Chapter Ten #3
She nodded. “The werewolves block the vents because of their superior smell. The vampires block the vents because of their superior hearing. Demons have neither and therefore no reason to obstruct this tiny little passage into their dwellings,” she told me.
“I will have no trouble moving from room to room. I dare say, this will be easy.”
BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!
I rolled over and slapped my alarm, too buzzed to keep sleeping for a second longer.
Sabrina had been out all night making real progress on finding Dora for the first time since I set foot in this cursed place. I’d already set my alarm to wake up two hours earlier, and I had my notebook and pencil lying on the pillow beside me, waiting for Sabrina to return.
“Okay, okay, okay,” I mumbled to myself. “First, I’ll get the list of all the suspects, write down everything Sabrina can tell me about them and their possible motives, and then... I tell Tristan everything.”
I nodded to myself, finally making it full circle to acceptance.
“It can’t just be me and Sabrina following these guys and trailing one of them back to Dora.
It can’t even just be me and Sabrina confronting this guy.
” I shuddered thinking how easily Erlik tossed me around like a rag doll, and how even more easily Ronin exploded heads with the snap of his fingers.
“Side by side, Tristan and I can rescue my sister and avenge his brothers. He—” I trailed off, something catching my eye.
A single sheet of paper lay on Sabrina’s armchair.
I froze. “Was that there when I went to sleep...?”
The empty bedroom didn’t need to answer me, because I already knew the answer was no.
Slowly, hesitatingly, I crept across the bedroom and picked up the paper. Fifteen seconds later, I was running out the door—my day clothes, my patch, and my shoes forgotten.
I bet you thought you were being very clever,
sending your sneaking, slithering spy into my bedroom.
Since we are very much close to the end now, I will forgive this lapse in judgement,
and give you a chance to save your pet.
Come to the fourth-floor demon wing library before the breakfast gong sounds,
and don’t be late.
There’s nothing like deep-fried chili snake to start the day.
I TORE THROUGH THE empty hallway, skidded into the main corridor, and then turned left. Between Sabrina’s nighttime wanderings and mine, we had quite a bit of the manor mapped out, and that more than included the demon wing.
I raced up the stairs two at a time and it sharply reminded me of my ill-fated chase after the Dora phantom.
But this is not going to end the same way. This time I will save you. I picked up the pace. I’m coming, Sabrina. Just hold on!
Topping the landing, I peered down a single straight hallway to towering double doors. Once again, the décor was a masterpiece. Endlessly creepy and beautiful, the face of a skull stretched across both doors so that its mouth could swallow you when you pushed them open.
And that’s what it felt like as I fell on the doors and roughly shoved them open.
I was walking into the belly of the beast.
Bare feet padded across the cool stone, carrying me deeper into the bowels of the library.
I didn’t know if electricity existed in hell, or if they really just preferred everything be lit by torches and candlelight, but the latter were all I had lighting my way as I moved through the shadowed stacks.
The light burned brightest toward the back of the library. I found myself naturally moving that way, if only to escape the chilling darkness. I reached the last stack and stopped.
Slowly, I stuck my head out, peering around and—
“Ahhh!”
I had walked into every one of these horrible scenes, so you would’ve thought I’d be desensitized to the wanton cruelty and violence. But you’d be wrong.
I screamed so loud my voice gave out, and then I screamed more.
Five fae men—each of them instantly recognizable to me—lay sprawled out over the library’s sitting space.
Draped over the armchair, lying on the coffee table, crumpled on the floor, and propped up against the shelves.
They looked so untouched and serene, you could’ve almost believed they were just sleeping, if it wasn’t for the fact that nearly all of them were missing their wings.
All except for the faeman spread out on the coffee table—the one I knew as the guard who tried to punch my skull in on the first day of classes.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered. Tears soaked my face as I went over to him. “I’m so sorry this happened to you and your friends. I’m going to get you out of here before anyone else comes in here and gawks like you’re a window display, and not—”
His eyes snapped open.
“Ah!” I screamed, and so did he.
“Mhhh! Mhhhmm!” he grunted. His eyes rolled in his head, shouting a visceral, naked fear that chilled my soul.
Not dead! He still has his wings because the bastard didn’t sacrifice him. He just left him in this hell.
“It’s okay,” I cried, grasping his shoulders. “I’ll get you out of here. I’ll get you help.”
I tried to lift him, and my foot slipped. I crashed down on top of him, ripping a grunt from the poor man.
It was like I tried to lift a ten-ton boulder. He was stuck fast to the table, and it wasn’t because of his girth.
“Magic,” I gritted. “Fuck!”
First week in hell, and my no-cursing vow was dust.
“I’m sorry, I can’t move you,” I told him. “I’ll have to go get help, but it won’t take long. My stalker never sleeps, so he’s probably out listening for me right now—”
“Hphh!”
“I’ll be right back, I swear.” I scrambled off him, backing away. “Just one minute, and we’ll—”
Panic bled his eyes white. “HMMMM!”
A hand clamped on the back of my neck and ripped me off my feet.
“Kergh!” I choked, scratching and clawing at the vise. Freaking out, I kicked and flailed in the hold as all Sabrina’s mutterings that I was a clueless, stupid human tumbled through my head.
The last fae wasn’t alive because the killer left. He was alive because the killer was interrupted... by me.
“You got here much earlier than I was expecting.”
My eyes bugged, and not because the life was being choked out of me. Surprise rocked me to the core because the voice the that filled my ear was distinctly, unmistakingly, female.
Female... and familiar.
“I’m sorry, but as I said, I’m too close to the end to let you get in the way now. You and I will see each other again when the time is right.”
What? What did that—?
Pain exploded in the back of my head. The grip on my neck released, but I sank into darkness long before I hit the floor.
“—UP.”
“Ugh,” I groaned, peeling an eye open.
“I said wake the fuck up,” Iarla barked, bringing me solidly back to consciousness.
My head felt like it was being held to my neck with glue and string. I strained to lift it up, and met the burning, enraged eyes swallowing me whole.
Slowly, my senses came back to me—picking up the hardness pressing into my back that was the coffee table, and the pain in my head and neck that was why I was slumped on the cold, hard ground. But what was the weight on my lap?
Drifting down, I landed on a still and sleeping Sabrina.
“Hey! Pay fucking attention.” Ravenscar grabbed my chin and snatched my head up. “Look at me,” he growled, and then swung my head around so I couldn’t look at him at all. “Did you do this?”
My brows popped, and then my eyes filled to see that all the faemen were killed, and all of their wings taken—even the poor man I failed to save.
“N-no,” I rasped. “I didn’t do this.”
Iarla rocked back on his heels, expelling a long, hard breath.
“No,” he echoed, shocking me. “I didn’t think you did.
These five were the strongest of my guard.
There’s no way they would’ve been felled by a puny little shit like you.
And even if they were, there’s no good reason for you to plop down and take a nap beside their bodies.
“So what happened?” His eyes sharpened. “Did Lucifer kill them and then left you here to deal with the fallout?”
I stilled. “Excuse me? I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t you?” There was no trace of grin, smirk, or humor on Ravenscar’s face.
“I’m having a little trouble believing that because yesterday, you jumped off that tower with no hesitation or fear.
I thought that was strange for an entire five seconds before Lucifer, the lord of hell, possessed that wretched imp and saved you.
“You weren’t afraid, because you knew you weren’t going to die,” he said. For the first time, Ravenscar sounded like a smart, quick-witted prince, and not like a potty-mouthed jackass. “And the only reason you’d have been sure Lucifer was coming, was if the two of you are working together.”
“Hmm.” I pushed up my lips, turning my gaze to the sky. “Actually, no. To all of that. I jumped off because I accepted I had no other options. I wasn’t going to let you kill that harmless creature, or go after Tristan next.