Screams of Rebirth

The world was cold.

No silk. No warmth. Just stone-rough, unyielding, and wrong.

Ava gasped, her breath slicing through the darkness. She couldn't move.

Her wrists were bound—leather straps biting into her skin. Her ankles, too.

Naked. Exposed.

Her back pressed against something old, something that pulsed beneath her like a living thing. The chair.

No—not a chair. A throne of agony.

"Oh, precious star."

The voice slithered from the shadows—low, knowing, amused.

Ava jerked, but the bonds didn't budge.

The Mormont stepped into the dim torchlight, illuminating his bald head. His eyes glowed like dying embers, his robes flowing like spilled ink. He moved too slowly, too deliberately, savoring the sight of her helplessness.

"You don't understand what you're asking for, do you?"

Ava's throat tightened. She knew what she had asked. But now, bound and trembling, she felt the weight of her own desperation.