Time passed differently in the torture chamber. There was no light, no window to mark the passing hours. Instead, all we had to mark the time was the number of cuts on the assassin and how hungry I was getting.
The room had quieted, though the air still pulsed with heat and blood. But this was the kind of heat that didn't come from the brazier but from breathless waiting—like a coil pulled too tight. Yaozu, Mingyu, and I were all waiting to see what the man in the chains was going to do next.
The assassin slumped forward, barely conscious now. His skin glistened with sweat, his chest rising in shallow jerks, each breath labored. But his mouth twitched—and not with defiance.
With surrender.
Yaozu crouched again, one hand pressing against the wound on the man's thigh to slow the bleeding. "You're going to speak," he said calmly. "Now. Or we'll keep you alive for days, and I'll let her keep playing."
