Chapter Twelve
2124 Words
The leash clicked into place, the sound too loud in the hush. Ciara lowered her head and followed when I tugged gently, her steps small, deliberate—like each one cost her more than she wanted anyone to see.
The doors opened and the hallway outside surged with motion. Guards thundered past in formation, boots hammering stone. Orders cracked in clipped bursts. Armor brushed close as sentinels cleared a path. It wasn’t chaos. It was precision—a House on full alert.
Ciara stayed close, her breath shallow, trembling against the leash’s pull. I kept her moving, steady, even as the tide pressed around us.
When the Great Hall doors swung wide again, Raven was already seated, still as carved obsidian. Banners hung high. The sentinels along the walls didn’t sway. The weight of every eye found us. Judy’s voice rang from the dais, clear and controlled.
“The line is ready, my Lord.”
“Main screen.”
The far wall flared to life. Vulkarin’s scarred face filled it—but no one in the hall looked at him for long. The chamber behind him stole every eye.
It was rot dressed as rule.
Walls split with molten veins glowed red like open wounds. Smoke hissed up from vents in the floor, rolling low, painting the ground in a dirty, volcanic haze. Ash clung to everything. Dark stains smeared the stone where no one had bothered to clean.
They knelt there. Dozens.
Collars chewed into raw necks. Chains dragged heavy across the floor, iron biting wrists and ankles until skin split. Bodies were maps of bruises and welts, cuts left to fester. Some still bled. Their hair was matted, their faces hollow, their eyes locked to the ground as if even looking up would bring punishment.
The sound carried: chain on stone; a woman’s low, exhausted sobs; a voice whispering, please… please, no…—so faint it nearly vanished in static; a plea that broke mid-breath and fell into silence.
The camera drifted, slow and merciless. A woman lay curled on her side, garment torn to rags, knees pulled tight, shaking so hard her chain rattled with each breath. Blood ran down the inside of her thighs, dripping into the ash. Her lips moved around the same plea: please, just let me die.
Another hung suspended, arms wrenched above her head, chain pulled so taut her shoulders trembled. Her mouth opened and closed in soundless sobs, face streaked with filth and tears.
A child clung to his mother’s hip, collar too large for his thin neck. His eyes were wide and empty. He did not cry.
The stink seemed to seep even through the transmission—smoke, sweat, old blood, rot, despair.
The Great Hall reacted because there was no other honest thing to do. A guard’s jaw clenched, the muscle twitching before he crushed it still. A medic breathed a curse and swallowed it. Someone shifted their weight, boots scraping stone. Judy’s hand hovered one heartbeat too long above her console before it steadied.
And Raven.
Even Raven flinched. His mouth pressed thin; his eyes narrowed, not in anger but in pain. He blinked once—slow, deliberate—the movement of a man forcing something unbearable down where it would scar but not break him. He kept looking. He bore witness. Someone had to.
The leash slick in my palms. My gut turned. The bile rose sharp in my throat. I wanted to look away. I didn’t. Because if I did, I’d be one of the ones who let it happen.
This was what Raven fought. Not titles. Not politics. This.
And then—Kael.
Whole. Unharmed. Standing just off Vulkarin’s shoulder, straight-backed and comfortable, like the filth behind him was a banner to be proud of. No chains. No shame. No hesitation. He looked at home.
Ciara stopped. The breath hitched in her chest and wouldn’t come back. Her body shook—not delicate, not theatrical, but the kind of trembling you get when grief and rage collide so hard the body can’t contain either.
Her freckles stood out on skin gone bloodless. Her fists closed until nails cut into her palms and bright dots of blood welled. Her lips dragged tight. Her eyes flicked between Kael and the screen’s hell and still she tried to stand upright.
Raven shifted the cloth across his lap.
The collar dangled from his hand—or what was left of it.
It wasn’t a collar anymore. It was a ruin: leather blackened and curled; the once-strong band warped and split where fire had eaten through; the crest of Vaskra blistered and half-melted, peeling like burned skin; ash clinging to the edges, flaking off as if it were disintegrating a little more with each breath in the room.
Her anchor. Her name. Reduced to a pathetic scrap.
A sound tore out of Ciara—half sob, half growl.
The leash slipped. My hand didn’t even try to stop it.
Her body buckled all at once. Knees struck stone. Her shoulder hit with a heavy thud that ricocheted through the hall. She didn’t swoon. She went down like something vital had been cut out of her.
“Medics to the Great Hall!” Judy’s voice snapped the silence in two.
I was already at Ciara’s side, fingers on her throat, counting. Pulse strong, racing. Breath shallow, ragged. Skin clammy; color already fighting back into her cheeks. I’d seen it before: the body surrendering to a truth the mind couldn’t hold.
Raven’s voice came level, edged. “Is she all right?”
“I think so, my Lord,” the senior medic called. “Signs are strong. She’s coming around.”
“Could she be faking?”
The medics exchanged a glance. “No chance. Nobody fakes this.”
“Wake her gently. Take your time.” Raven’s gaze slid to the dais. “Judy—put him through.”
“Yes, my Lord.”
Vulkarin sneered when he appeared full-frame. His voice was as harsh as the world behind him.
“Raven. What the hell do you want? Be grateful I’m in a good mood. Today’s a day of celebration in the House of Vulkarin.”
Raven’s smile was faint, his voice calm. “Yeah, I caught the news. A coup, wasn’t it? Must’ve rattled you.”
“Even the greatest Houses draw rats,” Vulkarin spat. “I flushed them out. Nothing you need to worry about.”
“Rats come back,” Raven said. “Burn them, drown them—they find the cracks again. Still… good to see you standing. I’d hate to watch someone else get the pleasure of killing you.”
Vulkarin’s face darkened. “Careful. I’m not convinced your hand wasn’t in it.”
“If that’s what keeps you awake, I can prove right now I had nothing to do with it.”
“Oh yeah? And what’s your proof?”
Raven leaned forward, smile like a knife.
“Simple. You’re still alive.”
The hall froze—one collective heartbeat where no one breathed.
Vulkarin sputtered, but Raven didn’t give him room.
“I didn’t call to talk about your narrow escape. I want a word with one of your men. Lord Kael of Vaskra.”
Suspicion cut Vulkarin’s eyes. “Why him?”
“I’ve got something of his,” Raven said. “Figured I’d ask how he wants it returned.”
Vulkarin barked an order offscreen. At my side, Ciara stirred, eyes wet and open, pleading without sound. Don’t send me back.
A runner reached the dais and set a cloth-wrapped bundle in Raven’s lap. He rested it across his knees, gave Ciara the barest nod that meant no, and waited.
Kael stepped into frame, smirk already loaded. Ciara surged forward, rage snapping through her like wire pulled tight. Judy’s hand hit mute in time. Gabriella was there a heartbeat later, easing a soft leather gag between Ciara’s teeth—the kind with a breathing channel—murmuring steady words even as three of us held Ciara fast. She still nearly broke free.
Kael looked Raven up and down. “So. You wanted to talk? Or are you finally ready to stand under a real House?”
The room went ice still.
Raven’s voice dropped. “Actually, I wanted to ask you about this.”
He pulled back the cloth and let the ruined collar hang in the red light of Vulkarin’s pit.
Kael barely glanced at it. “That was probably Ciara. Or Cia. Whatever she called herself. Last words don’t mean much. The blast likely scrambled her brain. She’s dead. So who cares?”
“Her collar bore your crest,” Raven said evenly. “Thought you might want her remains.”
Kael’s smirk widened. “She was nothing. If there’s anything left, let your dogs enjoy a treat.”
Ciara thrashed so hard the guards shifted their grips and the senior medic slapped a patch to her thigh. The fight drained from her muscles; the fury didn’t leave her eyes.
Raven’s words came deliberate, placed like stones. “Then I’ll see her cremated. Scattered. That will be enough. Congratulations on your promotion, Kael. May loyalty follow you—exactly as you deserve.”
Kael blinked, thrown off. “Thank you. As you know, power flows to those who deserve it.”
Raven’s smile didn’t reach his eyes. “Then I hope you get every drop of what you’ve earned. Goodbye.”
Judy cut the feed. The pit vanished. The wall went back to stone. No one in the hall felt any cleaner.
Raven gave a single glance. We let Ciara go. Gabriella eased the gag away; the leather bore deep tooth marks.
“Sir Wildcard,” Raven said. “Bring your submissive forward.”
I touched the leash. Ciara followed, pale and shaking, and dropped to her knees before the throne.
She stirred, blinking as though the world had shifted under her. Her lips parted once, but no words came—just a rasp of breath. When her eyes found mine, raw and unsteady, the first word broke through.
“Master,” she whispered. “May I speak?”
The first time she had ever said it. It landed heavy. I nodded.
“Lord Raven,” she said, her voice breaking, “what I did just now… I’m sorry for the scene I caused.”
Raven’s tone softened. “No. I should be the one apologizing.”
Her brow creased. “I… I don’t understand, my Lord.”
He lifted the ruined collar. “I destroyed this. If you want it repaired, I can have my craftsmen try.”
Ciara rose carefully and held out her hand. He placed the blackened scrap in her palm. She studied it a long moment. A submissive’s collar is everything—name, belonging, promise. Tears slid clean lines through the soot on her cheeks. She turned and threw the thing into the fire. It curled and blackened, then was gone. She sank back to her knees.
“I’d rather be nothing in BlackWing for the rest of my life than spend one more hour being anything in Vulkarin,” she said. “May it please you, my Lord. And I’ll serve this man”—she looked at me—“who’s shown me nothing but kindness.”
“So be it.” A small smile touched Raven’s mouth. “Sir Wildcard, you have a submissive, for as long as she chooses you.”
“Thank you, my Lord,” Ciara and I said together.
“May I be excused, my Lord?” she asked.
“No. You’ll report to the infirmary. Gabriella will take you. The medics will check you head to toe, then you may return to your quarters. Understood?”
“Yes, my Lord.”
Gabriella stepped forward, took the leash gently, and led her out.
The chamber still smelled of ash. The pit lingered even with the wall dark, clinging in the back of my throat.
Raven leaned back, studying me. For a long moment, neither of us spoke.
Finally he exhaled, slow. “Now. Advice. Dominant to Dominant. She’s just been betrayed. That weight takes time to settle.”
He held my gaze. “Do you know what I’d do if I were you?”
“No, my Lord.”
His tone shifted, lighter, dry. “I’d get back to my quarters before she does… and remove everything breakable.”
I inclined my head. “Sound advice. Thank you.”
For a heartbeat, I almost smiled. Almost.
He dismissed me with a flick of his fingers. I left and picked up two guards in the corridor. I would need the help.
- Writer
