Chapter 8: Hard Bread in the Black Cell

Elora's POV

I was dragged out of the greenhouse by two burly academy guards like a dead dog being hauled through the streets.

My boots scraped against the rough cobblestones, leaving trails of mud in their wake. My left shoulder burned with searing pain—the gray robe, melted through by the lava water, had fused with my skin and flesh. Every slight movement felt like someone was peeling my skin off in strips.

My ribs, which had taken a vicious kick earlier, throbbed with each breath, filling my mouth with the metallic taste of blood.

But I didn't make a sound. I let them drag me into a windowless black tower and finally hurl me into an underground confinement cell.

BANG—!

The heavy iron door slammed shut in front of me and locked with a decisive click.

Instantly, I was plunged into a darkness as absolute as death itself.

There were no magical lamps, no hearth fires. This godforsaken place was even colder than Greystone. The stone floor seeped with bone-chilling moisture, and the corners were overgrown with slippery, slimy moss.

I collapsed on the ground like a pile of rotting flesh, taking a long time to recover before I could barely prop myself up with my uninjured right hand and lean against the wall to sit upright.

So cold.

The burn on my shoulder was becoming infected, and that scalding pain mixed with the damp chill of the dungeon made my body shake uncontrollably. I touched my forehead—unsurprisingly, my fever had worsened.

I leaned against the moss-covered wall and closed my eyes.

I didn't know how long they would keep me here. One day? Three days? Or would they wait until I burned to death in this hole and then toss me straight into the morgue? I began to worry about the little dragon I'd left in the dormitory, wondering if Nyx would remember to give it water.

Nyx... she was a good person. I shouldn't have been so cold to her—at least she'd given me bread without expecting anything in return, hadn't she? My thoughts grew increasingly muddled, turning into a foggy mess. I bit down hard on the tip of my tongue, forcing myself to stay conscious.

My stomach began cramping in waves again.

From morning until now, I'd only had a single sip of cold water. Hunger and pain were slowly draining the last remnants of strength from this broken shell of a body.

Just as I was about to slip into unconsciousness again, footsteps echoed from the corridor outside.

These weren't the light, soft-soled shoes of mages. These were hard-bottomed military boots striking stone, producing dull "clack-clack" sounds accompanied by the metallic scraping of iron plates.

It was a guard wearing chainmail.

The footsteps stopped outside my iron door.

I snapped my eyes open, my fingers digging desperately into the cracks between the stones. That red-robed noble whose nose I'd broken must have sent someone to take revenge. In the Lower City, bribing a guard to kill a prisoner was the easiest thing in the world.

Click.

The palm-sized observation window at the top of the door was pushed open from outside.

A weak beam of torchlight filtered through.

A face pressed against the iron bars, peering inside.

"Elora?"

A voice came through—low, urgent, and filled with disbelief.

My entire body stiffened.

This voice was too familiar, so familiar it had no business being in a place as lofty as Arcanum.

Using my hands and feet, I crawled toward the small window and pressed close to it, peering out at the face illuminated by the dim firelight.

Brown cropped hair, brown eyes. His jawline was sharp and lean from years of chronic hunger. He wore an ill-fitting, cheap suit of chainmail, with the badge of Arcanum's lower-ranking guards stamped at the collar.

"Rowan." My cracked lips moved, forming his name.

Rowan—the boy who had scavenged through garbage heaps with me in the Lower City slums, who had taken beatings from street thugs meant for me. On the day the Grand Inquisitor took me away, he'd been lying on the ground, beaten so badly by a tavern owner that he couldn't get up.

And now he was here.

Rowan looked at my face covered in blood and mud, his gaze falling on my left shoulder with its charred, acrid smell. His brown eyes instantly reddened, a flash of extreme anger and heartbreak crossing their depths.

"Those sons of bitches." He cursed through clenched teeth. "I heard from the guards changing shifts that some crazy new student smashed a noble boy's nose. I knew it had to be you."

He glanced around quickly, confirming no one else was in the corridor, then rapidly pulled an oil-paper package from inside his chainmail and shoved it forcefully through the gap in the observation window.

"Take this."

The package fell at my feet.

I picked it up with my right hand and unwrapped it. Inside was half a loaf of rock-hard black bread and a small handful of green herbs that gave off a pungent, bitter smell.

"Pain-relieving grass. I picked it from the wild fields behind the mountain." Rowan's voice was rushed and urgent. "Chew it up and apply it to the burn with your saliva. Don't worry about the clothes—tear off the fabric that's stuck to your skin."

I gripped the herbs, feeling as though something had lodged in my throat and blocked it completely.

Since entering Arcanum, I had faced lofty instructors, malicious nobles, and Silas's cold, emotionless scrutiny. I was like a hedgehog thrown into a pack of wolves—all I could do was bristle my spines.

But now, in this lightless black cell, I smelled the familiar scent of pain-relieving grass, the scent of Lower City weeds.

I didn't say thank you. In the slums, saying thank you was hypocritical.

I grabbed the bread, hard as stone, and bit down viciously.

It was so hard it hurt my gums, and the coarse wheat bran scraped down my parched throat like swallowing knife blades. But I chewed with all my strength, not wasting even a single crumb, desperately forcing it down into my stomach.

Through the iron bars, Rowan watched me devour the food ravenously, his eyes growing even redder.

"Slow down." He unhooking a leather waterskin from his belt and passed it through. "I've only been recruited into Arcanum's patrol team for three days. They don't feed me, so I can only sneak away bits of dry rations. Once I figure out the shift rotation schedule here, I'll find a way to get you some meat."

I took a huge gulp of water, washing down the bread stuck in my throat.

With food weighing down my stomach, my body finally began to generate a faint trace of warmth.

"How did you get in here?" I handed back the empty waterskin, my voice hoarse.

"The Imperial Defense Forces have taken heavy casualties recently, so Arcanum's been recruiting lower-tier guards from the slums." Rowan hooked the waterskin back onto his belt, his eyes showing an unusual resilience. "I watched Silas take you away. I knew this place was a man-eating hellhole that doesn't even spit out the bones. Elora, I couldn't let you stay here alone."

I froze.

He was an ordinary person without even the most basic first-tier magical power. For my sake, he had voluntarily walked into this meat grinder where mages could blast him to ash at any moment.

"You're insane." I stared at him. "The nobles here could crush you with a flick of their fingers."

"Then let them try." Rowan gave a cold laugh, his hand resting on the inferior iron sword at his waist. "As long as I don't die, I can keep watch over them for you. You need to survive among these monsters, Elora. Don't die easily."

The echo of metal clanging came from the end of the corridor. Someone was on patrol.

"I have to go." Rowan's expression changed, and he quickly closed the iron cover of the observation window. "Apply the medicine. Stay alive."

Clack.

The cover shut. The firelight vanished.

The sound of footsteps in the corridor gradually faded away, and once again the black cell held only the sound of my breathing.

But I no longer felt cold.

I grabbed the handful of pain-relieving grass, stuffed it into my mouth, and chewed hard. The bitter juice spread through my mouth, so bitter it made me want to vomit.

I spat the chewed herbs into my right palm, then gritted my teeth and ripped away the gray fabric stuck to the flesh on my left shoulder in one motion.

"Ugh—!"

A muffled groan escaped me as cold sweat instantly drenched my back.

Without pausing, I smeared the paste of herbs hard onto the bloody, raw burn.

After the piercing pain subsided, the numbing effect of the herbs began to take hold, finally suppressing the burning, searing sensation.

I leaned against the cold wall, clutching the remaining small piece of black bread in my hand.

Rowan's appearance was like a nail driven forcefully into this body of mine that was on the verge of collapse.

I was no longer alone.

In the Lower City, as long as you had food, herbs, and someone watching your back—

Even stray dogs could survive the winter. Why couldn't I?

I closed my eyes and swallowed that small piece of black bread with determination.

Tomorrow, I didn't know what I would face. But now, I had something to hold onto.