A humourless, singular snort of laughter escaped her. I felt that way about the bandit.
Since she’d also asked for a cloth, she approached the Duskwalker again now that he wasn’t mindlessly thrashing.
“I’m going to clean you,” she informed him.
She needed to do something in this room before they took her from it.
“Don’t touch me.”
Emerie ignored him and wrung her cloth of water before she faced him. He jerked, but his bounds kept him in place.
“Were you lying when you said you came here for our aid?” she asked, dabbing at his chest to rid him of a few crimson droplets.
This time, she thought it best to start with the place they weren’t just fucking with.
“You look like a Demon,” he snapped, the swirling vortex of his orbs reddening.
Emerie paused with her eyes narrowed. Then she hooked her index finger into the side of her hood to unclip her mask and pushed both away.
“Is that better?” she asked, already noting the colour of his angry orbs softening.
“Yes.”
He wasn’t lying. Considering his reaction to her uniform, it was obvious he felt hatred towards them.
Emerie held her breath as she gently gripped the underside of his beak, expecting him to jerk. He didn’t, his orb redness fading even more, and she was able to comfortably wipe the seam of it.
She noted the tension in his shoulders eased, and she thought he may have even rested a bit of the weight of his head in her palm.
Then her eyelids flickered when his orbs changed to a colour she’d never seen before. An orchid hue of purple.
She’d already summarised that red meant anger and hunger, and white was fear. She could only guess that blue was sadness.
She didn’t know what orchid meant.
His skull twitched in her palm, and she was surprised the bone was so warm.
“That scent is gone from you,” he stated, quick huffs escaping him. He was sniffing her. “The one that smelt possessive.”
Her head darted back. She had no idea what he was talking about.
“If…” she started, lowering her voice to make sure the guard couldn’t overhear. “If I were to release you, would you promise not to harm anyone?”
She thought he would leap at the potential opportunity to escape. He didn’t, and his silence was crushing.
“Duskwalker?”
“Ingram. My name is Ingram. Do not take away my name when I only just obtained it.”
Emerie, done cleaning him and merely wiping at a now-white skull, stepped back. He has a name? Why did that gouge at her chest? A real monster… wouldn’t have a name. Does that mean someone cares about him?
Gosh. Was there someone out there who missed him?
“You did not answer me, Ingram,” she whispered, hoping he would follow her lead.
“Promises are things that should not be broken, yes?” She nodded. “Then I cannot promise this.”
Her lips parted at his honesty. He was a fool! He’d almost had her in the palm of his hands, and he’d chosen to reveal he’d gladly kill her fellow Demonslayers.
“Okay, fine,” she grumbled, turning her back to him so she could collect her supplies.
“You are angry?” his high-pitched tone of surprise was unmistakable.
“I’m not going to free someone who will go out of their way to hurt my people.”
“I would not be able to help it if they harm me, or I them.”
Her lips tightened. She halted from leaving to toss her head to the side and look at him from her peripheral. “How so?”
“Mavka cannot help letting their rage take over. We… do not always mean to hurt, especially if we have been harmed.”
Mavka? Is that what they call themselves rather than Duskwalker?
She slowly turned around to warily face him. “Sometimes it’s an accident?”
“Yes. Like when your people struck me with arrows as I knocked on your gate. I could not calm down once they started to attack me.”
The word ‘knocked’ lingered in her mind.
Emerie cupped her chin in thought. I see. So Duskwalkers turn mindless? Like an instinct to destroy? At least when she killed, it was completely on purpose. Animals act out when cornered for self-preservation.
And if Wren and the other Elders had been doing this to a wolf or a bear – that was immortal and couldn’t die – she would have long ago tried to free it.
Hell, even humans behaved differently when cornered and afraid.
“I also hunger. The scent of blood calls to me. It is never-ending, never goes away.”
Emerie chewed at the right corner of her lips. She muttered, “If you smell blood, you’ll go bat-shit crazy like when we captured you?”
Great! The likelihood of that was high. He wouldn’t even make it out of the hallway just beyond his dungeon door before he lost his shit.
She couldn’t think of a solution right now. She wasn’t even sure if she would actually let him go. Emerie was just trying to figure out what she wanted to do, how she would handle this.
Emerie needed to pick a side, but first she would determine what was actually possible – and wouldn’t get her killed for no reason.
Maybe I’m selfish, but I kinda, you know, want to live?
She was so deep within her musings that she wasn’t sure if he’d actually answered her or not. It didn’t matter. It was bedtime, and she doubted her mind would shut the fuck up from thinking to let her sleep. She needed as much rest as she could, even if it was just to close her eyes and let them relax before they were forced to read more boring diaries and texts.
She headed to the door, and her heart shrivelled in her chest when he let out the tiniest whimper.
“Please don’t leave me alone.”
She halted as his plea instantly squeezed at her heart. A Duskwalker was begging for her to stay, and she didn’t think she’d ever heard something so depressing.
She bit her bottom lip so hard she feared she’d draw blood. “I’m sorry, but I have to,” she whispered back, glancing at him and his blue orbs.
She knocked on the door to be let out.
Ingram’s pulse raced with anxiety as he watched the female leave.
Her hair streaked with orange and red, and those light-blue eyes, had brought colour to the four grey walls that constantly surrounded him. Her pretty scent, finally free of that wretched underlying note, had been lung achingly sweet. Her voice had battled with his thoughts, gentling and calming him when he doubted anything else could.
And her touch underneath his jaw had been warm, soft, and pleasant. Under the strength of her holding his weighty head when he’d been lulled by her scent, her voice, and the sight of her, she had managed to bring back his normal purple hue.
Now it was a suffocating blue, highlighting just how anxious he was about being alone in the room – waiting for them to do more unpleasant things to him. His sight darted to every crack in the wall, like he was searching for a way out.
The walls were slowly closing in on him.
He closed his sight to escape it, wishing his mind would cease being so alert so he could finally sleep.
I am so tired.
“You are not alone,” came a feminine voice, echoey but warm.
His sight flashed open to blue, and he looked around as best as he could in his confinements.