Free Only the Worthy by Morgan Rice Page B

her fate. She recalled Lord Nor’s words, and they rang in her ears like a
death knell:
    Yet your
bride-to-be shall never be yours. She shall become the property of one of our
nobles.
    There was no
outrunning them; there was never any outrunning them. The nobles ruled
their lives, and always had. Disrespecting one of them meant a possible
death—and killing one guaranteed it. And yet Royce had not hesitated to kill
one for her sake.
    Genevieve reeled
at the thought. How much Royce had loved her; she had seen it in that moment.
It had been so easy for him to give up his very life for hers. She wanted to
risk it all for him, too, and what made her feel the worst of all was that she
was trapped here, unable to help him.
    A heavy iron
bolt suddenly slid back on the other side of her door, shattering her silence,
and Genevieve flinched in her solitary cell. There came the sound of the thick
wooden door creaking as it was pulled open, and she saw two stone-faced
soldiers awaiting her silently. Her heart fell. Were they coming to lead her to
her death?
    “You will be seen
now,” one announced gruffly.
    They stood there
in silence, waiting, yet she only stood there, frozen in terror. A part of her
wanted to stay here, alone, in this cell, a prisoner for the rest of her days.
She was not ready to face the world, and certainly not the nobles. She wanted
more time to process it all, and more time to think of Royce. Yet returning to
her normal life, she knew, was no longer a possibility. She was the property of
these nobles now, theirs to do with as they wished.
    Genevieve took a
deep breath in the stillness and took one step forward, then another. Walking
towards these men was worse than walking to the gallows.
    As they walked
down the corridor, the door slamming behind her, one grabbed her roughly, too
roughly, his calloused fingers digging into the soft flesh of her arm. Genevieve
wanted to cry out in pain. But she did not. She would not give him the
satisfaction.
    He leaned in
close, so close that she could feel his hot breath on her cheek.
    “Your boyfriend
killed my lord,” he said. “He will suffer. You, too, will suffer—though in a
different way. A longer, crueler way.”
    He jerked her,
leading her down the twisting and turning corridors, the sound of their footsteps
echoing on the stone, and as they went, Genevieve shuddered. She tried not to
think of what lay awaiting her. How had everything turned out this way? This
had begun as the happiest day of her life—and somehow had morphed into tragedy.
    Genevieve glanced
out the open windows as they passed by and saw the courtyard far below, the
masses coming and going, all of them already back to their daily routine. She
wondered how life could just go on like that, as if nothing had ever happened.
For her, life had changed forever. Yet the world seemed to be unfazed.
    As she looked
down at the stone far below, she felt a sudden rush of hope. She did have one last power at her disposal, she realized: the power to end it all. All
she had to do was break free of this soldier’s grip, run and jump out the
open-aired window. She could end it all.
    She calculated
how many steps it would take, whether he would catch her before she leapt, and
whether the fall would be far enough to break her neck. Pondering this, she
felt a perverse sense of joy. It was the one power she had left. It was the one
thing she could do to show her solidarity to Royce. If Royce was going to die,
she should die, too.
    “What are you
smiling about?” the guard hissed.
    She didn’t
respond—she hadn’t even realized she was smiling. Her actions would answer for
her.
    Heart pounding, Genevieve
waited for his grip to loosen so she could yank her arm away and run. Yet, to
her dismay, he only squeezed harder, never loosening it for one second.
    Genevieve’s
heart fell as they turned down a new corridor, one with no windows. They
reached a new door and as he ushered her inside, she realized her