Page 178 of Somno Slave

Deogal says nothing. He just sits there, looking at Peter, letting the quiet drag on until the room starts to tighten around it.

“We have a date for your death. Friday. It’s been brought forward.” Peter hums.

My stomach lurches before I can stop it, palms immediately slick.

Friday.

The word rots through me.

I look at the bruises around his wrists and something sudden twists low in my stomach.

If he says they hurt him, Peter has to document it. If Peter documents it, the board has to review it.

Review means delay.

Delay means alive.

My fingers tighten around the file hard enough to bend the paper.

“You said you’d talk.” The words fall out before I can stop them. My voice comes out rougher than I expect, like I’ve been screaming.

Deogal inclines his head slightly. His black eyes settle on me, not just watching, buttaking. The kind of attention that feels like he’s peeling something back layer by layer just by looking.

The corner of his mouth lifts. “Ask.”

It lands too easy.

My stomach turns.

For a second, I can’t move. I glance at Peter instinctively, looking for him to step in, to take the room back. He doesn’t say anything.

And Deogal is watching me. Waiting forme.

I swallow, hard enough it hurts. My fingers tighten around the file in my hands, the edge of the paper biting into my palm. The case file. The victims. The reason I am here.

The reason he is here.

The reason he is going to die if no one says the right thing in the right room with the right people listening.

My throat tightens.

I already know too much. I’ve seen enough in pieces, in sleep, in broken flashes that don’t belong to me and still wake up inside my body like bruises. I know there is something beneath the murders. Something done to him first.

But knowing it doesn’t matter. Dreams don’t change sentencing. Instinct doesn’t stop a death warrant.

He has to say it. Out loud. In front of Peter.

I force air into my lungs. “Why did you kill them?”

The room goes so quiet I can hear blood rushing in my ears.

His mouth parts slightly, and when he speaks his voice is calm enough to make my stomach turn. “They took from me.”

My pulse slams against my throat.

A confession.

My hand tightens so hard around the file the pages crumple, and he sees it. His mouth shifts, faint and cruel, because he knows exactly what he’s just handed us.