Rossie did not know if she had slept.
She lay on the heavy furs in his den, a hollowed-out, calibrated instrument. The fire had burned down to glowing embers, casting a deep, blood-red light on the dark wood ceiling.
He had not left.
He sat in a large leather chair near the hearth, a thick, ancient-looking book open on his lap. He was not reading. He was watching her.
His silver eyes, sharp and analytical in the gloom, tracked the slow, steady rise and fall of her chest. He was monitoring his asset, ensuring the "system stabilization" from the night before had held.
The agonizing, high-pitched frequency of her terror was gone, replaced by a cold, echoing void. The "protocol" he had spoken of.
He had drained her, then refilled her just enough to function. She was an empty vessel, waiting for orders.
Finally, as the first hint of a polluted grey dawn stained the penthouse windows, he closed the book with a soft, definitive thud.
"The system is stable," he announced to the room.
He stood, his tall frame a monolith against the dying fire.
"But stability," he continued, walking toward her, "is not the goal. Stability is merely the baseline. The engine must be primed."
Rossie's muscles tensed. Primed?
He stood over the bed, looking down at her. His gaze was devoid of all malice, all passion. It was the detached focus of an engineer.
"Your performance in the boardroom was… illuminating," he said. "The fuel generated by your panic and fear was potent, but, as I said, inefficient. A wildfire. What I require is a furnace—a sustainable, high-temperature burn."
"I... I don't understand," she whispered. Her voice was hoarse.
"You don't need to understand," he replied, his voice still holding that low, hypnotic quality from his "maintenance." "You only need to feel."
He reached down, not to her forehead this time, but to her arm. He gripped it, pulling her upright. She was weak, her body still humming with the residue of his power. He sat her on the edge of the bed.
"We have established a protocol for maintenance," he said. "Now, we establish the protocol for fueling."
A new, colder terror began to dawn. This was worse. The maintenance had been an invasive, intimate repair. This sounded like a deliberate, scheduled violation.
"The Karet Syndicate will be here in two hours," he stated, as if discussing the weather. "They are… volatile. They will require a significant demonstration of control. My control."
He turned and walked to the wall-to-wall glass of his den, which overlooked the still-sleeping, smog-covered city. "Your reserves are empty. We must fill them."
"What... what are you going to do?" she asked, pulling the fur pelt around her trembling shoulders.
Maher did not turn. "I am going to do what I have always done, Rossie. I am going to transact."
He gestured to the glass. "Come."
A command. A tool follows its master.
She forced her weak legs to obey, crossing the rich rugs until she stood beside him, reflected as a small, pale ghost against the vastness of the Jakarta skyline.
"Look," he commanded.
She looked. At first, she saw nothing but the familiar view. The concrete towers, the endless traffic, the hazy light.
"Closer," he murmured.
He placed his hand on the back of her head. It was not the "calibrating" touch from before. This was a guiding, focusing grip.
"Look through the noise."
His power flowed into her, not warm and soothing, but sharp and precise, like a lens clicking into focus. The city blurred. The concrete dissolved.
She was looking at Senopati.
She was looking at the café she and Tio used to frequent.
Her breath hitched.
She saw Tio. He was sitting at their usual outdoor table, a kopi susu in his hand. He was laughing.
"Tio," she breathed, her hand rising to the glass, as if she could touch him.
"He seems well," Maher observed, his voice a detached rumble in her ear.
And then, the person across from Tio leaned forward into view.
It was her mother.
She was wearing a bright yellow t-shirt. Rossie recognized it. It was her t-shirt. The one she had left behind in her laundry basket.
Her mother was smiling, her face relaxed and happy. She hadn't looked that happy in years. She raised her own coffee cup, toasting Tio. They looked carefree. They looked... fine.
"No," Rossie whispered. It was a lie. It had to be a lie. They were supposed to be suffering. They were supposed to be grieving. Her sacrifice was supposed to matter.
"They mourned," Maher stated, his voice clinical, as if reading a report. "For a time. They filed a missing person's report. They were devastated."
The scene in the café flickered. Rossie saw her mother, weeping in her empty room. She saw Tio, angrily putting up "MISSING" posters.
"But human grief," Maher continued, his voice devoid of sympathy, "is a temporary, inefficient burn. It fades. The human mind seeks equilibrium. It forgets, so that it can function."
The scene snapped back to the present. Her mother and Tio, laughing.
"They believe you ran off," Maher explained. "A rich, spoiled girl who couldn't handle the pressure. They are disappointed. Angry, even. But mostly... they are relieved. The uncertainty is over. They have moved on."
"No. No, you're lying," Rossie choked out, but the vision was too real.
"I am an entity of contracts, Rossie. I do not lie. I simply present the facts."
He showed her another vision. Her father, at a board meeting, presenting a new, highly profitable expansion. He was thriving. The "blessing" of the contract was stronger than ever, now that the "payment" had been made.
They were all fine.
They were better off.
Her sacrifice had not saved them. It had simply unburdened them of her.
The realization was not a wildfire of panic.
It was a cold, dark, heavy stone of pure despair, sinking into her stomach.
The "gilded void" she had felt her entire life had been a prelude. This was the true emptiness. The agonizing, absolute, and total irrelevance of her own existence.
She began to shake, but not with fear. It was a deep, internal tremor of pure, agonizing grief. A sob, silent and painful, tore through her.
She had not just lost them. She had been erased.
She pressed her forehead against the cold glass, the visions fading, the reality crushing her.
She felt Maher's hand on her head again.
But he was not soothing her. He was not "maintaining."
A faint, invisible tendril of her agony, her despair, her angst, was flowing from her. It was dark, rich, and potent.
He was harvesting.
"Ah," he breathed, his voice filled with the same deep, possessive satisfaction as the night before. "There it is."
He was taking her grief, her ultimate pain, and he was breathing it in.
"This," he murmured, his hand still on her head, absorbing the clean, high-grade fuel of her despair, "is a much more efficient burn. This... this is the furnace."
He kept his hand there, drawing the energy from her as she wept silently against the glass, until she was nothing but a hollow, cold shell once more.
He lifted his hand, seemingly energized, his presence more powerful, more dominant.
He looked down at her, a crumpled, broken thing.
"Excellent," he said, his voice crisp and professional. "The engine is primed. The fuel is sufficient for the meeting."
He turned away, leaving her there, and walked to his desk to prepare for the Karet Syndicate.
Rossie slid down the glass wall until she was a heap on the floor.
She had a new protocol. She had a new function.
Her suffering was no longer a byproduct of her captivity.
It was the purpose of it.
It was her job.