Chapter 50: Like a Machine

Brutus’s words rolled across the warehouse like thunder wrapped in iron.

The men below lifted their heads at once, some with wide eyes, others with twitching jaws, all of them listening like frightened schoolboys about to be told whether they’d be whipped or knighted.

From my vantage on the balcony, still tucked comfortably against the side of his mountainous shoulder, I could feel every vibration of that rumble. Saints above, it was like sitting on the armrest of a cathedral bell as it tolled—steady, unrelenting, and a bit arousing if I’m being honest.

Not that I’d admit that out loud. Well, maybe I would. I usually do.

“Each of you,” Brutus bellowed, pointing one slab-like hand toward the men, “will be handed a portion of the product.” His words snapped across the air, precise as hammer blows. “Not a scrap to waste, not a drop to squander. You will sell it—not just in the courtyard, not just to your bunkmates—but to every damned corner of this prison. To every last rat and dog scratching in the dirt. If there is a breath of air in this pit, it will be laced with our work. It will belong to us.”

I swear, the way he said us sent a shiver crawling down my spine. Not just because it sounded good—though it did, gods, it did—but because of the way the men leaned forward when he said it. They wanted it. They needed it.

These broken bastards, these prisoners with dirt-streaked cheeks and calloused hands, were so hungry for purpose that Brutus could’ve told them we were starting a knitting circle and they’d still look like disciples waiting for the first hymn.

He wasn’t finished, of course. Brutus never stopped at one sermon. He planted both hands on the railing of the balcony, leaning forward until the torchlight carved his scars into sharp shadows.

“You will keep a portion of what you sell. Not scraps, not crumbs, but a cut worthy of your work. Productivity will be rewarded, sloth punished. The harder you labor, the more you thrive. And for those who rise above—those who exceed the standard—there will be bonuses.”

The word “bonuses” rolled out of him like a secret spell. You could feel the tremor it caused in the room, a ripple of murmurs and shifting feet.

Even Freya, lurking at the edge with her arms crossed and her usual scowl ready, tilted her head at that. Bonuses. That was how you lit fires in desperate men—give them something shiny to kill each other for.

“Think on it,” Brutus growled, slamming a fist against the railing. The sound cracked like a gunshot, and several men actually flinched. “No more bits stolen from the guards’ tables. No more waiting for rats to crawl into your stew for a taste of meat. With this—” He reached into his pocket and yanked out a glowing vial of Erosin, holding it aloft like some holy relic, “—with this, you are kings in chains. And if you have the will to rise, if you have the strength to grasp what’s in front of you, no man in this pit will ever stand above you again!”

Oh, saints, it was perfect. A little fire, a little threat, a little hope. Honestly, if Brutus hadn’t been such a meat-wall of stoicism, I would’ve sworn he practiced that in front of a mirror with a candle and a glass of wine.

I half-expected the men to start chanting his name like zealots. Instead they muttered among themselves, approval simmering low, a wave of hunger building beneath their ribs.

I could smell it—their want, their greed, their stupid, desperate belief that maybe, just maybe, they’d found a ladder out of this godforsaken pit.

The murmur swelled into a ragged cheer, voices hoarse but eager. Men clapped each other on the back, some cackled with nervous glee, others stomped their feet against the stone until the floor itself shuddered beneath us.

Brutus let them go on, watching like a priest whose sermon had finally cracked open his flock. Then he gave a sharp nod, and our people moved.

Rows of vials were brought out. Malrick’s old empire, reborn and redistributed like party favors at a funeral. Each man was handed a small pouch, enough to tempt but not enough to squander, and with every handoff came the weight of expectation.

They knew it. We knew it. Failure would not just be punished—it would be erased.

When the last pouch was given, the men filed out into the courtyard like a flood of rats loosed into a cathedral. They moved with haste, heads bent, voices low, scattering across the area in pairs and trios.

From afar it looked like a spreading plague, like sparks leaping from ember to ember until the whole prison threatened to be lit ablaze. And gods, was it beautiful.

I stretched like a cat against Brutus’s shoulder, sighing dramatically. “Well then,” I cooed, “if this isn’t the prettiest revolution I’ve ever seen, I’ll eat my own skirt.”

He rolled his eyes toward me. “Don’t joke about that.”

“What, the revolution?”

“No, the skirt. It suits you.”

I cackled, letting my weight sink more heavily into him as we descended the steps, my arm looping around his like I belonged there. Which, saints help me, I almost did. But then I had an idea. A terrible, brilliant, life-shortening idea.

“Brutus,” I whispered dramatically, tugging at his arm like a child begging for sweets, “lift me.”

His brow furrowed. “What?”

“Lift me! Hoist me aloft! Raise me into the heavens so I may survey my glorious kingdom.”

He stopped dead on the steps, giving me that long-suffering glare that could peel paint off stone. “Loona.”

I widened my eyes, batting my lashes. “Please? Just this once? For morale?”

He muttered something dark under his breath, but before I could press further, his massive hands wrapped around my waist. And then—up I went. Saints preserve us, I squealed like a tavern girl on her first swig of wine.

My legs kicked wildly until I found my perch, straddling his broad shoulders like some triumphant general riding into battle.

“Ohhh, yes,” I purred, settling in with a wiggle that made him grunt in warning. “This is perfect.”

We strolled through the courtyard together, our shadows stretching long beneath the lanterns, watching as our men began their work. Deals whispered, palms brushed, coins slipped. It was happening already. The machine had started, and there was no stopping it now.

And that’s when I saw him.

At first glance, he looked like any other broken dog in this place. Hollow eyes, jittery hands, shoulders hunched as if the world itself had crushed him. But there was something wrong. His prison wear was too clean, his frame too lean.

Oh, he’d tried—scuffing the knees, mussing the hair, putting on a good show of collapse—but gods, I’d spent enough of my life staring at men pretending to be something they weren’t. I could smell the act from a mile away.

I nudged Brutus in the back of the head, rolling my eyes. “Look at him,” I whispered. “Poor bastard thinks he’s Hamlet, but he’s barely pulling off a court jester.”

We slowed as the man drifted toward one of our own, a broad-shouldered ex-thug named Renly. Gods, Renly was a sight—hair the color of spilled wine, that deep red catching even the meager torchlight and burning like he’d dunked his head in fire for fun.

His eyes, sharp and dark, carried the kind of permanent squint that made you think he was either plotting your murder or trying to remember where he left his boots.

Out of all the dogs we’d scraped together, Renly was the most promising—cocky without being stupid, vicious without being sloppy, the kind of man who’d bite a guard’s ear off and still find time to flirt with his widow afterward.

The jittery fool “accidentally” bumped into him, a clumsy shoulder-check that would’ve been believable if he hadn’t whispered straight into Renly’s ear at the same moment, subtle as a nun in a whorehouse.

Renly froze, then shoved him off with a glare. The undercover’s mask cracked instantly—he leaned in again, whispering harder, the words blurred but desperate. I didn’t catch the details, but I didn’t need to. He was begging. Pleading for a taste.

What an idiot.

To my surprise, Renly didn’t bite.

Instead, he drove his knee straight into the man’s gut with enough force to send him crumpling like a puppet whose strings had just been severed. The undercover guard hit the ground gasping, clutching his stomach, eyes wide with shock that his little act hadn’t worked. Renly spat on him, sneered, and stalked off without a backward glance.

I clapped a hand over my mouth, stifling a laugh that came out sounding more like a gasp. “Oh saints, did you see that?” I hissed. “Down he goes! And here I thought I was the dramatic one.”

The man writhed on the cobbles, wheezing. Nobody came to help him. Nobody cared. He was already dead to them, whether guard or prisoner. One failure in this place and you’d vanished without a trace.

And me? I smiled. Because in that instant, watching Renly walk away without a flicker of doubt, I knew. I knew we could leave the work to them. Our machine didn’t need me hovering over every lever. It was alive, and it would devour this prison piece by piece.

By the time we made it back to the warehouse, my head was pounding again, my eyelids heavy. Brutus all but carried me the last steps, setting me down in my makeshift bed again like a child dropped into a cradle. I didn’t even argue. For once, saints bless me, I slept. Real sleep this time. Deep and unbroken.

When I awoke, it was to the shadow of Freya looming above me like a goddess ready to pass judgment who greeted me.

I bolted upright with a start, hair sticking out in mad tufts, only for her hand to snap down like a hawk and seize me by the ear.

“Up,” she growled, yanking me off the floor.

“Gods above!” I yelped, stumbling as she dragged me toward the door. “I’ve barely woken up, I’m fragile, my poor ear will never forgive you—”

“Shut up,” she cut in, though her lips were beginning to curl into the faintest smile.

Oh, she was enjoying this. Every twist of her wrist, every tug that made me squeak, she was drinking it in with vigor.

Down the halls we went, my complaints bouncing uselessly off her indifference. The corridors twisted tighter, darker, until the lanterns gave way to candles, their flames trembling against damp stone. The air changed too—thicker, heavier, humming with old secrets.

And then I saw it.

The room opened wide, its walls lined with devices that could only belong in nightmares. Hooks, chains, wheels with leather straps. Great wooden contraptions sprawled across the floor, splintered and scarred with years of use. It hit me at once, like a slap from hell: a torture chamber.

Of course it was. Saints forbid I ever wake up and be led somewhere normal.

And there, in the center of it all, was Atticus. Kneeling on the stone, hands folded neatly in his lap, his glasses catching the candlelight until he looked like some pale spirit summoned for judgment.

I froze, blinked, then blurted the first thing that came to mind. “If this is a sex dungeon, I am not safe-wording until I get at least two orgasms, understood?”

Atticus didn’t even flinch. He just gestured calmly to the space beside him. “Sit.”

I giggled nervously, glanced at Freya, but she only arched a brow as if daring me to disobey. With a groan, I slumped down onto the stone beside him, pulling my skirt carefully out of the dust. Freya settled opposite me, her eyes gleaming in the candlelight, sharp as ever.

I chuckled weakly, scratching at my collar. “So… what’s this? Some kind of intervention? An exorcism? Did Brutus finally tell you about my snoring?”

Atticus leaned forward slightly, his voice low and deliberate. “Nothing so trivial. I was thinking of running a few tests.”

“Tests?” I echoed, my stomach sinking.

“On your newfound powers,” he said simply.

Freya’s smirk deepened. Atticus adjusted his glasses. And me? I laughed, high and thin, because saints help me—I had no idea what I’d just been dragged into.

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