Water covered the floor to the man's waist. He stood in the centre of the cell inside the round glass jar, which reached up to 11 metres high. His skin had turned white and pruney, the texture of something left submerged too long. His teeth chattered. The water was cold. Cixi could feel the chill radiating from the cell three feet away.
How long had he been standing in it? The waterline on the walls said weeks.
Cixi stopped walking.
She stood in the centre of the corridor, her arms wrapped around herself, her grey eyes wide and glassy, her chest rising and falling in short, uneven breaths.
The corridor stretched ahead of her with more cells, more bars, more shapes behind the bars that she could not bring herself to look at anymore.
She turned to Cassian.
He stood beside her, calm as morning, his hands still in his pockets, his dark eyes watching her face with the same patient, unreadable attention he had carried since the first cell.
