Chapter 21
RIV POV It had been three weeks since I was dragged into the Veil’s underground stronghold, half-conscious, chained, and hunted. Three weeks since I first saw her face in the torchlight—eyes sharp, posture coiled like she wasn’t sure whether to strike or spare me. Now? Now she brought me breakfast. Every. Damned. Day. We didn’t talk about the guards. We didn’t talk about the silver that passed between her hand and theirs at the end of every day to make sure I wasn’t chained. We didn’t talk about the extra blankets, or the basin of clean water every other day, or the fresh shirts that somehow always fit. We just talked. About our childhoods. About things that hurt without being too sharp. Safe wounds. Things like summer gardens and training bruises and the way frost looked on pine bra
- Writer
