36. The Sinner
Iforce the tears back and regulate my breathing. I can’t allow this asshole to know how much his words have affected me. How they are giving me hope. Hope that I can still save Sammy and my nephew. Hope that Sammy will return to me, and that we can get far away from all of this hell together. Hope that I was starting to lose, when it seemed that we would never be able to find either of them. The air becomes lodged in my throat, preventing words from escaping, even as my heart beats rapidly like a war drum inside my chest.
He’s lying. He wants to use you. They all want to use you. No one loves you, pretty little Dinah.The words slither through my mind, with the familiar inflection of the monster that haunts my dreams, causing a shiver to slide down my spine.
“What do you want her to do for you? Hmm, it seems you have enough rebel troops to overtake the Brotherhood. What could one woman do that you can’t?” Zeke’s voice breaks through my panic, as he voices the thoughts racing through my mind out loud. Trap, this is all a trap.
A frustrated sigh leaves David, the only indication so far that he’s losing his control. The man seems to be colder than the frigid northern regions of our world. He motions to the side, where there is a glass door leading to the exterior of the space. One of his rebel soldiers opens it wide, and after a brief moment of our eyes all connecting, I nod. Zeke walks out the door first, with me following and then David, with Abe bringing up the flank. I have no doubt in my mind Abe will snap David’s neck if he tries anything. The minute we are outside, the cool air hits my overheated flesh, and I can finally clear my head and take a deep breath. This is bad, really fucking bad.
“You don’t fear me, but you should. I will destroy you, David. I’ll destroy these little toy soldiers you have amassed if you are lying to me.”
David comes to a halt, and his chocolate brown eyes seem to glow in the moonlight. “That, right there, is why I need you. That is what I want. A fierce leader, ready and willing to do whatever it takes to free a person she loves.”
“You don’t want a leader; you want a figurehead and a scapegoat, in case things go wrong,” Zeke mutters, getting right back into David’s space. His display of anger on my behalf, and his protective tendencies, are causing emotions I don’t have time to process to swirl inside of me.
“I need someone who can rally the people. Someone who they would support with the usurping of power.” He uses his shoulder to push Zeke back, utterly unfazed by the larger man radiating violence and his possible death before him. Who the fuck is this guy?
“Who better to play that role than Dinah Camrose?” He turns to face me, his eyes meeting mine, and his features open so that I can read them. He is either suffering from delusions, or believes every word coming from his mouth. I don’t know which is more dangerous to me. This man either plans to kill me himself, or sacrifice me to his cause.
“The beloved daughter and sister of the men who betrayed the Order, and lost their lives trying to bring about change that would have lessened the foot on the necks of those below them. The daughter of the woman who called for vengeance against the Brotherhood, before taking her own life in a room filled with her oppressors. How about the niece of the most powerful man in our world, defying him and leading us forward in a revolution?”
He turns his gaze to Zeke and Abe. “She has been made an orphan by the Brotherhood, has lost everything, and still she is a force to be reckoned with as the Unholy Ghost. The populace will flock to her. They will follow where she leads.“ His eyes are large, filled with fervor and madness. Jesus, he’s insane, the realization terrifies me.
“And you would tie a noose around my neck, making me a puppet while you create a new world order, using my name as the flag for change.” I grab onto his dark shirt, lifting the small blade that he didn’t see me unsheathe from my wrist, and pressing it up against his neck. “I will not be your puppet and allow you to enslave everyone again.” My heart pounds in my chest, the air thinning as I begin to lose control of myself.
“Then he will die, Dinah, and you will have to live with the knowledge and memory that you could have saved him.” I press the blade harder into his bronzed skin, until two drops of blood slip freely from around the sharp blade, and trail down the long, straight column of his neck. “We don’t plan to ever enslave them. We want them free, free to choose how they live, like it was in the old world.”
His hand wraps around mine, pushing the blade further into his neck like a psychopath, while never releasing his intense gaze from mine. “You would be free; all women would be free to choose what they do with themselves, their lives, and their bodies. No more classes or stations, Dinah. The world would revert back to the way it was before the Brotherhood took over.”
I yank my hand with the blade away from him, my body trembling with adrenaline and a tinge of fear at his madness. Is this possible? Could we really free everyone, and let the world go back to a time when there was freedom and choice for all?
Freedom is a mirage, Dinah. One cannot have freedom without someone else paying the price. My father’s words slip through my mind from my childhood. A moment in time before I realized he was a monster, and I asked him why the world we lived in was the way it was. I wanted to be able to do the same things as Gabriel, Zeke, and Abe, but was constantly being told to sit down, and be pretty. The role of a Sacred Daughter, already filled with chains that held me down, even at a young age. I remember the sadness in his face at those words. He knew then what I know now; no one is ever truly free. Sacrifices must be made in the name of freedom, and that word is a blanket we wrap around ourselves to hide from the dark. The dark is still there, though. It’s just waiting to consume you.
This man knows that, too. He is no fool. He gives hope with one hand while knowing that he must take it with the other. The question is not about unattainable freedom. The question is how far I’m willing to go to get what is mine back, and to keep all the people I love safe.
I cannot live without Sammy, Abe, and Zeke, and I will not let my brother’s child suffer at the hands of the Brotherhood. I close my eyes, making peace with the fact that there is no actual decision to be made here. That is why David is so fearless and confident. He knew he had the right carrot to dangle in front of me. He holds the power to my, and their, survival. He’s an asshole, but a smart and cunning one, it seems.
I open my eyes, gray clashing against brown, and I let him see his own death in the depths of mine. I show him the levels of my insanity that are just below the surface, chained and ready to devour everything in my path. I let him see the monster rattling in its cage, begging to be released, so it can cause infinite bloodshed and misery. I allow him to meet the Unholy Ghost, and know that once I’m released from the burdens of my morality, I will not stop. I will lay waste to everything in my path. I let him see the real me, the terrified girl who became the woman who would never kneel at a man’s throne.
“You will have your Unholy Ghost who will lead the people to a new world, I swear it, but David, be very sure you know what you are unleashing. Once released from her chains, you cannot put her back in the box.”
I turn away, desperately needing to get some space from everything and everyone I have encountered tonight, and go over what I have just done. I turn and look at him over my shoulder, and my gaze is scathing and promising him death. “If he dies, or you renege on your word and both of them are not returned to me alive, you will not be able to hide from me. I will take your life first.”
“I wouldn’t doubt it, Dinah Camrose. You are truly something wondrous to behold. By morning, you will have all the soldiers and weapons you need, and the intel to retrieve your Sammy. The boy will be rescued and brought to you. I swear it on my life, but you need to hold up your end of our bargain, or I will have you all killed.”
I turn away and take a few steps into the darkened night, unafraid of threats, and hear Abe and Zeke’s footsteps mirroring mine. Just when we are almost at a safe distance, David calls out to me and has me stopping short, and Zeke and Abe do the same. “Dinah, you will have to murder the Holy Father, if we have any chance of succeeding. He must die as a sacrifice to cleanse the earth of the Brotherhood’s power.”
Fuck, I don’t even acknowledge his demand, but I was waiting for it. There was no way, unless the Holy Father was involved, he was going to be left alive. I just had a small hope it wouldn’t be me they required to slaughter him. I guess we can never get what we want in this world. What is more bloodshed, when faced with the opportunity to have my Sammy and my nephew back? The price is the Holy Father’s death. He’s already taking his last breaths, he just doesn’t know it yet.
I keep moving forward, giving David my back, showing the cunt that I am not afraid of him when inside, terror is running rampant. I replay David’s words rapidly in my mind, and one thing sticks out immediately. He said, ‘We,’ when I questioned him about enslaving the populace under a different banner.
“We don’t plan to ever enslave them. We want them free, free to choose how they live, like it was in the old world.”
He’s not the only one at the head of this. He might be the ringmaster, but I don’t think he owns the circus. He’s the shadowed face of the rebellion, but I don’t believe he could have pulled all this off without help. Something nefarious is happening here, something just out of the reach of the light. Someone else is pulling the strings, but the question is, who?
Who is playing with mine and my men’s lives? Who wants me to destroy the world as we know it?