"Lieutenant Renna’O Blossom," the woman said, her voice honeyed, the syllables dripping like syrup from a spoon. She circled the metal table slowly, her gloved fingers trailing along its edge. "Elite interrogator of the Seventh Division." The title rolled off her tongue with practiced ease, as if she’d introduced herself this way a thousand times before. Sarah watched the woman’s reflection in the mirror—the way her hips swayed slightly with each step, the deliberate grace of a predator who knew her prey couldn’t run. The lieutenant stopped at Sarah’s feet, her polished boot nudging the inside of the child’s thigh, forcing her legs wider apart. Sarah clenched her teeth, her muscles trembling with the effort not to squirm. The leather straps creaked.

"You will tell me," Renna murmured, leaning down until her breath ghosted over Sarah’s cheek—warm and scented with peppermint, incongruously sweet. "Every name. Every drop point. Every safe house." Her gloved hand drifted lower, fingertips brushing the soft swell of Sarah’s inner thigh. "Or I will make you *beg* to tell me." The threat hung between them, thick as the antiseptic stench. Renna straightened abruptly, her posture rigid as a steel rod, her lips curling into a smile that didn’t touch her poison-green eyes. "Let’s begin with the whip, shall we? Aged leather, soaked in brine overnight—it leaves the skin so *deliciously* tender." She paused, savoring the words. "You’ll scream before the third lash. They always do."

Sarah swallowed, her throat clicking dryly. She imagined Lily’s laughter again—bright and bubbling like creek water over stones—and let it fill the hollow places fear had carved inside her. Then she tilted her chin up, her violet eyes locking onto Renna’s with a defiance that made the lieutenant blink. "Your face looks like a pig’s butt," Sarah said, her voice small but clear, the words deliberate. "Smooshed and ugly." A pause. "And you smell like cabbage farts."

Renna froze. The tapping of her boot heel against tile ceased mid-stride. For a heartbeat, the only sound was the fluorescent light’s incessant buzz. Then the lieutenant’s gloved fingers twitched—once, twice—before curling into fists. A flush crept up her neck, mottling the porcelain skin above her collar, her lips parting slightly as if she couldn’t quite believe what she’d heard. Sarah watched the tremor of outrage ripple through the woman’s body, the way her shoulders stiffened, the tendons in her jaw standing out like piano wires. The air between them crackled, thick with the promise of violence.

Then—just as suddenly—Renna exhaled. A slow, deliberate breath through her nose, her posture relaxing into something languid, almost amused. The flush receded, leaving her skin marble-smooth. Her lips curved into a smile that didn’t reach her poison-green eyes. "Oh, little bird," she murmured, tilting her head as if examining a curious insect. "You’ve just made this so much more *fun*." Her gloved hand drifted up to trace the edge of Sarah’s collarbone, the leather cool against the child’s feverish skin. The threat in her voice was velvet-wrapped steel. "I was going to start with the whip. But now?" A chuckle, low and honeyed. "Now I think we’ll skip straight to the fire."

Renna turned on her heel, her boots clicking against the tile as she strode to a steel shelving unit against the far wall. Sarah’s eyes tracked her, the movement jerky with panic. The shelves were lined with instruments—gleaming, sinister things that caught the fluorescent light like teeth in a predator’s maw. Renna’s fingers danced over them with the familiarity of a librarian selecting a favorite book. First, the whip: coiled like a sleeping serpent, its braided leather darkened by brine. She lifted it, letting the tip unravel toward the floor with a wet *slap*, her tongue darting out to moisten her lips. Then—almost regretfully—she set it back, her attention shifting to a pair of electrodes, their clamps gaping like hungry mouths. She flicked one with a polished nail, producing a sharp *ping* that echoed in Sarah’s bones.

The child’s breath came faster now, her chest rising and falling in shallow hitches. Renna hummed—a tuneless, absent sound—as she trailed a gloved finger along the electrodes’ wires, following them to a small black box with a dial. She twisted it idly, her green eyes flickering to Sarah’s face, watching for the flinch when the machine emitted a low, ominous *buzz*. But Sarah clenched her jaw, her nails digging into her own palms despite the restraints. Renna sighed, her disappointment palpable as she draped the wires back onto the shelf with deliberate care. Then she paused, her gaze lingering on a narrow cylinder nestled between jars of unmarked liquids.

The blowtorch.

Sarah's breath caught in her throat as Renna lifted it with reverence, her gloved fingers tracing the steel barrel like a lover's spine. The nozzle gleamed under the fluorescent lights—small, precise, the kind of tool a jeweler might use to solder delicate filigree. But Sarah knew better. She'd seen the scars on Marta's back, the puckered flesh that looked like wax left too long in the sun. The panic rose in her chest like bile, her pulse hammering against the thin skin of her wrists where the restraints bit deeper. Her thighs trembled, the cold metal table leaching warmth from her bare skin as Renna depressed the ignition switch with a soft *click*.

The blue flame erupted with a hiss, no bigger than a candle's tongue at first—then lengthening as Renna adjusted the valve, growing until it licked the air with a dancer's grace. Sarah's vision tunneled, the world narrowing to that flickering point of heat, so close she could already feel its phantom touch searing her ribs, her belly, the tender insides of her thighs. Her bladder clenched, a hot rush of shame prickling behind her eyes as her body betrayed her. Renna smiled, her poison-green eyes reflecting the flame like stained glass. "Such a pretty little thing," she murmured, rotating the torch so the light played over Sarah's splayed form. "How long do you think you'll stay silent when your skin starts to *melt*?"

Sarah's breath came in ragged gasps, her pulse fluttering like a trapped moth against her throat. She squeezed her eyes shut—but the darkness only made it worse. All she could see was Marta's ruined back, the way the old woman had winced when Sarah's fingers accidentally brushed a knotted scar while helping her dress. *They take their time,* Marta had whispered, her voice raw with memory. *Slow circles, like they're painting you.* Sarah whimpered, her thighs twitching as if already recoiling from the heat. The straps cut deeper, the pain a distant counterpoint to the terror coiling in her gut. She could *smell* it now—the acrid tang of burning hair, the sickly-sweet char of flesh. Her own.

Then, like a lifeline thrown into the abyss, Lily's face surfaced behind her eyelids. Not the feverish, sweat-slicked Lily who'd clutched the smuggled medicine with shaking hands—but the Lily who'd spun in the orphanage courtyard after first snowfall, arms outstretched, laughing as flakes caught in her lashes. *"Look, Sarah! I'm a sugar fairy!"* The memory was so vivid Sarah could almost feel the snowflakes melting on her own cheeks, taste the metallic chill of winter air. Her breathing slowed. Lily's laughter, bright and reckless, drowned out the blowtorch's hiss.

Marta's voice followed, gnarled and cigarette-rough, but threaded with something Sarah hadn't recognized until now: pride. *"Pain's just weather, girl. Storms pass."* The old woman had said it while stitching a torn dress, her needle flashing in the lamplight despite the arthritis twisting her fingers. Sarah remembered how the thread had pulled taut—how Marta's hands never shook. The realization hit like a slap: *they'd broken Marta's body, but never her silence.* The flame's heat wavered in Sarah's vision, suddenly insubstantial as a candle guttering in draft.

Lily's face superimposed itself over Renna's smirk—not the feverish child from the infirmary cot, but the wild, ink-stained imp who'd once bitten a guard's thumb clean to the bone when he grabbed her braids. Sarah could still see the bloody gap in Lily's smile where a baby tooth had been. *"Worth it,"* she'd hissed around the copper taste, grinning as the man howled. The memory seared hotter than any flame. Sarah's trembling stopped. Her thighs, slick with cold sweat, pressed defiantly against the straps. A different heat uncoiled in her belly—not fear, but fury, bright and clean as a struck match.

Renna's gloved fingers twitched around the torch. The blue flame wavered as the lieutenant's perfect posture faltered for a fraction of a second, her poison-green eyes narrowing at the sudden stillness of Sarah's body. The child's violet gaze locked onto hers—unflinching, almost curious—as if Renna were a mildly interesting insect crawling across a windowsill. The lieutenant's lips parted slightly, her breath hitching mid-exhale. Sarah saw it then: the microscopic tremor in Renna's lower lip, the way her polished boot tapped the tile twice—quick, staccato—like a metronome skipping a beat. The torch's hiss sounded suddenly shrill in the silence.

Then Renna laughed—a soft, practiced sound that didn't reach her eyes. She adjusted the flame higher with a flick of her thumb, the blue tongue licking hungrily at the sterile air. "Such bravery," she murmured, tilting the torch so its light painted Sarah's ribs in lurid detail. The child's skin glowed amber where the heat hovered centimeters away, tiny beads of sweat forming like dew on ripe fruit. Renna inhaled sharply through her nose, savoring the metallic tang of fear beneath the antiseptic stench. *They all break,* she reminded herself, watching Sarah's pulse flutter in the hollow of her throat. *Even the defiant ones.* Her fingers tightened around the torch's handle, the leather creaking.