Dionne
One step. Then another. Through the broken space where the bar had been, into the darkness beyond.
The beast went completely still. I could see it more clearly now that I was inside, my eyes adjusting to the deeper dark.
The sheer scale of it was overwhelming — easily eight feet tall even slightly hunched, shoulders that could barely fit through the gate, arms thick with corded muscle beneath dark fur that caught the faint light in places.
But it was the eyes that held me. Gold and burning and fixed on my face with an intensity that made it hard to breathe.
I forced myself to look away, to take in the rest of the cell. Details emerged from the shadows — rough stone walls streaked with something dark that I didn't want to examine too closely, a floor covered in straw that looked damp and old, and in the corner— My stomach turned.
Piles of food. Trays and trays of it, stacked haphazardly, some tipped over and spilling onto the floor.
