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There was still silence. If my animalia powers were gone, if the magic Naî had taught me was gone, then there was no chance that my animal speak had survived.

My arms were broken. Kacha had done something to my legs or my back. He was going to kill me. He was going to kill me, while at the same time convincing Tallu that he would give me back if Tallu gave him what he wanted.

But he had already told me what he was actually going to do with me. Kacha had reminded me of his patience, of what he had lost already in his quest for imperial domination.

So my death was going to be a slow one. I felt panic at the edges of my mind, but ground it out. Yorîmu’s voice was in my ear. A slow death simply meant that I had more time to escape. A slow death simply meant I had time to relearn magic as I had the last time Kacha had used his evil technique on me.

The click of the scorpion’s legs against the glass became background noise, a metronome to keep the time. In the dark, I had no way of determining time. I knew it would stretch, elongate. When waiting, it never condensed.

Kacha came back, and stomped on my arms again, sending pain that I couldn’t push away through my body. It screamed through my flesh, nearly deafening me.

“What are you asking Tallu for?” I forced myself to speak. I kept my voice flat, the only way I could manage it without screaming. “The capital? The throne?”

“His head,” Kacha said with a laugh.

“His Dogs won’t let anyone hurt him, even himself,” I said.

“They will, once they see the weak man he has become. Once they see the coward he is, hiding behind his whispers and electro magic. When they see that he will bend at the knee for a northern barbarian—a northern monster—they will hand me his head themselves. Even Dogs have pride.” Kacha sneered the last words.

“That’s true,” I managed. “After all, Asahi has more than enough pride to know that between you and Tallu, the emperor is the better master to serve.”

Kacha raised his foot, and I ducked my head, avoiding his kick. He stomped down on my arms again, and this time I did scream.

“Do you think to make me kill you?” Kacha tsked. “I plan to send you to the emperor in pieces. I will cut out your heart last, so that he will see the black thing and know he fell in love with a monster.”

Kacha took another glass jar and put it on the ground next to the first. I strained my ears, hearing the hissing as the two scorpions began speaking to each other.

There was no other sound in the hallway. Kacha had to have men. He could not have kidnapped me with simply the two. I had killed one of them but there had been more than one on our journey here.

How had we gotten here so quickly anyway? If Kacha had a sand crawler, the goblins would have seen it. Even when they were having their feast, surely they had posted scouts and sentries.

But those questions were mostly to distract myself. Kacha closed the door behind him, leaving me in the darkness again.

My mind spun, asking questions I didn’t have the answers to. My arms hurt so badly that if I shifted at all, new spikes of pain pierced my head. So I didn’t move.

You trained for this, Yorîmu reminded me. I could practically hear her next to me, sitting just as still. You trained for this, Airón. This is nothing. Do you remember when I made you sit without moving, without food, for two days?

“In the banquet hall,” I managed. “Under the table. I could smell the food.”

You survived that. This is nothing. Your sister would torture you worse than this in the winter.

“She would,” I agreed.

Focusing on the pain was pointless. Instead, I delved deep into my own mind, reaching for the first magic I had learned after I had lost my animal speak.

Ice was desire. And I desired to get out of here. I desired to stab an icicle straight into Kacha’s heart, to watch him die.

Nothing. No magic. Nothing.

But I kept working at it, until unconsciousness claimed me. It wasn’t quite sleep. The pain made sleep impossible, but my mind would fall away, and I would come back to myself realizing I had been gone.

The scorpions went quiet, their hissing turning sub-vocal, something I could feel against my skin, even if I heard nothing.

Kacha returned and began to work on my fingers. I tried to keep my hands fisted, but he forced them open, breaking each digit one by one. When he was done, he left another scorpion behind.

I continued working on my magic, continued reaching for the ocean of power that I had once feared so much. Now I would gratefully bathe in it.

Kacha cut away my fingers one by one. The number of scorpions grew to a dozen.