Page 22 of The Princess of Nothing
I yelped when the snake’s fangs punctured the skin on my leg. It retreated, then attacked again and again, each leaving a pain more searing than the last. My eyes rolled to the back of my head as I choked on my wails.
“Serves her right.” One guard laughed when they arrived. Even through the agony, my hatred of the king kept my will strong. The sound of an axe on dirt forced my eyes open. The viper’s head rolled to my side. The guard growled under his breath. He was a large muscular man with too much chin and eyes too small for his head. His dark-brown hair had thinned from the steel helmets they were forced to wear. “Poor thing.” He looked at the head of the beady-eyed reptile.
The second guard, a stubbier blond man, twisted his mouth in disgust. “I’d rather we have killed her than the snake. At least it belongs here.”
The venom crept through my veins like lava, pulling me from their unwelcome remarks. A scream erupted from my mouth. I dug my fingers into the ground, drawing blood from my nailbeds.
“Give it to her,” the taller of the guards ordered.
My mouth was forced open, and what I hoped was antivenom was poured onto my parched tongue. The liquid coated my throat, giving some relief to the state of thirst they’d kept me in for days. How many had it been? Six, maybe seven without adequate water. At first, they had given me what I needed, but something changed a week in. Perhaps they’d originally thought they could barter me or something. Whatever happened, they didn’t get what they wanted, which meant I was worth little to them now. I was offered no shade and only the occasional scraps of food and water, just enough to keep me alive until the king decided what to do with me.
The guards slammed the door shut—I hadn’t even noticed them open it—and clicked the padlock. My breaths were shaky, and my chest rattled. Hot tears, fresh and thick, burned my cheeks. Blinding light fell through the bars. The chains on my wrists heated with the sun, ensuring the marks on my body never healed. Berovia was in the middle of a tropical heatwave, and I’d never longed for the iciness of home more than now.
Squeezing my eyes shut, I prayed to dream. It was the only solace I had left in my torture. Cedric and I spoke a lot when he had first visited my dreams. He apologized over and over for his part in the battle and how it was his brother, the heir to his father’s throne, who’d struck André. What he didn’t know was his brother was at the top of my kill list if I ever got out of this place. I didn’t hold it against Cedric for lying. How could I when I’d done much worse? Being stuck in a small cage with nothing to do and little sleep gave me a lot of time to think.
I convulsed as my consciousness slipped away. My pain turned to a dull ache, and pictures formed in my head. I was in a better place, one reserved for memories of the people I couldn’t save.
“Cedric.”
His face lit up when he saw mine, and my heart sank.
“You’re still here.”
He lightly touched my arm. “I wouldn’t let you go through this alone. I’ve been waiting for you.”
With a smile like sunshine and hair as golden as his intentions, he was the perfect haven. “Where do they have you now?” I questioned.
“Same place. The dungeons to the west. My father has been negotiating my release,” he explained. “I’ve been trying to reach you. You didn’t fall asleep.”
“Briefly, only when exhaustion forced me out for fifteen minutes here and there.”
“You’re sick.” He tilted my chin upward, examining the marks on me. His eyes darted down to the snake bites. “Have they said anything about letting you go? You’re a princess, a queen in your own right. Surely, they are willing to trade.”
I shook my head. “Edgar isn’t going to want to help me, not now that he has the crown, that’s if they’ve even told him I’m alive.”
His expression hardened. “I’ll find you a way out of here. I promise.”
“What about my kingdom? Cedric, my cousin will start changing things as soon as he has the chance. I can’t be here this long. Morgana...” I choked on her name.
“You’ll still be queen.”
I puffed out my cheeks and slumped my shoulders. The place Cedric and I stood, an architecture of his own creation, was the Gardens of Aeternum, where we had first met. The memory felt like a lifetime ago. “Not if the people don’t allow it. Not if his reign is cemented. I could have had it all, be the queen of Niferum and Magaelor. Now, I’m just a princess.” Color flooded my face. “The princess of nothing.”
“Things will be okay. Hey.” He placed his thumb under my chin, tilting my face up. “Don’t give up. I’ll find a way out of this. I promise.”
“I know you’ll try.”
“Promise me you won’t give up. No matter what.”
I didn’t get a chance to answer. A voice reached him that I couldn’t make out, which meant only one thing.
“The guards are coming to my cell,” he whispered. “I must wake up.”
“No.” I gripped the illusion as it faded. “Please don’t leave me here.”
His face was pained as he was torn from me, and I was unwantedly shoved back into my beaten and broken body.
I lingered somewhere between asleep and awake when the guards dragged a dead man past me. Another had died from starvation, or one of the many infections that hovered in the air. The stench of diarrhea and vomit stayed putrid. The sun kept it ripe, but I got used to the smell after a while.
