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Nelda wasn’t sure if she was relieved or more frightened being locked away in the cold dungeons. This place had been rumoured to hold all sorts of evil when she was young, and now she herself was one of those evils. Not that there were witches. Once discovered, they were destroyed—not just killed but obliterated, never to be spoken of again. She had expected to see Nuris in the throne room, but in some way it was a relief not to see his face. Although she knew he had been there, hiding somewhere out of view. Did he fear what the king might say? Or that the cardinal had done what he could not?
Exhaustion pulled at her, and she wanted so much to curl up and sleep. But the cell was damp as well as cold, and the straw in the corner of the room smelt of rot and urine. She rubbed her hands together to try and warm them. She could likely dry it out, warm them all with a fire and remove the odious straw. But they had been separated. The boys were together in a cell opposite her and Grace in the cell beside her, a solid stone wall keeping them separated.
“Where is the child?” Grace asked, and Nelda wondered at her worry about another. Wherever the little witch was, if she lived, she was likely in just as bad a position as them.
Heath sat against the wall, his arms wrapped around himself as he shivered. Frayne stood at the bars, looking across at her. She had no idea if they would live, or if the queen might even recognise and save her son. Something about her behaviour in the throne room earlier suggested that she might have been involved. She had known there were two children and had said nothing, unless the girl wasn’t worth mentioning.
A bitter taste in Nelda’s mouth told her that she had brought this boy into more danger. “Keep your brother warm,” Nelda said across the expanse. Frayne looked down at Heath, nodded slowly and sat beside him, putting his arm around his shoulders. She should have run far away when they had disappeared into the camp—or before then, before they’d seen Grace. But would she have been able to live with the idea of letting Grace die?
Now she was worried about them all. What had Jamie done all those years ago? Was it his own idea to save the baby, or was he under instruction? If he was told to take the child and go, it could only have been the queen who would have sent him on his way. Or had he saved Frayne from the same fate as his sister?
Footsteps echoed down the corridor, and Nelda’s stomach growled. She wondered if they would be fed and watered at all or left to rot in the damp conditions. A torch burned just outside her cell. She wondered at the light and that they would leave a flame so close to her.
The soldier appeared in her field of vision and drenched her with a bucket of water before she realised what he had.
“Hey!” Frayne called out, jumping to his feet again. “What are you doing?”
“She has fire. It doesn’t work well under water,” the soldier explained with a laugh.
In some ways the cold was refreshing, taking Nelda back to the hours of prayer in the convent. The cool solid stone beneath her knees had helped keep her grounded and her magic at bay.
“She’ll freeze!” Frayne insisted.
Nelda tried not to shiver, but she couldn’t seem to catch her breath. For the first time, she longed for a quick death. They were going to make her suffer here, and not just with cold water. They would use the boys to hurt her. The feeling overwhelmed her.
“Mother?” Heath’s soft, steady voice was distant as she struggled again to breathe. “Mother?” More panicked now.
“If you kill her before the king gets his opportunity, you might suffer the same fate.” Grace’s voice was clear, strong.
Nelda staggered. She couldn’t find her breath, and she dropped to her knees. She just had to find some focus. It was this place, being back here with these people and her brother, so close and yet so distant.
The world was blurring around her, and then a sharp slap across her face brought her senses back. She sucked in a deep breath, looking up at another soldier, a slender older man. Nuris. The scarring from the fire marked his face and neck, and she ached at the pain he must have suffered that night. He dropped a blanket around her shoulders. She looked beyond him at the other soldier standing outside the cell, his face angry and his eyes cast down.
“General, I am doing as directed.”
“By your king?” Nuris asked, not looking at Nelda.
The man stammered. “I assume my superiors are directed.”
“Give them bread and blankets, and leave the torture to those who know what they are doing.”
The man saluted and walked away, grumbling all the while. Nuris stood over Nelda, but she couldn’t lift her eyes. She didn’t want to see the disappointment he still held, the hatred he would have.
“Mother?” Heath’s voice made her look up, the fear in it palpable.
“It is fine, Heath,” she whispered. “I am fine.”
“These are not your children,” Nuris said, his voice low.
“Of course they are.”
“You think this claim will save them?” There was something she couldn’t read in his voice. Was he laughing at her, or was he worried? When she chanced to glance up at him, he had his back to her, and Frayne on the other side of the wide walkway was looking at him, not her.
“They must live,” she said. Nuris looked down at her then. “They must.”
“And yet your claim to them only puts them in greater danger.”
“They are in grave danger whether you believe me to be their mother or not. No one survives here—few survive the cardinal to make it here.”
Nuris hummed agreement.
“Please save them,” she asked him, her voice level.
He shook his head, just the once and barely. “You cannot ask such of me.”
“I have never asked you for anything,” she whispered.
“And yet I ensured you had everything you ever needed.”
When she looked beyond him, she realised he was inside her cell with the door open, no other guards in sight. Both brothers stood at the bars of the opposite cell; both looked more worried than relieved at the man beside her. She wanted to reassure them, but she couldn’t.
“Do they not know who I am?” Nuris asked, and she wondered at the question when he hadn’t believed the lie. She heard the footsteps of the approaching soldier.
“We met at the camp,” Frayne said.
“He is your uncle,” Nelda said.
They both stepped back as one, and she was surprised by the action—firstly that it was done in unison and secondly because they had not fully realised their story before they’d run into trouble.
“The one trying to kill you,” Heath said. “We have heard of you. We did not expect to meet you.”
“Really?” Nuris asked.
“Blankets and bread,” the soldier announced, dropping two blankets and two small chunks of bread on the ground outside the boys’ cell. Then another outside Grace’s cell and within view of Nelda. She assumed it would be too far for her to reach. And she couldn’t see any more bread. As if on cue, her stomach growled again.
“Bread?” Nuris asked.
“I won’t feed witches, no matter who directs me.”
Nuris walked out of the cell, leaving the door open, but she remained where she was. He stood face to face with the soldier, who surprisingly didn’t back down. Her brother was far too calm. The air was charged with tension.
“I appreciate, Private, that I work outside the usual chain of command and that might be confusing.” As Nuris paused for breath, the soldier puffed up his chest.
“I am a sergeant,” he snapped.
“Are you?” Nuris asked, a smile playing across his lips. The other man stepped back. “I do speak the king’s command.”
“Yes sir,” the man said, hanging his head. Nelda wondered at what point Nuris had risen to such a status and what he had done to get there.
“If you do not bring enough bread for each as would be suitable for a soldier’s ration, I shall see you sharing a cell with them.”
“Sir.” The man snapped to attention, then turned on his heel and ran away.
“Thank you,” Grace said.
Nuris turned a serious expression her way. Then he sighed and turned back to Nelda.
“It doesn’t matter,” she said. “But the boys are big men now—they can have my share.”
Nuris gave her a disappointed look, as though he had gone through the effort for her. He turned away, following the path of the other soldier.
“Nuris,” she called. He stopped, something hopeful in his features as he turned back to her, something like the way he would have looked at her when they were young. “The door.”
He looked at it then, open to the corridor, and back to her.
“You can’t bear the consequences of such an action,” she reminded him. It was hard enough he was left to repent for a sister being a witch; if she were to escape, it would be another action he would have to pay for.
He opened his mouth and then closed it, stepping into the open cell and adjusting the blanket around her shoulders. She chanced a look at his face above hers, still the same and yet so much older. She wanted to run her fingers over those familiar lines, almost lost beneath the thick scars. Yet as she raised her hand, she found herself grabbing at his sleeve instead. He lowered his dark eyes to hers.
“I missed you,” she whispered.
He pulled her fingers free, his face unreadable, and then he was clanging the door shut and standing in the middle of the walkway, his hands behind his back.
Has he always been that thin? she wondered. It wasn’t that he wasn’t healthy. He looked fit and lean but far too thin, and her instinct was to cook for him.
They remained in silence until the soldier returned not long after. He handed the boys another chunk of bread and held out the other two larger chunks to Nuris.
“Give them to the women,” Nuris commanded, something frightening in his voice that made the soldier jump. He quickly moved to Grace’s cell and then to Nelda’s, where he held the bread to the bars. Nelda hesitated before she reached for it, catching it as he released his hold on it. With a quick nod to Nuris, he ran off again.
Nuris walked away without glancing at any of them, slowly, confidently, his hands still clasped behind his back.
Nelda listened to the retreating steps of her brother, something familiar in the sound and yet unknown at the same time. He had become someone she didn’t know. She longed to believe that the brother she loved was still in there somewhere, that he still loved her, but she wasn’t sure it was possible.
She looked across at the boys still watching her and gave them a small smile. “Eat,” she said, turning her back on them to move the two small steps across the cell, where she sat down and leaned against the damp wall. She pulled at the blanket, thankful for the barrier it provided, but she was sure it too would be damp before long and do little to keep her warm.
She bit into the bread, listening to the low worried voices of the brothers across from her. She couldn’t make out what they were saying, but it sounded as though they were trying to work out what they should do. Frayne would know. No matter what his choice, it was his to make, and she trusted it would be the right one.
It was hard to chew the bread despite its softer than expected texture. There was a lump in her throat. It was her time. She had done too well to survive as long as she had. If what she had done was surviving. Perhaps she should have handed herself in to her brother before. Maybe he could have given her the quick death she longed for now, rather than this drawn-out mess.
No matter that the child had survived, she would never be forgiven or accepted for the woman she was. She was a witch. She sighed as the knowledge flowed through her. The fear of what they might do had ebbed away. Despite the difficulty in swallowing, she took another bite and then another. The conversation had stopped, and she looked over the bread in her hands—dirty, despite the water that had soaked her. She was cold, but the shivering had stopped. In fact, she wasn’t even sure she could feel the bread she saw in her hand. She flexed her fingers, and it tumbled to her lap. Maybe the cold had taken a greater effect than just quelling her fire.
Nelda tried to find the fire within her then, tried to pull it forward. Nothing happened; no fire appeared on her fingertips. Not that she’d had to pull it previously. In the cardinal’s tent, it had just appeared. It had come to her uncalled, as though the fire within her understood the need greater than she did. But it wouldn’t come now.
She closed her eyes to the numbness that seemed to spread throughout her body. She would have pulled the blanket tighter, but her fingers wouldn’t even move. Her hands rested in her lap. And then she couldn’t even keep her eyes open. She was exhausted after so long running away and hiding. Perhaps she could allow herself the time to rest now. She was safe in the cell.