Chapter 59: Idle Cruelty...

Chapter 59: Idle Cruelty...

The elf watched Lenko with lazy interest, amusement sharpening toward curiosity.

"Oh?" they said softly, as if testing a new note. "Is that resolve... or merely bravado?" Their voice carried no hurry. They had time. They loved to watch choices unspool.

Lenko didn’t answer.

He only stood, the image of stubborn youth made of set bone and hot, dangerous loyalty. For a sliver of a second, Keiser could see what the promise meant to the boy... not empty bravado, but a weight he had already chosen to lift.

Every second stretched like a wire.

Keiser felt the mana hum at the edges of the elf’s presence, hungry and patient. He felt the lives on the line... Muzio’s, Lenko’s, his own... tipping on the edge of whatever gamble Lenko had chosen to make.

If the plan failed, the elf’s words would not be idle cruelty.

If it succeeded, perhaps they might walk out of here alive.

Keiser prayed without faith, every muscle ready for the moment the gamble flipped one way or the other.

The elf tilted their head slowly, as if listening to a tune only they could hear, eyes sweeping over more than just the two boys at the front.

Their gaze flicked to the others huddled in the gloom... Tyron, Jim, Jill... who stood rooted like statues with wide eyes and half-breaths. "Or,"

"should I simply make it so you are all cursed to die?"

Tyron let out a sharp, choked sound, almost a whimper, trying to stifle it as his hand clutched the vial necklace at his chest. Even that tiny sound made Keiser’s jaw tighten. He could feel the surge of Lenko’s body beside him... every muscle ready to lunge, reckless and unthinking.

Keiser caught him by the shoulder, fingers digging hard, holding him back with all the strength left in his frame. Lenko strained, but Keiser managed to anchor him in place. He didn’t look at Lenko, his eye stayed locked on the elf, meeting the gleam that glowed faintly green in the flickering torchlight.

"No," Keiser said finally, voice low, steady, and deliberate. "Make it that they’ll live."

Lenko stiffened. Slowly, he reached up and shoved Keiser’s hand off his shoulder.

His eyes, pale compared to the dark corridor, turned on Keiser and the look in them cut sharper than the elf’s words. It wasn’t fear, nor anger alone. It was betrayal, raw and unshielded.

Keiser froze.

That stare... burning with hurt... held him more firmly than the elf’s looming presence ever could.

Lenko’s hand shot out, grabbing Keiser’s hand.

His grip was tight, almost desperate, right over the bandaged hand that still leaked warm blood from where Keiser had stabbed himself with the rusted key. The faint patter of drops hitting stone echoed in the stale air, the smell of iron thickening between them.

"Muzio,"

His grip tightened, trembling. Blood seeped fresh against Keiser’s skin where Lenko held him, hot and slick, mingling with the strain in his voice.

Lenko’s chest heaved, every breath heavy with the effort to hold himself together, his gaze darting between Keiser and the looming elf.

Behind them, Tyron stood pale and silent, biting into his knuckles as if to keep from making another sound. Even Jim and Jill, men weathered by age and hardship, looked as if they’d rather vanish into the stone than stand another moment in this corridor where blood, magic, and choice pressed down like a noose.

And Keiser, caught between Lenko’s grasp and the elf’s shadow, thought bitterly, ’if I waver now, we’re finished. If I press on, he’ll hate me for it.’

The elf hummed again, a small, thoughtful sound that dragged at the edges of every nerve in the corridor.

Lenko’s head snapped back toward him as though struck, the boy’s gaze was a whip, furious and raw. For a heartbeat the elf only watched, amusement curled at the edges of that perfect mouth.

Then the smile widened until it was almost predatory. "Okay," the elf said softly, each syllable slow and deliberate, "in exchange for this deal," their hand reached outward, fingers flexing like a cat testing the air, "...you’ll die." The words hung between them, smooth and unavoidable.

Keiser’s lungs tightened.

The elf’s fingers hovered just inches from his eye, the nail tips like tiny knives gleaming in torchlight. For a flickering second it felt as if time itself paused. Even the torches burned a touch dimmer, as if the stone around them held its breath.

Lenko moved like a man answering a bell he’d never heard before.

His hand shot out, not in a reckless lunge but with the terrible purpose of someone who had already decided. He grabbed the elf’s outstretched hand.

"No," he said, raw and thunderous in the hush.

Keiser’s heart slammed.

He reached to wrench Lenko back, to tear their hands apart before the elf could do whatever dark thing they intended. He slammed his hand into Lenko’s wrist and closed his fingers over the other boy’s.

But the elf’s palm had already closed, and as Lenko’s grip took hold something colder than steel slid through Keiser’s fingers.

A ring of light, or perhaps a faint circle of mana, wrapping the entangled hands in a single, terrible clasp.

Lenko met Keiser’s eyes for a single instant. There was no pleading there... only absolute resolve. "They’ll live, in exchange for mine," he said, low enough that only Keiser could hear the brittle hope in it.

The sound of it was small and enormous at once.

Around them Tyron made a choked sound, Jim and Jill swayed as if the world had shifted under their feet. Keiser’s breath came too fast... because somewhere inside that sealing touch a lock had clicked.

The elf’s face bloomed into slow, delighted triumph, their green eyes gleamed with acquisition, as if they’d bought not just time but spectacle.

Keiser clawed at the intertwined hands, to pull Lenko free, to break the ring of whatever magic the elf had stitched around them.

His fingers slid across searing threads of magic that blistered under his nails and sanged the cloth.

Blood beaded once again where the rusted key had pierced his palm earlier, now the scent of iron mixed with ozone and something sweeter.

"No, you fucking idiot... " he rasped, but Lenko’s jaw was already set.

The boy’s knuckles were white, the faint tremor in his limbs was all that betrayed how close to breaking he was. He swallowed and pull Keiser’s hand back... an answering pressure rather than release, the smallest oath against panic.

The elf hummed in pleased approval, fingers relaxed as if they were already counting coins. "Perfect," they said, voice silk over steel. "A bargain then. One life for many."

Keiser felt the weight of the word like a dropped stone, bargain. It smelled of markets and ledgers, of nobles whispering favors for coin, of murder dressed in polite terms. His vision blurred at the edges from onslaught of aches, anger, and a sudden, cold clarity. Lenko had just bartered himself.

The sealing mark glowed faintly where skin met skin. Red and hot as a wound, and for a single, terrible instant Keiser understood the truth of the bargain.

Magic had a ledger, and this elf had just written their names across its top line.