Frozen Tides (Falling Kingdoms 4)

A filthy eyeball stared right up at Felix.

How much simpler things had been earlier today, when it had been in his head, before the demon-guard took a dagger to his left eye socket.

“Why don’t you get on with it and kill me,” Felix sputtered.

“Where’s the fun in that? I have to work here, with you stinking, disgusting murderers, day in and day out. Why would you deny me a little joy?”

“Your joy is wasted on me. I didn’t kill Emperor Cortas and his sons.”

The guard smiled thinly. “Of course you didn’t. You’re completely innocent—just like the rest of the scum in this prison.”

“That bitch you call a princess framed me for her crimes!”

“Oh, not this again. Beautiful, sweet Princess Amara, killing her father and brothers? Why would she do something like that?”

“For power, of course. Trust me, there’s nothing sweet about her.”

The demon-guard snorted. “She’s nothing but a woman, what use would she have for power?”

“You’re so stupid, I almost feel sorry for you.”

The demon-guard narrowed his eyes and rose to standing. He took his dagger out and used the tip of his blade to poke the wound where Felix’s tattoo used to be.

Felix cried out at the sharp, sudden pain.

“Aw, does that hurt?” the guard asked, grinning.

“I’m going to kill you,” Felix gritted out.

“No, you’re not. You’re going to hang there in chains and let me keep hurting you until it’s time for you to die. And then I’m going to beat you some more before I finally eviscerate you.” He scraped at the flayed patch of skin again. “Yeah, we know all about you and your Cobra Clan here. You lot think you’re so tough, so elite. Well, you were right to slice your meaningless tattoo off. Because now you’re nothing. Can you see that? Can you see you’re nothing?”

“Go kiss a horse’s arse.”

The guard trailed his blade up Felix’s arm, along his shoulder to his neck, and up over his chin and cheek until the sharp tip came to rest right beneath his right eye. “Maybe I’ll take this one, too. Maybe I’ll take your tongue and your ears, too, and leave you blind, mute, and deaf.”

He thought about reminding the moronic guard that taking his ears wouldn’t make him deaf—he’d witnessed someone in the Clan make this mistake before—but he said nothing.

There was a knock at the door of his cell. The demon-guard answered it, speaking to someone through a small window.

“Sorry to disappoint you,” he said, turning back to Felix, “but I have to leave you for a bit. I promise I’ll be back later. Rest up.” He cranked a wheel that lowered Felix’s chains, relieving him from standing on the tips of his toes and sending him slumping down to the floor. “Look at you, red with your own blood. Red is the color of Limeros, isn’t it? I’m sure that King Gaius would be proud to see your patriotism now—that is, if he gave a damn about you anymore.”

Laughing, the guard left him.

“Well, now,” Felix mumbled to himself, “this is certainly an unfortunate situation, isn’t it?”

He choked out a laugh, but it barely sounded human.

The walls of his cell were covered in foul-smelling slime; the floor was nothing more than a mixture of dirt and bodily waste. He’d been given nothing but filthy water since he’d woken up there, and not a single scrap of food. If it wasn’t for the chains holding him up, he didn’t think he’d be able to stand on his own.

“What do you think about all of this?” He posed his question to the large, hairy spider in the far corner of the ceiling. Felix had named his ugly cellmate Amara.

In his nineteen long years of life, Felix has never hated anyone as much as he did Amara.

“What was that, Jonas?” Felix had also given a name to the spider’s most recent victim: a fly who’d haplessly wandered too close to the web and was now as trapped as Felix was.

He held a trembling hand to his ear. “‘Don’t lose hope?’ ‘Keep that chin up?’ Sorry to say, friend, but it’s far too late for that. For both of us, it seems.”

The only thing that was keeping him conscious, that kept him fighting to live through this hell, was a hopeless dream of vengeance. Oh, how he would ruin her if he ever managed to escape. That deceptive, conniving, ruthless, cold-blooded, power-hungry monster.