Chapter 236
-Soren-
Rhett is looking on the brink of death as I enter the dungeons where he is kept. His entire body bloody from the relentless torture he has endured, but I need answers, and today I would get them. Alaric had compelled him good because he hasn’t uttered a word about who is the person working with them from my guard.
However, Damian believes we have broken the compulsion Alaric has over him because he tried to tell Damian who the traitor in my castle was, so he came to get me. It seems compulsion can be broken after all, or we are hoping my added command behind the torture will finally break him. Blood dribbles from his mouth, his head hangs forward, his chin resting on his chest. Opening the door to his cell, his head rolls on his shoulders to look at me. He whimpers and starts sobbing.
“Please, no more,” he begs.
I do not feel pity for the man, not after what he has done. I move into the cell briskly, leaving the door ajar behind me. The room reeks of sweat and blood, thick in the air like a fog. It sticks to my throat with every breath. I keep my expression neutral.
“I don’t care for your tears, Rhett,” I say, my teeth clenched in restrained rage. “I want names.”
A pathetic whimper is his only response, the connection of his
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fragmented mind barely holding on. But I have no time for sympathy – not for him.
“You can make this stop,” I tell him coldly. “Give me what I want. Who is the traitor?” I ask him, my fingers moving over the knives on the small table that Damian set aside for me.
Rhett’s eyes follow my movements with a sense of dread. His breaths come out in short, ragged gasps as he winces at the mere sight of the sharp edges.
“P–Please.” He chokes out once more, before spluttering into violent coughs that have his body shaking.
“Names, Rhett.” I repeat, the iciness in my tone matching the cold metal of the blade I pick up. The dull light of the dungeon flickers on its polished surface, and Rhett’s body stiffens.
A shudder runs through his frail body, his blue eyes widening with terror as they dart to the gleam of cold, sharp steel. “I …can’t,” he whispers, his voice raspy and barely audible.
Squaring my shoulders and steeling my gaze, I step closer – close enough to pull his head up by his hair and force him to look me in the eye. “Rhett,” I say his name with deliberate clarity, “You die today regardless. But how you die – whether it’s swift or prolonged by hours – depends on you. Tell me who betrayed me.”
I run the blade across his bare chest. Howling in pain and fear Rhett clenches his eyes shut momentarily before he pries them open enough to meet my steely gaze. His breaths are ragged, tearing out from his blood–caked throat in
intermittent gasps. I wait, holding on to a strand of patience as thin as the very edge of life he clings to.
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He tries to stutter out a response, making me realize Damian is right, we have nearly broken the compulsion on him, the fact he is trying to tell us means it’s nearly broken. Making me wonder if it is in this near death state that allows it.
“Speak clearly, Rhett!” I snap out, my patience wearing thin. Moving the blade, I plunge it into the one leg he has left, the other we removed with a serrated bread knife, trying to get answers out of him. Ripping the knife out, I plunge it into his groin. He screams and thrashes, his werewolf genes
attempting to heal him, however, even that ability is miniscule since his bond was broken.
Finally, after what feels like an eternity, a comprehensible name slips out from between his bruised lips. It’s a name that causes an icy chill to coil around my spine–a name that I never expected to be involved in this ploy- “Mavis, she opened the gates for us.”
My mind struggles to accept the information. Mavis has been one of my most loyal staff for years. Her betrayal feels like a knife twisting in my gut and stuns me momentarily.
Rhett gasps as I yank the knife out, trying to work out why she would betray me. Yet, I know trying to get those answers out of Rhett will be time–consuming when I can go straight to the source. Though suddenly things click into place, like that night I saw her on the stairs was one of the nights a call had gone out. She has also never been ordered out of the castle, even when security was tightened. Here I was thinking it was one of my guard, but no, it was someone far more trusted. Someone I trusted my son to, his Nanny.
Anger courses through me at the new information when Rhett groans, making me remember he is still alive. Gripping
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his hair, I tilt his head back, sawing through his neck with the blade. His eyes widen, and he gurgles and gasps as the blunt blade painfully and slowly cuts through his flesh. And just before I know he is about to die, I lift the blade and plunge it into his chest. He jerks but dies instantly. Blood coats my hands, drenches Rhett’s now limp body and the floor. Yet, I barely notice as I walk out of the cell. All I can think about is Mavis. How she betrayed Jacinta, and me. How she betrayed the little boy she has helped raise. How could she?
