leg throbbing. He walked from the dungeon as my eyes flickered around. The guards stationed there simply looked the other way as we emerged into the familiar darkened hallway.
I didn’t speak as he walked us up the endless staircase. The staircase that had winded me until I was gasping didn’t even raise his heartbeat. I could feel its steady, strong rhythm against my arm, whereas mine was fluttering like a caged beast’s.
Instead of heading towards the throne room when we made it to the first landing, he continued up the staircase, rising, rising. We emerged on the next story of the keep, a lavish, carpeted hallway appearing when he exited left.
When we passed an open door, I saw there were rooms, private quarters. When we passed a closed door, I heard a moan echoing behind it and then the sound of skin against skin. Rhythmic sounds, animalistic groans followed.
Realization hit me.
My breaths came out quicker as panic took hold. Just like last night, I came to the conclusion that the Vorakkar could do whatever he wished with me and I would be powerless against him. I knew my own strength. I hated how weak my body was. And I’d felt his desire pressed against my belly last night.
The Vorakkar walked to the end of the hallway and nudged opened the last door on the right. Once he crossed the threshold of the room, he kicked the door shut with his booted foot and it slammed against the frame, the loud sound making me jolt.
“Skittish kalles,” he murmured, his voice soft. “When you were so brave before.”
Surprise whistled from my throat, a pathetic breathy noise.
“Brave?” I whispered.
“What else frightens you, I wonder?” he asked next. I gasped when he set me down on a raised bed. A padded bed, like a cushion. It gave a little under my weight. His hand came to my hair. Tingles exploded across my scalp, running down my spine when he stroked his hand through the long strands.
I pulled away, leaning back, casting my eyes around the room wildly, looking for something. Anything.
It was a spacious, comfortable room with lavish adornments, including the padded bed. The floor was carpeted with the softest rugs and tapestries. There was a golden basin in the corner, a fire crackling within it, warming my bones. I watched the flames dance for a brief moment before continuing my scan. A low table was in front of it, two cushions on the ground on either side. The table was filled with platters of food, but my eyes caught on a golden goblet, on the liquid glimmering inside.
There was a travel sack stuffed in the corner of the room and an open wardrobe next to it, filled with furs.
“Looking for a weapon, leikavi?” he asked, his tone almost amused.
The horde king stepped away from me, shedding the furs that stretched across his broad shoulders. When he turned to throw them over a rack by the door, I sucked in a sharp breath, my eyes widening at the sea of scars decorating his back.
He still wore criss-crossing straps across his chest, making an ‘X,’ and I saw two daggers strapped within them at his back. But he wore nothing underneath, allowing me the full visual of the wreckage of his skin.
I recognized the patterns to know he’d been whipped. Endlessly. The scar tissue was thick. The wounds had healed poorly, raised up from his flesh, winding all the way from the tops of his shoulders down to his trews, to where his tail protruded from them.
Was this the source of the darkness, of the pain and anger I’d sensed within him? It had to be. How could one endure this level of violence and malice without losing a little bit of their mind?
“Pretty, are they not?” he rasped and when my eyes met his, he gave me a dark grin, revealing sharpened teeth. The scar on his face was cast into shadow from the flickering fire but I knew it was there, only adding to the fearsome image.
I’d been right. He was insane.
“Why…why am I here?” I asked, my eyes snagging on the daggers sheathed into the straps on his ravaged back. I remembered when Maxen had tried to teach me how to wield a knife but I’d forgotten much of what he’d said.
He pulled the daggers from their places. The blades were gold, sparking reflections on the stone walls, and he placed them into a chest and locked it, slipping the key into