Chapter Six
ROXY
The descent into darkness happens in stages, each one stripping away another layer of the illusion that I have any control over what happens next.
Scar’s grip on my arm remains gentle but unbreakable as he guides me through corridors that twist and turn like a labyrinth designed to disorient.
The chill from the main club room bleeds away with each step, replaced by a colder bite that seeps through stone walls thick enough to muffle sound, thick enough to bury screams where no one will ever hear them.
My boots scuff against floors that transition from wood to stone to something older, rougher, carved directly from the mountain itself.
“Where the fuck are you taking me?” The question comes out steadier than I feel, though my legs shake badly enough that Scar’s support is the only thing keeping me upright.
“Somewhere safe.” His tone carries amusement that doesn’t match his words. “For us, not you. The prez needs time to think, and you need time to understand exactly how much trouble you’re in.”
We reach a stairwell that spirals downward into shadows so thick they feel solid.
The temperature drops another ten degrees as we descend, each step taking us deeper into the mountain’s belly, farther from anything resembling escape or hope.
The walls close in, rough stone pressing from all sides, and the air tastes stale, recycled through too many centuries without seeing sunlight.
My ribs scream with each breath. Blood has dried in my hair, crusting against my scalp where something split open during the crash.
The ringing in my ears hasn’t stopped, a constant high-pitched whine that makes it hard to focus on anything beyond the immediate reality of stone steps beneath my boots and Scar’s cold hand wrapped around my arm.
“How deep does this go?” I try to pull against his grip, testing his strength, but it’s like trying to move a statue. He doesn’t even seem to notice my resistance.
“Deep enough that you could scream yourself hoarse and no one above would hear a whisper.” He glances back at me, red eyes gleaming in the darkness like a predator’s.
“Not that I recommend trying. Wreck tends to visit when people make too much noise, and trust me when I say, you don’t want his attention. ”
The name sends ice through my veins that has nothing to do with temperature. Something about the way Scar says it, casual and warning at once, suggests Wreck is significantly worse than locked doors and iron chains.
We reach the bottom after what feels like hours but is probably only minutes.
A corridor stretches before us, lit by bare bulbs strung at irregular intervals that cast more shadow than light.
Doors line both sides, heavy wood reinforced with iron straps, each one sealed with locks that look medieval in their brutality.
Scar stops at the third door on the left. The lock clicks open at his touch, without any visible key, magic, or mechanisms I can see working in perfect synchronization. The door swings inward on hinges that don’t make a sound despite their obvious age.
The room beyond is exactly what I feared.
Stone walls on all sides, maybe eight feet by ten, with a ceiling low enough that I could touch it if I stood on my toes.
A single cot pushed against the far wall, a thin mattress that looks like it’s seen better decades.
No windows and no ventilation beyond a small grate near the ceiling that probably connects to nothing helpful.
The overhead bulb flickers weakly, casting shadows that dance and twist like living things.
“No!” The word tears out of me as survival instinct finally overrides exhaustion and pain. “No, you can’t put me in there. Please! I’ll leave. I’ll forget everything I saw. I won’t tell anyone about any of this, I swear—”
“Everyone says that.” Scar’s voice carries something that might be sympathy if he were capable of genuine emotion.
“They all promise silence, cooperation, anything to avoid what comes next. But humans lie. It’s in your nature.
And the prez can’t risk his family on promises from someone who touched his fire and made it burn like it hasn’t in decades. ”
He guides me into the cell with relentless pressure, and the moment my boots cross the threshold, something changes in the air.
The temperature plummets until my breath fogs white.
Magic presses against my skin like invisible hands, testing, searching, finding whatever it was looking for, and settling in with satisfied weight.
“What did you just do?” Panic edges into my voice as the sensation intensifies, magic burrowing deeper until it feels like it’s touching bone.
“Activated the wards.” Scar releases my arm, stepping back toward the door.
“This room was designed to hold supernatural beings who have crossed the club. The magic recognizes threats, contains them, and keeps them exactly where they belong. You’re human, so it won’t kill you.
But it will make certain you can’t use any abilities you might be hiding to break free. ”
“I don’t have any fucking abilities!” The protest comes out desperate, edged with hysteria that I can’t quite control. “I’m a photographer. I take pictures of trees, mountains, and wildlife. That’s it. That’s all I am, for fuck’s sake!”
“Unfortunately for you… the flame disagrees.” He tilts his head, studying me with the kind of clinical detachment that suggests he’s seen this scene play out before, probably more times than I want to know. “But that’s a problem for tomorrow.”
He reaches to the wall and pulls something free from a hidden hook.
Chains.
Dark metal glints in the low light, heavy links whispering against each other as he steps back toward me. Instinct makes me retreat, but the wards flare and lock my feet in place before I can get more than a single step.
“Wait, what are you doing?” My voice spikes.
“Precaution,” Scar says simply, already moving behind me. The metal closes around my wrists with a cold, solid click.
The moment it touches my skin, an ache flares.
Not intense.
Not painful.
But enough to sting.
I hiss, jerking against the restraint. “Jesus, what the hell is on these things?”
Scar stills, eyes sharpening as he watches the faint red marks bloom where the metal rests. “Interesting.”
“Interesting?” I snap, breath hitching as the sting fades into a low, persistent ache. “It fucking burns!”
“They’re just iron,” he says, voice quiet, thoughtful now instead of detached.
“Then why do they sting?” My pulse pounds harder, unease crawling up my spine.
His gaze lifts slowly to meet mine, something colder settling behind his eyes. “That…” he murmurs, “… is exactly what we want to know.”
The chains settle into place, not tight enough to cut circulation but firm enough that I can’t slip free, the metal cool and heavy against my skin as the wards hum louder in response.
“Tonight, you stay here,” he continues, tone returning to businesslike calm. “Locked secure. Exactly where the prez can find you when he’s ready to ask better questions.”
The door starts to swing closed, and I lunge forward, driven by terror and desperation in equal measure.
My hands hit wood with enough force to send pain shooting up both arms, chains rattling sharply against the movement, but I don’t care, because that door closing means darkness, isolation, and being trapped in stone that swallows sound like water.
“Wait! Please. I’m hurt. I need medical attention. At least let someone look at my ribs, at my head—”
“Ivy will check on you tomorrow if the prez allows it.” Scar’s expression doesn’t change—sympathy or mercy apparently not included in whatever he’s capable of feeling. “Until then, try not to bleed out. Would hate to waste a perfectly interesting mystery on something as mundane as a head trauma.”
The door slams shut with finality that echoes through my chest like a physical blow.
I hear the lock engage, multiple mechanisms clicking into place with sounds that promise there is no picking this open, no forcing it from the inside.
Then footsteps, Scar’s boots on stone, fading as he ascends the stairs and leaves me alone in the darkness.
The bulb overhead flickers once.
Twice.
Then stabilizes into weak illumination that barely pushes back the shadows gathering in corners.
I press my back against the door, sliding down until I’m sitting on freezing stone, chains clinking at my feet on the floor, and finally, I let the tears come.
They’re hot against my cheeks, burning tracks through dried blood and exhaustion until I’m crying over the crash, over the dead hunter, over my destroyed car and shattered phone, over every stupid decision that led me to this mountain at this exact moment in time.
But mostly, I’m crying because I’m absolutely, unequivocally terrified.
Not the adrenaline-fueled terror of the crash or the ice man’s fury. This is deeper, colder, the bone-deep recognition that I’m trapped somewhere no one knows to look for me, held by creatures that shouldn’t exist, and nobody is coming to save me because nobody even knows I need saving.
The crying doesn’t last long. Exhaustion steals my tears before they can provide any real relief, leaving me hollow and shaking against the door.
My ribs throb with each breath, my head pounds like something is trying to crack my skull from the inside, and the cold seeping up through the stone is already working its way into my bones despite my jacket.
I need to move.
I need to do something besides sit here and wait for whatever the hell comes next.
The cot calls to me with promises of rest, but I force myself to my feet instead, using the door for support as the room tilts dangerously. My vision swims, black spots dancing at the edges, but I breathe through it until the vertigo passes enough that I can shuffle forward without falling.