09

SIENNA

The sound of lashes didn’t fade quickly. It clung to the air, sharp and rhythmic, each strike like a heartbeat that didn’t belong to me. Ten lashes. I counted them without meaning to.

The courtyard fell quiet after the last scream. The silence that followed was heavier than the pain itself. Even the birds stayed hidden.

I pressed my palms against my belly, feeling the faintest movement beneath my fingers… small, fluttering, alive. My little pup. My reason for breathing, even when it hurts too.

From where I stood, half-shadowed near the corridor, I could see the servants scatter. Heads bowed, eyes lowered, lips sealed. Not one of them spoke. Fear moved through the house like smoke.

The smell of blood lingered too long.

I stayed still until the sound of footsteps faded, his footsteps. Then I turned the corner, slow, my heart still beating unevenly.

Rhea was already there, crouched on the floor, sweeping the broken glass from the rug. Her movements were quiet, deliberate. She didn’t hum like she usually did when she worked. Her silence said enough.

The rug was stained where the tea had spilled, dark patches marking the spot like bruises.

“Rhea,” I whispered.

She didn’t look up.

“I can help.”

She shook her head, quick and firm.

I bent down anyway, picking up a small shard between my fingers. The edge bit into my skin almost immediately creating a shallow cut. I flinched, sucking in a breath.

Rhea’s eyes darted up at that sound. Just for a second. Then she reached out, snatched the glass from me, and hissed quietly, “Don’t.”

Her tone startled me, not angry, not cruel, but urgent. The kind of urgency that comes from fear, not scolding.

“I just wanted to…”

“Don’t,” she repeated, softer this time.

I froze, my hand still open, a tiny drop of blood beading on my fingertip. Rhea tore a piece of cloth from the hem of her apron and pressed it against my palm. Her hands were trembling.

“He punished the guard because of this,” she murmured, barely moving her lips. “Because of what happened here.”

“I didn’t know,” I whispered. “I didn’t mean for that to…”

Her eyes flicked toward the staircase, the one he’d descended earlier. “You think that matters?”

Her words weren’t cruel…they were tired. Defeated.

I looked down at the floor again. “He didn’t have to do that.”

“No,” she said quietly, “but he did.”

For a moment, the only sound between us was the sweep of broken glass.

“I thought he was going to hurt me,” I admitted after a long pause. “When he told me to stand.”

Rhea’s gaze flickered toward me, quick and sharp. “He doesn’t waste words.”

“That’s not an answer.”

She straightened slowly, a tray of glass in her hands, her face pale and unreadable. “It’s the only one you’ll get.”

I stared at her, at the fine tremor in her fingers. She looked smaller somehow, folded in on herself, like the fear in this house was something she’d learned to wear.

“He’s not what I thought,” I said finally. “He’s worse.”

She didn’t agree. Didn’t deny it either.

Instead, she said, “You should stay in your room today.”

I blinked. “Why?”

“Because you were seen,” she said, her voice almost a whisper. “And because that’s enough.”

Before I could respond, she turned and walked away, her steps quick, her tray rattling faintly.

I stayed kneeling a moment longer, feeling the weight of her words settle like dust.

Because you were seen.

***********************

By the time I reached my room, the morning light had softened into a pale haze. The servant stairs creaked beneath my feet… old, narrow, forgotten by most who mattered. My palms still stung, the small cut pulsing with every beat of my heart.

The tray he’d sent me before still sat near my door, untouched. The stew had gone cold, the bread stiff. I stared at it for a long while before crouching to pick it up.

The bowl was heavier than I expected. Or maybe my arms were weaker than I wanted to admit.

Inside, the broth had congealed at the edges, but it still smelled faintly of herbs and spice. Warmth. Comfort. Things that didn’t belong to me anymore.

I carried it inside and set it on the small table by my bed. The room was still. Quiet.

“You shouldn’t look at me like that,” I whispered, the words spilling out before I could stop them. 

“Like I’m a mistake he hasn’t decided what to do with.”

Talking to empty rooms had become a habit. Safer than talking to people.

The floorboards groaned softly under my weight as I sat. I forced a bite of bread down my throat. It tasted like dust.

My baby shifted again, a small nudge beneath my ribs. My hand went to my stomach automatically. “You’re safe,” I murmured. “I’ll keep you safe. No matter what.”

A soft knock came at the door.

My entire body tensed. “Rhea?”

There was no answer even as I waited for whoever was at the other end of the door to say something. I waited, holding my breath. Then slowly, carefully, I opened the door.

There was no one, only a new tray sitting on the floor. Steam curled from the bowl…fresh food.

I froze. The smell hit first…venison stew. The same as before, only hotter. I looked both ways down the hall. Empty. The shadows stretched long and silent.

He’d sent it again. The same man who’d stood in that hall with eyes that could freeze your bones had sent me another meal.

I closed the door slowly, the tray warm against my palms. My chest tightened. I didn’t know what terrified me more… the punishment he’d given, or the strange, deliberate kindness that followed.

When Rhea came to collect the laundry later that day, she didn’t greet me. Just went straight to the basket by the bed.

“Rhea,” I said quietly.

She didn’t look up.

“Why did he do it?”

Her hands paused on the folded sheets. “Do what?”

“Punish the guard. Ten lashes. For a tray.”

Rhea’s fingers twitched slightly. “You think it was for the tray?”

I frowned. “Then for what?”

She turned then, eyes meeting mine. “That’s not why he was punished, he was punished to serve as a reminder.”

“Remind who?”

Her silence was the only answer I needed. She went back to her folding, but her shoulders looked tight, strained.

“I don’t understand him,” I admitted softly. “He spares me, then terrifies everyone around me. He sends food, then makes blood spill on the same floor I walk on.”

Rhea stopped moving. For a heartbeat, I thought she wouldn’t say anything at all. Then, quietly, she said, “That’s how he stays alive.”

Her tone held something strange… not respect, not fear, something in between.

“Do you think he hates me?” I asked.

Rhea folded the last sheet. “He doesn’t hate,” she said. “He decides.”

I let the words sit between us, heavy and sharp. She left after that, the door closing softly behind her. I stood there, watching the fading steam from the tray, her words echoing in my head.

“He doesn’t hate. He decides.”

That was worse. Hate you could fight. Decision you could not.