Inhuman

The leader of the organization was not the old, scrawny creep Katherine imagined. In fact, he seemed to be of similar age as her parents and King William, though much better preserved than the latter. With an upright stance and fit figure, he appeared to be a handsome gentleman if one didn't know better.

The strands of grey in Ve's reddish-brown hair were few and added sternness to his cold grey eyes. Eyes, that inspected Katherine with a certain curiosity, like she was an insect under a magnifying glass. As if she was not even human.

The chill that ran down Katherine's back only sufficed to straighten her spine. She returned the gaze with all her disgust for this person fueling the arrogance she learned in her noble upbringing. She was unwilling to succumb to someone on the lowest step of humanity's staircase, no, someone who had already fallen from said staircase! Only a demon could order experiments on Babys! Pushing herself up like this, Katherine clicked her tongue condescendingly. "So, you must be the copycat that toys with human lives. Your record of failure is the longest I've ever heard of. Now tell me, what am I here for? So that you can beg me to help with your atrocities? You can forget about that."

The silence following her words even included the people on the machines. Frozen in their work, they stared at her with shocked faces. Katherine herself felt uncomfortable, as the rush of courage depleted as soon as she ended. Maybe offending Ve was... a bit dumb. But since she already said it, she could only keep a straight face and hope she would survive. Ethan's grip on her shoulder had tightened, but her eyes did not stray from the man in front of her.

And the grey eyes stared back. If there was even a shred of emotion in them, she would say that it was... disappointment? He lifted a hand, the one with the ring on the index finger.

Suddenly, she remembered the magic researcher she met at a ball. His wound had come from a slap, and a ring had left a bloody mark on his face. Would she get such a mark now? The three diamond stars inlaid in the ring seemed sharp-edged. Would Ve slap her? Grap her collar? Choke her?

He motioned to his subjects. "Continue."

As if shaken from their trance, the researchers started to fiddle with their machines again, the clicking from metal on metal and swishing of robes filling the cave. Yet Katherine dared not relax. Ve's gaze was still on her. Again, it felt like he looked at an insect, but one that had turned uglier than before. A spider maybe, or a cockroach.

Katherine gave her best to hold out under his eyes, but her own started to turn dry and itchy. Just when she could not stop herself from blinking any longer, Ve looked up at the person behind her. "Bring this child over there. We need to measure her first. The remaining data should be out by then."

In this tense moment, she had almost forgotten about Ethan and now cursed herself for it. How could she forget about her archenemy? But somehow, solely by his presence and not because of any action, Ve seemed more dangerous than Ethan. Maybe it was because she didn't see his kind of craziness yet. For now, he seemed uncomfortably sane.

Ethan led Katherine to the corner with the machines. While she did not stop looking for escape routes, she decided to lay low for now. Since Ethan was the one threatening her child, it would not be easy. Dragsa's mages were trained in aiming fireballs just as much as melee combat. Despite that knowledge, she had to stop her hand from wandering several times. Feeling the knifes hidden below her clothes and inside her boot would be very reassuring. Yet it was not the right time.

The horse, she noticed, was taken into one of the tunnels, but the one who lead it soon returned. Meanwhile, the researchers measured her pulse, pricked her finger for blood, and acted overall like doctors - only that none of them looked into her eyes, asked for permission, or talked to her even when she tried to converse. Like their master, they treated her like something inhuman, and she heard them talk about 'the subject' in a hushed voice. How frustrating.

"What exactly do you guys want with me?", Katherine finally asked Ethan in exasperation.

Her cousin never left her side, his arms crossed, and his usual smile playing around his lips as he leaned his hip against a nearby machine that looked like a white kitchen counter with a glass front and several buttons.

He hummed. "Something ~"

Katherine's frustrations heightened. "Aren't you afraid I won't cooperate? With the war outside, why are all of you leaders huddled up here and doing other stuff anyway? You know, with nobody leading your army, there will be someone to save me in no time."

Ethan shrugged his shoulders. "Huh, who cares about the army? We are here for the science. Besides, those are just borrowed troops."

"Borrowed?!"

"Several kingdoms are interested in science as well."

"Several? Dragsa - and who else?"

"Since our soldiers are a bit cut off from information here in the mountainside, they may not have noticed a change of reign. Of course, we did not inform them either. It somehow served our purpose better to just hide their emblems and flags."

Katherine gasped. "Icelandic troops?!"

Ethan grinned. "Exactly. Most are from Dragsa, but some... isn't it funny that the pawns fight against their master without knowing? It would be better if they all die before they notice, else we would have to dispose of them later."

Anger boiled in Katherine's stomach, but she learned to control it in the endless days with Ethan by her side and only took a deep breath. And then, one of the researchers suddenly grabbed her, dragging her in the direction of their leader. "Hey! Let go! I can go by myself!"

The man, middle-aged and with the usual thin build of a scientist, didn't listen. Her short fuse lit up. Katherine reverse-gripped him and slipped below their intertwined arms, thus pinning his fist painfully high between his shoulder blades. The man screamed.

Only then did she notice that it might be dangerous to attack as the sole other party in a room with fifteen-some enemies. And, half a second later, that she now had a body shield. Pulling the scientist with her, she swirled in Ethan's direction. As expected, her cousin already wielded a fireball, the light ominously shining on his suddenly serious features. "Still as impulsive as ever, Kitty. But it is no wonder when these idiots are so rude to a noble. Now, if you let him go, we can forget the matter. You don't want this to escalate, do you?"

Katherine gulped, her eyes flittering over the panicking researchers to the guards in the tunnels who slowly drew near, their hands on their blades. She did not dare avert her eyes, despite knowing that the leader of them all stood behind her back, on the other end of the cave. Was it suicide to hope that someone researching magic had no offensive magic of his own?