The Bell of Freedom (King and human romance)✔

Chapter Forty-Seven

"Talk to me, human. Can you talk?"

I haven't moved from the floor in several minutes. Thea finally grew bored of beating me and left. Saffron won't offer me that privilege. My arms tremble as I try to push myself up from the floor, I spit blood on the ground as tears sting my eyes. I'm not sure if anything is broken but the pain from my ribs is making it hard to breathe. I twist myself onto my backside as Saffron enters the cage. Her hand is outstretched as she walks towards me, I cower back into the wall.

"Relax, I'm not going to hurt you. I just want to test something." She places her hand to my shoulder and then jumps back several feet like I've electrocuted her, her lips snarl at me. "What are you?"

I push my knees to my chest. Thea had that same reaction every time she touched me for too long, I think that's why she left. Though not before inflicting beating after beating upon me. My body is sore and bruised, I'm surprised I'm still conscious. Saffron shakes her hands and clears her throat. She kneels down in front of me, looking over me with a deep sigh.

"I really wanted to show him your disguise but it doesn't look like that will be possible," she says. "I'll have to take you to him instead."

I want to see him more than anything but I know what she means. She wants to kill me in front of him. I am merely the collateral in their war and killing me would not only hurt him but it'd also weaken him.

"It's not personal," she says. "I just never imagined he'd ever care for something this much. The others said that he's owned you for months, he had his chance to become the most powerful being in the universe and he gave it up just to lose you anyway. It's tragic really."

I clench my jaw. "What have you done to him?"

"You'll find out soon. I'm going to reunite you. That's what you want, isn't it?"

"No."

She grins, her eyes sparkling with amusement. "Do not worry, I won't torture you. It'll be quick and painless. I do not like hearing humans scream, it is annoying. However, I don't care about your soul becoming depressed anymore." She tightens her hands around my throat and pulls me up, slamming me against the wall. She clenches on her teeth as something inside of me makes her unable to hold me for long. She releases me and I fall back to the ground. "No specimen has ever been able to do that before. It is a first for me."

I rub my throat as I struggle to breathe. I look up to see her distancing herself, her teenage gaze locked on me with curiosity.

"Humans are so weak," she mutters. "It baffles me that my kind even bother to paralyze you at all. I guess they find the screams annoying too."

I sit against the wall, cradling my knees back to my chest. Something strange keeps demanding my attention from the corner of the cell, at first I think I am imagining it, that I am hallucinating from all the punches to my face, but the shine from something metal is becoming brighter.

"Are you ready to go?" she says. "It's time for your reunion."

"You said I would be bid on at the end of the week."

Saffron laughs. "That was just to get them off my back. They are still loyal to the King, give them the chance of a completed soul and they'll fall in line easily. But once you are dead and the King is weakened they will have no choice but to conform and accept me. And if they don't, well, I'll just kill them." Saffron observes me closely, trying to look for a way to grab me that won't cause her any suffering. "How should I do this?"

I don't understand what's happening to me. I am still aware that Saffron is before me, that my life is in very real danger, but my body is beginning to get heavier as though I'm being shaken. Something opens inside my mind and it distracts me with a beautiful and panicked familiarity.