Stone as cold as a crypt cradles the back of my head. An arm—my arm—rests against my stomach, the other flat at my side. Before I've had the chance to register that I'm alive, that I'm breathing, every slice of pain through my body registers in one foul whoosh. I peel my tongue away from the roof of my mouth, but that hurts too.

Everything, down to opening my eyes to determine my location, brings peculiar, searing, hot flashes of agony. Through my blurred vision, I see bars. Cell bars extending towards the ceiling and bayonetting the stone. I have been in a cell like this before; the design is familiar. As is the musky stench of rotten hay and soiled bodies.

I'm underneath the palace. In the dungeons. How did I get here? How did...anyone get here? The thought of the Void Queen succeeding in sacking the city is enough for me to slip back into unconsciousness just to make the pain go away. I can't even cry. Mustering tears is too much effort. Before I give in to another bout with risky slumber, I try to move my leg. Thousands of needles dig into my skin, stabbing me from top to bottom, and I fall limp, my chin rolling to my shoulder.

I don't know how long I'm under before the door to the dungeons slams open. A resounding grunt follows it, echoing through the cells, and shifting feet along the stone floor move rapidly. Cell bars reverberate when something slams into them down the hall and I wince from the resonance clanging in my ears.

Why can't I sleep? Why is my body so determined to remain alive? My magic sits indolent; it knows that any effort to remain active will drain the lingering vigor I might have. If there is anything left. Currently, I find an empty reserve teetering on the edge of demise.

The sounds of struggle move closer and someone huffs an angered growl of protest before delivering what sounds like a blow to the cheek. More bars face the brunt of fighting bodies, pebbles and loose straw crumbling to nothing underneath their stomping boots. Whoever it is slams into the opposite cell of my own, the hinges screaming as the door is thrust open quickly and shut faster than they can recover.

They continue to fight, slamming into the now shut door and reaching out as far as they can. Someone put them here, guards possibly, but the officials are smart enough to back away. I hear their lingering steps, cautious whispers as to not reveal their identities to my halfway-conscious state. Then, silence. It stretches through the dungeons and wiggles through my ears until the door opens down the hall and shuts with a familiar slam. I hear nothing but chaos beyond.

I don't care who is now in the opposite cell. They make no move to call for me, nor ask if I'm actually alive. My eyes can't open to see who they are. It might be someone of the Void Queen's forces, maybe the bitch herself. Millicent Terravale wouldn't hand over her kingdom so easily, then again, I don't know how much time has passed and how long battle has raged.

The guards that brought in the new prisoner must belong to Rivian, right? They can't belong to the Void Queen if I'm underneath the palace. If so, the fate of this kingdom hangs in the air. Possibly teetering closer to self-destruction than I am.

Castiel.

His name is a whisper in the wind, in a musky breeze, and I catch onto the scent and grip tight. He's out there somewhere, in the city, and I can't protect him like this. I have to try to move. Before I can even think about it, registering the mind process to attempt something so tricky, my body gives up. I try to grasp for a hold within, but nothing comes.

Death wraps a dark sheet over my head and suffocates the air from my lungs. I hear nothing, see nothing, and give in before I can remember that someone needs me. Even if I can't remember their name, they need me. And I can do nothing other than lie here, helplessly, waiting for death to claim the remaining light I cling to.

I dream of passing faces that move too quickly for me to understand. They come rapidly; only one remains clear. That of the Void Queen. Out of everyone, I remember her name, her face, and most importantly, her betrayal. She tried to use me as a sacrifice; she planned to kill me all along. But it didn't work. Resilience I didn't know I had has kept me alive, at least for this long, and I have a second chance. If I keep fighting, I might make it. But I'm so tired. Tired enough to consider throwing all of this away so I don't have to feel agony anymore.

Of course, her theatrics haven't stopped. She tried to make a fool out of Castiel when she severed his spine instead of killing him immediately with her Luminary powers. Nothing goes without a show, not for her. And when she could've impaled me with a blade, she built the Fulgur Turrim. A grand stage for another show in the Rithorne line. Only, she failed at killing me, too. Maybe that says something about the way Castiel and I have grown up by our mother's life lessons and father's self-preserving skills. We didn't make it to this moment without them, even if they haven't been in our lives for three years now.

We have survived by luck. Castiel struggles every day to wonder if his life still means something, and if he can go on this long, I can try to withstand the same pain he endures. As I climb the rope meant to bring me back to the light, my hands burning and fingernails cracking, something small pricks my forehead.

My face muscles scrunch in response. A bug, perhaps. There's a bug in my cell and it'll crawl in my ear to eat at my brain. I can't raise my arm to wipe it away, so I scrunch up my nose and furrow my brows, hoping it'll leave on its own.

"Marie," a voice hisses.

A similar, small plunk hits near my hairline. Not a bug. Pebbles. Whoever is in the opposite cell is...throwing pebbles at me. For the sake of telling them to knock it off, I crack my eyes open enough to spot a blurry figure standing against the bars to his own cell. Above his head, dark, curved horns arch backward. In his palm, he holds more ammunition.

A relieved laugh leaves Cloak's throat. As my vision clears, I take in his fanged smile and fresh wounds. He doesn't look worse than me, at least. He's alive. Cloak's alive. Content with the relief that I didn't kill him on that open stretch of field, I allow my eyes to close after they began to shed tears from the strain to remain open.

"No, no, no. Stay awake," he says softly. "Keep your eyes open."

Another pebble hits south, on the side of my neck.

"She took the city, Marie. She took the palace. The other three are on the run but I got captured to see if you were still alive. I'm here to get you out."

The corner of my mouth pulls crookedly, that's the only appreciation I can show before I shut my eyes. I'm not ready to escape, not without being able to open my eyes without having my head spin like someone is twisting the palace on the tip of their finger and seeing how fast it can spiral.

A pebble hits my head. I can't growl. My throat is too dry.

"I need you to get us out of here, all right?" he asks. What was his plan if I wasn't alive? "Use your powers to help us escape and I promise to get you somewhere safe. I promise." His words drip into my mind like salt in a wound, stinging as they go.

I crack my eyes open all the way to look at him. That's the last thing I want to do. Attempt my hand at escaping. The strength required to muster a droplet of my power might do me in, and if he doesn't realize that, he's acting too quickly on his own impulses. He risked his life to get himself captured, to meet whatever fate the Void Queen has in store. She could've killed him right away, but every life is useful to her.

Cloak can hide down here in the dungeons for weeks, months, maybe even years before she comes up with a way to use his life to her advantage. He's no good to her dead. With enough food and water to keep himself alive and a cell in which he can remain, out of the way of her operations, he's a pawn. Same as I was, just without the confinement.

That's how she tricked me. I fell right into her trap. Willingly. Because she gave me a room to myself, a servant, delicious meals, and a safe place to explore my abilities, I trusted her. After so many days, I stopped looking over my shoulder and focused on what lied ahead. She told me her plan, and I still didn't think to free myself. I was completely idiotic. I still am.

For Cloak, I must try. He came all this way. The other three aren't here, risking their lives to rescue me—dead or alive—so I can try to move my body and get us both out of here. But it won't come without effort.

I start with my fingers. Every bone in my body aches, and every breath of frigid air makes my throat feel like fire. I curl my fingers into a fist and wake them from their slumber. That wasn't so hard. Out of the corner of my eye, I see the indentions of the manacles burnt into my flesh; I hope those markings will fade with time. Otherwise, she branded me.

I receive a different result when I try to move my arm. The sensation of bone snapping ruptures underneath my skin and I cry out. My arm remains intact, the bone solid, but the phantom pain streaks tears down my cheeks. Still, the worst of this arm is over. Once the pain subsides, I move it again and take a deep, shaken breath. Even my ribs won't expand enough to take a full gulp of musty air, they quake and crackle.

I'm certain one of them is broken after slamming directly into the Fulgur Turrim's tower. It's a miracle my body isn't in pieces after what she did to me.

"Good, that's good," Cloak encourages. "That's only one step, though. Now the other arm."

I grit my teeth together and grab hold of the adrenaline surge pouring out of every oozing wound. I'm met by similar pain with the arm draped over my stomach but I power through and scream through my teeth when another of my bone snaps, then replaces itself.

My toes wiggle in my boots with extra effort and I brace for the surge of throbbing that comes with bending my leg. I have nothing to grab onto, and I fear the phantom blade stabbing through my pants will cause me to slip deeper and deeper into death's grasp, cuddling into the warmth it provides. The stone underneath my body is unforgiving and hard, yet I can find comfort in it if it means I have nothing left to feel.

For Cloak. For Castiel. For Chaska. For everyone that believes I should be dead. For Zikkora. He let my death happen, and he'll pay for it. I'll make sure of that.

I bend my leg like a thousand pounds weighs on my knee. My back arches off the ground, breaths coming in unsteady rasps, and I take hold of the dizziness plaguing my focus and yank it out. I'll focus on that later. When I have time to let the world spin.

Both of my legs are willing to give me momentum to roll onto my stomach. My nails crack against the stone after curling inwards, searching for a stable hold and find nothing. I rest my forehead against the floor and close my eyes. I shake so badly I think I might fall apart, and take a breather, registering that sinking feeling to ignore later.

I can do this. Cloak has been tortured, led on, and forced into a life where he had to leave his father. So much of his life has involved running for a cause he doesn't support, bordering on the edge of jumping just to remember what it feels to be alive seconds before death, and if I can't save him here, I'm doing him a disservice. He came all this way to save me, and I should do the same for him.

I crawl across the cell floor, feeling every pebble lodge into my body. Ignoring a tender shoulder—stiff from being yanked back during my brief experience on the Fulgur Turrim—I reach up and wrap my fist around one of the bars. I rejoice when the flickering Luminary light doesn't cringe away. They're not iron. One lucky factor to my day.

Unable to keep my head up any longer, I drop my forehead to the floor and force out the hiding magic. It doesn't wish to rise, it practically pleads to cower until I'm strong enough to use it, but we're running out of useful time. Cloak plans to bring us to safety, and he can't do that if we're locked away in a cell. Magic is our only escape and barring everything I have ever learned about protecting the power within my body, I force it out.

White-hot heat bleeds from my palm and wraps around the bar, beginning the long and grueling process to melt one at a time. The guards won't come to the dungeons unless they have to, leaving me ample time to melt through my cell door and move onto Cloak's. At least he'll be close enough for reassurance, and if I decide I can't go on any longer, we'll say our farewells before I slip into the afterlife.

Death continues to stroke my conscience with comfort.

Down the hall, the creaking of the dungeon door is unmistakable. "Get back, get back," Cloak whispers. He shoos me away and I fall back, my head rolling. I fall into a similar position I was before, happy to be flat on the ground so I'm certain the world isn't spinning on its head. I close my eyes, not only because the guard will suspect me to be near death, but a headache stronger than the beating of a hammer has infected my skull with deep rumblings. Heat pricks at the back of my neck and wraps around my throbbing spine.

The itch traveling up and down my back makes me squirm.

Armored boots click softly on the floor. Bored footsteps take one hall at a time, sufferably slow, and I can hardly stand to keep myself from screaming before they finally stop, close enough to my head that the owner of such movement can kick me directly in the skull. When the steps stop, a man laughs down at me without humor. A guard belonging to the Void. I know that, without having to look, he's not here on pleasantries from his queen.

"You should know your place," he chuckles. His boot taps around the bar, close enough to the sweltering heat of my handprint that I know it hasn't faded yet. Shit. "As should you, prince."

Metal groans underneath Cloak's fists wrapping tighter and tighter around the bars. "Let's see if you're this confident when I'm outside of this cell," he threatens.

"I refuse to acknowledge why you fight." The guard's voice bleeds confidence and arrogance. He fits in perfectly with the Void Queen's forces. "My queen will change Rivian, she'll strengthen this kingdom in ways your mother has failed. Luminaries won't have to hide." Cloak has nothing to say to that, and I'm happy for it. Any sounds other than the ringing in my ears is too much to take. Just when I think the guard has said his piece, a knuckle of his gauntlet knocks on the bar of my cell. "Wake up!" he shouts. "Dungeon mice didn't heat these bars; I know you're awake."

I lay utterly still. For dramatic effect, I halt my breathing so they can't watch my chest rise and fall. A moment passes. "Marie?" The fear in Cloak's voice is unmistakable. "Marie, wake up."

The guard grumbles underneath his breath, something about how he shouldn't have to take this shift while the action remains outside, and I hear the key to my cell fit in the lock. Perfect. The door swings open, a brutal ring from the hinges echoing from one end of the dungeons to the other. The other prisoners, if there are any, don't make any sounds. They're holding their breath to see what will happen to the guard, if the Luminary with white hair spilling over her shoulders, ripped from a braid secured with golden clips, will wake and challenge him a duel he'll most certainly lose.

I'm betting on him not holding a similar power as my own, and if he has it, I'm signing a death sentence. The Void Queen must've seen I was still alive, her attempted sacrifice failing, and put me down here for a reason. Another life to use on someone that cares enough to risk themselves for me. But the only person who would is waiting with bated breath to see if I'm still inhaling.

Close to my ear, his feet scrape against loose pebbles, and when he bends down, his armor adjusts to that subtle movement of his body by folding together in spots and stretching to accommodate. I feel his warmth against my side, inches from stepping on my arm. His fingers press to my throat, not to choke any remaining air I have, but to feel for a pulse. Now's the chance.

I thrust my hand upwards, building the energy manifestation before I can think twice about pain, and slam my palm into his chest. My magic collides with his armor, sparks soaring, and he flies through the air. The back of his head hits the wall of my cell with a resounding crack and he slumps forward, slamming hard to the ground at my feet. He doesn't move.

Cloak's shocked laugh is nothing short of beautiful. "Grab the keys from his belt. They're strapped to his sword belt," he says, pointing feverishly towards the ring of keys dangling from underneath the placard.

Black spots fill my vision and I ignore the phantom push against my shoulders telling me to lay back down. I'm short of propping myself on my elbows, not even standing, and this is too much for me to bear. Even Cloak's encouragement can't make me move faster. I shift my legs underneath me and avoid standing at full height for I know I'll fall right back over, and crawl instead. At some point, I must take that brave step—literally. We won't escape this place otherwise. The Raven Queen has fallen into the hands of her sister, palace included, and Cloak won't be able to carry me through the dungeons and into the lower levels of secrecy while fighting off anyone that discovers us.

I rip the keys from his belt without a second thought. They're nearly all identical, all wrapped with a white ribbon. A number is stitched over every one. I take a chance and choose one number higher than the key used to unlock my cell and find the courage to grab onto the bar to hoist myself up.

My legs are like pudding. Dammit. Why can't I remember what it feels like to walk? I'm a newborn calf with wobbly legs, searching for my mother. My knees buckle against each other, the insides knocking but I remain upright besides dipping my head low to stare at the floor. Cloak is practically jumping up and down, making it all that much harder to focus.

One step is too much for me to take. My legs buckles underneath me and I fall forward. Before I hit the ground, two strong hands brace underneath my arms and hold me upright. "You're fine," Cloak reassures. "Just unlock the cell."

I feel absolutely foolish with two useless legs underneath me; they're practically dragging on the floor. The prince wraps his arms around me to tug me tighter against his cell. On my first attempt, the key knocks against the slot, then to my shaking dismay, slides in. I cry out in relief when the lock clicks.

Cloak releases me as swiftly and softly as he can and I fall to the floor. The door to his cell swings open and he's around it in a second, warm hands gripping both sides of my face to examine the life he hasn't seen in a month. A month. We haven't considered each other as a friend in longer than that, his cold demeanor extended the timeline of days spent apart.

None of that matters now. His arms wrap around my ribs and he tugs me into his lap, forcing a bone-crushing embrace. My breathing rapid, body unsteady, I'm happy to have something secure to hold onto. Though my arms are numb, I slide them around his neck and breathe in as much of his scent as I can, remembering what it feels like to be in his company when we're not reminding ourselves of disapproving things the other has done.

"I'm so sorry, my Igrum," he muffles into my neck. "I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have—"

The door to the dungeons swings open, slamming against the wall behind it. Cloak whirls, gripping tighter onto my sensitive ribs. Something about his arm tightening around my back sears my spine and I hiss, baring my teeth in the animalistic fashion Cloak has shown me many times, but that is ignored by the guard standing at the opposite end, his eyes wide. He's not as strong as the last, and certainly not as large. He's scrawny, almost like Mutes, and much too young to monitor these dungeons.

That's not the worst of it. Beyond the open door, weapons clash together. Someone is fighting, someone on differing sides trying to best the other. The guard screams out to alert the others and a flash of curly blonde hair whirls through the doorway, the body belonging to that unmistakable identity driving a blade through the young guard's back.