A woman's laughter—breathless, broken by pain, yet unmistakable. There was no madness in it. That was what made it terrible. It was deliberate. Knowing. The laugh of someone who had just watched her torturers walk away and found something deeply, quietly funny in their retreat.
It echoed against the vaulted ceilings in a way that made even the hardened guards glance uneasily at one another. Because it did not sound like a captive collapsing under torment. It sounded like someone who had seen something they had not—something that changed the shape of the room, the stakes of the game.
"Haha…"
The sound chased them long after the cell door had vanished behind iron turns and shadowed bends. No one mentioned it. But each of them heard it. And none liked what it suggested.
"Damn you all..."
The laughter faded slowly, not because it had run its course, but because her body could no longer sustain it.
