Page 44 of The Crimson Throne (Spy and Guardian #1)

Samson

I’m underwater, all the world gone muffled and distant and dulled.

Men haul me from the great room. I feel bruises from the rope, from their fingers; I feel pain from being kicked in the stomach, and I think I taste iron. But it’s all obsolete.

There was blood on Alyth’s chest.

The water I’m under fills my lungs. Inch by inch, it rises, saturating my body. That’s what I feel. Not pain, not horror, not guilt.

Drowning.

I’m drowning.

Voices speak, and I’m outside.

“…orders to throw him in a cell—”

“He will be dealt with.”

“But, sir—”

“He will be dealt with. You question us?”

A crack—a fist, maybe? A strike. Then the jingle of coins hitting the ground.

“For your silence.”

I’m limp, choking on each breath, fighting to stop breathing entirely.

I want it to take me. The water. The crushing weight of it.

But I’m so aware of my heart thumping heavily in my chest, and it just goes on and on, taunting me.

Why’d I have to wake up? Why couldn’t this time have been the one when the blackout just took me permanently?

My ropes are removed, and before I can complain about that—don’t release me, don’t let me free—I’m tossed into someplace dark. A cell, likely. But I still smell the outside, so we’re not back in the castle, and it rocks a bit—a wagon?

The coins. The argument. It was Darnley.

Two benches sit opposite each other on either side of where I crouch on the floor, the whole interior done up in something that shimmers in the dull moonlight. Silk? Velvet? A carriage.

I’m thinking all this, but everything’s still numb. Just filling lungs. Crushing weight.

I stabbed Alyth.

I tried to kill her.

And worse, worse than everything—I remember it.

I never remembered other blackouts. Because they weren’t against anyone I cared for? Because they happened so quick?

Because this one was forced on me under Darnley’s controlling spell?

I remember wanting Alyth’s blood like it was the cure for all ails.

I wanted to flay her rib cage and stand drenched in her life force and soar.

The visions I had of what I’d do to her are so visceral, I might as well have done it.

They’re living images, thoughts that race across my head and back again with sights, sounds, smells—

She was right. About me, about everything. She was right not to trust me. She was right to try to kill me.

She was right.

I don’t move on the floor of the carriage. I stay perfectly still and will myself to go under fully.

After a while—hours? minutes?—a door opens and shuts, and the frame rocks again. Horses whinny, and then the wagon’s in motion, moving forward.

A boot nudges me. “You’re awake.” Darnley. It isn’t a question.

It’s nearly total blackness, with hazy moonlight illuminating the space. I shift upright, still on the floor, and just barely make out Darnley’s scowl before pain explodes in my cheek.

Instinct has me lifting my hand, in defense or attack, I don’t know—but Darnley’s quick to start reciting that spell I both can’t understand and hear too much, the one that makes pain lance through my head and pushes me toward a subservient blackout.

“You obey us,” he reminds me with a snarl. “You cannot turn on us, you useless piece of shit.”

Another blow, his fist cracking hard across my cheekbone, and I just take it.

“You had one task.” His knuckles slam into the side of my head where I’m hunched down, barely shielding myself.

“You had one measly task. Kill the Leth guardian. That was all. How damn hard is it to put a dagger in her chest?” Another punch.

This one catches the side of my throat, and I wheeze involuntarily. “Worthless—goddamn disgrace—”

Each word is matched with a punch, and I’m curled fully in on myself, but I don’t fight back. I’ve got nothing left. No reaction, no feelings, no thoughts.

Monsters don’t have those things, do they? They don’t deserve them.

I’m shutting down. Breath by breath, heartbeat by heartbeat, my whole body’s failing, and I ache all over, but the internal is far worse than whatever Darnley’s taking out on my external.

When his rage is sated, he sinks back against the carriage seat, breathing hard. “Once the dust settles, you will correct this error. You’ll kill the queen’s lapdog.”

“No.” It warbles out of me. Blooms and bursts from somewhere within the rubble.

My whole mouth is nothing but the sour tang of blood now, one eye swelling, jaw and chin aching and raw.

Darnley kicks me in the side, and I cry out. Blood fills my mouth, and I spit it on the floor of this pristine carriage, coming down on my hands and waiting there like his own lapdog.

“You will kill her,” Darnley repeats. Something sloshes; he’s drinking, of course. “You serve us. You are ours. This isn’t over. This isn’t over until that bitch is dead.”

“No,” I say again. It’s barely a sound, just a movement of my lips.

But my refusal doesn’t matter, does it? I’d refused before Darnley’s spell took hold of me, and I still went after her on his orders.

I huddle there, aching inside and out, my only solace in knowing Alyth’s bound to her word. I’ve proven myself a danger now.

Next time she faces me, she’ll stop me.

But that relief is so short-lived, it doesn’t register. Because she’ll be alone again, won’t she? I offered her help, and that help vanished just as quick as my relief. Those moments we had, her actually smiling, some of that weight lifting from her shoulders—it’s all gone now.

I sway with the rock of the wagon, the stench of blood and Darnley’s wine tart in the darkness. The windows are open, and a breeze gusts in, briefly countering the smells with the tang of winter cold, the earthy musk of packed dirt, the crispness of dried leaves.

I see us on the moors, camping when we first met.

I see us at Mary’s ball, dancing under the glittering magic lights.

I see us in the goblin market, my lips on hers.

It should be that easy. It should be that right .

She deserves that.

I’m sorry. I don’t even mouth the words, not wanting Darnley to think they’re at all for him. I just force them out in my head, will them to somehow permeate the ether to her.

I’m so sorry, Alyth.