Chapter 5 5

Narnia's POV

The silence was more unbearable than the screaming.

I crouched in my cell, knees to chest, waiting for the fall of an executioner’s blade. It had been hours since I told Elias the truth. Cause when I did tell him I wasn't nobody. Not Lysandra. Not the Alpha's daughter. Only Narnia, the serving girl who had been so foolish to think her family would find her.

But no one came.

Not the guards armed with their silver chains. Not the priests and their holy fire. Not the executioner, who walked in heavy boots and a heavier blade. Nothing but silence, thick and smothering, crushing my chest until I could hardly breathe.

All the noise inside me had gone quiet. My wolf, Eira. For weeks she had just been a whisper at the corners of my mind; weakened by the iron cage and the silver they branded into me. But now she felt absent — as though the betrayal had injured something deeper than flesh. I tried to reach her as I usually did, seeking the haven of that familiar warmth at te back of my mind, and there was nothing..

I was alone in all respects.

My father’s moonstone pendant hung cold against my chest. I took it from under my ripped dress, and held it in the dimness that filtered into my cell from the grating. The sigil that some long-dead sculptor had etched into its face was faintly luminous, and it throbbed rhythmically as if in tune with a beating heart. I’d never really gotten it until now. My father died before he could tell me, and my uncle eradicated every record of him from the pack's history.

Was my mother truly dead? Or had she deserted me, too, like everyone else?

The idea made my throat close up too. I shut my eyes and pressed the pendant against my forehead, trying hard not to shed tears. Tears were useless here. They changed nothing. They saved no one.

Feet down the hall from my cell. Multiple sets, moving fast. I braced myself for guards, repeated beatings, the end I'd longed for since Elias had walked away. But instead, I heard voices. Sharp excited voices that cut through the stone walls like knives.

“Not even worth ransoming,” one guard snickered. “The king spent two weeks on a servant.”

“Should have killed her the first night,” another responded. “Would have saved us the trouble.”

Their words cut deeper than any sword. I huddled into an even tighter ball, covering my face with my knees. They were right. I was worth nothing. Not to Corvin. Not to Lysandra. Not to anyone.

The cell door slammed open.

My head jerked back up, my heart pounding against my ribs. Lady Vaera stood in the doorway, her auburn tresses no worse for wear even in the shadows, her green eyes alive with rage. Her costume featured silver and scarlet the hues of the Guild, with a leather lash twisted around her right palm.

"You," she hissed, stepping inside. The door slammed closed behind her. "You scheming little vermin."

I got to my feet and leant against the cold stone wall. "I did nothing wrong."

"Nothing wrong?" Vaera shrieked to be heard. "You lied to us. You made the king appear foolish. You wasted his time, and you took away from him what has been freely given to us—all this for what? To prolong your miserable life another few weeks?”

“I never asked to be dragged here,” I snapped, my own temper flaring in the midst of my fear. "I never wanted any of this.”

Vaera went faster than I thought it would. The whip sailed into the air, struck me on one shoulder and ripped deep through my dress. I screamed, staggering sideways, but she was bringing it up again.

"You are nothing," she snarled. "Traitor's spawn. Your father stole the pack from his brother, your mother was a coward who left. You are descended from rot, and you will die in rot.”

The whip came down again. And again. Every one of them felt like molten silver, and I could only curl up on the floor, arms folded over my head, to try to shield myself from as much as possible. Eira stirred faintly within me, a growling of impotent fury, but she had no strength to lend. The iron cage had sapped her too much.

Vaera brought the whip up for another lash, and her face was as full of satisfaction then as it had been wicked now.

"Enough."

The voice was cold and commanding, and it jarred Vaera so hard in her swing she dropped to her knees. A guard stood in the door, his face impassive. “By the king’s orders, my lady. Prisoner is not to be hurt any more. By anyone."

Vaera blanched at first, then turned red from rage. "What?"

"The will of the king," repeated the guard. "She is under his protection."

Vaera turned to him and looked at him for a long moment, her chest heaving. Then she focused those green, venomous eyes on me. “He can’t defend you indefinitely,” she whispered. And when he’s done, I will make you wish for death.”

She flung the whip down at my feet and stormed out of the cell, skirts hissing like a serpent’s. The door slammed shut behind her, and I was alone once more, shivering and bleeding on the cold stone.

I wasn't sure why Elias had issued that command. I could not figure out why he gave a damn whether I lived or died. But I was too smart to trust it. Men like him did not grant mercy for nothing. And no matter what his reason was, it would not be for my good.

Hours passed. The sting of the whip marks changed over and became a dull ache. I was perched against the wall, staring at nothing, completely empty.

Then the door opened again.

This time it was Brother Nyrand. There was a tray with bread, water, and a small cloth package on the young priest’s lap. He didn't say anything, his dark cloak whispering gently as he knelt next to me there on the ground, his face kind.

"Hmm,” he said quietly as he pointed to my shoulder.

I pulled back instinctively. "Why?"

“Because you’re hurt,” he replied, matter-of-factly. He unwrapped the bundle of cloth to show bandages, salve and a small vial that smelled herbal. “And because there is no one who deserves to suffer like this. Not even prisoners."

I didn't know whether to trust him or not, and I lowered my arm. He was careful, washing the cuts off with water before filling them with salve. His hand was so gentle, careful, nothing at all like the heavy touch of a guard or Vaera's cruelty.

"You don't deserve this," he murmured as he rolled the bandages around my shoulder. “Your family did whatever they did; you are not them.”

The tenderness in his voice almost made me unravel. I clenched my teeth and bit on my lip, swallowing back the tears. “You are the first person to say that.”

Nyrand looked up at me, his dark eyes pondering. "Tell me about them. Your family."

“I don't know why I responded. Perhaps because I was tired of bearing the weight on my own. Perhaps because he had been the first person in weeks who had addressed me like a human being and not an animal.” So I told him. About Corvin's hatred. Of the whispers that followed me everywhere. About the pack treating me like an omen, like something diseased. Of my father who was killed when he tried to save me from what I still couldn’t grasp. About my mother, who disappeared when I was too small to remember what she looked like.

“I just want to know who I am,” the woman murmured. "I need to know if my mother is alive. If she ever loved me. If she even thought about me.”

There was a long pause while Nyrand's hands went still over the bandages. Then he nodded slowly. "I will help you," he said. "The Guild has archives. Old records, forbidden texts. If exists any writing on your father or mother I will find."

Hope wavered like a sickly candle in my chest. "Why do you have to say it for me?"

He smiled faintly. "Because everyone has a right to know where they come from.”

He was done with the bandages and rose, collecting his items. I observed him walking towards the door, my heart still panting with that small, perilous drip of hope.

But as he was about to leave, Nyrand hesitated. He turned towards me and looked at me, he gazed intently on my face. Specifically, on my eyes.

"Your eyes," he said slowly. "Those two colors. One gold, one grey. I’ve read about them before. In the Guild's forbidden archives. Advertisement"In old books about the Moonlight Guardians."

My breath caught. "The what?"

“A bloodline,” Nyrand muttered more to himself than the others. Reported to be favored by the Moon Goddess. Wolves of silver, power untold. "But that lineage has been absorbed more than 200 years ago.” He glanced at me again, a curious look in his eyes. "It is impossible. Isn't it?"

Before I could respond, he left.

I sat alone in the dark and my heart beat furiously as the moonstone pendant on its long chain scorched cold against my neck.