Maris fell in beside him. “She’s going to be fine, Darling.”

He wished he had Maris’s faith. But that had been kicked out of him when he’d told himself every day that his friends would find him and release him from hell. Meanwhile weeks had gone by while he’d hung in his cell in utter agony.

Now…

Darling didn’t believe in much of anything, except the universe’s willingness to screw him over.

Please let her be all right. Thoughts of her being brutalized tortured him even worse than his own memories. Every hour they didn’t rescue her had him living in fear that she was being raped and beaten while calling out for him to help her.

Just like Lise when she’d been shot…

His panic rose so high that for a moment, he couldn’t breathe. Please don’t let my eyes start jerking. Though there was no real rhyme or reason to when they’d start, they seemed more inclined to do it whenever he was stressed.

He glanced askance at Maris. “Did Safir give you any information about her condition?”

“No. He tried his best to find out for you, but he couldn’t access that. He did say that he’d cautioned Kyr against raping her when they’d taken her into custody.”

Darling clung to the thread like a lifeline. “Do you think Kyr listened?”

“Honestly? I don’t know. I hope and pray for her sake and yours that he did.”

Darling’s throat tightened. “Did he know if she’s one of the ones being tortured?” The League had bragged to the media every night since they’d raided the Resistance’s HQ that they were “interrogating” the Resistance leaders in an effort to find the rest of their members.

“He couldn’t answer that either. Sorry.”

Darling ground his teeth as pain shredded his gut. “As bad as Kyr hates me… I hope he’s not taking that out on her.”

“You know, he’s not so—”

“Don’t lie to me, Mari,” he said, cutting him off, “and tell me he’s above that. We both know better. I have the scar to prove just how bad his temper is. He didn’t get to the top of the League high command by showing mercy to those he perceived as enemies. He got there by carving his way through a mountain of bodies.”

Maris winced at the truth. “He wasn’t always like that, you know. He was a kid once, too.”

“I know.” Like Maris, he remembered when Kyr had been in possession of the soul he’d sold to the League for vanity and glory. Granted Kyr had never had much of a sense of humor, but he’d been fair.

Decent.

Until something had happened shortly after Kyr turned seventeen. In one summer, he’d turned from being an insecure, average teenager into a cold-blooded soldier.

I guess my father’s old adage was right. “Whenever you take the shot, Darling, two men die. The man you targeted and the man you used to be. Once you draw first blood, you can never go back to the way you were. It will always change you, and never for the better.”