Is it morning yet?
I curl into myself on the floor. There’s no bed in this cell, only a crude stone bench. Stone, rough and sharply hewn, composes everything but the ceiling. It leaves uneven red patterns in my skin.
I try to be brave. For hours I have tried to be brave. Bravery is one of the first things my father taught me. To remain stoic in the face of pain, to hide the hurt, to turn away when berated. But staring at the locked door, which I can barely see in the darkness, erodes my last traces of bravery. It slips away slowly, letting through shudders and lancing pain in my abdomen, then tears that spill over my lashes, half curving into my hairline and half pooling on the floor. Small, tight sobs form in my throat. The scent of bile clings to my sinuses.
Pressing the heels of my hands into my eyes, I cry as quietly as I can. I’m twelve years old again, muffling myself with a blanket, hoping no one hears me because I can’t bear more punishment. But neither can I steal food from the kitchen and climb out the window, escaping into the desert beyond Lucarpo’s borders. Despite what Grodd said, there is no escape from Cagmar. Not anymore.
Exile or the canyon. Either way, I’ll never see Azmar again.
A sob breaks past my lips, and I drop one hand to strangle subsequent ones in the crook of my elbow. Azmar, I’m so sorry. He’s the one sure way I could prove my loyalty to Cagmar, but I will never reveal him. I will not hurt him to save my own skin, even if the council chooses to throw me to the monsters. I am trapped between these walls for my own choices, not his. And I love him so dearly; I can’t bear to imagine him harmed in any way. At least a sliver of peace settles in, knowing he’ll be all right when this is over. Azmar will be all right.
I wish I could sleep, for dwelling on the place, purpose, and love I have found in Cagmar rips me to shreds, peeling my spirit away, one slender scrap at a time. It feels as though a fist clamps around my heart and slowly twists, never relenting. I think of Ritha, and it twists. Unach, it twists. Perg, it twists. And between each name and memory, Azmar surfaces, and the fist digs in its nails and squeezes, choking me with more sobs. It’s like merciless clockwork, turning seconds to minutes and minutes to hours and hours to days and years, until I would rather jump into the canyon than spend one more second within these tortuous black walls.
My eyes peel open. I rub the crust from them and wince with an aching back. It’s an effort to stand. Every part of me weighs a thousand pounds. My chest, tenfold. But I manage it. I’m dry to my bones, my water lost through weeping. No food or drink has been brought to me, though I’m not surprised.
I shove one foot in front of the other, walking to one wall, then to the opposite, until my body finds a rhythm in the pacing. I chew on my nails. Rip my hand away. Chew again. I try to piece my thoughts together, but I can’t find a thread to hold them. So I pace, slipping in and out of memories, dazed.
When a soft tapping sounds at my door, it strikes my ears as thunder. I jump, limbs quaking, and hear a very soft “Lark?”
I run to the door, skinning the side of my knee on the bench, and press my hands against it. Have I finally lost my mind, or—
“Lark?” A little louder.
My stomach twists. “Perg?”
He shushes me. “I don’t have a lot of time. Hold on.” I hear scratching at the lock.
I find the thread and stitch my mind back together: fears, logic, worries, everything. “What are you doing?”
“Sh,” he hisses, barely audible through the door. “There isn’t much time. You’ll have to climb out through Intra housing—”
He’s breaking me out. Oh stars, Perg is breaking me out.
“Perg, stop.”
The scratching halts. “Lark, they’ll kill you.”
“I can’t leave.” I can’t leave Azmar behind. I have to say goodbye to him. Somehow, I have to say goodbye. “Have they ruled my death?”
He hesitates. “I don’t know.”
“Perg, I can’t—”
“It’s my fault.” The scratching resumes. I can’t tell if he’s trying keys or a lockpick. “That’s my knife.”
“I didn’t tell them.”
“I’ll get you out.”
Every heartbeat is a hammer driving down on a spike in my core. I know it’s hopeless, and yet still, “I can’t leave, Perg.”
The scratching stalls again. “Why not?”
I swallow against my dry throat. “I can’t explain.”
A moment passes, and I think Perg has left. But then, so quiet I have to press my ear to the door, he says, “I’ll come with you.”