I woke in my cell without remembering falling unconscious. I was on my stomach, and when I moved I could feel the restriction of bandages covering the lashes on my back. So they were a punishment, but of course the Emir had to mend his broken toys. How else would they continue to amuse him?
The Emir. I laid there and recalled his eyes, lit from within with cruel delight as he kissed me. As his tongue ran across my lips and tasted my blood, my fear, as I struggled to move away… I could feel the bile burning the back of my throat. Ignoring the agony of my back and ribs, I pushed out of the cot and fell to my knees in front of the bucket in the corner. For a few minutes I was quietly, thoroughly sick. Since I’d had no food in some time, all that came up was the revolting crimson of Silas’s blood, and it did not taste as good coming up as it had going down. I pressed my cheek to the cool stone wall beside me, feeling the gentle ooze of blood as the lashes on my back protested my movements. The inside of my mouth tasted like rotten meat and iron, almost enough to get me heaving again.
I moved my head around, looking to see if the guards had left me anything to eat. They had, and right beside the cot. I was surprised by that small kindness. Maybe they’d enjoyed my fight. Either way, it was much easier to reach as I slowly hauled myself back onto the cot, lying on my stomach as before. I supposed the Emir hadn’t ordered my meals to be restricted in any way, because instead of the stale bread and broth I’d expected, I found a mostly cooled bowl of stew and a small wooden pitcher of water. I brought it up to the cot and ate slowly, trying to move only my wrist and hand. Any larger movements pulled at the lacerations on my back.
After my bowl emptied I set it back on the floor and closed my eyes, letting my fatigue take over. I drifted in and out of sleep, waking when I heard nearby doors slam closed or a nearby slave started wailing. Between fits of dozing I would stare at the Chain around my wrist. Were it not a symbol of oppression I might find it almost pretty. Solid black but for a single thread of gold ink that almost blended into my light brown skin. It circled my wrist completely. If I ever escaped, I would Break the links to show I was owned by only myself. I would need to find someone to help, to burn the links in a very specific way so any officials looking at it would think it were real. So many had escaped and Broken the links themselves, only to be found out because the scars healed wrong. They were cut down or brought back to their hell.
I must have drifted off while thinking, because the next time I woke I felt someone’s fingertip very lightly tracing the side of my face. There was no malice in this touch, just curiosity. Gentleness. Nothing like the softly malign touch of the Emir. I sighed and leaned into it, and the finger quickly withdrew. The owner of that finger was breathing quickly, almost… panicked? My eyes opened and I looked around.
Night had fallen, and there was nearly no light at all in my cell. The dim moonlight was all that gave the room shape. The silver light caught on a pair of eyes above me. Violet eyes. Now I could see the willowy shape of Khith in the cell beside mine. My cot was against the wall with the bars, and Khith sat on his own cot on the other side. My elven eyes could see much better in the dark than any human’s, so I could see Khith clutching his hand to his chest as if touching me had burned him.
“That was you.” It was not a question. “How long were you doing that?” Silence greeted me, but I hadn’t really expected a response. I stayed where I was, laying on my stomach. I wouldn’t have moved even if I could have. “It was nice,” I said softly. At this, Khith glanced at me.
It was a hunger in Khith’s eyes. A desperate, raging need for contact, for kindness. For anything remotely gentle in this dark Abyss. Again I could see myself at eight, nine, ten years old. Wishing someone would save me, or even give me some reprieve. Slowly, I slid my palm up the wall and onto the ledge where the bars began. My back twinged in protest but I kept my hand pressed to the stone.
“You can touch me,” I offered quietly. “Whenever you feel alone, or scared.” Khith’s eyes burned into me. “No one can live without kindness for long. Even I have had constant kindnesses in my life, when things were dark. But it is your choice, and it always will be. I want you to have somewhere safe, somewhere kind, even if it isn't me. Somewhere you can remember that there's compassion in the world. You don't trust anything now, and maybe you never will again. But if you have hope for anything, I want you to have hope for yourself.”