She trembled, blinking at their stumped heads, at the bruises beneath the blood lathering their chests, at the pools of it on the base of the spikes. And then her attention skittered down to the horrified, pained expressions etched on their faces. Mouth agape, bulging eyes, and broken teeth.
She didn’t know these men, she didn’t?—
But then shedidrecognize one of them.
A cold jolt ran through her and she squinted at the man in the middle. He was her guard. Chao, the one who had pleasured himself to her while she slept. She turned to the other two and recognized them as the two guards from that day who had dismissed her concerns.
“You never told anyone,” Nikator whispered into her ear, making her flinch. She didn’t dare turn to look at him; she couldn’t meet his gaze, terrified at what she might find. His breath was warm against her ear. “When I was interrogating your guards, imagine my surprise when I found out they had been scheming, for months, to—how should I say this in a way to not horrify you? To …tasteyou. Willing, or not.”
She couldn’t stop quivering.
“They were waiting until their patrolling schedule aligned perfectly,” he continued. Her vision tunneled until she could see only those three corpses and hear only his voice. “It would have been next week when they all would be on your floor, without other guards present in the area. When I pulled those thoughts from their minds, do you know what they said next? Each of them? They asked if I wanted to join in.” He snarled the last part with disgust. “Not only do you have incompetent menguardingyou, Princess Biyu, but you have virtually no protection against anyone here.”
Biyu wanted to throw up. She wanted to faint. She wanted to be anywhere but here.
“They’ve grown bold ever since …”
Ever since Feiyu disappeared.
He stared at her, as if daring her to finish the sentence. But she couldn’t. She didn’t want to admit that the only friend, or ally, she had in the palace—minus the recent alliance with Yat-sen—had died cruelly at the hands of the emperor, and hisdisappearance, or death as she suspected, had been brushed under the rug like he had never existed. She didn’t want to admit that it was his status that had kept her safe all these years.
“Take me away from here,” she whispered. “Please.”
She could feel him watching her, but she kept her attention averted. A tremor ran down her spine and she gripped her elbows to her body tightly, hoping she could disappear into herself. A whimper escaped from her lips and she finally squeezed her eyes shut. It was hard to breathe now, her breaths coming in shallow rasps, and her chest constricting painfully.
These men had been planning on …
Biyu couldn’t take it any longer. She couldn’t be here. She couldn’t?—
Nikator grabbed her hand and tugged her away; she scrambled after him as they left the groups of horrified and intrigued spectators—none of whom seemed to be paying attention to them. She wondered briefly if any of these people knew that it was Nikator who had carved their bodies, severed their heads, and impaled them for all to see. Without their uniforms, without their clothes at all; as if they were undeserving of that.
Her thoughts frantically switched from one question to the next—why had they been planning something like this for her, had Nikator used magic to interrogate them, would Chao have done something to her that day when she ran out of her room? Their mutilated bodies wouldn’t escape her mind, even as she tried to purge the imagery completely.
They kept walking and it took her a moment to realize they weren’t going straight to her room. Her steps slowed and she took in the unfamiliar halls, the pillars that were deep-red and likely appeared black in dim lighting, and how the insignia of the Drakkon dynasty, a dragon, was more apparent here. Her heart was stuck in her throat as the realizations struck her—they weredrawing close to the inner palace. The emperor, his inner circle, and those closest to him resided here. This was also where most of the palace business, the war meetings, and the governance of the empire happened.
He was planning on handing her over to the emperor. He was going to tell him that she was involved in something suspicious.
Nikator paused at one of the doors and glanced at her sharply. Her breath caught in her throat and she stared at the handle, which he wrapped his blood-speckled fingers around. The emperor must have been in there.
9
For a moment,they both stood there. Biyu stared down at her hand, still nestled in his blood-spotted one. It was a reminder of what he had done to those men, and a chill crept down her spine. The same would happen to her right now, wouldn’t it?
But even with her doom looming in front of her, her attention was drawn to how warm his fingers were, wrapped in hers. How large his calloused hand was.
“Let me go,” she whispered.
He released her as if he had forgotten he was even touching her. An unreadable look passed over his face—so fast she almost missed it—and he turned back to the door. She cradled her hand to her chest. It wasn’t too late to run, but she would most certainly be caught before she could make it to the end of the hallway.
Nikator didn’t even bother to knock or make his presence aware, just yanked the door open and waved her inside. She hesitated at the threshold, her lungs seizing. He truly expected her to walk straight to her death? She quickly glanced over her shoulder; the hallways were long and bustling with guards in imperial armor, government officials with their fluttering robes,and maidservants carrying food, laundry, cleaning supplies. She wished she could disappear somewhere there.
Nikator made an impatient throaty sound. “You’re not going to be able to outrun me, so don’t even try thinking about it.”
“What about last night?” she countered without thinking.
“I let you run until it wasn’t safe anymore.”
Biyu scoffed. As if he cared for her safety.
