Chapter 36
Chapter Thirty-Six
Shivering on the cold ground, I’m startled by a thin beam of light shining in from the cellar door.
Icy fear crawls up my spine. It’s the men, they’re coming back to hurt me.
But a young woman steps through the opening and descends the set of stairs I tumbled down earlier, the hard angles of her face illuminated by the lantern she’s carrying.
My heart lifts. A woman wouldn’t come to harm me.
She’s wearing rubber boots and leggings, and a long-sleeved T-shirt that hugs her pregnant belly, the sleeves falling past her fingertips, and a ski coat that’s several sizes too small, the fabric damp from the rain. She’s carrying something under her arm. A blanket?
The hope that she’s here to help me is so powerful that I start crying again.
Please!
I try to form words. Help me!
But she walks in swift strides to the edge of the bars, her gaze fixed on the yellow pool of lantern light bobbing ahead of her on the cement floor.
Her thin brown hair is pulled back in a tight bun that’s wet from the rain, and she’s pale and thin, her leggings baggy at the knees, like she’s had to crouch down or kneel for an extended period of time.
Wincing and huffing against the pain, I try to sit up, but my head pounds and whatever’s broken inside my chest screams at me to stop.
“Put your back to the bars,” the woman says in a tense whisper.
My panicked brain tries to process her request but I’m shaking and so tense my teeth are rattling.
She stands there out of reach, head bowed. Waiting.
What does she want from me? Can I trust her?
“I have water,” she adds, her gaze still fixed to the floor.
I want to scream that I don’t need water but there’s something about the fear in her voice that snaps my panicked brain to attention. Did she sneak in here to do this for me?
If she’s here to give me water, she’ll have to take the tape off my mouth, and if she does that, maybe I can talk to her. Maybe she’ll listen.
She glances over her shoulder, then our eyes meet for a brief flash. “Hurry. Please.”
It’s the “please” that spikes my determination.
I get to my knees as best I can. Each inch of movement sends hot pain searing up my side, turning each breath into a stabbing ache and a wave of nausea.
Tears sting my eyes but I blink them back.
I beg the woman to look at me. At least so she can see my desperation. You have to help me!
But she stands still as a statue, the soft circle of lantern light trembling, like her breathing is unsteady. Finally, I get close enough that she lifts her gaze, but only for a fraction of a second. When she looks away, I feel cold, and more desperate than before.
I slump back into the bars, so tired that I have to rest the back of my head against them. Crying any harder than I already am makes the pain worse but I’m losing hope.
She’s pregnant, which should mean she cares about human life. She can’t possibly be bringing a child into the world while in support of the suffering I’m going to endure if I stay here, can she?
She loops something around my bound wrists. It’s so fast and I’m so surprised that I jerk back in protest, shouting words she can’t understand into my taped mouth. Whatever she’s done keeps my hands tied to the bars. Then she unlocks the cell door and slips inside.
It makes me think she’s done this before. How else would she move with so much confidence?
“It’s safer this way,” she says like she’s reading my mind, before reaching out to peel the tape from my mouth.
It burns but the relief to have it gone makes me start blubbering.
“Please help me, let me go, please.” I suck in a breath but I whimper at the sharp pain and try to brace my muscles, as if that can protect me.
“Drink,” the woman instructs, holding an uncapped bottle of water in front of my lips.
“Why?” I crane my neck so I can see into her eyes, but we’re outside the circle of her lantern, and her face is cast in shadow.
“Because you helped Elijah.”
She presses the opening against my lips and tips the bottle, sending cool, clean water past my tongue.
My throat is so dry and hot that my attention shifts immediately to taking as much of the water as I can get, swallowing past the constriction in my throat, forcing it past my dry tongue, my lips sticky with the tape residue.
But it’s not long before my need for answers overrides the desire to drink the bottle dry. Breathing fast, I turn my head away and water spills down my front.
“Who is Elijah?”
A flash of lightning brightens the space for an instant, giving me a fleeting glance at her vacant eyes and thin face.
“You helped him.” She frowns. “They will punish you.”
My head pounds. None of this is making any sense. “Do you work here? Do you work for them?”
Thunder rumbles in the distance. “I don’t expect you to understand.”
I shake my head because she’s not making any sense, but the motion just makes my temples throb. “Let me go and we can get away together. You’re going to have a baby. Is one of those monsters the father?”
She presses her lips together, like I’ve triggered some kind of emotion.
“We can leave right now,” I stammer. “Please. Please.” My voice has turned high and thin. “Let me go, and I’ll get you both out of here safely.”
She slaps my tape shut and slips out of the cell, locking the door behind her, then my hands are released. I shout at her to come back, but she climbs the stairs and shuts the door behind her.
I close my eyes but my head swims. I don’t know what to make of her visit. Is she helping me, or prepping me for the horrors that will begin the moment the men return? Who is Elijah? They will punish you.
I grit my teeth. The answers I crave are irrelevant to me in the short term.
I renew my determination to get at my pocket.
Gritting my teeth, I rock to my knees, then breathe in shallow gulps through the pain.
My eyes water and the nausea returns. Keep trying.
But no matter how hard I arch and twist and contort my frame, I can’t get my bound hands into the pocket.
It’s only when I fall on my back that something in my pocket shifts.
Frantic, I roll backwards, elevating my hips enough that my knife slips out and clatters to the floor.