>"You want to frighten me? I am frightened. You want to hear me say I'm powerless? I am, completely. How many more times do you want me to say I'm sorry?"
>"That's a good expression! Cornered, afraid, and yet still defiant enough to rail against your lot. It's been a long time since I've seen that." The puncture wounds in your legs are starting to burn. "It takes surprisingly little to reduce someone to terrified weeping," she continues, walking slowly past your helpless form as you smother another wince. "A limb, a loved one, seeing all their decades of training defeated by a single gesture. Empty, hollow fear. But that isn't what I see on
your face, even now. Oh, you curse me, curse the world, curse your own powerlessness, and yet you still haven't
quite given up your resolve." She leans down and holds your gaze in her own, her eyes deep with age-old malice, but her smile surprisingly gentle. "You're a brave little mouse, aren't you?"
>You don't feel very brave right now.
>"I could break you, of course," she says lightly, as though she were discussing the weather. "I could ensure that every last moment of your life was spent in such pure agony that you'd only
wish for death to claim you. But that seems like a terrible waste, don't you agree?" The vines around your chest make it difficult to draw enough breath to respond, even were you not gritting your teeth against the searing in your legs. "As it so happens, I have no desire to kill you. You've been a polite enough intruder that I'm willing to give you a chance to redeem yourself ? a chance, even, to gain the very thing you came here seeking. Are you interested?"
