“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.

Just the thought of her now made him tremble with rage, a wracking motion that quickly devolved into a mess of dry sobs.

Oh come now, Amara the spider said. You’ve done more than your share of harm in your life. Wouldn’t you say you’ve earned this kind of treatment?

You’re as bad as they come, squeaked Jonas the fly. You’re a killer, remember? You don’t deserve a second chance.

“I’m not saying you’re wrong,” he replied. “But you two aren’t helping, you know that?”

He gingerly touched his face, feeling the thick, dried blood caked to his left cheek. His severed eye stared at him from the far side of the cell.

Amara had made him feel like he mattered to her—like he mattered at all—if only a little bit. And then she’d done this. Why? And why did the king so readily go along with it?

It didn’t make any sense.

Felix thought he’d earned the king’s forgiveness and trust, but perhaps that too had been a lie. Perhaps the king had only brought him along for this very reason—to have someone to blame, someone to punish.

He lay down on his side, shivering.

He’d felt lost and alone and hopeless before, plenty of times, whether or not he’d ever admitted it. But never like this.

“I’m going to die,” he whispered. “And no one in the entire world will miss me.”

Slowly, he faded into a semiconscious state—whether it was sleep or simply pure blackness, he wasn’t sure. But time passed. And then the rattling of a key in the door jarred him awake.

The demon-guard peered at him through the small window. “Did you miss me?”

Felix sat up quickly, his body screaming with pain. He scooted backward, as far as he could get from the iron door.

He didn’t think he could endure more torture. Any more and he was certain he’d lose his mind completely.

He was already naming insects and talking to them. What next?

The guard was about to open the door when, suddenly, a loud boom sounded out, roaring through the dungeon. The walls shook, dust falling from the ceiling in large clouds that made Felix cough and wheeze.

The guard turned around to look down the hallway, and then disappeared.

Felix pressed his head back against the slimy wall, momentarily relieved.

Another boom, even bigger than before, rocked the dungeon. A small crack started splintering along the wall and spread up to the ceiling, until a chunk of rock crashed to the ground only a few feet away from Felix.

This whole place was going to come crashing down on his head.

Felix supposed it was better to die this way than at the mercy of that sadistic guard.

He moistened his dry, cracked lips with the tip of his tongue, tasting sweat and his own coppery blood.

“I’m not afraid,” he whispered. “I’m not afraid of death. But I want it to come quickly. Please, goddess. No more pain. If that request makes me a coward, then so be it, I’m a coward. But please . . . please. I’ve had enough.”

He waited, straining his ears to hear anything out in the hallway. But after the second explosion, all had gone deadly silent.

Minutes passed, or was it hours? He didn’t know how long he waited. Time had no meaning here.

Then, he heard it. Shouts. Screams. The clash of metal on metal, the crash of iron doors against stone walls. He strained to break apart his chains, but the cuffs only bit deeper into his wrists, rebreaking the wounds they’d already inflicted.

Someone was trying to escape. And someone else was helping him.

“Here—I’m in here.” He tried to shout it, but he could barely manage more than a rasp.

He had no idea who might come to his door, if he were calling out to friend or foe. But he had to try.

“Please,” he gritted out again. “Please help me.”

Finally, the clash and clatter hushed, and the battle sounds faded away to silence.

Felix inhaled, his breath making a shaky, pitiful sound, and he felt the shameful sting of tears.

He’d been left behind to rot.

He closed his eye against the dust and nothingness, hoping he could just fade away in peace. But then a small scuffle from the hall made him look up again.

Footsteps. And they were growing louder, closer.

Finally, someone came to the door. All Felix could see was a pair of eyes, briefly glancing in at him through the window before they disappeared again.

He heard a key turn in the lock, and his whole body tensed. He waited, barely breathing, as the door squeaked open.

Afraid to look up, first he saw a pair of mud-crusted black boots. Leather trousers. A dirty, blood-spattered canvas tunic with ragged, crisscrossed ties.

The glint of a sharp sword.

Felix began to tremble as he forced his gaze upward. Dust filled the air and Felix’s eyes burned from it as he tried to focus on the shape of this intruder.

Familiar. He seemed . . . so familiar.

The young man silhouetted in the doorway wore an expression filled with horror. “Damn it. What the hell did they do to you?”

“I’m dreaming. A dream, that’s all this is. You’re not really here. You can’t be.” Felix leaned back against the wall. “Oh, how funny. A dream about an old friend, just before dying.”

The dream figure came to crouch in front of him. “This is what you get for trying to be one of the good guys, you arse,” he said.

“Apparently so.”