I Bought the exiled king (by Natalie Winter) novel Chapter 146

Chapter 146

Chapter 146

Valencia

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It was a low, ragged sound that I would have missed if not for my ears straining to catch any sign of a living being down here.

This place reeked of death, gloom and misery. Just a few hours and I was already feeling suffocated and weak.

I didn’t even dare look at the floor too much, afraid of spotting more than just blood on it. The stench of rot and decay was growing overbearing so I tore a piece of the robe to tie it around my mouth.

It helped, barely.

I kept the torch focussed ahead and swung it from one side to the other, hoping that my ears had not tricked

1. me.

I was met with silence again, and my heart was starting to hammer again when I crouched down on the floor, pushing away the bones to lay down and focus.

And I heard it again.

A ragged breath coming from somewhere below.Not the shallow gasps of the dying, but something sharper.

I plastered my ear to the dungeon floor and closed my eyes, recalling how I had laid my head on Killian’s chest to hear him just breathe the night he almost came back to me from near death.

I felt those muscles under my fingers, felt his heart beating strong under mine.

And then I heard that same breathing sound again.

Stubborn. Refusing to be extinguished.

Wasting no time, I got up and ran toward it, climbing down three steps at a time to go down even deeper as hope flared inside of me, brighter than the torchlight flaring against the iron bars of a larger cell block.

My boot thumped and a layer of dirt along with that same stinky smell rose up in the air and I coughed, my voice echoing against the walls.

“Val?” I heard his voice finally, coming to me from a far corner.

My heart almost leapt up in my throat as I ran in the direction of the voice, abandoning logic or reason. And my boots skidded to a halt when I accidentally ran into a large stone wall, the ragged edges biting into my

skin.

But I didn’t even bother looking at my injuries because in front of me was a large dark cell. And in that was a

man.

“Killian!”

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Chapter 146

I whispered and he raised his head to look at me.

And I couldn’t control my tears as I saw him again.

:..

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I hadn’t seen him for a few hours but it felt like a millennia had passed already. He had been stripped off his clothes, barely a ragged piece of cloth covering his waist. His arms and legs were bound in heavy chains along with a giant iron collar with huge pointed spikes around his neck.

In the few hours that he was here, it looked like he had gone through hell. He was covered in numerous cuts and wounds, his hair was matted and there was not a single patch of clear, wound free skin anywhere.

I placed the torch on a nearby sconce and rushed to the cell, grabbing the iron bars keeping him away from me tightly.

I shook them hard, making my teeth chatter due to the force but the rusty iron bars stayed steadfast.

“Killian, I am here!” I said, my voice thick with emotion.

He had barely gotten better after that recent battle with a werewolf and the wounds had taken ages to heal and here he was bloodied and battered again.

“Who did this to you?” I asked though I knew the answer.

If Martin could hate his own father and plot to kill him, he could definitely cage and torture Killian.

The question was why. Why would he torture Killian who never posed a threat to him.

The young brother who adored him despite his glaring flaws, hoped that his family would love him back.

I slumped down to the ground, trying to stretch my fingers to reach towards him. But I couldn’t.

Killian saw me crying and slowly whispered.

“Dont”

He said a single word but I could hear the pain in his voice.

If I could see this much blood in the flickering torch light, I didn’t want to imagine how deep his injuries truly

were.

“Martin!” I swore under my breath. “He did this to you, right? Sent you here while plotting your father’s death.”

Killian moved a little or tried to but the restraint put on him barely gave him much room. Even inside this dungeon and in the farthest cell, he was chained and caged, injured and bleeding, but still he was alive.

He was slouching down against the wall but he slowly forced himself to get up and fresh blood gushed out of

his wounds.

“Noooo!” I cried as fresh tears trickled down my face.

15:25 Wed, Sep 24

Chapter 146

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His matted hair, covered with dust and dried blood was hiding his eyes from me. But when his eyes met mine, I saw that his eyes were red too.

Not because of any injury. But anger.

His eyes looked like pits of fire, filled with bubbling lava.

They focused on me or rather what I was wearing because I had dropped the robe while trying to stretch my arms to get to him.

His eyes widened again as he took in the clothes I was wearing, or lack thereof.

“What are you wearing?” He asked and I looked down at myself in confusion.

“Uh, that doesn’t matter. I have to get you out first” I said, scrambling for the robe and pulling it around me but Kilian was like a fiery torch running on pure rage.

“Who made you wear that?” He asked, voice clear and steady.

All his earlier tiredness and pain was gone, replaced by cold, unadulterated anger.

I didn’t want him to do anything in haste. He was already bleeding and had lost a lot of blood. And only the Goddess knew how many more men Martin had killed.

There must be an army of soldiers around him now. I didn’t want Killian to even think of facing him right

now.

So I tried to feel around the bars for some sort of lock and a hatch to open the door. But I could not find any.

“Who?” Kilian growled and I was taken aback by the sheer intensity of anger in that voice.

Despite being bloodied and injured, he looked nothing like a weak prey but an apex predator.

“M–Martin” I responded and a terrifying howl left his mouth when he heard that name.