I sit and I look out the window, my mind spinning, body aching, tears falling, all while I gently pull out the knots on my poor abused ribbons.
The gold satiny strands that grow from the sides of my spine feel broken. They ache and sting from where Captain Fane tied them in brutal tangles. Every touch makes them flinch and has me grinding my teeth.
It takes me hours of sweating and shaking in grimacing pain, but I manage to get the knots undone.
“Finally,” I mutter as I set the last one down.
I roll my shoulders back, the skin along the length of my spine twinging where each ribbon is attached, twelve on each side, from between my shoulder blades to just above the curve of my bottom.
I spread all twenty-four strands out as much as I can in this cramped space, smoothing them with a soft touch, hoping it will help ease the hurt running through them.
They look wrinkled and limp where they lie on the carriage floor and bench. Even their golden color is slightly muted from their usual luster, like tarnished gold in need of polishing.
I let out a shaky sigh, my fi
ngers sore from how long it’s taken me to tug out every knot. My ribbons have never hurt so badly before. I’m so used to hiding them, to keeping them a secret, that I’ve never used them like I did on that pirate ship, and it’s obvious.
While I let my ribbons rest, I use the last shards of the gray daylight to check over the rest of my body. My shoulder and head hurt from my carriage toppling over and from being dragged out of it when the Red Raids captured me.
I also have a small split on my bottom lip, but I barely notice it. The sharper pains come from my cheek where Captain Fane struck me, and my side where he kicked me in the ribs. I don’t think anything is broken, but each movement has me sucking in a breath through clenched teeth.
A gnawing in my stomach reminds me that it’s hollow and angry, while my mouth is dry with thirst. But my most demanding feeling is how incredibly depleted I am.
Exhaustion is a chain locked around my ankles, cuffed over my wrists, draped around my shoulders. My strength and energy are gone, like someone pulled a plug from my back and let it all drain out.
Bright side? At least I’m alive. At least I got away from the Red Raids. I won’t be subjected to whatever Quarter wanted to do with me once he discovered his captain was missing. Quarter isn’t the kind of man you want for a captor.
Although my new escorts are far from ideal, at least I’m heading toward Midas, even if I don’t know what will happen once we get there.
Glancing out the carriage window, I watch dark hooves mottle the snow, their riders sitting proud on their saddles as they march on.
I have to be strong now.
I’m the captive of Fourth’s army, and there will be no room for fragility. I don’t know if the bones in my body are as gold as the rest of me, but for my sake, I hope they are. I hope my spine is gilded, because I’m going to need a strong backbone if I want to survive.
Closing my eyes, I reach up and press my fingertips against my lids, trying to rub away the sting. Though as tired as I am, I don’t sleep. I don’t relax. I can’t. Not with the enemy marching outside and those terrible memories hovering over my head.
Was it really just yesterday morning that Sail was alive? That Digby was barking out gruff orders to his men? It seems like weeks, months, years ago.
Time changes with torment. It stretches on, lengthening seconds, extending minutes. I’ve learned that pain and fear have a way of prolonging. And as if that weren’t cruel enough, our minds make sure we relive those moments again and again and again, long after they’ve passed.
What a bastard, time is.
I know that I’ve left a part of me behind on that pirate ship. I’ve been through enough tragic moments to recognize the feeling of rawness left to ache.
Every heartbreak I’ve endured in my life, every harrowing pain, it’s ripped a part of me away. I’ve felt every piece of myself that’s been torn off, seen each bit where it fell behind me in the path of my past like breadcrumbs, only to be snapped up by vicious birds of prey.
In Highbell, people sometimes traveled for weeks just to look at me. Midas would let me stand beside him in the throne room as they gawked.
But no matter how long I stood there on the pedestal for them to look, no one really saw me. If they did, they’d know I’m just a girl with jagged rips and pitted holes inside of her, with golden skin hiding a broken heart.
My eyes burn, telling me that I’d be crying again if I had any tears left to fall, but I guess that’s drained out of me too.
I have no idea where the other saddles or guards are, and I have no idea what the commander intends to do with me, but I’m not a fool. King Rot sent the might of his army to Fifth Kingdom to confront Midas, and I fear for my king as much as I fear for myself.
I shiver when the last sliver of sunlight finally drops down to be tucked beneath the blanket of the horizon. Day has officially ended, and with it, I force myself to lock away my emotions.
Now that dusk is turning into the promise of night, the carriage comes to a lurching halt. When you’re on this side of the world of Orea, night descends swiftly and brutally, so it’s no surprise that Fourth’s army begins to make camp.