Nox, still seated on the floor, leaned his back against the bed frame and sank into reflections on his miserable fate.

He couldn't stop thinking about how much easier life would be if he had a red Mark like his father. Then, he could face Torven as an equal. Perhaps Torven wouldn't even stand a chance.
'Or perhaps he would, ' Nox reconsidered, recalling Torven's powerful, well-built frame.

He gently rubbed his wrist, pulled back his glove, and glanced at the scrape Torven had left behind. He winced. But it wasn't the physical wound that hurt the most.

'What a shithead,' he thought, a shadow of regret creeping into his mind. He wished he had said it out loud to his face. 'Couldn't he have just told me not to go in there? Why did he have to yank me so hard?'

At that moment, all he could see in Torven was a thug who took pleasure in tormenting those weaker than himself. Yet what stung the most was the fact that he hadn't been given a chance to explain anything.
He had been dismissed like some insignificant insect, unworthy of attention, let alone a conversation. Treated like a child, as though he didn't even deserve an explanation or a chance to voice his reasons. He felt small. Insignificant. He felt angry.

Even more puzzling was Velkan's behavior. Why hadn't he simply admitted that he had allowed Nox to open the door? And even if he hadn't had the chance to say it, why hadn't he tried to defend him? Was he afraid of Torven, too?

Nox felt betrayed. He had never truly expected anyone to stand up for him, but still, he felt emotions growing inside him: a sense of abandonment, of being alone in a world full of people.
A bitter thought crossed his mind: that Velkan had done it deliberately, to get him into trouble and leave him to face the consequences alone.

At the same time, his mind kept circling back to the question of what was behind that door. Torven was clearly hiding something, he thought.
Something important.
Something big.

He thought it over and concluded that the key to his escape was Torven. He found himself wondering about the man's past. Had Torven, like him, spent years on the battlefield?

For a long time, Nox pondered how he might gather more information about him. Asking directly was out of the question. He had no access to that mysterious outbuilding either, and he certainly wasn't going to risk sneaking inside again.

Could he ask the guard? Probably not. There was a good chance Torven would simply reassign the man to other duties after today, and besides, Velkan had already lost his trust.

That left the maid, his last hope. But she seemed nervous, as if frightened. Nox felt an odd connection with her, sensing the same fear and uncertainty in her eyes that he felt in himself.

He briefly wondered whether anyone else lived or worked on the estate. So far, he hadn't seen a soul. The only other living beings were the horses in the stable.

Nox's mood lifted slightly at the thought of Gerhart, his stallion, trying to learn something about Torven from the other horses and then telling him all about it. If only Nox could understand horsish. The image brought a small smile to his face.

He exhaled. He couldn't delay any longer. It was time to finalise a plan to escape as soon as possible.

He began thinking about everything he had seen that day, considering how he might free Gerhart. Two options came to mind.

The first: flee right after dinner through the main door.
He asked himself whether he had any real chance of success... and before the thought had even finished forming, he already knew the answer. It would be impossible.
Torven and Velkan would catch him within seconds, before he even reached the stables, let alone freed the horse.

That left the second option: escaping during the night.
But how to get out of the room? Through the door? The window?
Was there any chance he could use something to saw the window bars?
Maybe he could steal a knife during dinner. But he'd have to do it completely unnoticed.
He also wondered whether he might be able to pick the lock with something sharp. A pin, or even an old nail, might do the trick. Nox resolved to start paying more attention to his surroundings.
Both options were incredibly risky. Either would require a lot of courage. But he knew he couldn't remain here much longer.

Still, the greatest unknown, one that could overturn all his plans, was something else entirely: Torven's Mark.

Nox wrestled with his thoughts, trying to grasp who Torven truly was. A warrior? A healer?
Or did he bear the green Mark - the sign of those who could control minds?

Of course, not all Marked were vulnerable to mind control. There was a crucial condition: the controller had to have seen the target's Mark beforehand.

Even then, the control was not limitless.
A mind controller could not control someone from afar, their influence faded with distance. The power was, of course, based on one's personal ability, but it also required close proximity, which limited its range. To simply explain it, some green-Mark bearers could control others over many miles while others wouldn't be able to hold the connection beyond the next village.

What's more, if both individuals bore the green Mark, the situation became even more complicated. One green Marked could overpower another if his strength was significantly greater.
In practice, it became a battle of minds where the weaker could only resist or, in rare cases, even fend off the attempt at control if lucky.

The thought of being turned into a puppet, of having your movements and decisions directed by someone else, without your consent, was just terrifying.
Worst of all, victims of such control often remembered nothing from the time their minds had been hijacked.
It meant the complete loss of freedom and identity.
And you could be forced to commit acts that completely defied your beliefs.

That's why many of the Marked preferred to keep their signs hidden, protecting themselves from such manipulation by concealing them from the world. Being reduced to a mere instrument in someone else's hands was horrifying.

Nox shuddered, thinking Torven could perhaps bear THAT kind of Mark.

A sudden memory struck, pulling him back to his mercenary days, back when he had crossed his paths that mind-controlling jerk...