Page 104 of Thunder's Reckoning
I waited. My pulse pounded in my ears, but I didn’t move right away. Not with the camera in the corner still watching, its black lens glinting like a second eye. I forced myself to wait, to let the silence settle back in, to make my movements look routine.
Finally, I crouched beside the tray. I shifted the bowl aside, my fingers steady though every nerve in my body screamed.
There—tucked beneath the cloth—was a scrap of paper, folded so small it looked like nothing at all.
I stared at it, my chest tight, afraid it might vanish if I blinked.
Then I slid it into my palm and carried it to the cot, turning my back to the wall. My hands shook as I unfolded it beneath the cover of my body.
The message was written in small, tight script.
The children and the woman are safe but separated. Just obey and be patient.
My vision blurred. Tears welled hot, sliding free before I could stop them.
I folded the paper back into the cloth with trembling hands. If she had been caught carrying it, she would’ve been dragged to the fire again—or worse. And yet she had risked everything.
I didn’t know her name. Didn’t know her story. But I knew this: she remembered what it meant to resist.
And now, so did I.
Tears ran down my face. Silent, steady. Not from fear.
From hope.
CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
GABRIAL
CHILDREN OFthe Flame compound
The hallway to Miriam’s cell was colder than the rest of the compound.
Not by accident.
I had designed it this way, bare concrete, no windows, ceilings pressed low enough to smother a person’s breath. A corridor meant not just to contain, but to diminish. To strip people down before they ever reached the door. To remind themof what they had been before softness, before rebellion, before rot. Before they forgot who made them.
I walked slowly, my footsteps carrying like the toll of a bell. Each step an echo. Each echo a sermon. At the door, I paused. Adjusted the cuffs of my shirt. Smoothed the collar as though preparing for communion. Then I opened it.
The chamber breathed cold.
She didn’t flinch.
Miriam Merrick—now Thorne—sat on a wooden bench bolted to the far wall. Her hands rested lightly on her knees, her spine a rigid line, her chin lifted as though daring the ceiling to press harder. Her hair, still shining silver, braided with precision. Time had carved her body, but not her defiance. It had only calcified. She was still the Shepherd’s wife. Still the traitor. Still the murderer.
“It’s been a long time,” I said softly, my voice carrying into the corners like smoke. “As though no time at all.”
Her eyes met mine, steady. “Not long enough.”
A smile touched my lips. I stepped inside, let the door shut behind me. The sound sealed like stone.
“You know,” I began, my tone reflective, almost gentle, “I’ve always wondered what became of you after the fire. After they found your husband’s body, half-burned, a bullet lodged neat in his heart. A holy kind of execution.”
Her jaw tightened, a flicker of heat in her eyes, but her silence held.
“You should thank me,” she said at last. Her voice was quiet but edged. “I ended him before your father could.”
“My father admired him.”
