Amelia POV

The healer’s hut felt too small for the weight pressing down on my chest.

The air in the room was thick with tension.

The Lupari soldier sat at the center of it all, tied to a heavy wooden chair reinforced with iron rings.

His wrists were bound behind him, rope biting deep into his skin.

His shirt was torn open at the chest, bruises blooming purple and blue along his ribs where I had struck him earlier.

Blood stained at the corner of his mouth, but his eyes….

His eyes ...