I tried to remember who I was.
“You are Rowan,” Rhyzkahl said, helping me. He lifted my lolling head, looked into my eyes. “Rowan.”
I dragged in a breath, feeling the name. He brought the pain, but then he stopped the pain. Perhaps he was right. I tasted it on my tongue.
He put a hand to the side of my face, cool and smooth, easing the pain. “Yes, say it,” he said voice soft and soothing. “Say your name.”
Kara…Kara…
A name. Felt more than heard, as if from an incredible distance. I tasted it, found it more right than the other. “Kara,” I managed to rasp.
He took a long deep breath, lifted his hand, allowing the pain to return. “No. Rowan.” He moved around to my left side, began another sigil, ignored my keening wail of a scream.
Kara…
“You are Rowan,” Rhyzkahl said, returning to stand before me. Once again he laid his hand on my cheek, once again gave me numb refuge from the pain.
I heard him. Heard the name. Heard the distant call.
Kara…
“I’m…K-Kara.”
He pulled his hand away, allowing the pain to flood in. I spasmed in the bindings, vision going red as my shoulders dislocated.
“You bring the pain upon yourself,” he told me as he brought the blade before me. “Speak your name—Rowan—and end it.”
Kara…Kara…Kara…
I moaned, unable to say either name.
Stepping back, he gestured, pulling my arms out to my sides, though keeping them twisted enough to maintain the searing agony in my shoulders. Another gesture pulled my legs apart until I was stretched in a vicious spread-eagle about a foot off the ground.
Once again he bound me in potency to keep me from twitching and marring his work. He set the blade on my upper back, slowly parting my flesh in the complex pattern.
Once again, he brought the pain.
I hung limp in the cruel position, twitching within the imprisoning sheath as he began a new sigil. A thousand times we’d been through this. Surely it had been that many. Yet other than the carving of my flesh and the ruin of my shoulders, I was undamaged. Each bout of agony was only that, yet all of that.
I couldn’t pass out. That way was closed off to me. But another way beckoned, shimmered with a promise of ease, of a different sort of oblivion. All I had to do was relax my grip on myself. Let go, and the pain would fade away. I could drift there and be nothing.
Kara…KARA!
I moaned. No. I couldn’t let go. I’d never find my way back. “…here,” I whispered.
Rhyzkahl lifted his head. “Mzatal.” He bared his teeth and growled a very nonhuman sound. “Dahn!” He moved swiftly to grip my hair, hauled my face close to his. “What have you done?” He snarled, face contorted in fury.
“…here,” I gasped, “…Kara.”
He released my hair with a shove, then backhanded me. “He will not know you. Your name is ROWAN.”
I shuddered in pain, uncertain which name was right. He moved to my back, drew a breath, and began a new sigil.
Kara…Kara…Kara…
Twitching, I whimpered, “…here.”
Rhyzkahl carved the sigil into my lower back, taking far longer with this one than any other. At last he finished, moved back around to look into my face. “After this, you will know your name,” he said, voice hard again and full of fury. “And he will no longer touch you.”