Page 38 of Dark Night of the Soul

Sebastian seemed to be enjoying this all too much. “Yes, Miss Walker. Prep you.”

I shook my head, knowing where this was going. “I won’t help you. You can’t turn me like the others.”

“The others?” Vormund asked.

“She means like those in Antarctica,” Sebastian supplied. “Turning her dream walking powers into something more.”

“Oh, I see,” he said with a nod. “No, Miss Walker. We’re not going to turn you into that. We’ve moved beyond those… primitive experiments.”

Primitive? That was primitive?

My pulse jumped. “Then what are you proposing?”

“Something different. Something better. Something… shall we say, honed,” Vormund said.

Fury bloomed within my chest. “I will not.”

“I’m afraid you don’t have a choice,” he added. Then gave a nod toward Sebastian. “Does she?”

“She doesn’t.”

Then he leaned toward me. Sebastian’s voice was quiet when he answered. Too gentle.

“You’ll stop resisting,” he said, “once you understand who you’re meant to hurt.”

The truth slid into place with horrifying clarity.

I understood what Kincade was trying to shield me from. I wasn’t leverage.

They were going to make me break him.

I was a weapon.

Chapter 14 | Kincade

Bagras Castle. I’d been here far too much. I’d trained men here. Lived here for a time before I was sent to dispatch the new Keeper of the Holy Relics. Before I knew who that was.

As soon as we’d arrived, I was taken to the prison cells. A place I’d seen men chained up and left to starve and die. Deserters. Burned assets. Men who would rather die than live another day under the control of the Brotherhood. I didn’t understand then.

I understood now.

I understood what I was willing to do to become one of those men.

The knowledge sat heavy in my gut. Not fear. Not regret. Certainty. The kind that strips a man down to bone and leaves him standing, anyway.

There were no windows. No markers. No sunrise or sunset to cling to. Just stone and iron and the steady ache of chains pulling my arms wide enough to keep my muscles taut and burning. They hadn’t chained my legs. That was deliberate. I could stand. Shift my weight. Pace the length of the cell like a caged animal allowed enough room to remember movement.

They weren’t trying to weaken me.

They were waiting.

The cell door opened, casting light where there was darkness. Sebastian stepped into the cell, pausing in the doorway, the light at his back. Making him nothing more than a silhouette. Behind him, more guards. As if I was some common criminal that needed watching.

“Welcome back,” he said, his tone even.

“You came yourself,” I said. “That means you’re scared.”

His eyes sharpened. “Of you?”