Total pages in book: 218
Estimated words: 205594 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1028(@200wpm)___ 822(@250wpm)___ 685(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 205594 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1028(@200wpm)___ 822(@250wpm)___ 685(@300wpm)
“Psst.” It says again. “Princess. Is that really you?”
Chapter
Seventy-Three
Igasp and turn on hands and knees, pressing my cheek to the coarse blanket and mat that make up the bedding in my cell. The voice I heard, asking if I was the princess. It’s unfamiliar to me, but they’re speaking the Lios tongue. I gaze at the tiny crack in the mortar of the rock wall, where the finger slips away again. I can’t see anything on the other side. It’s too dark. I’m reminded abruptly of Balon and his visits to the tower, the gossip he told me through the wall, and how I’d begged for him to free me.
A wave of longing hits me. It feels like a hundred years ago since those days.
“Who’s there?” I ask when the voice goes silent. I’m tempted to stick my finger through the hole to the prisoner on the other side, but what if it’s a trap? So I brush chips of mortar away from the hole, trying to widen it. “Hello?”
“I’m here.” It’s a woman, speaking softly enough that our conversation won’t be heard by the guards. “My name is Senna. I worked in the palace as a washerwoman. Are you really the princess?”
“I am,” I tell her, excitement racing through me. “It’s me. Candromeda.”
The finger appears through the rocks again, wiggling. “Give me a piece of your hair so I know it’s you.”
Oh. Hastily, I pull a few dark strands free of my messy braid and then wrap them around that wriggling fingertip. It retreats back behind the stone walls. A quiet moment passes, and I grow impatient. “Well?”
“It’s you, isn’t it? You even sound all impatient like a princess.”
Well then. “I’m not lying.”
“I know. I didn’t think it was really you until you mentioned the medicine,” the voice on the other side—Senna—says. “Riza is my friend. She told me about you and the potion you have to take daily. That you get sick if you don’t get your medicine. Why aren’t you in the tower?”
I bite back a sound of excitement when she mentions Riza’s name. I’ve missed Riza so much. I know she’s my maid, but she’s also my companion and friend and a constant person in my life…or at least she was before I entered the tower. “Where is Riza? Is she well?”
“She’s here in Darkfell,” Senna whispers. “She was sold off to a Fellian master and so I rarely get to see her anymore.”
Sold off? Like a farm animal? The idea is horrifying…but she’s alive and well at least. When I get out of this dungeon, I’ll make Nemeth free her. “What about my sister, the queen? Erynne? Is she here too?”
“Aye. She’s the slave of one of the Fellian princes.”
“Why is she a slave?” I choke, horrified. “What happened to Lios? Tell me everything!”
“She’s a slave because she’s pretty,” Senna says, her voice bitter. “When the Fellians took the city, they slaughtered the men and took the women captive. They brought us back to this place, but it’s just another tomb.”
“A tomb?”
“You’ll see.” She chuckles, as if this is all somehow funny. “So what’s the princess doing in the dungeon instead of in the tower?”
“I left the tower when there was no more food,” I confess.
“Mmm, aye. There’s no food anywhere above ground. The goddess weeps constantly, and the rain washes everything away. At least these Fellian bastards have food.” She laughs, and the sound is faintly unhinged. “Up above, we starved. Down here, there’s food but it’s a different kind of hell.”
I blanch. “Why are you down here?”
“Because I spit in my owner’s food,” Senna tells me, still laughing. “And food can’t be wasted. He had to eat it or give it to me. So he sent me down here to teach me a lesson. More fool him, I’d rather be here in the dungeon than out there. At least down here I’m safe.”
“Safe from what?”
“From the goddess’s wrath, of course. She’s not starving the Fellians. She’s got a very different punishment for them.” And Senna laughs again. “You can’t escape the eye of the goddess, even underground! She still watches!”
My skin prickles with goosebumps. Senna doesn’t sound…well. “About the goddess—”
“CANDRA!”
The bellow comes from down a distant, echoing hall, but every pore in my body pricks to attention the moment I hear it. I know that voice. I jump to my feet, forgetting all about Senna on the other side of the wall, and I press my face to the bars of my cell. “Nemeth! I’m here!”
There’s a furious sound, a male roar of primal fury, and the sound of something crashing into a wall. “Where is she?”
“Nemeth!” I cry again, shaking the door of my cell even as the guard swoops through the shadows toward me. “Let me out of here! Nemeth!”
“Female,” the guard hisses as I grab the empty cup from its shelf and bang it against the metal of my door. It makes a horrifically loud sound, which delights me, and even when he snatches it out of my hand and grabs me by the front of my dress, I don’t care. Nemeth is here. He’s going to save me. “Be silent—”