Chapter 63: How to Rescue Someone Who’d Never Admit Needed Saving (3)
The corridor in front of the cell was narrow, just over two meters wide, with the floor stones laid out unevenly, some slightly sunken, as if the centuries had chosen specific spots to give in first. The light came from a torch fixed to the opposite wall, the flame flickering lazily and casting dancing shadows through the bars.
The smell of burnt animal fat lingered in the air — cheap and efficient fuel, but it clung to clothing like an old regret.
The cell, on the other hand, was a vertical cage. Three steps in any direction. A straw bed that had long given up on pretending to be useful, a sanitary corner with a dark metal hole that looked more like an insult, and a bucket of stagnant water that was half water, half existential doubt.
I was leaning against the left side of the bars, my shoulder pressed to the main rod, like an animal feigning disinterest. Mordrek was further back, propped against the wall like a caricature of defeated confidence. The torchlight hit the right side of my face — enough to cast shadows under my eyes, but not enough to hide the smile beginning to grow there.
The guard had stopped about three meters from the cell. A broad-shouldered man, too wide for the dark leather uniform, short sword at the waist and a runed baton slung across his back — both visibly well-used. His face was tense, eyes narrowed, and his hand rested with a disturbingly familiar ease on the hilt of the blade.
"Deaf as you are dumb in there?" he growled. "If you want to keep yelling, I can bring company with less patience."
"Easy there, champ." My voice came out with the right mix of irony and pain. "It was just... an interpretive disagreement. He thinks my mother was a witch, I think he was raised by pigeons."
The guard didn’t move. Still firm, like someone who knows presence is half of authority.
But I wanted the other half.
[System Notification]
[Passive Skill Activated: Tongue of Silver]