Chapter 31
Chapter Thirty-One
Thea
“Ifeel bad spying,” Nessira whispered.
I almost snorted. The part of me that felt bad for things like that had died a long time ago.
“We need to know if we’re safe here,” I reminded her. “We can figure that out by spying or waiting for them to try and kill us.”
She thought on it for a moment, pursing her lips unhappily, before she sighed and waved a hand forward.
I nudged the door open, straining to hear anything amiss. As I did, Nessira pressed tightly against me, her brow as deeply furrowed as my own, both of us rigidly tense as we took in the sounds of hushed voices in the kitchen.
“Where did you find them?” whispered a low male voice.
“Your brother found them on the road into town,” Eloise answered in that same gentle tone she’d used with us moments ago.
“Hush!” the man hissed. “What did they look like?”
“Oh, they’re just two young girls in need of some help, George. It’s nothing to fret over.”
“And was one of those girls blonde-haired and blue-eyed, wearing a gown fit for a royal?”
I swallowed as a shudder worked its way down my spine. He knew who I was. Nessira’s wide eyes and newly pale face mirrored my own as she latched onto my hand and squeezed. There was only one reason they would know what I looked like, and it wasn’t good.
Hyrax had sent forces after me.
“There’s a price on that girl’s head!” George insisted in a hushed breath, so quietly it was difficult to fully make out the words. “Three hundred gold shillings for returning her to the castle.”
Three hundred.
A sum of that amount of money would have every person in this kingdom desperate for my head.
“Oh my,” Eloise gasped, and for a moment, I held onto the frail hope that maybe they wouldn’t drag us out of here kicking and screaming. Maybe we could trust them.
Eloise cleared her throat. “They’re in the bedroom.”
Maybe not.
My heart lurched, panic shooting through Nessira and me both as we stared at one another, a million fears lancing through each of us at breakneck speed. She took three hurried steps backward. I gasped a ragged breath that felt like nails scraping down my windpipe.
And then we moved.
“Go!” I ordered, pushing her towards the window as footsteps began sounding heavily across the hardwood.
She allowed me to step over her knee as I hoisted myself with one hand over the ledge.
With a grunt, I fell awkwardly onto the hardened ground, cradling my broken wrist, before rushing around to help her.
Nessira was quick to follow me, a look of utter determination on her face as she hoisted herself halfway through.
“Where do you think you’re going?”
She yelped as a meaty hand wrapped around her ankle—the man who I could only presume was George standing behind her. He wore a thick, dirt-brown overcoat that made his frame appear oversized compared to the smallness of his head. As he ripped Nessira backward, his upper lip curled back in a snarl.
I rushed forward, grabbing her under the arms and pulling, desperately ignoring the unforgiving pain that shot through my arm.
Nessira screamed in my arms as I pulled her, stretching her arm back to throw a plume of fire from her fingertips.
Sparks burst around George so suddenly that he released her in an instant, and she came falling down on me.
My lungs seized under the sudden weight as we both toppled to the ground.
“Hurry!” I coughed as she rolled off me.
We rushed to our feet, and in an instant, I had grasped her fingers in mine and launched us into a sprint. My feet beat down onto the overgrown grass, and I didn’t bother to look behind us. I couldn’t even begin to plan out where we were going.
The only thing that mattered was escape.
“The woods!” Nessira shouted, pointing ahead of us.
I nodded, forcing myself to push harder, to move faster, until my chest felt as if it might burst.
Nessira stumbled, her neck craning behind her, and I tugged at her arm.
“Do not look back,” I ordered mercilessly. “Just run.”
We made it through the first covered stretches of tree-lined wood but didn’t slow down.
Slowing down wasn’t an option, not yet. They would follow us.
I knew it in my bones. If we slowed and they caught us, then it was just a matter of time before they were dragging me back to whatever remained of the castle.
They would drag me right back into Hyrax’s clutches.
I couldn’t let that happen. I wouldn’t.
I wouldn’t go back there.
“Thea!” Nessira’s grasp on my hand tightened as she skidded to a stop, pulling so hard on my arm that the socket protested as I skidded to a stop.
“What?” I gasped, helplessly lurching forward to brace a hand on my knees as I struggled to catch my breath. “What is it?”
Her eyes widened as her lips parted in an expression of pure horror. Unblinking, she stared over my shoulder, lifting a single trembling hand. “What is that?”
Time slowed as I turned, following her line of sight.
And an icy fear slid over me.
Caldrius hadn’t been lying when he said that he and Hyrax weren’t the only beasts that had escaped when I’d opened those portals to the Underworld.
Because there, emerging from the crevices between the densely packed trees, were four of the Undone slinking towards us, hunger in their eyes and blood lining their mouths.