The weight of that promise, drained blood from her face as she watched him in utter dread.
For the first time, that mask seemed less a barrier and more a weapon when she felt the slight tug on the lower part of his face. No…
"No," it left her lips before she could prevent it, low and steady now. "Y-You'll do nothing to her. I-I've confessed. You have your culprit. Punish me instead," She forced the last three sentences in a breathless pace.
Something like amusement flickered through his eyes, and she forgot to breathe. "Punish you?" he tilted his head. "And why, my beloved traitor, would I grant you such reprieve?"
R-Reprieve?
Lucrezia didn't know what to say, yet she opened her mouth, allowing whatever words be damned later, "B-Because if you kill her," she started. "… you'll never know what she found." Lucrezia's heartbeat doubled when she blurted, breathing from its weight.
The atmosphere shrank out of gravity as silence stretched in a hard electric expanse by eliciting a dangerous air exuding from the monster before her.
For a while, he said nothing but observed every bit of her soul. The raw emotions in her eyes; the pain, the fear, the doubled defiance…
He stared with an unreadable expression behind the mask, but from the mischief in those eyes, one could tell he was clearly enjoying every bit of her torment.
"I don't need to know what she found when I await your confession," he said at last. "And now, you'll watch me take her life away as easily as it was to convince her to come to my land."
Lucrezia's heart stopped beating.
"Unbind her,"
At that command, a guard stepped forward from behind. The soft thud of his boot on the stone floor mimicked the rate of her heartbeat as her eyes followed every detailed movement.
In an instant, a half-loud, half-silent whoosh disimbued the magic as the air rippled until the wolf gained liberation, and silence claimed after.
She was free.
Lucrezia's heart pumped with such savagery that it almost disparaged her consciousness. Beyond his shoulder, she saw the wolf collapse to its knees, as the invincible chains lost their hold and a tremor passed through her lips before it settled into a sigh of relief.
Hope—as dangerous as it was—bloomed across her chest and flooded her veins with both promise and peril. If he let her free, does that mean he was going to let her go?
Lucrezia knew how foolish the thought was. The Devil never lets his prey away until it rips out every bit of its soul.
So her eyes quickly scanned the number of guards present at the courtyard and ones surrounding the threshold—nine at the pyre, three by the main gate, two shadowing the lord himself. Enough, perhaps, to clench the courtyard like a fist. Not enough, maybe, to hold her if she moved clean and fast.
Lucrezia knew the wolf couldn't make it as a result of its weakness but could if she was fast enough.
Fast enough to escape the hands of death when it foolishly perhaps—not mercifully—rendered an advantage to the wolf and when her eyes found it, she breathed.
For a moment, all she could see was the eyes of Madelyn; those fierce yet warm eyes, that voice whispering "everything would be okay" when the days went bad, and the embrace whenever her nightmares happened…. it all flashed like a blur, and a lone tear spilled across her face.
For one minute, Lucrezia's eyes never left it, afraid that if she did… she'll be gone. But she wouldn't be if she escaped.
Her face drained of color at the thought. Go! The word burned on her tongue—she longed to scream it, to rush toward the wolf—but terror clamped her voice shut. This time, a single word might truly get her killed and strong hands held her back.
So she waited, hoped, and prayed Madelyn would run, make use of this advantage to escape.
More than ever, Lucrezia was willing to risk her life if it meant Madelyn surviving. She would have drawn on her power but the tonic's effects still lingered, suppressing every trace of her sorcery.
Never had she ever thought of defying her father's order and put not just herself and her mother at risk, but House Bathory's if ever the Lord of Sin realizes the trifling trick against him, that she wasn't her step-sister.
What could happen if he realizes he bethroted the Curse of Veximoor and not the Alpha of Secktom Pack? What could happen to House Bathory and the entire wolf's kind? What could happen, if she risked all King Vladimir's plans by saving a mongrel?
The mongrel who happened to be her friend. Lucrezia was torn between duty and death, but more than ever, she was willing to let hold of the latter. They could disappear if fast enough, escape this cruelty before it worsens and save her mother.
But the ability to make the latter happen was through this marriage.
Finally, as though it heard her, the wolf moved. Lucrezia let out a shaky sigh as she watched it take charge, thinking it was turning away, but blood drained out of her face when it surged toward their direction.
No…
The world seemed to spin tremendously around her when a sudden blur of white and motion wrapped her vision. The flash of claws and teeth baring to a snarl gripped her attention as Madelyn lunged straight for him—who remained facing her—in a desperate streak of wounded light.
Lucrezia gasped, unable to manage the head spin, and thankfully, she pressed her body instinctively as though it could shield her from the horror at broad daylight.
For a fleeting, foolish heartbeat, she thought the wolf might reach him. That it might sink her class into his throat and tear free some vengeance for whatever cruelty had brought her here, but Lord Vaeron didn't even flinch.
The wolf was young, yet formidable at a greater advantage but no matter how big it was, it couldn't match the creature's intimidation.
He stood perfectly still, one hand at his side as it neared, and the other lifting slightly, not in defense but an invitation. At that moment, rationality clamped her shut, trapped somewhere between the thundering of her pulse.
Something was wrong and Lucrezia felt it deep within her bones. I-It was a trap.
"Madelyn, no!"
But it was already too late as it collided with him, and a burst of motion rolled across the stones, vanishing into the tangle of white fur and black buldric.
Out of reflex, Lucrezia clasped her eyes shut, hoping to all the gods what she wasn't really sure about. Her safety… or his?
Silence followed after the crash until the soft tumble of something rolled across the stone floor, resting a few inches away from her feet.
Oh gods...
Lucrezia's pulse thundered against her chest when the silence seemed to rot, growing heavier the longer she refused to look.
She knew she had to—she should turn and see— to confirm perhaps, but even the thought of it stripped away what little courage she had left.
It was only when it felt like the world sucked in that familiar darkness, replacing it with something lesser, did her eyes slowly opened.
The courtyard was unnervingly still and too good to be true. It was the kind of silence that felt wrong, deliberate, like the world was waiting for something to move first, and the first thing that caught her eyes was the blood-stained creature holding a dripping blade.
It suddenly felt like the world was upside down, when her gaze fell to ground, noticing the severed head of a wolf a few feet away.