Chapter 10
TORMENT
Some bastard had thrown a cloth over the mirror that had become my prison. For days, all I saw was the foggy glass and my own jaded reflection. I wondered if Cruelty was out there, staring at the covered mirror like a psychopath. Most days, I expected Violence to come and shatter it to pieces.
What would happen to me if the mirror broke while I was still inside? Somehow, I doubted I’d magically be expelled from the damned thing. Death was more likely. Horrible, torturous, unbearable death.
That didn’t stop me throwing every bit of magic I had at the glass.
It didn’t stop me hurling punches into it, throwing myself shoulder-first into it.
Nothing made an impact. I didn’t make a dent, let alone a crack.
Until those fuckers decided to whip the cloth off, I was trapped between foggy glass and the darkness of the mirror back.
Still, I drove the side of my fist into the glass one more time, the vibrations working up my arm, biting into my bones.
I needed to get the hell out of here. I needed to get home.
Not knowing what was happening to Cat drove me fucking mad.
Not knowing if the others got out or if Cruelty had them stashed away too made me downright murderous.
I saw the iron coffin she’d locked my Cat in. Was my beautiful wife back inside, screaming to get out, waiting for me to save her? No, Cat didn’t wait to be saved. She fought her way out like the badass she was. And yet, the last time I saw her, she was vacant and quiet. Haunted. Bleeding.
Rage lit a wildfire in my blood, and I threw a renewed barrage of shadows and torment at the mirror, slamming my fists into the warped glass. I’d tried getting out the back way, too, but that was locked as tightly as Fort Knox. Covered in charms and magic and shields.
“I will get out of here,” I roared, just in case the lunatics were on the other side of the cloth, “and I will kill anyone who stands between me and my wife.”
The warped glass flickered, a ripple of light that startled me back two steps. Because I only had two steps of space in this damn mirror. Either I was going entirely fucking mad—possible—or the mirror had just shown me an image of the grey-haired woman who lived in this prison before me.
“Show me again,” I barked, and when the glass stayed dark, I added, “Please.”
Why did I expect that to work? It was a mirror, not an ancient magical entity.
I repeated what I did before the flash, throwing magic at the surface, and fuck all happened. Great, I really was going mad. Just to be certain, I repeated the words I said—and jumped hard when the image burst to life.
This time, there was movement and sound, like watching a film reel.
“You can’t leave me in here! I’m a wife, a mother. I have a life!”
It faded to darkness, but I frowned. “What else can you show me?” I asked, taking a tentative step forward, darkness pooled at my feet. “Can you show me Cat? Can you show me my wife?”
It replayed the same vision of the woman, and I pinched the bridge of my nose to not lose my temper.
“Show me Cactus Wallison.”
The glass flickered with light, then Cruelty’s face filled the frame, but distorted, blurry the way things were when viewed through the mirror.
This was something the mirror had witnessed, not something that happened to its occupant like the vision of the grey-haired woman.
I couldn’t remember her name. Couldn’t remember if I’d ever learned it.
“That’s Cruelty,” I pointed out, watching the unhinged goddess pace across the floor, wearing that hooded lace wedding dress as always.
“Wallison,” she snarled, her shoulders bunched. “That’s all you could find out?”
“It’s enough,” Violence replied, his voice recognisable even if I couldn’t see him. “We know he’s based in Northern England and was given the surname Wallison. It’ll take time, but we can track him.”
Track who? Virgil maybe? I daren’t speak in case the mirror lost the image, but curiosity burned at me.
“There must be a hundred Wallisons!” Cruelty cried like a petulant child. I half expected her to stomp her foot. “It will take months. Years.”
“Better get started then,” Violence replied, unmoved by her tantrum. “The faster you find the old Cruelty, the sooner you’ll be free of this.”
Free of what?
The image faded. I lurched forward. “What was that about?” I demanded of the mirror. “Free of what?”
The old Cruelty, though… I knew the man who’d been Cruelty before its current incarnation. A serious, stalwart man who behaved like a noble knight, following his moral code to a T. What did Cruelty want with him?
And what the fuck did he have to do with my wife?