Chapter 71: Flash of death
Stefan’s POV
"Fuck me!" I grunted, my hope already dimmed.
But as I walked slowly, an idea hit me halfway down the corridor, sharp and sudden enough that my legs were already turning back toward Belladonna’s door before I’d fully thought it through, before I’d even decided whether it was a good idea or just the only one I had left.
I pushed inside without knocking this time. She didn’t even look up from her scroll, that same looping, angular script still holding her full attention like I hadn’t just barged back into her quarters twice in one afternoon.
"I would like to offer you something in exchange for your bird." I said.
That got her attention, at least. She lifted her head slowly, the scroll still balanced on her knee, frowning, waiting for me to keep talking.
"A treatment," I went on, warming to it, letting the pitch build the way I used to build them on earth, back when a good line was the only currency I ever needed to survive.
"Not the kind the other warriors are getting downstairs. Something better. My hands work differently, General. I could loosen every knot of tiredness sitting in these muscles of yours, the kind that never fully leaves after a war like the one you just came back from." I softened my voice, added just enough warmth to sound sincere, watching her face for any crack in that flat composure. "I don’t offer this to just anyone. Royalty, mostly. But you’ve earned it. And I am sorry, truly, about the bird."
Belladonna’s expression didn’t so much as flicker. "That doesn’t interest me," she said, and dropped her eyes back to the scroll like I had already left the room entirely.
I swallowed that down and regrouped fast, feeling the confidence I’d walked in with start to slip through my fingers. If sincerity didn’t work, maybe something sharper would.
"Or," I said, smug now, tilting my head, "is the General afraid of it? Worried it might undo her? That she isn’t quite as unshakable as everyone assumes?" I let that hang a beat, watching it land. "Being a General doesn’t mean you’re good at everything, you know. I know that too."
Her head snapped up, eyes narrowing into something considerably more dangerous than the flat disinterest from a moment ago, and for a second I genuinely thought she might reach for the blade resting against the wall behind her. "Remove yourself from my presence," she said, low, final, every word carrying the weight of an order rather than a request.
I actually froze for a second, thrown properly this time. Neither approach had worked. Flattery bounced off her like water off stone, and the dare, the exact trick that had worked so cleanly on Zinnia days ago, had only made her angrier, sharper, closer to actually acting on the threats she kept handing me so freely.
I wasn’t ready to give up, though. I never was. Giving up wasn’t a skill I’d ever bothered developing.
I made a show of turning to leave, shoulders dropping, footsteps slow toward the door, dragging my feet just enough to look properly defeated. Belladonna’s attention drifted back down to her scroll almost immediately, satisfied she’d won, already dismissing me from her mind entirely.
That was exactly the opening I needed.
I spun back fast, snatched the scroll clean off her lap before she could react, and bolted, feet slapping against smooth stone as I put as much distance between us as I dared.
Thankfully, this room was impossibly big.
I knew, with total certainty, that she could outrun me without breaking a sweat if she actually gave chase properly, that whatever head start I had meant nothing against legs built for war. So I didn’t run far. I stopped just past the doorway, scroll held up between two fingers, grinning at her over my shoulder like this was the most natural thing in the world.
"You’ll have to come get it yourself," I said. "What do you say, General? Fancy a game of hide and seek?"
Belladonna stared at me like I’d started speaking in tongues, utterly failing to parse whatever foreign concept I’d just thrown at her. Then she rose, slow and lethal, every line of her body coiled tight, muscles shifting visible beneath her skin.
"Give it back."
"No," I said, already backing further down the hall, my eyes catching the archway of her bathroom just past my shoulder. A plan clicked into place, fast and reckless, the kind of plan that had gotten me into trouble more times than I could count back on earth and had somehow, against all odds, kept working out here too.
She growled, low and warning, a sound that vibrated somewhere deep in her chest. "Are you daring me?"
"No," I called back, already turning to run properly now, "but I might just destroy this thing out of pure boredom!"
That did it. I heard her behind me a half-second later, fast, far too fast, footsteps closing the gap I’d counted on lasting longer, and I put everything I had into reaching that archway before she reached me.
I dove through it and threw myself straight into the gold-carved jacuzzi waiting there, already filled, warm water sloshing violently around me as I hit it, soaking through my silk cloth instantly. Belladonna came in a half-second behind, lunging for the scroll still clutched in my raised fist, and I grabbed her arm and pulled, dragging her down into the water with me before she could stop her own momentum, both of us going under for a brief, chaotic second before surfacing.
She scrambled for the scroll immediately, reaching past me, fingers grazing the edge of it, and I used the half-second of distraction to summon my inventory.
My fingers found the small vial of numbing salve tucked away there. I uncapped it fast, one-handed, and smeared it across her shoulder before she’d even registered what I was doing, then dug my fingers in, working the muscle there hard, the way I’d worked it on Jonquil and, praying my instincts hadn’t failed me.
"Please, let this count." I begged silently to whatever system or mini god was actually listening right now.
Belladonna went rigid under my hands, water lapping around both of us, glaring at me with an expression that suggested she felt absolutely nothing at all, that this entire gambit had failed just as spectacularly as the first two, that I’d bet everything on a hand that had already folded.
I didn’t stop. I kept working, my hands moving to her other shoulder, down along the tight cord of muscle at the base of her neck, thumbs pressing firm into skin slick with water and salve both, refusing to let go even as she snarled something low and furious under her breath, some warning in her own tongue that needed no translation to understand.
Whatever patience she’d been holding onto finally snapped completely.
She surged forward with a sound closer to a growl than a word, her hands slamming into my chest, and shoved me straight down under the water, pinning me there with the full, terrifying weight of her strength.
My eyes went wide, water rushing up around my face.
One clear thought cut through everything else, louder than the panic, louder than the burn already building in my chest.
I could actually die here.