Chapter 19
I stand frozen, thoughts chasing themselves in circles.
Davis knows who I am. He called me “my lord.” He wants me to sit on a throne in his bizarre basement room, all the while implying I’ve been here and done that before.
The chairs, the symbols, the robes, his strange glee…am I in a cult? More—am I leading a cult?
But no, Hart lured me, drugged me, possibly with something Davis provided. Why would they then give me an important role in their delusionary group?
I don’t understand what’s happening to me.
When I don’t move, Adrian bows as well, echoing Davis’s gesture. He wants me to keep playing along. Without any better ideas, I walk as if in a dream to the end of the room and sit on the throne. It’s horribly uncomfortable, but that’s the least of my worries right now.
I look straight ahead down the aisle, trying to imagine other people sitting in the chairs, perhaps wearing robes like the ones in the laboratory. I wrack my brain for any flicker of recognition, of memory, but there’s nothing.
Davis turns to Adrian. “Please, Brother Miller, have a seat. It will be my joy to attend to your needs as well as our lord’s. What, ah…forgive me, but what rank are you, exactly?”
Rank? I looked down at the symbols, realize for the first time they line up with the chairs to either side. Whatever this organization is, it has levels, with the lowest presumably the farthest away and the highest next to…well, me.
Adrian is clearly good at thinking on his feet, but I catch his hesitation. Should I say something to get Davis’s attention off him? But what? I don’t want to give us away.
The sound of running feet comes from the laboratory outside, and both Adrian and Davis whip around to stare at the door. A moment later, a man flings it open. He’s well-dressed, his suit expensively tailored, but his tie is askew and his face flushed from exercise.
Davis takes a step back. “Brother Gabrielli, what’s wrong?”
Gasping for breath, Gabrielli points an accusing finger at me. “Davis, you fool, it isn’t him!”
I remain absolutely still, my heart hammering and my fingers aching from how hard I grip the throne’s arms.
Adrian draws himself up, expression going cold. His gun is in his hand before I can even register him taking it from his pocket, its bore trained on Gabrielli. “You! You’re the one who’s been trying to kill us.”
Gabrielli rounds on him, sees the gun, and freezes. “Who the hell are—”
“Brother Davis, this man is a traitor,” Adrian says loudly over him. “He shot up the car we were traveling in—he means to murder our lord!”
Davis turns to me. “Is it true?”
I’m as confused as he is, if not more. What on earth can Gabrielli mean, accusing me of not being “him?” Him who?
Amnesia is one thing, but I draw the line at a secret twin. It must have something to do with my alter-ego, the one that took over after Hart drugged me.
I try to act like I imagine a cult leader would, glaring down my nose at Davis. “Of course—do you doubt me?”
He firms. “Not at all.” Turning to Gabrielli, he says, “Brother, calm down and use your eyes. You know Shepherd Caine.”
Gabrielli’s face darkens. “You idiot, he—”
Adrian cracks him in the side of the head with his gun butt. Gabrielli crumples to the ground unconcious.
Davis gasps and steps back. The look he gives Adrian is deeply uncertain. “We should call Brother Myers. Gabrielli is one of his men. You can explain everything to him.”
Myers again. He must be high up in the cult, even if he was playing servant to Hart the first time I saw him.
“We’ll speak to him in person,” Adrian says. “In the meantime, you keep an eye on Gabrielli.”
“I’ll lock him in and come with you,” Davis counters.
Adrian shoots me a prompting look. I consider just ordering Davis to remain, but I don’t want to make him suspicious. Not to mention I neither know where Myers can be found at the moment, nor want to encounter him again.
I have to keep playing my part, though, if we’re to get away without raising even more suspicion.
“Let’s go.” I stand up and walk briskly to the door, stepping over Gabrielli’s body.
Sweat slicks my back and palms, and I keep going through the laboratory, letting Davis stay behind to lock the little room with Gabrielli inside.
Adrian is on my heels, and when I reach the stairs, he places a hand to the small of my back as if to hurry me along.
Davis is still well behind us as we emerge. Should we try to lose him? He’ll realize quickly that we don’t know where to go.
I open my mouth to ask Adrian what we should do, and the world explodes.