After the War: The White Wolf of Doranelle (Fenrys Moonbeam)

Chapter 10: Glaring Contest

Fenrys

Fenrys and Nia were having another unofficial glaring contest.

Nia blinked first. Fenrys asked, "How long do most people last?"

"Two weeks," Nia answered without hesitation, her back leaning against the wall of the cell. "If they can hold up to two weeks of torture, then they like to mix it up." 

They went back to glaring at each other for another minute until Fenrys blinked. 

Nia asked, "How old are you?"

"One hundred and fifty four."

"So you're not that old."

"By Fae standards, no."

More glaring.

"Are you going to eat that?" Nia asked when Fenrys blinked.

Fenrys glanced down at the plate of food that he barely touched.

"I'm going to be completely blunt," Fenrys said, looking back up to at Nia. "Once I was assigned to hunt down this rouge Fae that was terrorizing human towns, and that entire expedition took about three months, and during the entirety of it I basically only eat hard cheese and depressing bread, and I would take that depressing bread over this one, in a heart beat."

Nia bent over and laughed, a light and joyous sound that Fenrys loved. "Well sorry to report, but your meals are probably not going to get much better than that."

Fenrys crinkled his nose. "I hope that you haven't been eating this for the past several years."

Whenever Fenrys got Nia talking about anything he considered it an accomplishment. He saw her twice a day for meals, unless he was unconscious for one of them. And Nia hadn't talked about much of who these people were, but at least stopped ignoring him completely. 

"I eat usually whatever The Furies are eating," said Nia smoothly. 

And then they were glaring again.

Nia blinked, Fenrys asked, "Do you want to be free of this, of this place?"

Her dark eyes narrowed and after a minute she said, "It doesn't matter what I want, because I'm never going to get it."

However depressing that was Fenrys only said, "You know, I said the exact same thing to someone once."

Her eyebrows raised. "Really?" she asked in surprise. 

It was 50 years ago, when Fenrys fell for a female and she asked if he wanted to be free of Maeve. The obvious answer being yes, but he basically said the same thing as Nia.

"So let's talk hypothetical," Fenrys said, ignoring the look in Nia's eyes to elaborate. "Hypothetically speaking if I were to escape--"

"Which you can't," Nia cut in.

"And if I had the chance to run with you--"

"Also not going to happen--"

"Would you want to come with me, or would you rather wait until a certain fire breathing bitch queen hears about this place?"

Nia glowered. "You dream of escape, but it's not going to happen, so you might as well give it up now," Nia said coldly. "Also how do you know that your queen will even give a shit."

Well I certainly hope that anyone with an ounce of moral values wouldn't let this continue. But Fenrys said, "Have you ever heard of Endovier?"

"The slave mining camp?"

Fenrys nodded. "Aelin spent nearly a year there."

Even behind the mask Fenrys knew that her jaw dropped. "But-but, I thought Endovier was a death sentence, like the average life expectancy was--"