Page 21 of The Curse of Gods (The Curse of Saints #3)

The cold bite of the iron table should have been a relief—a soothing balm to the white hot agony that radiated through Aya, carving a wound so deep, she was sure it would never heal.

But instead, the chill seeped into Aya’s bones, the unforgiving surface stinging the skin of her arms and legs as she thrashed within the confines of the chains that kept her pinned.

The woman’s hands were rough on her shoulders, her nails digging crescent moons into her flesh as she tilted her head back and grinned at the chorus of Aya’s screams.

It was a wonder Aya had any voice left at all.

How many had come to her today?

Three?

Four?

They’d once again dragged Aya from her cell with no windows and no light and no company save for her own raging thoughts and the screams of the prisoners—the humans—they were imparting power to.

They chained her here, another cell with an iron table and a single window that let in the sun. It was the only time she caught a glimpse of light, and while it had been a relief that first day they’d brought her here, she’d quickly learned that the light meant pain.

The darkness of her cell was better—safer. Even with the agonized begging she could hear seeping through her cell walls. She wondered if they tortured them near her on purpose.

When would they run out of humans to toy with? It had to be soon, didn’t it?

She had no way to know how much time had passed, nor how much stretched between her dark cell and the days when they’d drag her into the sunlit room and subject her to a pain worse than any she’d known before.

She tried to keep track of those, at least.

The first, where Aya had tried to hold in her screams. She’d caved before the first Diaforaté had finished with her.

The second, where Evie ordered they stop after three, lest Aya be overwhelmed too quickly. “She is, in some ways, still an ordinary Visya,” Evie had murmured to the king, who had come to watch the proceedings. “We must give time for power to replenish.”

The third, where the Anima healer who served as Aya’s guard stood in the corner to monitor her vitals had laid a reassuring hand on a young woman’s shoulder and said, “Don’t worry, dear.

It is not like stealing the power of another Visya.

You will not suffer the same effects of the Diaforaté of old.

Besides, you are starting with a single affinity rather than raw power. ”

It was Aya’s only indication that the woman was not a Diaforaté who was trying to heal the side effects of their stolen power. Not yet at least. Once she took Aya’s power…well, Aya did not know what she would be then.

She wondered what that meant for Gregor’s experiments.

Had her power eased the Diaforaté’s suffering, and so now they were moving on to ordinary Visya?

Or was this merely another step in the king’s studies—to see if Aya’s power could create something raw and painless to its host from the very beginning?

Either way, they were careful not to let her die. The Anima guard tended to her in her dark cell. Their precaution had taught Aya not to waste her time wishing for death. Now, she simply longed for the moment that her power would be drained entirely.

Make me soulless , she begged in the trappings of her mind. I do not care.

Because Aya…Aya had known pain.

She’d taken a knife to the chest. Had suffered the loss of her mother. Had thought the love of her life had died. Had learned her bonded had been burned alive. Had watched as her best friend’s neck was snapped by the woman Aya thought would save them all.

Aya had known pain.

None if it scratched the surface of what this entailed.

The woman standing above her now tightened her grip on Aya’s shoulders. Aya’s back arched, another keening scream ripping from her as the woman’s affinity scraped at her insides, the sharpest of nails, ripping and tearing and wrenching at the very essence of her.

She had tried, in those first few days, to lose herself inside the confines of her mind. She’d summoned memories of Tova, of her father, of Will. She’d clung to the dips of his voice as it curled around words like I love you , and mi couera , and fight with me .

Fight with me.

Fight with me.

She did not think she could fight for much longer.

Il sy parigatin sto li mortera, ati li Diavni se promani li Péla.

There is consolation in death, for the Divine shepherd you to the Beyond.

The words rose to Aya’s mind unbidden as she tugged against her restraints. Her back slammed into the cold, hard surface as the woman laughed, and laughed, and laughed.

She released her hold on Aya, her power vanishing with her touch. But still, the pain remained.

The pain, and something worse. Something hollow and cold and furious and…

Broken.

Broken beyond repair.

Il sy parigatin sto li mortera, ati li Diavni se promani li Péla.

There is consolation in death, for the Divine shepherd you to the Beyond.

Aya had never found consolation in death.

But now…now there was no peace to be found in the thought of her gods at all.