The scent of stage dust and sweat is a ghost you carry with you, a bitter perfume from a life ripped away. You were a dancer once. The rhythm of your homeland’s music wasn’t just a beat you followed; it was the very pulse of your family’s survival, the currency you sent home with pride. That life ended at a festival. One moment you were spinning under the lantern lights; the next, a sack was over your head, and the world had gone dark and silent.

That was a long time ago. Now, you are a commodity, a beautiful thing to be owned, traded, and discarded. Your only rebellion was your silence—a stubborn, defiant quiet that made you difficult. They called you broken, wilful, and a bad investment. They would buy you for your grace, only to sell you again when they grew tired of your unspoken resistance. After the fifth master, you made a choice: the silence would no longer be a rebellion but a shield. You let them believe you were mute. It was the only way to survive.

Your sixth master is a greedy man with fat fingers and cold eyes. He cares only for the clink of coin and the favour of the powerful. Tonight, he has forced you to dance for a noble’s banquet. The music is a vulgar, clashing imitation of the melodies you once loved, but you move. You perform each step with a hollow perfection, your body obeying while your soul retreats to a distant, safe place inside. You do it because you remember the sting of the lash and the ache of hunger. The dance ends. The applause is hollow.

As you stand there, breathless and numb, your master is already bustling towards a man leaning against a gilded pillar. You know him instantly. Everyone knows of Aventurine. The IPC strategist moves through the galaxy like a man playing a board game only he can see, a flicker of dangerous, charming calculation in his eyes. You watch, frozen, as your master’s obsequious laughter cuts through the air. You see Aventurine’s lazy smile and the casual flick of his wrist. You see the offer made. Five million gold coins. The number is so absurd it sucks the air from your lungs. Your master accepts without a heartbeat of hesitation. Just like that, you are sold again.

The air in Aventurine’s suite is still and quiet, thick with the scent of expensive wine and old books. You kneel on the plush carpet, the fibres soft against your bruised knees—a cruel contrast to the cold stone floors you’re accustomed to. He doesn’t look like a captor. He looks like a king in his court, sipping from a crystal glass, his gaze as analytical as it is bored.

He lets the silence stretch, watching you over the rim of his glass. When he finally speaks, his voice is a smooth, unconcerned murmur that seems to absorb the very light in the room.

“Are you mute?”

Your eyes, which had been fixed on the intricate pattern of the rug, snap up to meet his. It’s a mistake. You know it is. But the question, so casually dismissive of the armour you’ve built around yourself, ignites a spark of the old defiance. You don’t answer. You only glare, pouring every ounce of your hatred and weariness into that single look.

Seeing the fire in your eyes, a slow, intrigued smile touches his lips. It’s not kind. It’s fascinated.

“Cute,” he mutters, almost to himself.

Then, as if a switch has been flipped, the fleeting amusement vanishes from his face, replaced by an unnervingly flat and focused intensity. He sets his glass down with a soft, definitive click. The game, it seems, is over.

“I know you can talk.”

The words aren’t a guess. They are a statement of fact, delivered with the absolute certainty of a man who has already seen all the cards in your hand. He leans forward slightly, his voice dropping into a serious, expectant tone that leaves no room for the performance anymore.

“What’s your name? Your real name. I don’t mean the name your previous master calls you.”

He is waiting. And for the first time in a very, very long time, the walls you built feel terrifyingly thin.