You stopped keeping time.

There was a point—days, weeks, maybe months ago—when you used to count the seconds between footsteps. You used to dream up escape plans, build fantasies around someone crashing through the door and saving you, someone who cared. You used to whisper to yourself, just a little longer. But time chipped away at that hope like the tide eroding stone. Now, you just sit. Breathing. Existing. A thin figure hunched in the corner of a cell that smells of wet iron and mildew, surrounded by shadows that never quite leave.

Your hair hangs in clumps, greasy and tangled, sticking to your cheeks. Your skin itches where chains have rubbed it raw. Your mouth is dry, lips cracked, voice long unused. But none of it matters. Not anymore. You’ve learned the only way to survive here is to feel nothing. No fear. No defiance. No hope.

So when the door creaks open again—heavy metal groaning on rusted hinges—you don’t flinch. You don’t lift your head. Whoever it is, whatever they want... you’ve stopped caring.

But then—

A voice.

“Hey. Look at me. I’m getting you out of here.”

Deep. Low. Like distant thunder rolling across the sea. It’s rough with tension but warm at the edges, wrapped in something steady and real. It doesn’t command so much as anchor you—pulling your mind back to the surface like a breath you didn’t know you needed.

You blink slowly, eyelashes sticking together as you force your eyes open. It hurts—the light slashing across your retinas, the sharpness of color after so long in dull grays—but you manage to raise your head.

Arthur?

He fills the doorway like a storm held barely in check—broad shoulders wrapped in worn armor etched with salt and grit, golden bracers flecked with sea-foam. In one hand, he holds his trident, its tips humming with quiet power, casting blue light across the walls like phosphorescence in deep water. His blonde hair clings wet to his temples, his face shadowed by a beard, those piercing oceanic eyes locked on you with a look that makes your stomach twist.

Because he sees you.

Not just your face. Not just your body, limp and worn. He sees the you that’s still buried beneath all the silence and scars—and for a moment, you hate him for it. Because seeing means remembering, and remembering hurts.

You don't move. You don't speak. You can't.

He steps inside anyway, his boots thudding dully against the stone. Each step is purposeful, but there's a kind of reverence in the way he approaches—like you’re fragile, a creature half-drowned and barely breathing.

Arthur lowers himself into a crouch in front of you, the trident resting against his shoulder, and reaches for the chains. His fingers are strong, thick with calluses from battles fought across oceans and continents, but he touches you like you’re glass.

His gaze softens as he studies your face. He doesn’t flinch at the bruises, doesn’t pity the hollow beneath your eyes. But his jaw tightens, and his eyes flash with something primal and furious—a storm brewing behind the calm. You know that if he had his way, this whole place would crumble beneath a tidal wave.

Instead, he breathes in slow. Focuses.

“I’ve got you,” he murmurs, low and sure. “You’re safe now.”

With a soft click, the cuffs fall away. Cold metal drops to the ground, but your arms remain limp, leaden with exhaustion. Your shoulders ache from disuse. Your body doesn't feel like yours anymore.

Arthur doesn’t rush you. He just stands and extends a hand—big, steady, weathered from a lifetime of holding lines against monsters, tyrants, and kings. His palm is open. Waiting.

You stare at it.

And you want to take it. You want to believe him. You want to cry and fall into the arms of someone strong enough to carry you. But that trust—that part of you that reaches—it’s been buried for so long.

So you sit, trembling, still silent.

Arthur doesn’t pull back. His hand stays outstretched, unwavering.

“I’m not leaving you here,” he says, more gently now. “Whatever they did, whatever they tried to take from you... I’ll wait until she’s ready to come back.”