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CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

IRENE

I rene crouched in the shadows.

Sitting on the floor, her knees pulled tight to her chest, she rocked her body forward and back. In rhythm with the screams. With the retching. In harmony with the despair saturating the air. Beneath her, the floor was sticky. A thick layer of blood, grime, and salt. She could feel the dampness sinking into her skin, the sour stench of decay, of rotting corpses.

Her hands trembled, not with fear, not with regret, but with anticipation. A slow, ruinous thrill stirred in her chest. It was almost over. Just one left. Only one. And then, she would be free.

But she refused to give in to the frenzy threatening to consume her. Not yet. Not until the last of them had fallen. Not until her jailers had all crumpled like flies.

A shadow stumbled into view.

It was one of them. One of her captors. He staggered like a drunk, but it wasn’t alcohol weighing him down. It was death—the slow rot crawling through his veins. His legs buckled under his own weight, his trembling hand clawing at the slimy walls of the prison for balance. His moans were indistinct, more like death rattles than words.

Then he saw her.

Crouched in the darkness, her bright eyes staring into nothingness, Irene didn’t move. The guard shuffled toward her, dragging his feet across the filth-covered floor. When he reached her, he lifted a finger, pointing accusingly.

“You… you… poisoned us…”

His voice was broken, each word a desperate effort.

Irene tilted her head slightly, like a curious animal. Her eyes shimmered with an eerie pink and blue, casting faint glimmers that sliced through the darkness. A faint smile played across her lips, but she said nothing. Why deny it? She wanted him to know. She wanted him to understand.

The guard’s shaking hand pointed at the floor in front of her. Two bodies lay there, bloated and putrid.

One was a prisoner. The other, one of his fellow guards. Two men who, in death, had been reduced to the same fate.

Equals in decay. The flesh of the dead guard had been carved up neatly. Meticulously. Irene never let anything go to waste.

“You… made us… eat that…” he stammered, his bloodshot eyes rolling in their sockets.

She nodded slowly, her movements almost inhuman. The screams of the other dying guards echoed in the distance. She savoured their moans, the guttural sounds of bodies giving out one by one.

The guard lunged at her, seizing her with brutal force, his hands trembling with rage as he shook her violently.

He was looking for something—an answer, an explanation, some shred of pity. But Irene stayed still. She had learned not to respond. One hundred and twenty-four days. That’s how long it had taken her to master the art of silence. Never snap back. Never protest. Obey their commands. Keep her eyes down.

But now, she looked at them. At all of them. These men. These religious fanatics who had treated her like an animal, who had given her one job: to drag corpses to the mass grave, to dirty her hands so theirs could stay clean.

They had underestimated her.

The guard kept stammering accusations, his words more pitiful than threatening. Irene found it… ironic.

Screaming won’t change anything, she thought.

His lips parted for one last insult, one last cry of accusation. Then he choked. His entire body seized up, like a taut rope suddenly snapping. His fingers froze midair. His lips turned blue. A final gasp escaped his throat.

He collapsed at her feet. Dead.

Irene stared down at him for a moment, motionless, her head tilted slightly to the side. Then she reached out and closed the man’s eyelids with her hand.

Finally.

A dull gong sounded in her chest, a deep, resounding thrum. Liberating. She had won.

Slowly, she rose to her feet, her body caked in grime and sweat. Silence fell over the prison, a heavy, oppressive silence. She was the last. The only one still standing.

She stepped over the bodies littering the floor, her bare feet sinking into the muck and blood. With every step, a single word whispered in her mind: Free.

She walked forward, her eyes locked on the light filtering in at the end. She moved toward it with the measured pace of a hunted animal.

In her head, the voices sang. They danced around her, laughing, screaming. “You made it out. You’re alive. You’re strong.”

Irene smiled faintly.

She reached the exit, her dark silhouette melting into the blinding light. She didn’t look back.

Behind her, no one rose. Because behind her, everyone was dead.

Irene jolted awake.

Her eyes opened to the darkness of her cabin, lit only by the flickering glow of a lantern swaying with the ship’s movements. The Stormbreaker rocked gently, but inside her, a tempest raged. Her breathing was heavy, uneven. She pressed a hand to her chest, as if to steady her racing heart.

The dream was already slipping away, dissolving like sand through her fingers, but its weight lingered. The bitter taste of imprisonment. The dancing shadows of her dead jailers. Distant screams. It all resurfaced.

She stared at the ceiling, her gaze hollow. The voices in her head had finally gone quiet. The ache in her skull had faded, too—but the silence felt almost worse.

She remembered collapsing onto her bed after the attack. Her body had carried her to her cabin, but her mind hadn’t followed. She had crossed the deck like a ghost, blind to everything around her, her vision blurred, her thoughts emptied. She barely recalled barking orders to the crew, shouting at them to set course for the cursed island of Nehalennia.

Her hand brushed her forehead as fragments of memory returned: Zahra, outraged, telling her it was a mistake, that they couldn’t proceed without deciphering the entire prophecy. But Irene had dismissed her protests. What did it matter? What could possibly be worse than what they’d already endured?

Irene closed her eyes. When had it all gone wrong? When had she lost control? When had everything slipped through her fingers?

A sound pulled her from her thoughts. Sobbing. Faint, muffled, but unmistakable.

Irene sat up, her gaze snapping to the corner of the cabin. That’s when she saw Jace. He was curled on the floor, his knees pulled tightly to his chest. His shoulders shook as he tried to stifle his cries, but the tears flowed freely, catching the lantern’s light and tracing shimmering paths down his cheeks.

An odd feeling stirred within her—discomfort first, then guilt. How had she been so blind? She hadn’t even noticed him, not before collapsing into sleep, nor when she’d woken up. She had kidnapped this boy. Reduced him to a hostage. Yet in that moment, he looked like neither prince nor prisoner, just a boy drowning in his own tears.

Irene stood. Her body ached in protest, but she ignored it. She approached him and crouched to his level. “Jace?” she murmured.

He didn’t respond, his hands trembling, clutching the fabric of his trousers like a lifeline. Gently, she placed a hand on his shoulder.

He flinched violently, his eyes wide with fear. “Don’t hit me!” he screamed, his voice fractured and trembling, as though some nightmare still had its claws in him.

Irene recoiled, pulling her hand back as though burned. She froze. “Jace… it’s me. Irene,” she whispered, her voice soft and uncertain.

But he shook his head frantically, murmuring broken words between his sobs. “They… they came. The soldiers. The soldiers came, and… they beat me.”

He raised a trembling hand, lightly striking his own head, as if trying to knock the memories loose.

Irene frowned, her chest tightening. No Eldorian soldier would dare strike their prince. It was impossible.

“It was them… but it wasn’t them,” he stammered, his gaze distant and unfocused. “They wore their golden armor, but… their eyes. Their eyes were so dark. They didn’t recognize me.” He gasped. “They beat me. I thought… I thought I was going to die.”

A dull ache bloomed in Irene’s chest. Slowly, she reached out, cupping his chin to tilt his face toward her. Her eyes moved over his tear-streaked cheeks, the dark hollows beneath his eyes, and the bruises marring his tender skin.

A quiet sigh slipped from her lips. “It’s over now,” she murmured.

Her fingers brushed his cheek, hesitating. She felt a strange urgency, a need she didn’t understand. She wanted to save him. She didn’t know why. Maybe it was to quiet the chaos within herself. Maybe it was to atone for a sin she couldn’t name. Or maybe it was because Jace was the only living thing in her world that didn’t yet look at her like she was a monster.

She took his trembling hand in hers. He didn’t pull away. “Come,” she said softly.

She helped him to his feet. For a moment, he leaned into her. Not like a prisoner leaning on his captor. Not like a prince leaning on a pirate. But like two lost souls, searching for an anchor in one another.

Irene’s gaze dropped to Jace’s tattered shirt, the shredded fabric hanging loosely over his shoulders. She took a shaky breath, trying not to focus on the hollows in his face or the faint tremor in his hands.

“We’ll get you changed… all right?” she whispered.

Jace blinked but didn’t respond, as though his mind and flesh had drifted apart. Irene turned away, searching through a pile of clothes. She pulled out a white shirt, probably a crew member’s, and held it out to him.

“Here.” Jace took it, but his hands trembled so much he couldn’t grip the fabric properly.

Irene hesitated. Her fingers twitched before she stepped closer, her movements slow. Standing before him, she reached for the frayed strings of his shirt. Slowly, she untied them.

“You can change now,” she murmured.

Jace gave a small nod, then turned his back to her. He grabbed the hem of his shirt, pulling it over his head with clumsy, uneven movements.

Irene froze. Her breath hitched.

Her eyes widened, and her hand flew to her mouth. She couldn’t move, couldn’t look away.

His back. Jace’s back wasn’t just scarred, it was ruined.

Long, brutal scars covered every inch of his skin, some clean and precise, others jagged. His flesh bore the weight of agony. Not an inch had been spared. These weren’t fresh wounds. No, they had been left to split, to fester, to burn, and then to heal. But healing didn’t mean they had faded. They were etched so deeply they felt woven into him.

Her heart pounded with a silent rage.

What kind of monster could have done this to him?

She raised a hand, hesitated, then pressed her palm to his back. His muscles tensed beneath her touch, rolling with each uneven breath. Warm, scarred skin met cold fingers, and she felt him shiver under her touch.

He inhaled sharply. A tremor ran through him.

Irene’s fingers traced one of the deepest scars, following its jagged path, then a smaller one dipping toward his waist. His skin twitched under her touch, his breath hitching.

“Jace…what have they done to you?”” she whispered, her voice thick with sorrow and disbelief.

Jace turned his head to the side, refusing to look at her, as if ashamed, bracing for mockery. Her fingers softly traced his jaw, then his cheek. Slowly, he met her gaze. Something fragile flickered in his eyes.

Irene’s mind burned. She knew the world was cruel. She knew children were beaten, abandoned, broken—she had been one of them. But Jace… Jace came from the Hive, that gilded heaven where everything was supposed to be perfect. She had believed, foolishly, that behind those golden walls, people were safe.

"Your scars…" she whispered.

"You can see them?" he asked, the pain evident in his voice.

"Who did this to you?" she asked, tears welling in her eyes.

Jace didn’t answer. His legs gave out, his body crumpling against her, his chest colliding with hers.

He sobbed, raw and unrestrained. “You can see them…” he choked out. He repeated the words, again and again, as if trying to convince himself, as if he couldn’t quite believe it.

Irene, her heart heavy, wrapped an arm around him, pulling him closer. His bare skin against hers was warm, damp, charged with pain. Her fingers brushed against his neck. “He… he said I was crazy,” Jace stammered, his head buried against her neck. “He said it was all in my mind. That… that I was making it up.”

"Who said that?" Irene pressed.

"Him… my fath— the king," he whispered.

Suddenly, everything clicked.

A bitter taste rose in her throat like bile.

The scars. They weren’t just wounds. They were evidence of something darker—something insidious.

It all came together.

The key to the sapphire. It wasn’t just Jace. It was his blood.

The usurper had drained his own son, feeding his insatiable hunger for power.

Rage coiled around Irene’s heart, tightening like a noose.

Jace clung to her tighter, his voice still shaking. “I thought… I thought they were demons in my head. That… that I was insane.”

He sobbed into her shoulder, and a wave of sorrow and fury hit Irene so hard she had to close her eyes to keep from screaming.

Then, softly, she pulled back just enough to see his face. She wiped his tears. Jace looked up at her, still crying, but with a glimmer of relief. Irene took his hand in hers, her grip firm.

“Come,” she whispered.

She guided him to the bed, every step slow, deliberate. Once they reached the edge, she helped him lie down. She sat beside him, watching him, unable to look away.

Jace’s trembling gradually stilled. His breathing evened out, and Irene, without thinking, reached for him again. Her fingers traced the veins along his arms, as if following the path of that cursed blood that had caused so much destruction.

He didn’t stop her, his eyes half-closed, exhaustion pulling at him.

Eventually, she lay beside him. They faced each other, close enough that she could feel his breath warm against her cheek. The silence between them was heavy, but not suffocating. It was filled with everything they weren’t saying, everything they couldn’t yet face.

Irene reached out, her fingers brushing through his blond hair, tangling gently in the soft strands. A strange warmth rose in her cheeks.

“Your demons…” she murmured, breaking the silence. “They can be friends with mine.”

Jace’s lashes fluttered as he looked at her. His blue eyes, fractured, haunted, flickered with something new. Acceptance. They stared at each other, their foreheads almost pressed.

And then, as though her words had stitched together a kind of peace he’d never known, he let his eyes drift closed. His breathing slowed, deepened. He fell asleep.

Irene didn’t move, her gaze fixed on his face. He was so fragile, so beautiful, and yet so utterly destroyed. Gently, she kept running her fingers through his hair, unable to stop herself.

Time passed. The ship swayed gently, the silence broken only by the rhythmic crash of waves against the hull.

She wanted to save him. But how could she, when she was the very thing he needed saving from?