Shadow Slave

Effie stared at him with no amusement whatsoever on her childish face, which only made her attempts to appear serious look more comical. Then, she scowled and said evenly:

"Wanna die?"

Sunny shook his head with a grin, then went into more detail about the things he had learned, including various pieces of information he had gleaned in the nightmares, his experience with the Warmongers, and his observations about Solvane and Noctis.

When he was done, there was silence for a while. The others were digesting all the information he had shared with them, full of thought. Well… everyone except Effie.

The somber silence was soon broken by the sound of loud chewing. The little girl swallowed a piece of meat pie, then blinked a couple of times, noticing that everyone was staring at her. Finally, she wiped the oil off her lips and said:

"What? I am a growing child, you know! I need to eat well to grow big!"

Then, she wiped her oily fingers on the tablecloth and shrugged.

"Well, anyway… I guess I'll go next."

The little girl glanced at Sunny, made a face, and turned away.

"There's not much to tell, anyway. My three months in the Temple of the Chalice were not at all as exciting as Sunny's wild misadventures. Although…"

face suddenly grew dim and

weren't very pleasant,

lingered for a few moments, and said spoke in a somber

had grown cruel and perverse over the centuries. Now that I know about how Hope

The little girl trembled.

and managed to make it to the Iron Hand island. But I was caught, and the punishment… at the time, they already knew that nothing they did to me would make me obedient. So, they punished the others in my stead. After that… well, I did not

grew silent for a

to endure fear, how to steel your will. How to be a perfect, merciless, lethal vessel of War. Of course, they were very inventive in their lessons… what better way to teach someone to endure pain than to torture them to the brink of

girl's

turned out to be weak.

bite out of her piece of

to begin with? So… so stupid. But mostly, it was just combat training. They trained us ruthlessly. There's a lot you can achieve with a few Awakened healers and no regard for whether your

Effie shook her head.

worse than the rest. The girl whose body I took had the misfortune of Awakening at a very young age, you see. So, the Maidens saw her as their promised chosen one…

girl looked

older Maidens treated us like their little sisters — when they were

hesitated for a moment,

I think they went harder on the other girls because of me. My presence… reignited their fervor, I think. After everyone else died and the Maidens had nothing else to hold over my head, I