Chapter Nineteen
Tonight, as it turned out, was a time of no dwellings and no questions.
If she directed her senses toward the end of the alley, Seraphina could hear faint sounds of squelching and grunting, and smell the copper of fresh blood carried by the wind.
She stood frozen just inside the shop’s doorway, where Rune had retreated and pulled the door shut behind them.
The darkness pressed in around her, and she had to focus hard to place the killer and his victim in space; it was more like using her imagination than anything.
The relic sharpened her senses to a degree that surpassed even normal sight, allowing her to perceive the wet sounds of tearing flesh and the ragged breathing of a man bent over his work.
It was almost impossible to process… That a human being could do that to another human being.
“We must do something,” she and Rune said at the same time.
A rush of anger vibrated through her body.
Seraphina had never witnessed such savagery.
What had happened to her two years ago had been savage, but at least she had survived, she was here, and she had another chance at life no matter how wretched it may be.
The woman lying on the ground as she was being torn to shreds was gone, and the unfairness of it made something hot and terrible rise in Seraphina’s chest. The barbarity of a man taking the lives of so many women for his sick pleasure made her boil, and she felt drops of sweat forming at her nape despite the frigid air.
“I saw a door at the back of the shop,” Rune said. “I can go through there. If we walk out the front door, he will see us and flee before we get to him.”
Seraphina turned toward his shadow.
“The back door most likely opens into an inner courtyard. There will be no way out.”
“I will climb on the roof and drop down to the other alley.”
“That’s impossible.”
“Not to me.”
She remembered him telling her how he’d scaled the city wall. If he’d managed that feat, then he could climb onto a low roof.
“Count to one hundred,” Rune said. “That will give me enough time to climb the roof and get back down, then find my way to the end of the alley. When you walk out of the shop, he will be cornered between us, blocked at both ends with no escape.”
“A good plan. I’ll let him see I’m blind and not a threat. That should distract him.”
Rune brushed her cheek with the back of his hand, the touch light and feathery.
“Be careful. Don’t put yourself in danger.”
“You too.”
He crossed the shop, and she heard the back door open and close.
Seraphina began counting in her head, her hand flexing on the walking stick.
She felt ready, her body coiled and prepared for what was coming, but she was also apprehensive, because something could go wrong.
The killer was dangerous. Even though she was certain that wouldn’t be a problem for Rune, and she was also capable of taking him down if need be – especially now that she had two daggers – she was more concerned about him escaping and killing another woman.
No matter what happened, she and Rune had to stop him tonight.
When she whispered “one hundred” under her breath, she stepped out into the alley.
The cold air hit her face, and with it came the overwhelming smell of blood and opened bowels, so strong she almost gagged.
She tapped her walking stick in front of her, and she could sense the man’s shadow looking up at her from where he crouched over his victim.
“Stop right there. Not another step.”
Seraphina halted, her body swaying slightly as if uncertain of her footing.
“Who is there? I’m sorry, sir. I cannot see you. I’m blind.”
There was a pause, and she felt him assessing her, his attention shifting from the body at his feet to the young woman standing before him, with long blond hair and a scarf covering her eyes. She’d pulled the hood of her cloak back to expose her young, gaunt face.
“Come closer, beautiful stranger. It’s late. What are you doing out in the cold?”
His voice was middle-aged and smooth. She could tell he was leering at her, already imagining doing to her what he’d just done to the other woman. Through the relic, she saw Rune’s tall shadow now positioned behind the killer at the far end of the alley. Seraphina smiled.
“I was walking home, but I believe I’ve gotten lost.”
She took a few steps forward, still tapping her stick in front of her, playing the part of a helpless blind woman who had wandered into the wrong place at the wrong time.
“In your condition, that is understandable. Tell me where you live, lovely lady, and I will make sure you get home safe.”
Seraphina moved closer, and the smell intensified until it was all she could do not to retch.
Her stomach turned violently, and she had to swallow hard to keep the bile down.
She could sense the woman’s body now through the relic, the torn flesh and spilled organs creating a dark mass on the ground.
“You will indeed help me, sir? That is so kind of you.”
She saw his shadow move as he stood up, wiping his hands on something.
“Let me see you–”
Rune struck him from behind. The man stuttered mid-sentence and crumpled to the ground, gasping softly, his body folding in on itself.
Seraphina rushed to Rune’s side and pressed the end of her stick to the man’s throat.
“What did you do?”
“I hit him. With my fist.”
She gaped at him, barely able to comprehend that he had rendered someone incoherent with a single blow.
She pushed the stick harder into the man’s throat, and he gurgled and grabbed at the end of it, but he didn’t have the strength to push it away.
The blow to his head had left him dazed and confused, probably unable to even understand what was happening to him.
“He’s wealthy,” Rune said. “His clothes are finer than anything I saw in the tailor’s shop. He wears a purple jacket underneath his cloak.”
“Purple is expensive. A difficult color to obtain and hard to come by.”
“The woman is dead, so he must die as well. He must pay for all the suffering he’s caused. I will do to him what he did to them.”
Rune leaned over the man, but Seraphina removed the stick from the killer’s throat and gently pushed Rune away with it.
“No. He will die, but not like that. It has to be clean, so when the watchmen find him in the morning, they will recognize his face.”
“I will leave his face intact.”
“Rune, trust me. It’s better this way. If we cut him like a pig, the watchmen will think he isn’t the killer, that he’s someone who wanted to save the woman and was murdered in the same way. This has to end. But we have to end it properly.”
She heard Rune growl with disapproval, but he didn’t contradict her.
“And we’re not like him,” she continued. “You’re not like him, Rune. Don’t fall to his level of atrocity. Do it quickly, cleanly. Just snap his neck.”
Rune nodded, and Seraphina stepped back.
She saw his shadow lean over the man who was now trying to crawl away on his hands and knees, his movements weak and uncoordinated.
There was a crack, and then silence. Seraphina covered her mouth with her hand.
This was the second time she was witnessing Rune killing a man.
This one deserved it, too. She wasn’t going to dwell on it and wonder what it said about Rune.
What it said about her that she agreed to murder.
“Cover her with something,” Seraphina whispered.
“Her dress is torn to pieces,” Rune said. “There’s a pair of scissors and a knife. That’s what he used.”
“I know that if we cover her the watchmen will know someone was here, but they’ll know anyway. They’ll look for the one who broke the monster’s neck. It doesn’t matter, we will be long gone. But she deserves some decency. We can’t leave her like this.”
She remembered a ditch, mud in her hair, blood and seed dripping down her thighs.
Pain in her head, so terrible that she was barely conscious.
Her hands had trembled when she’d moved them and started pushing down her skirt, her legs raw and bruised as she closed them.
She could feel death coming for her, but all that mattered in that moment was to cover herself.
Rune hummed something unintelligible, and it snapped her out of her thoughts before she could go deeper and succumb to the shame that would never leave her.
She heard him moving around. There was shuffling, the sound of fabric being pulled and arranged, and then Rune was draping the killer’s cloak over the woman’s body.
“We should go,” he said.
“Wait. You said he looks wealthy. Search his pockets.”
He crouched down again and started patting the dead man’s clothing.
“A gold watch chain… Papers…”
“What do the papers say?”
“His name. I think these are traveling papers. And a stack of notes.”
“Notes?”
“Bank notes. A hundred gulden.”
Seraphina motioned for Rune to give them to her, and he placed a heavy leather wallet in her hand.
Even though she’d been born into a well-off family, women had never handled money.
She slipped the wallet into one of her pockets and felt its weight brush against her upper thigh.
She felt powerful all of a sudden, and it felt…
strange. To know that a stack of notes could make her, a down-to-earth person, straighten her back and lift her chin, as if she were ready to face the world with a different kind of attitude.
It scared her, but she wasn’t going to question it.
Tonight, as it turned out, was a time of no dwellings and no questions.
“Take the papers as well. They might come in handy,” she instructed.