Page 20 of Chained to the Horned God

VALOA

T he infirmary stinks of antiseptic and desperation.

That smell—chlorine sharp and stale—hits me when I open the door, followed by the iron tang of blood and sweat that clings to every direction.

I step inside to find more bodies than beds, more tears than water, and curses tucked behind every bandage.

A new group arrives midmorning. They’re fresh—hungry, terrified, terrified to be chosen.

Among them is a girl no older than sixteen, her tears silent but endless, ripped clothing muddy and torn.

This is new meat for the arena. I can’t stop thinking: that was almost me.

The blood races through my head, breath choked, memories of my father’s hand, my father’s teachings.

I kneel beside her slab, face damp, sleeves torn, hands red. I press cool water to the side of her face, thread golden salve into her lacerated cheek, whisper nonsense I hope she hears as more than curses. I tie clean cloth around a deep cut. She flinches. I compress and murmur, “Stay with me.”

Sharonna steps beside me without a word.

She reaches into her belt pouch and slices bread for the girl.

She wipes her tears with the back of her hand.

She doesn’t ask why I’m sweating, grey hair damp and vines of grief in her posture.

She already knows. She holds my shoulders so I don’t collapse under guilt and panic.

Around us, fissures grow in silence. Whispered words slip past wincing jaws. Rebellion. Sabotage. Assassination. The weight of them presses at my throat beneath my scrub-bleached tunic. Every eye in the infirmary shifts from pain to plotting. I grip the edge of the table to stay upright.

Later, I find another scroll slipped under my laundry—hidden with careful folds.

There's no seal again, but I know the handwriting.

One word: Soon. Signed by Beltran. Beneath it, tiny map sketch to a supply corridor, a closed passage where some guards grate before dawn.

It smells like hope—and something much more dangerous.

I fold it back and let it pulse in my palm.

Sharonna offers me a nod when I dry the girl's cheeks. I nod back, wordless solidarity between two women who survive by stitching other people’s trauma shut.

By evening, the girl still breathes. I’m exhausted. But she lives. That mistake almost me—and she lives.

The infirmary doors close. The torches gutter. The whispers grow into plans beneath torchlight and pain.

When I return to our cell, my bones ache more than the wounds I treat. I find Barsok by the gate, fingers tracing the outline of his carved minotaur figure. His shoulders slump. His horns catch the torch flicker.

I step beside him. He doesn’t ask. I don’t tell.

He slings an arm over my shoulders, pulls me into his shadow. Our breath mingles.

I lean into him, letting promise slip beneath bone and knife scars.

Because now I know: we carry the fight in us—ragged, hurt, relentless.

S oon might just be now.

I know the moment Barsok realizes something is wrong. He reaches for me before I even begin—bridging space with intent. We step into the inner cell together, the torchlight casting trembling shadows over stone walls soaked with damp and dread. I feel his breath slow, heavy with caution and trust.

I inhale and speak: “I have to tell you everything.”

His fingers tighten around mine.

So I tell him. About Beltran. About the whispers of assassination and sabotage. About the plan hidden in skirts folded over laundry. About Lotor sharpening kingship with fear and the possibility that tomorrow, they might break Barsok’s body to turn him into a weapon they can no longer control.

He listens. Jaw clenched. Eyes intense. Not scary—just weighty with every battle he’s already fought.

I watch his breathing steady as I unfold the map, trace corridors through memory and rebellion, where soldiers sleep and corridors open with careful bribes.

I hear my voice quiver on the sentence that says escape is possible .

I say it anyway. I add that hope is where power lives—hope in her hands, trembling, steady, tethered.

He nods once—slow, final.

“If we do this,” he says, voice low as worn leather, “we do it right. No wasted lives. No wild flailing.”

My heart thuds. I reach up to cup his cheek. “Agreed,” I say, voice steady. “We do it together.”

He leans forward, brushing his lips to my forehead—the spot where he first kissed in promise, when the world was still bigger than hatred. That kiss feels like a vow. Not to die. To rebuild. To fight bathed in conviction, not vengeance.

When we break that silence, it's not with words. It’s with resolve, heavy and soft, like a blade sheathed but sharpened.

There’s no turning back now. Every moment ahead is irrevocable. Escape isn’t optional—it’s inevitable. We’ve crossed into danger. Smoke charged with revolution. I feel the iron in my veins quiver with purpose.

He pulls me into his arms—for comfort, for oath—for home. His breath rumbles. My hand tucks into the curve of his neck, brushing his scars as promise and prayer.

The world beyond us—the cold corridors, the shifting guards, the royal box cracks open again—feels suddenly smaller, weaker.

We are bigger now.

When I step away, I gather the map. I fold my tunic over it. I lace my fingers in his, thumb pressed to his warm palm. His pulse stills beneath my palm, heavy and real.

I tell him what needs saying. “Tomorrow night. When the bell tolls final. We move.”

He nods.

When we lie down, I feel something stubbing inside me—a word: freedom. Not the impossible fantasy of gardens or whispered names, but the real, brutal fight for breath, blood, body, allies, history.

He holds me until we fall to silence. The cell door remains closed. The allies shift. Whispers grow.

And in the quiet drift, I know—I don’t want to go back to living in this cage anymore.

That night, when the torches gutter low and the corridors hush beneath the final bell, we give up words entirely.

Instead, we make love—slow, patient, unbroken.

There’s no urgency, not like the pit’s demand.

Just two bodies breathing in shared fear, shared conviction.

His hands tremble as they explore soft scars I left on him.

My fingers shake tracing the ridges where steel cut deep.

Under each other's touch, both of us know this might be the last time we stand unbroken in darkness together.

I press kisses to his scars—along his jaw, over the seam in his side where muscle closed back on itself with my stitches. I let each kiss carry gratitude, apology, promise—that I found him beneath legends and rage, that I’ll fight even if tomorrow ends legend or man.

His arms wrap around me like a shield, his fingers tangled at my back. He holds me as if I might vanish if he breathes wrong. The cell is small and bare, but home in its fragile quiet. No banners, no chants, only us pressing breath into silence.

When we drift into sleep, I wake to his heartbeat drumming beneath my cheek. Heavy. Insistent. Alive. Mine echoes inside me the way fire roars against storm.

I curl toes into his side and whisper: “Whatever happens... don’t let go of me.”

His stillness answers before his voice. Then a slow nod against breathless midnight.

“Never.”

We drift back into darkness. No more words. Hearts pulsing war drum rhythms. Outside on the corridor, torches flicker and fade, guards shift overhead. But inside this tangled quiet, we are fierce and human and tethered—broken pieces pressed tight by love.

Some fears don’t evaporate with dawn. They linger in bones. But for tonight, in the scent of lavender oil and warm flesh, in the hollow thunder of breath across ribs, I believe what I whispered: I will not let go.