When I notice that he said myname first, my heart skips a beat. When given an opportunity to save the both of us, he thought of me first.Me.
One glance at Elison and I can tell she's noticed too.
For what it's worth, she steels herself well against whatever pain his words might’ve caused. She might be focused on the same thing we all are: our freedom.
Just the two of us though? He can’t be serious. We can't just leave everyone else behind. We'd be condemning them all to their brutal deaths.
What about Mira? What of the other prisoners? Or the woman named Fox who is watching everything unfold like a wolf stalking prey in the night. It hasn't gone unnoticed by me that she is acutely aware of the keys in the lock of my cell door, and I think even from where she's locked away behind iron bars, she's plotting how to snag them away from me.
"Interesting," the prince purrs, one hand stroking his smooth chin. "Not your feeble attempt at a proposition after I was already presenting you with a more than generous offer, but that you'd condemn everyone else in this prison for these two women."
The noctis beside him, the one I believe they called Caz the day I was captured, chuckles. "It'll be even more interesting to see what the other prisoners think of him now that he's sacrificed everyone in this dungeon for the sake of saving his women."
Mine isn't the only neck to almost snap.
Malachi, Rowland,Elison, and I all jerk in different directions, my friends and I gawking at Caz while Malachi's inquisitive gaze pins me in place. I don't trust the way he watches me, assessing every movement, every flicker of emotion that crosses my generally impassive expression.
Why? Why is he so interested in figuring me out?
Rowland struggles to regain his composure, his face flushing and his tongue tripping over his every word.
"They're not my—that's not what I—" Exasperated, he scratches at the tight braids, the same ones he used to despise so much when we were children. When they had once irritated him, they serve to calm him now, the braids a symbol for his mother and the comfort she'd once provided him. Calm and collected, Rowland glares up at Malachi, unintimidated by his size, or the sharp fangs glistening from beneath his lip. "They're members of my community and that's where they belong."
"So defensive," Caz utters from the side of his quirked lips to the smirking Devonshire woman who stole Sable.
Despite my keen eye, I don’t spy my crossbow anywhere on her, and my heart sinks. I’m not sure what would be worse, a noctis using her to torture and kill humans or having her abandoned in Gravenburg.
Maybe Rowland found her? That could make sense. Maybe he went searching for me and stumbled upon Sable, discarded in the gutter, and brought her back to his people before setting out to come to our rescue.
If that’s the truth, it’s too bad he didn’t bring her here. I would feel much safer with her at my side once again. Especially considering the sudden turn of events. Some rescue this is shaping out to be.
"We came prepared to fight," Rowland barks, unaffected by Caz’s taunt.
"Sure," the prince says, unconvinced and nodding in mine and Elison's direction. "But did they?"
The answer that rushes to my forethought, armed to the teeth and hungry for blood isfuck yeah, we did.
But as I stare out from my cell at the boy I grew up with, the boy so stupidly heroic and dependable that he broke into a noctis stronghold just to free us, I realize what I say next won’t just impact me, but the one person left in this world that I care about.
For whatever reason, Malachi is giving them a chance to leave here with their lives. I don’t know why, and I’m worried about whatever twisted angle he might be playing, but whatever his reasoning may be, it’s not an offer we can pass on lightly.
The whole room watches me.
If they were in my position, they might make a different choice than the one I’m about to make. Fox likely would've already broken out of this cell and somehow fled the dungeons without anyone noticing. Elison and the bold men, like Lewis, also would waste no time breaking free, but they’d stand to fight, and almost certainly die fighting, deciding that a death down here would be far more merciful than one on the battlefield of the Hunt. There are others, though, like Mira and Dunce, who have become complacent in their capture. I can't imagine them doing anything but freezing until the noctis retrieved the keys themselves, and then they’d spend the rest of their enslavement sobbing in the shadows, much like they’re both doing now.
Then there's me. The person the choice has been left to.
If I try to escape now with every noctis eye upon me, Rowland dies. More than likely, so do we.
Without breaking eye contact with Prince Malachi, I jerk the keys from where they’re wedged awkwardly into the lock in my cell door and toss them at his feet. “There. You have your keys back. We're still trapped in here. Now let them go."
His lip twitches, a half-kick of a smile appearing only for a breath before curiosity returns to his expression. Was that all this was to him? An experiment to see how I’d react?
"Char, don't—"
Rowland starts to make a move for the keys, but Malachi shifts his foot atop them.
Everyone in the dungeon stills. The prince bends to retrieve them.
