Chapter 17
A Lunch Invitation
The faint moonlight was obscured by thick clouds, leaving the night in suffocating darkness. The damp, moldy stench of the cell thickened the air, magnified by the spring rain trickling steadily through cracks in the stone. The musty taste clung to Rocky’s tongue, a bitter reminder of his confinement.
He leaned against the cold, damp wall, its chill seeping into his skin. His gaunt face, now shadowed by a scraggly beard, was pale and hollow, stripped of its former vitality.
“Vladimir de Winter,” he muttered, his voice dripping with venom. Even breathing stoked his fury, though he couldn’t tell if it was from the oppressive humidity or the hopelessness gnawing at him. “I never imagined he’d be so vile. Does that mean the stories of his atrocities during the war were true?”
“Yes, yes!” rasped a broken voice from the farthest, darkest corner of the dungeon.
