Page 67 of Xantera
Practically face to face, nose touching nose, she curtsies stiffly.
“Oh, that’s not necessary,” I tell her in a hurried voice. I glance at the locked door. “How’d you get in here?”
She straightens, blinks. Those narrow brown eyes feel like they’re slicing into me, like whatever they’ve witnessed have sharpened them into permanent slits.
Still, she doesn’t say anything, but she gestures to a space between the armoire and the bed, where I blink at a door I didn’t notice in my earlier attempt to escape, its pallid color blending into the wallpaper around it.
I furrow my brow. “Is that where you came from?”
She shakes her head, and with a strong hand, tugs at my arm, leading me to that sliver of white I can see through the crack.
I gasp as soon as she pushes the door back to reveal a bathroom. But the word bathroom doesn’t justify whatever this is.
White marble, floor length mirrors, and gold upon gold accents. My eye-line latches onto some sort of basin with clawed feet in the center of the room, where my servant turns two knobs and water flows from the faucet in a rumbling start.
Lucan senses my confusion.It’s a bathtub, little nightmare. Like a shower, but better.
The gears in my head click, but instead of responding directly to Lucan, I use my voice. “I get to sit in the tub? For as long as I want?”
Steam unfurls from the water, calling to my muscles that have been on edge for the last few hours.
My servant looks up and nods curtly before motioning to my clothes.
“Oh.” I startle when she reaches for the edge of my cloak. “I can do it myself. Thank you though.”
With a disapproving pinch of her lips, she busies herself with the hot water: plugging the hole in the bottom, testing the temperature, adding a floral-scented liquid that hits my nose as it swirls around like oil.
“I haven’t gotten your name,” I say as I remove my cloak and lay it over a chair in the corner.
She glances at me from behind her bangs, and I catch a flare of longing on her face before she turns away.
Saskia,Lucan starts slowly, hitting every syllable.I don’t think she can speak.
A haunting feeling settles in my gut.You mean…
I can’t even bring my inner voice to say it. I let my eyes linger on her mouth, too long, apparently, because a muscle in her jaw tics from how hard she’s keeping it shut.
Yes. I think her tongue has been removed, Lucan says carefully.
My breath catches as the truth barrels into me, horrible and vicious. All with the idea to silence these people, forbid them from communicating. And a tongue being removed… it would require instant cauterization or else the patient—servant—would die.
To think that the Guardians do this onpurpose, that they must have a palace healer on standby to attend to the wound they inflict on their own supposedpeople…
Taking a deep, shaky breath, I ask, “Can you write your name for me?”
She snaps her head up as she lays a towel on the cushioned bench on the other side of the tub, scowling at me like I’ve asked for something impossible. Yet as I sidle up next to her and she smoothsthe towel flat, I see that she’s tracing something over the plush cotton.
“E,” I say, watching her strokes closely, “l—e—n—i.” I look up. “Eleni?”
She shakes her head at the way I said it—El-uh-nigh—and points to her knee.
“Eleni,” I correct myself with a smile. “It’s nice to meet you. I’m Saskia.”
I’m met with a deeper scowl. But her eyes betray her—a trace of happiness glimmers through before she shutters her emotions again and crouches at my feet to untie my shoes.
“Please,” I insist. “There’s no need for that.”
Eleni huffs under her breath as she rises and fusses with my shirt.
