Page 134 of Exiled Heir

My face ached, and I sighed against the ground, my breath disturbing the dust. Part of me wanted to fall back asleep, wake up from this nightmare, but the other part of my brain wouldn’t stop turning over what had just happened.

The mages had accused me of magic poisoning. I ran through what I knew, pieces fitting together in a way I didn’t like. Cade had slowly been revealing all the details of how consorts and mages interacted, and after my fight with Tyson, I had an even better idea.

He had been using Sonja’s magic, but it had still been connected to her. If they assumed I was actually Cade’s consort and he was giving the magic, then if I poisoned the magic I had, I could poison him.

The reality was I didn’t have his magic, and I hadn’t poisoned him. Not that anyone would believe me.

Still, I had no explanation for what had just happened. If it wasn’t poisoning, then Cade’s magic had overtaken him. He had finally lost it, the mouse in the maze finally drowning. I tried not to think what it would be like to have that much magic removed at any one time. He had claimed that removing any bit of magic was like cutting off a piece of your body.

What would it be like to wake up and have that much skin, that many limbs, removed? Would his mind even survive?

I barely noticed the magic Sonja had bound me with disappearing. One moment, I was wrapped up as tightly as a body in a carpet before it was dumped into the ocean; the next, my arms were free, and I rolled face-first onto the ground.

I groaned, getting a mouthful of stale dust for my trouble. In the corner of the room, a rat skittered, climbing invisible crevices in the concrete walls until it disappeared into its nest.

Carefully, I pushed myself up to sitting, wrapping my arms around my knees. The position stretched my back oddly, peeling the wounds open further. I should shift into my werewolf form, try to break free of the cell.

But I knew that was impossible. My mother’s ring told me it was impossible. There was no way that she would have submitted, rolled over without fighting, without trying to free herself and my father.

Blindly, I found my way to the wall, tracing until I found the grooves carved by werewolf claws. I placed my own hand in the center, my fingers extended. The thought of her in this dark little room without light left me more defeated than anything else about the situation.

When they killed me, House Bartlett would finally kill the last of my mother’s line. They didn’t even know they were killing the last Castillo heir.

Rubbing my hands on my face, I could feel the grit I was smearing over my cheeks. No. My mother wouldn’t have given up, so I couldn’t either.

My stomach rolled in hunger, and I tried to think of the last time I had eaten. Before my fight with Tyson, before the formal dinner, before everything else.

Pushing myself up onto my knees, I managed to get myself to unsteady feet.

My eyes adjusted to the darkness, but I shifted them anyway, my wolf eyes seeing more keenly without light. I had already searched the cell once before, and I knew there was a weakness in this cell. Reaching up, I began pulling out handfuls of rat nest from the corner of the room where the ceiling met the walls. It smelled foul, and I scrunched my nose.

If I survived, I would worry about infection later. As it was, if they killed me, I wouldn’t need to worry about where to find a super dose of penicillin.

My right arm was useless, the fingers and forearm still broken. Hopefully, it would heal with time, but more than likely, I would need a doctor.

You should have run, Basil said helpfully.

“Thanks, Basil.” I kept digging, hearing the rats skitter away. A brave one nipped at my fingers, but when I grabbed for it, it fled with the rest.

Basil’s words rolled around in my head. Why hadn’t I run when Cade told me to? Why had I stayed when even Cade knew they were going to kill me as soon as they found me?

I slumped, resting my forehead against the cold wall, my chest rising and falling. I never would have stayed with Declan. If Declan had been dying, my own life on the line, I would have run.

Why was Cade any different?

I knew why. Because of the late nights, the darkness, the quiet words we spoke. It was because he saw me for who I was, and even though he had wanted to run when he saw my wolf, he hadn’t.

I still remembered smelling his fingers, the gentle way he stroked my fur.

“I should have run,” I said.

Basil hissed, but it sounded like a chuckle. I guess we both knew it was a lie.

I finally reached the edge of the nest, and my fingers felt the cool air outside. Now I just needed to work until the hole was big enough for me to get through. I reached for the edge, pushing and shoving, then tugging until I got a handful of loose concrete. It scratched and shredded my fingertips, but I kept going.

What would I do if Cade died? If he died, then I was alone again. When had he started taking up so much space in my heart that the thought of him dying actually hurt more than the wounds on my back?

The work was mindless, and I didn’t care that I was destroying my only good arm. I kept going until the hole was large enough for me to fit my entire arm through. Because of the gap I was making, I heard them coming.