The warm blankets brushing against her skin set Kealie on edge. The fibers were soft and gentle, stitched together like a quilt with plush pockets to hold in her body heat.

Dry.

She opened her eyes slowly, looking around at the unfamiliar stone walls.

Kealie's eyes burned as she focused on the tall shadow pacing back and forth, a disheveled Nerydian with burn marks lining his neck.

Kealie wondered how painful that had been. With electricity held to his jugular while they cooked his skin. Then threw them into this dark room and wiped themselves clean of this mess.

He was caged, a trapped animal waiting to lash out.

Her eyes tracked him as he stalked the length of the wall, pivoting every time he reached the corner of the door frame.

Nixian hadn't noticed she'd woken up yet, so lost in thought that his whispers to himself sounded foreign. As if they were in another language.

Taking in the rest of her surroundings, Kealie ached as she sat up in a strange cot. There was another lining the adjacent wall, but beyond that the room was empty.

Steel and magic reinforced the metal door frame. She could see the sheen of light glossing over every now and then when the flamelight flickered.

The world moved around in swaying stripes of color as Kealie focused even harder. Her head and neck throbbed, a strange pit in her stomach felt squeezed dry and empty.

The Nerydian stopped instantly when he saw her sitting up. He stared at her, searching her for injuries just as he did when pulling her from the water days ago.

Days.

Kealie swallowed hard when she realized she didn't know just how long she'd been unconscious.

"You're awake," Nixian said roughly. The playful demeanor had been washed away, replaced by an exhaustion Kealie wasn't sure if she'd seen before.

She nodded, pain seizing her neck as she did.

Luverie's execution practices were both more public and yet infinitely more secret than any other country. While within the borders every soul knew what was going to happen, every other country on Taeorra's surface lived in ignorance.

Many with their own discord to navigate.

Kealie noted the lack of cells, the emptiness might've been disheartening, but they were still kept in better quarters than escaped slaves.

Perhaps her mother simply intended to banish her.

Even if she knew it wasn't true, she'd hold onto the hope the worst wasn't finite.

"Well," she whispered. "We're not in the cellar."

Nixian scowled at her, nearly snarling. "Is that supposed to be comforting?"

"No, it was an observation," she snapped back.

He flinched slightly, frowning. "Sorry."

The tension in her body eased and she took a deep breath.

He took a few steps and squatted down in front of her. "What you did was foolish," he said, slowly lifting his gaze to make eye contact. "You could've died."

"I know," Kealie replied, strangely at peace. "I made an educated decision."

Anger bubbled under the surface of those jade irises, an internal war of hardening and softening. "I don't know how that-"

"Because now we are going to die here," Kealie growled, exhaling sharply. "Now we are going to be made into spectacles, burned in the center of the village and there is nothing we can do and no one we can turn to. There is no one to save us in Luverie."

"But we could have-"

"No! Don't you get it? You would have made it. You would have made it out alive, made it back to Aelusia and I wouldn't have to step foot in this wretched castle again. It would have been enough. It would have been enough..."

Nixian was stunned, his mouth parting to argue again but finding no words. He knew there were none. Not for what she was enduring. Not for the mental suffering, Kealie coped with on a day to day basis in the hell that was this estate.

He reached out and rested his hand over her wrist, running his thumb over the back of her knuckles.

"You truly believe there is nothing left for us?"

The question sat horribly in Kealie's chest, so much so she wondered if she might puke all over the ground once more. If there was anything left. But she knew the burning in her chest well enough, knew she'd forgone the curse, knew she wouldn't be forgiven.

She tried to speak but only a faint squeak broke from her lips.

This was the first time Kealie truly felt depleted.

She willed the tears behind her eyelids to stop pushing forward, clenching them tightly.

She would not bow again.

Nixian launched himself upward in a defensive stance, reaching for a blade that wasn't there when the door swung open.

Standing on the outside, a silhouette stepped into the fading light with a wry grin. With midnight hair as dark as if he'd plucked feathers straight from the backs of Ravens and wicked blue eyes to match, he observed with critical cunning at the scene before him. A gaze so familiar only his mirror could deliver it.

Kealie watched as her Uncle Verun made sure to mind the magical seal, but didn't stray from gawking.

"You killed a lot of men, Princess," he mocked her. "But I think you could've taken out more."

Kealie's nerves coiled inside her, reinforcing her spine as she growled at him and gritted her teeth. "Don't call me that," she bit out.

"Whether it be Luverie's Heir or..." Verun gave Nixian a crippling glare that had most men gasping for breath. "Aelusia's, it is a title you must bear."

Her half-brother did not falter, as if in any other mood Nixian would lift a brow and offer Verun a spot in Azuris' mines. He held his spot, calm but frozen with a lethal predator's senses.

"Is this how you speak to all royalty, Tosier?"

Verun lunged, quickly remembering to leash himself as the sealing barrier hummed to life against him.

"What did you just say to me, boy?"

Kealie felt her strength being plunged into the icy deep, her resolve flinching as that forbidden word left Nixian's lips. No amount of concentration translated it for her, only that it meant terrible things.

"If you've come here to regale us with senseless memoirs from your wretched lifespan, spare me," Nixian countered. "I predate your sire."

The world enveloped Kealie in a blanket of fear as she watched the smug expressions drain from her Uncles face.

Verun's eyes darkened, gaze searing into Nixian's. "I'm only here to deliver the news," he sneered. "The Queen made her decision."

"Oh, I suppose her highness doesn't deem us fit for trial?"

Kealie urged herself not to punch Nixian for arguing, for causing a scene, but she couldn't bring herself to move or speak.

Verun's evil grin slowly grew back. "Her daughter will answer to our Court," he explained. "It is you who are unfit for trial."

Nixian's eyes narrowed in on the touting man. He was quick to read between the lines and elaborate for himself from the information Kealie had given him.

"Well," her Uncle began again. "Unless you count Trial by fire."

Verun laughed and waved tauntingly before yanking the steel door shut.

Nixian kicked the door behind him, the look on his face nothing short of deadly.

"What did you call him...?" she murmured, breaking the haunted silence.

The vacant, numbness enveloped Nixian's features now. He came to sit beside her on the bed, his eyes empty as they fixated on the ground.

"Dynali scum," he answered.

His voice was soft despite the jagged edges in the air between them.

Nixian had signed his own death warrant.

Kealie couldn't help it anymore.

Her face was hot, her teeth grinding together as if preparing to shatter. The tears started falling before she knew how to control the emotions churning inside her.

Kealie buried herself into her hands, sobbing.

She barely felt the hand on her back, stroking gently. Nor did she know when her head had come to rest on his shoulder.

But she knew one thing.

Nixian was going to die.

And there was nothing Kealie could do to stop it. 

Word Count: 1,374             Total Word Count: 15,652