Page 16 of Mother of Death and Dawn

The onslaught of images, as they always did, left me slightly sickened. I had to fight hard to remain stoic.

Ilyzath’s whisper again echoed through my thoughts:Perhaps it is all real, and that is the greatest nightmare of all.

In rare times—in moments like this—I was grateful for my broken mind. Maybe some things were better left forgotten.

The Queen turned to Vardir, her arms crossed over her chest. “This needs to work,” she hissed. “Do whatever you need to do. We’re out of time.”

Vardir looked irritated. “It’s notmyfault thathe’sso much more useless than he was last time.”

“Enough of the excuses,” the Queen said. “Go.”

The door at the back of the room opened. The guards took hold of my arms, but I stood of my own accord.

The chamber was circular and white, with a second door at the opposite side. It was a small space, with white walls, a white floor, a white ceiling. As we entered, two other guards were disappearing through the second door, carrying a lifeless body. I glimpsed dangling feet covered in black veins just before it slammed closed.

To the left was a wide window that could be used to observe what happened within—magically reinforced, I had learned, during one of my many attempts at rebellion. Still, I’d nearly killed the person trying to hold me down by flinging them against it, and even though the glass hadn’t broken, it had been very satisfying.

I wasn’t rebellious today.

Instead, I went to the table at the center of the room and obediently lay down on it, blinking up at the ceiling. Stratagrams adorned it in garish crimson paint.

Hands held down my wrists, strapping them to the table, palm up. Vardir’s assistant today was a Valtain woman, but Vardir did the work. I didn’t even need to see the needles to know what was coming next. I was prepared for the pain.

“There’s no more room,” the woman muttered. “He has so many already...”

“There’s room,” Vardir said, cheerfully, before starting in on the tattoos on my palms.

I realized, as I had countless times now, that preparation didn’t mean much. The agony overtook me anyway. These weren’t normal tattoos. The ink marked every layer of my skin, seared there by magic.

The myriad of Stratagrams tattooed across my body cut me off from my power. Every time I managed to slip through, another tattoo would be added, closing each loophole. I wasn’t sure what I’d done to deserve these ones, but I’d learned that the Queen was very afraid of whatever might happen if I gained even a fraction of control over my own magic.

That was the only conclusion I could make, anyway. The reactions of others told me it was highly unusual for someone to haveso manyshackles inked into their body.

Eventually, Vardir finished his work. Even when the needles were gone, I was left dazed and numb in the aftershock of it.

Vardir patted my shoulder. “Excellent work. Now, the real fun.”

“Great,” I gritted out.

I heard the doors close. The room went dark.

Vardir’s assistant stood at my head, her hands resting on the table on either side of me. “What do I—”

“Just don’t let him die,” Vardir said.

Well, that inspired confidence. I focused intently on my breathing.

I had done some variation of this countless times since my imprisonment, though it changed a little with each test. I didn’t understand what they were trying to do, exactly. But I could string together some assumptions based on what Ididknow.

I knew that the Queen wanted a weapon powerful enough to win her war. I knew that somehow, they expected to get one from me. And now, I knew that desperation was driving them to rush—to be sloppy. To take risks.

It was only recently that I realized their experiments were largely out of their control. And what was out of their control might, justmight, be within mine.

And this time—

No time to brace myself. Nothing existed anymore but the pain.

I gritted my teeth, tried to ground myself in the cadence of my breath, in the metal against my skin. But so quickly, those markers of the world fell away. A fire had started in my blood and had nowhere to go, so it consumed me instead.

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