Chapter 1
Tinea Bellator opened her eyes. A moth was fluttering around the torch, basking in the warmth of its glow, and she sat up in silence. Her filthy smock stank, but she would be out of it soon enough. She scooped filthy silver hair behind her ear, ignoring the mats clinging to it, and shook Gregor awake.
“Gregor,” she whispered, and Gregor blinked his eyes open. “Get up.”
“Wha---?” he mumbled, and she shushed him.
“You wanna get out of here?” she whispered, and he stared at her before his eyes darted around.
“Yeah…?” he replied, and she pulled him to his feet.
“Wake up the other kids. Quietly,” she said, and he nodded and got to work shaking the other three children awake. Tinea took a deep breath in and summoned more fluttering moths, knowing she shouldn’t be doing this, but there was no other choice. She had to summon them. She needed to get the kids out.
“Tinea, what?” Gregor asked, and she ignored him as she focused and let the moths swarm the lock.
“You’re a noble?” Margaret hissed, and Tinea ignored her as the moths ate out the lock.
“It doesn’t count if they don’t want you,” Tinea said, and the lock was thoroughly eaten to pieces. It swung open, and she inched out into the hall as more moths crawled all over the walls. With a silent command, Tinea ordered them to swarm. They fluttered off down the hall, and she took Gregor’s hand. He was only five, and she needed to protect him.
There was a scream off down the hall, and she clapped her hand over his eyes.
“What?” he asked, and Tinea shushed him. The strangled scream became a hiccuped sob, and then it stopped. Tinea led the boy down the hall in silence, and he tried to peel her hand off, but she didn’t let him.
The body was on the ground, peeled open and spilling out its guts. Moths were feasting on its entrails, and she shuddered as she passed it, her bare feet stepping through the blood pooling on the floor. She didn’t have much time. He was due to arrive soon, and she needed to get out of here quick.
Quickly, she padded through the hall, and there was another cut off scream of terror. She tightened her grip on Gregor’s face, her heart pounding in her chest, and he whimpered under his breath.
“Tinea, what’s happening?” he asked, and Tinea said nothing. They needed to get out of here quickly.
“Don’t worry about it,” she gritted out, and there was a thump. The five of them reached the final door, and she pushed it open, only…
Shit.
Marquis Dominic Julius Inistor was standing there, in all of his glory, and she stared at him in silence. He had his sword drawn, and he was staring in silence at the dead bodies in the chairs, the moths eating out their eyes.
“And who might you be?” he asked, red eyes lighting on her, and she took a deep breath in.
“No one,” she said, and he glanced around at the moths eating through the dead bodies piled up in spades.
“No one?” he echoed, and a shudder rolled down her spine. “It looks to me like you’re someone.”
This wasn’t the way it was supposed to go. Mom had died early this time, and she was supposed to go with Sean, but her efforts to prevent Mom’s death had ended in Sean getting killed, too. Last time, Dominic had discovered her at fifteen. She was working to prevent that. Instead, here she was, ten years old and facing down her Lord Father, without a means of escape. She was going to be the villain, again. No matter what she did, she was always the villain. No matter what she tried to do to survive, she was executed, time and time again, doomed by the narrative, and if she could just avoid meeting Dominic, she could be free. Free to live as a mercenary, just like Mom wanted.
“I’m no one to you,” she said, and Dominic raised his eyebrows before he tilted his head. A slow smile spread across his face, and he leaned in to purr in her face.
“Interesting,” he murmured, and then a magic circle flared to life at her feet. Wait, no, no, no---
Everything went black.
