Page 13 of Blood Curse

Lenora filled the silver bowl from the jug and set it on my knees. She didn’t take my wrists or start cleaning them for me.

I lowered my hands into the water.

Red unwound from my skin in thin ribbons. I rubbed at my palms, then each finger, using a cloth until the water clouded and Adrian’s blood disappeared from the lines of my hands.

The Crown gave me the memory of his body hitting the throne-room floor.

I kept washing.

His face appeared in the water. His mouth shaped the order he tried to force from me. When I blinked, there was only blood and my own reflection broken by ripples.

Stellan stayed beside me and said nothing.

I wanted Adrian stopped. I felt contempt for the man who imprisoned Stellan, used Edith and tried to steal my will. I didn’t mourn him, and I was not going to invent softer feelings because he was dead.

I still hated that the Crown had used my body to kill him.

Both truths fit. Contempt didn’t make the violation harmless.

I scrubbed under my nails until the skin stung. It didn’t undo anything. It let me see my hands again.

When I finished, I passed the bowl to Lenora. “Now we decide what happens when the Crown takes control.”

“Start with what you can still move,” she said.

“My right little finger, sometimes.” I tested it against my palm. “Two taps means I’m conscious and whatever I’m saying or doing isn’t my choice.”

Stellan watched my hand. “Show me.”

I tapped twice.

“Again.”

I tapped twice more.

“I’ll recognise it.”

“If I can only manage one, ask questions I can answer with one movement for yes and two for no. Don’t discuss me as if I’ve left the room.”

“Agreed,” Lenora said.

The Crown closed over my spine.

My back straightened. My clean hands flattened on my legs. The shift happened between one breath and the next, complete except for the little finger curled against my palm.

I felt the chair under me, the ache in my scalp and Stellan’s attention fixed on my face. Nothing went dark. My body simply stopped listening.

The Crown wanted them to mistake stillness for absence.

I tapped once.

It pressed my finger flat.

I dragged it up again and tapped a second time.

Stellan’s expression changed. He didn’t grab me. “She’s conscious. The stillness isn’t hers.”

Lenora kept her hands down. “Bryony, one tap if you can hear me.”