06 COUP DE GRÂCE
—IT is a night like any other for the Beddor family.
Mr. Beddor winds down with distilled spirits in his study just as the stars start to glow against the purple sky. His long day consisted of many meetings with local sellers in need of a private merchant with connections to the continent. Mrs. Beddor, similarly, is nursing a glass of expensive, imported wine to curb the headache she's developed after hours of directing housekeepers. Their children, Clare and small Jamie, are in their respective rooms with small trays of dessert sent to them by the kitchens.
Jamie is only seconds away from falling asleep over his custard. His manservant's quick reflexes are the only thing that keeps his heavy head from hitting the dish. The young boy is reasonably exhausted after his long day of arithmetic lessons and pretend sword-fighting with the other village boys. Tomorrow, they all plan to try making their own bows and arrows with sticks they find in the nearby woods.
Clare, in the room adjacent, eats her own custard delicately as her own maidservant combs her hair behind her. She's just returned from a late teatime at the Archerons' manor with plans to go out again early tomorrow morning. Elain has invited her to take a turnaround the town square in hopes of seeing her new beau, Graysen. Clare just hopes that Nesta will opt to stay home for the day so as not to put another damper on the mood with her glares and silent brooding.
The night is relaxingly quiet as they all slowly turn in.
Mr. and Mrs. Beddor join each other at last in their shared chambers. Jamie is easily coerced into bed, eager to begin the next day. Clare sends her maid off to her own quarters in the other wing, promising to only spend a half hour reading by candlelight.
This half hour turns to a full hour, and then two. And before she knows it, she's finished one book and is beginning the next.
So enraptured in the story, Clare gasps when the candle is suddenly snuffed out by a swift draft. She looks to the window with a huff, seeing that it's opened just a crack to allow fresh summer air to enter during the night. Uneasily, she pads across her rooms to relight the wick in her fireplace but cannot seem to catch the fire no matter how far she places the candle into the embers. Deciding this must be a sign from the universe that she's been awake long enough, she sets her books and the candle aside and slides back into her soft covers.
With a short chuckle to herself, she promises to tell Elain about this curious happenstance the next day.
But the next day will find the entire Beddor estate in ashes, with the remains of Mr. and Mrs. Beddor, Jamie Beddor, their three housekeepers, four cooks, and five servants left forever in their beds. And no Clare Beddor in sight.
—KAZI is lost.
She feels as if there is something she's missing. Some piece of information that is staring her in the face but is hidden from her own sights.
Because this girl, Clare Beddor as she calls herself, is not the same human girl Kazi very briefly got a glimpse of on Fire Night. This girl may have the same build and the same golden-brown hue to her hair, but this Clare Beddor has no shine in her eyes, no glow to her skin. Not to the likes of the girl she'd seen months ago.
But neither Tamlin nor Rhysand seem to dispute the fact that this is the right mortal. Both of them simply...stare. Unflinchingly. They stare as Clare pleads for a life she will no longer get to live; they stare as Kazi is commanded to hold her down during her judgement. They stare as Kazi is then told to break her.
"You anger Her Majesty by hesitating!" The Attor hisses at her side. He is licking his lips in anticipation for her first strike.
Kazi takes a moment to shift her gaze to the High Queen herself, seated alongside a stoic Tamlin. His eyes—though they are not revealing at the best of times—hold a sheen of puzzlement that betray this girl's innocence. Linden, far off to the side, has a firm grip on a strap of his pauldron. Not in anything akin to fear for this young Clare Beddor's life, just...plain displeasure for an innocent's fate.
Amarantha sighs in disdain. "Is something the matter, Kazimyrah?"
Yes.
"No, Your Majesty," Kazi forces herself to say.
"I said," the Deceiver drawls out sharply, "break her fingers."
A resounding snap meets the ears of every High Fae in the room. Claire Beddor sobs into the gag at her mouth, tears streaming down her face in rivers as she tries to cradle her mangled thumb. She is able to pluck the damaged extremity out of Kazi's own trembling hands to nurse it at her chest.
Humans are so fragile, Kazi thinks emptily.
"Tell me, beast," Amarantha spits, "did you ever think a fae could love a foul thing like you?"
Clare shakes her head adamantly and her gasps of suffering barely subside so she can moan a negative. But the answer isn't enough to appease the Deceiver. Nothing ever is.
"Again."
Kazi bites her cheek until it bleeds as she snatches the girl's hand back to break her pointer finger. She can feel it snap in two places, at each knuckle. The young girl shrieks and yanks back against Kazi's unwavering strength to no avail. Her flooded eyes look up at the guardian and seem to beg for mercy. But there will be no other mercy than death for her now.
How easy it is to slip down this slope, she thinks. Too many before her had fallen to the corruption of torture.
Kazi stops just before turning the corner to the main corridor of the dungeon. She rests her back against the marble walls, heart pounding. Her ears unwillingly pick up on the sounds of flesh hitting flesh followed by a muffled scream. She thinks about turning back; now, while she still has her wits about her.
She has never come to this part of the dungeons before. It has only ever been to the holding cells to deliver and retrieve the prisoners. Never lower.
It is only at her mother's request that she hasn't. One of the only requests that Raxleon has ever granted for his wife, though it was not without contest. He and Danrys would sooner see Kazi down there each day, working the prisoners, learning the trade she was born into. But Khandora had held firm in her demands, all the way up until her death
There is a solid tug on her mind, another impatient summons.
Kazi takes another breath before pushing off the wall to continue walking. She holds her head up high as she tries to dilute the increasing sound of torture with her unsteady pulse. The war has desensitized her to many things, but this is not one of them. Not when it reminds her so much of what happened to her and Rhysand on the continent only months ago.
She comes upon the room where the usual dealings must take place. It reeks of sweat, blood, and fear, and her eyes involuntarily water at the potent scent.
Resisting another deep breath, Kazi enters the room with a fixed blank face. She holds it even as she takes in the scene before her. The walls are covered in chains, locks, and dull pokers. So similar is it to that Hybern tent. There are presentation tables littered with tools of the unspeakable type. And in the center of the room, a male practically stripped bare is hanging from cuffed wrists. His bare toes hardly scrape the hay-strewn floor as his arms stretch out high above his slumped head.
There are bruises forming all down the front of his body, and probably more to be seen on his back. There is not a single part of him that isn't left untouched. She has to look away when his bloodshot eyes turn to her, though the painting of her father is not relieving in the least.
"Kazimyrah," Raxleon addresses her once noticing the quiet entrance she's made. He gestures her closer. "Come, it is time you've seen this."
She does not know that there is ever a proper time to see a naked male beaten beyond sense. But she says nothing, knowing that however wrong this may feel, it is still her future.
She quietly steps further into the room, only then noticing the other body present with them. Ensconced in the shadows, Azriel lurks. She can see him purposefully avoiding the sight of her, placing all of his attention on the dagger in his hands. She wonders how often he spends his time down here with her father now that he has been promoted to Spymaster for Danrys.
Raxleon places a large and calloused hand on her shoulder to drag her closer to the unnamed male. All Kazi knows of him is his allegiance to Hybern, as all prisoners have been lately. If he has a name, she does not know it, nor does she care to. Not when she knows he has no life beyond these walls anymore.
They are within two steps of him when he begins to flail on his chains. He grunts through a gag that's been tied around his head, and tries to kick up his feet, but manacles around his ankles prevent any real attack. Kazi still flinches.
She can see Raxleon frown out of the corner of her eye. "Fear him not, Kazimyrah. You are the predator in here. Act like it."
Feeling properly scolded, she straightens to her full height with a dizzy head. She's fought and killed plenty in this ongoing war, but this is not a battlefield she feels comfortable in. It is one thing to fight to live, to kill or be killed; this is another thing entirely.
Out there, everyone is prey. In here, the lines are clearly drawn.
"We were just getting to the good part, weren't we?" her father asks the prisoner, inciting a round of panicked whimpers and struggling. Kazi does not look away, knowing the chains will hold him back but still feeling as if he should be watched. "Azriel, Shadowrend, if you would."
There is a slight clink on one of the tables as Azriel picks out one of Raxleon's favored daggers. Kazi knows then that he must spend quite a lot of time down here with her father to know the blades and their names by heart.
Light footsteps approach them, and she waits for the Illyrian to place the weapon in her father's possession. But she can feel him step up to her side and hears him clear his throat silently. She looks to her father first, only to see him staring back at her expectantly.
Ah.
She brings up her hand slowly, though it does not feel like her own. She feels as if she is watching from afar. Watching this female accept the tool with which she is to begin her new life as a torturer. Something she will forever be beyond this point.
It is only as Azriel's fingers accidentally brush against her own while placing Shadowrend in her hand does she feel anything like herself. It is a short burst of painful lucidity, but it is enough to remind her of who she really is. The fleeting moment of clarity is over all too quickly when the shadowsinger steps away, oblivious of the relief he's just bestowed upon her.
With the blade's hilt properly settled in her grip, she watches and listens from far away.
"Let's begin."
Each snap feels and sounds like shattering glass in her hands. There is something so barbaric about torturing someone with your bare hands. Something so heinous and wrong. It is torture, not just for the girl, but for Kazi too. Even as she disassociates from this moment, she cannot stop the effects it has on her soul.
She can practically feel the foul, black ooze of corruption seeping into her flesh and bones. It runs through her bloodstream like burning slag. And with every bone crushed between her fists, there is another round of sobs racked from Clare Beddor's body and another fissure that forms in Kazi's heart.
It is only as she reaches the sixth finger, and the human begins to choke on her own spit with the gag around her mouth does she falter. The mortal looks through her soggy lashes with a new plea in her eyes: End it, end it all.
She can do it, she thinks, she can take her knife and run the blade through her chest like she's done to so many others. It would be a more peaceful end for the girl. It would be a more peaceful end for Kazi. She can deal with Amarantha's repercussions. She can handle whatever consequence the Deceiver throws at her. But she cannot continue to break every bone in the young girl's body for something she did not do.
So, with an obsidian heart of darkness, Kazi dares to look into the girl's eyes one last time with remorse. Even in her deranged state of misery, she must see the intention and resolve in Kazi's eyes because she tilts her head back and takes one last deep, heaving breath. As she does this, a gray haze covers her irises and Kazi knows her High Lord is in her mind, ready to guide the mortal peacefully into the afterlife.
In one terribly perfected move, Kazi draws her cinquedea and punctures Clare Beddor's chest.
"No!" Amarantha screams in outrage as she stands from her throne.
The Beddor girl, eyes now completely glazed over and lifeless, collapses at Kazi's feet. Blood leaks onto her boots and the ground.
All the High Fae in the throne room are shocked into silence. She wonders what they must think of her in this moment, after her display of disobedience. She wants them to think the truth, that this is compassion, that this is the lesser of two evils. But she knows many must think her addicted to the sight of blood on her hands.
The Attor shrieks as if she's taken the blade to his heart. His head is shaking in distress as he looks between his mistress and Kazi with horror. "You dare disobey—!"
"Quiet!" Amarantha hisses at him as she descends the dais with graceful lethality. The Attor snaps his jaws shut and backs out of her oncoming whirlwind just as she descends upon Kazi. A ringed hand comes up and snatches her chin in an icy hold to hold her gaze.
Kazi stares back unflinchingly, but where she expects to see anger, she sees pride. And she thinks it may be worse.
"Have I created a monster out of you, Kazimyrah? Have I made you a blood thirsty, creature?" Her nails dig into her jaw and pull her closer until they are mere breaths apart. "You know, the longer you play the beast, the easier it is to become it. It was only a matter of time, sweet Kazimyrah. And I am so proud of you."
Kazi feels the bile rise in the back of her throat.
Amarantha scrapes a lacquered nail across her cheek, leaving a scratch in its wake. Kazi can feel the blood bead at the abrasion and slip down to her neck. The false queen leans closer to whisper at the shell of her ear, "But untamed beasts must be caged."
Before pulling away from Kazi's stock-still form, she kisses the trail of blood on her cheek and whispers a series of incomprehensible verses. And before she can resist and pull against the Deceiver's hardened grip, Kazi can feel the fogginess she'd felt those five decades ago invade her mind once more. It smothers her senses until she can no longer feel the slight sting on her face, until she can no longer feel her breaking heart drown in the darkness.
For a moment, she mourns the loss of her mind. In the next, she is thankful for the encroaching darkness to the numb the pain...to numb her from the world. Because a part of her does not want to live in it anymore.
—THE world is cold, and it's quiet.
Even the muffled screams of imprisoned faeries a few corridors down seem to be more of an illusion than a reality.
As a newly proclaimed monster, Kazi has been stripped of the rest of her powers, her weapons, and her armor. In their place, she's received tattered sacks for clothing and blankets, and a meal once a day to keep her just barely on the cusp of living. She knows it is to break her in like some wild mare. A beast in need of taming.
Kazi bitterly chuckles to herself in this dark cell. She finds that this solitude, this isolation, is anything but taming.
But it is better than killing, it is better than torturing.
But she's earned it at such a cost.
There is a tingle that ignites in her spine just before a swell of darkness blooms in her cell. She looks up from her cot to see her High Lord winnow into the shadows. He is dressed immaculately, black tunic and trousers, slicked hair. She wonders how he must see her in these rags, pitiful probably.
"You look lovely as ever, Myrah," he says, wandering over slowly as the darkness dissipates at his back.
She cannot help but roll her eyes, both at what he said and how easy it is for him to read her thoughts without her powers. She feels vulnerable, cracked open.
"I have mats in my hair," she says blandly, sliding over so he can take a seat beside her. "And I feel like I'm coated in a thick layer of dirt. Hardly lovely."
Rhysand peers into her eyes for a moment, bringing a hand up to her head. His thumb rubs at a spot on her forehead, wiping it of grime before placing a delicate kiss in its place. "You could be covered in mud and stink like carrion, and you would still be beautiful. But I'll have Nuala and Cerridwen come later tonight."
She leans into his shoulder. "Thank you."
He holds her. He holds her in a way she didn't know she needed to be held.
"Who was Clare Beddor?" she asks into the silence after a few minutes. He stiffens, and she pulls away from him. "Why was she here?"
Her High Lord looks around the cell, eyeing the walls as if they could listen. She almost thinks that he might not say anything because of it, but he answers her. "Claire Beddor...was collateral damage."
Kazi's eyes fall shut, having already suspected that for the truth but she'd still held that shred of hope that it wasn't.
"And her whole estate, as well? That's a lot of collateral for a mortal girl who can do nothing for us now."
Rhysand looks away, his violet eyes swimming with something she cannot decipher. She knows that he keeps things from her, for her own safety, but she wishes he would confide in her. They truly only have each other down here.
"Why, Rhys? Please give me a good reason why I had to kill her. Even if it's a lie," her voice breaks as she pleads with him.
"I don't lie to you, Myrah. You know I won't do that," he sighs.
"Then just give me the truth, or a portion of it. I don't care. But I need something. I can't have killed another innocent without cause." She blinks away a tear. "And if I did, please just come out and tell me that so I can ask the Mother for her forgiveness once more."
Ignoring the sweat and dust on her skin, Rhysand grasps her neck between his hands and pulls her forehead to meet his own. She watches through hazy eyes as he closes his own and takes a shuttering breath. "Kazimyrah, if anyone needs to ask for forgiveness, it is me who needs to beg for yours. Everyday, I regret ever bringing us to this mountain. I regret ever putting you in a position where you feel you need to sacrifice. You are a blessing to me, and I have brought nothing but curse upon curse to you."
This is more than the mountain, she knows. This is more than just these five decades. This is several centuries of regret that he is digging up.
"Rhys," her hands come up to cradle his own neck, "Rhys. There is not a day that goes by where I don't feel eternally blessed to have you as my High Lord, as my brother. Your guardian or no, I would want to be by your side through everything. Duty-bound or not, you're stuck with me. Sacrifice or no sacrifice, curse-no curse, you are worth it to me. You have always been worth it. You do not need to ask for my forgiveness; you will always have it."
His eyes have yet to open after her confession. He just continues to breathe in through his nose and out through his mouth. She begins to mimic him, hoping it will help him calm down.
After a few minutes of this controlled breathing, he finally speaks—not through the stillness of the room, but in her mind. With her barriers down, she can feel his presence so clearly. Their minds feel like one.
She is different.
She, Kazi thinks, knowing he will be able to hear it. The mortal girl?
It is quiet for a moment. I cannot explain it, but I felt it. There was something in her, something about her that I—it frightens me.
Kazi can tell that it is not the type of fear when faced with the scary, but the fear when faced with the forbidden that he is feeling. It is something she is all too familiar with.
Just the thought of her dying...
"I know," Kazi says aloud, finally. She pulls him into her, arms wrapped around his shoulders. He allows himself to relax, having got that off his chest. She will hold him; she will hold him in the way he needs to be held. "I know."
They stay like this, holding each other, for much longer than Kazi expects but far shorter than she wants. She wants to comfort him, to be comforted by him, forever. But that is not a kindness they will ever truly be granted.
Soon enough, there is a pair of heavy and ragging footsteps that rise up down the hall. Rhysand pulls away from Kazi at the disruption and kisses her once more on the forehead.
Nuala and Cerridwen tonight. You are a gift, Myrah.
She smiles, even as he disappears.
The smile falls, however, when the heavy-footed creature makes itself known to her.
"Look here," the naga says with a sneer outside her locked cell bars. "Traitor finally caught."
Kazi does not say anything, simply glares out to the dark faerie she and Alistair chose to preserve after their rescue in the Winter mountains almost half a year ago. It has remained true to its word, most surprisingly. She put the fear of the Wyrm in it, and it seemed to have done the trick. But now that she is behind bars where she cannot rightfully threaten it, she does not know how well their deal will hold. Alistair is still a formidable threat to the creature, but it may not be enough to keep this naga silent.
"Well?" it scoffs, clearly waiting for something. Maybe for her to beg for its continued silence. Maybe for her to beg to let her out.
"Well, what?"
"You scared?" it asks, frustration lifting his lips to reveal his fanged teeth.
"Of you?" She puts as much condescension as she can into the two words.
It triggers the response she was looking for. It growls and stalks down the hall away from her cell. Thinking the encounter finished, she turns to lay down in her cot, but pauses as the footsteps return to the threshold of her cell.
"I go to her majesty, I tell her of your crimes, now," the faerie says, its wings fanning out slightly. She recognizes the move, having seen it plenty on cocky Illyrians: posturing.
"So do it," she says, interested to see what game this naga is trying to play at. "I am already locked away."
"She kill you. She kill you and male you were with," it says. "I tell her and—"
"And what do you think she'll do when you tell her that you've kept this secret for this long? She won't take kindly to it, I'll tell you that. Not only will you have killed us, but you would kill yourself, as well." She dons a wicked grin. "We're in this together now."
"We not in anything together," it spits. "We do nothing together."
Kazi almost chuckles at how ridiculous this whole conversation is. "Right. Now, if that's all you wanted to say, you can go."
It huffs again and storms off. She waits a few moments, hearing the footsteps stop at the end of the hall. Clearly, that was not all it wanted to say.
Once it is back in front of her cell, she is up and leaning her arms against the cell bars, much closer than she was. It jolts at her new proximity, taking a step away. It's nervous, she concludes.
"Yes?" she begins first this time.
It shuffles on its taloned feet for a few moments. "You kill, why?"
She does not quite understand what he is trying to ask through his garbled grammar. "I kill a lot of things. To which are you referring?"
"Friends. You kill friends," it spells out for her, and she instantly wishes it hadn't. "Why? You enjoy?"
"No," she says adamantly. "No, I do not enjoy killing my friends. Your queen makes me do it, to hurt me."
"Hurt you? To kill?" it asks, and steps closer. "How hurt?"
Unconsciously, one of her hands lifts off the bar to touch just over her heart. "It hurts here."
The naga stares at the spot on her chest for a few long moments before speaking in a voice so low that she barely hears it. "Like poison."
Kazi blinks. "Yes, like poison."
She stares into the creature's eyes, realizing what it came down here for. Answers.
"Do you hurt?" she asks then. "Does it hurt like poison?"
It does not answer, but its own hand comes up to rest over its own chest only on the right side of its body where the naga's heart typically are. It is answer enough.
"Do you have a name?"
The question throws it off and it steps away from her again with a scowl, arms dropping. It looks down the hall, as if checking for something before looking back at her. "Name?"
"I am Kazimyrah," she offers first.
"I know name," it says bitterly. "I called Dryl."
"Dryl," she repeats. A naga with a name, she marvels.
Its eyes flicker back down to the hand she still has on her chest and raises its own hand once more to its heart. It only stands like that for a second before shaking its head and running off. This time for good.
Kazi does not know how long she stands there, just thinking.
About Rhysand and this human girl.
About Clare Beddor.
About Dryl, and about other naga who may feel the same as it does.
She is still standing against the bars when Nuala and Cerridwen appear before her in shimmers of smoke and shadows.
They smile warmly, holding up two buckets of clean water, soaps, and a brush for her hair. She cannot help the genuine small smile that appears on her own face as they guide her to a corner to bathe.
"You two are angels," she sighs.
"Wraiths," they correct her with short, wispy chuckles.
And Kazi can no sooner stop the grin on her face than she can stop the world from spinning.
NOTES ;
THIS TOOK A HOT MINUTE TO
GET UPDATED, MY BAD. I WAS
HIT WITH AN ONSLAUGHT OF
EXAMS AND COULDN'T FIND
THE TIME TO EDIT THIS CHAPTER.
BUT IT'S HERE NOW, AND IT'S
QUITE A BIT DIFFERENT THAN
THE FIRST TIME AROUND.
THE FIRST TIME AROUND,
KAZI TRIED TO KILL AMARANTHA
AFTER KILLING CLARE. AND THAT'S
HOW SHE ENDED UP IN THE
DUNGEONS. FIRST TIME AROUND
THIS CHAPTER WAS ALSO THE ONE
WHERE I HD FEYRE COME IN.
BUT I WANTED TO HAVE ANOTHER
RHYSAND/KAZI MOMENT BECAUSE
I LOVE THEM. AND I'VE ALSO
BROUGHT ANOTHER CHARACTER IN!
DRYL! SO EXCITED FOR THAT
DEVELOPMENT.
AND WE GOT TO SEE A FLASHBACK
WITH RAXLEON AND AZRIEL. THEY
WORKED VERY CLOSELY TOGETHER
BECAUSE OF THE WHOLE "WORKING
FOR DANRYS" THING. AND THAT LITTLE
TOUCH BETWEEN AZRIEL AND KAZI.
I LOVE THOSE LITTLE THINGS
ANYWAY, I HOPE THESE CHARACTERS
DON'T SEEM TOO OOC. RHYSAND
FEELS TERRIBLE FOR HAVING
KAZI DO ALL THESE THINGS, BUT HE
ALSO DOESN'T HAVE MUCH OF A WAY
TO STOP IT WITHOUT RISKING HER
LIFE ANYWAYS. AND HE'S GOT THE
WHOLE FEYRE THING TO THINK
ABOUT. OBVIOUSLY, HE KNOWS
SOMETHING ABOUT HER IS DIFFERENT
BUT HE HASN'T QUITE CAUGHT ON
THAT SHE'S POTENTIALLY HIS
MATE YET.
SO NEXT CHAPTER, WE'LL
MOST DEFINITELY GET TO SEE FEYRE'S
WELCOME TO THE MOUNTAIN, SO
THAT WILL BE FUN.
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