His voice emerged rough and scraped raw — dry… exhausted… yet unmistakably his.
My eyes burned instantly. I hovered on the edge of laughter and sobbing all at once. Instead, fingers clamped desperate and tight around cold iron bars between us.
"You absolute idiot…" I breathed, voice shaking uncontrollably. "Why wouldn't you answer me before?"
Long silence stretched heavy and still.
Then — slow and indifferent:
"I was sleeping."
I stared at him in pure disbelief. "You looked completely dead!"
One corner of his mouth shifted faintly.
"That would certainly have been quieter."
Even now — amid blood… heavy chains… broken body wrapped in injury — he remained impossible, infuriatingly himself. Something twisted sharp and painful deep inside my chest.
He shifted weight just barely… and I caught instantly how every muscle locked rigid afterward. Pain. Real, biting agony. Even drawing breath seemed difficult labour. Old guilt surged up again, violent and bitter.
