrace as a cover for something far more sinister. He tested his plan, running a drill, using the forged documents of my downfall as a dry run for his true purpose.
The human, Bella, stops reading, her head tilted, her sharp eyes sensing the sudden, violent shift in my demeanor. “Votoi? What is it?”
I look at her, but I do not truly see her. I see a map of betrayal, drawn in my own blood. I see the horrifying, brilliant, and utterly dishonorable perfection of Malacc’s plan.
“Those aren’t just random routes,” I realize, the words a low, horrified rumble that seems to come from the very depths of my soul. “That’s the patrol path for the King’s honor guard. He wasn’t framing me for a trade deal. He was mapping the assassination.”