Glima brought us over to the dying Noble.
She had restricted our cuffs the moment she came back into the Pit, then walked us over to our would-be rescuer. While we were silently waiting for instruction, some Bandits brought Jord over as others showed up with Neme.
Jord had one eye swollen shut, bruises and cuts all over his body and it looked like a hand was broken.
The black-haired woman looked in much better condition, until she saw her father. She started screaming and trying to reach him, but the Bandits escorting her, kept her in place.
Whisper turned to look at all of us. "This boy freed the prisoners and tried to escape.” He kicked Jord, which made us all wince. "If it were up to me, there would be a much more final punishment, but it is not.”
I swallowed, but didn’t dare look at Rix. They thought Jord had been behind it, which meant they wouldn’t look into it any further.
He pointed at us. "If any of you attempt this in the future, I may not be able to restrain myself.” The blonde man turned to the screaming woman. "If you do not shut up right now, then I will slice your throat so you can’t.”
Her screams vanished, instead feeding the hate in her eyes.
“Good, now…” He motioned to Glima. "I can show you what is in store for the next person who tries to escape with this volunteer.”
The bald woman set her jaw as she stepped up and pulled the sword out of the dying man. In a single swift motion, she cut off his head. Light shone off of her for a moment.
Neme couldn’t hold back the screams as she tried to get to her dead father, frozen upright like a headless scarecrow.
“You MONSTER!” she strained against her captors.
Whisper was in front of her, somehow moving almost twenty feet in the blink of an eye. He thumped her on the head and she went limp.
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“Get her back in her cage.” The blonde outlaw turned to Glima. "An example and you got to level.” Whisper clapped as he looked at us. "I hope I don’t need to demonstrate any further?” When none of us moved, he waved at us. "Then get your friend and get to wherever Sipher has you holed up.”
We were all too stunned to move.
“NOW!” That single word from him motivated us. Gesai picked up Jord and cradled him close to her as we all hurried to the bunks.
Once inside, Justia shut the door while Gesai laid the moaning man in an unclaimed bed. As much as he was bleeding, it was probably best that he not mess up a bed that someone would be sleeping in.
Rix was on her bed, sitting on her knees and watching Gesai try to use healing magic that was sealed by the cuff on her arm.
Justia was tearing strips out of a sheet to dress the wounds while Ren kept asking what she could do to help.
Oz grabbed my arm and laid her head on my shoulder. "We’re not getting out of here are we?”
“We’ll get out of here.” I tried to assure her.
She didn’t look convinced as she walked over to her bed and pulled the covers over her head.
We didn’t get lunch or dinner. Either Glima forgot about us, we were being punished, or she was waiting for us to come out. I didn’t know, but I wasn’t very hungry anyway.
Jord finally stopped moaning about bedtime and after an afternoon of feeling helpless, I laid down in my bed waiting for sleep that I knew wouldn’t come anytime soon.
About two hours after the lights were turned out, Oz got up and sat down on the edge of my bed.
“Atlas, are you awake?” Her voice was almost so quiet that I couldn’t hear it.
“Yes?”
“Ren is sleeping with Justia…”
That was something I hadn’t realized, but I could understand. The two of them had been working together most of the afternoon. And Ren struck me as the kind of person that wouldn’t want to be alone after seeing something traumatic like that.
“...So can I get in bed with you?”
That, I hadn’t been expecting. If anything, I would have thought that she’d try to crawl in bed with Justia and Ren, but these beds were about as wide as the ones in the RV, so fitting three people in one would be almost impossible.
“You know I’m with someone?” I tried not to let Aelin’s voice say something perverted in my head.
“I don’t want anything sexual. I just…” I thought I might have heard a sob. "I just don’t want to be alone right now.”
“Alright.” I started to scoot over.
Oz grabbed my arm as she laid down on her side and pulled it tight against her chest with both hands. She squeezed close to me. I could feel her body trembling as she silently cried.
After a few more hours, the trembling stopped and her breathing normalized. She’d finally fallen asleep and it wasn’t long before I followed suit.