Chapter 34
We all stare at the chair to my left. The chair that is now empty.
“He couldn’t have just escaped. He was tied up right there,” says the first guard. “You,” he says, spinning around toward Venus, but she’s as panicked as the guards, her eyes darting around the room, her pitch hiked.
“He was just there,” she says, pointing toward the empty chair in the middle of the room as if it were a specter.
“I’ve heard rumors,” whispers the second guard, his eyes wide, his voice trembling. “They say he’s a ghost.”
“Surely you don’t believe that,” says the first guard, although he, too, looks unsure.
A dark, bodiless chuckle echoes through the room. The second guard shrieks and practically throws himself toward the bolted door, keys rattling.
The lock clicks. As the bolt comes free and the door opens, there’s a cracking sound.
Before my eyes, the second guard falls to the floor.
The only thing left in his place is a chair hanging in midair, slightly askew.
Before the first guard can react, the chair swings around, smacking him in the back of the head as well. He slumps behind me.
“What was that about not being good in a fight?” says a growl from the shadows.
Venus takes a step backward. “You tricked me.”
The Nomad materializes. There’s no amusement left in his expression, though sarcasm drips from his lips. Anger simmers underneath his words. “Did I?”
“You’re still tied up,” says Venus, betraying her lack of confidence by taking another step backward. She glances around him, around me, toward the door.
“I can see it in your eyes; you’re calculating,” says the Nomad. “What do you think the chances are that you make it through that door?”
“I don’t know,” she admits, though her gaze is still darting back and forth between the Nomad and her potential escape path.
The Nomad kicks his foot back, and the door clicks closed behind him.
“You. Untie her,” he says, glancing from Venus to me.
“I could scream,” she says. “The guards would come running.”
“If there was anyone close by, these two imbeciles on the floor would have tried that when they thought I’d escaped, don’t you think?” he counters. “Besides, even if they do come running, it’s not as if they’ll see me coming.”
“You lied to me.”
The Nomad laughs loudly enough that it echoes through the room.
If there were any guards out in the hallway, they’d surely hear it.
But perhaps that’s his point. “That one’s on you.
You didn’t really think I would let you leave with all your magic, did you?
You didn’t think I wouldn’t keep something behind as collateral? ”
“Makes no difference to me,” says Venus, her jawline bunching as she tries to keep a brave face. “Didn’t seem to affect my powers at all.”
“No. But do you know what will affect your powers?” says the Nomad. “Death. Although, to be technical, I suppose you will be invisible eventually. The decaying process is funny like that.”
Venus shudders.
“I said, untie her,” says the Nomad. “And I can see what you’re thinking.
What are the odds you can turn invisible, get out the door, and outrun me?
Trust me. I’ve marked you, Venus. And if I had to hunt Tink down, I’ll hunt you down as well.
You could probably escape me—if you stayed invisible for the rest of your life.
But I have eyes everywhere. In every dark corner.
And if I don’t find you, it’ll only be because you never show your face. To anyone. Ever again.”
“The Company will kill me. They’d know I let you escape,” she says.
“If, between the two of us, you wished for the Company to be more frightening, you shouldn’t have told them to cover up Tink’s hands.”
My heart clenches in my chest, my body still aching with the pain.
Venus’s mouth ticks open, and I can see the calculation in her eyes. “I didn’t tell them to torture her.”
“Untie her,” says the Nomad, “before I change my mind.”
Venus swallows, then makes her way across the room. As soon as she touches my restraints, the pain surges again. Her fingers fumble with the restraints, and for an agonizing few seconds, I think I might actually pass out. But then the restraints come free, thudding to the floor.
Moving my hands from behind the chair to my lap takes a stronger will than I’ve had to utilize in quite some time. Again, the pain of moving them feels like a wall, one I have to simply believe is all in my mind. Like my limbs are seizing up, refusing to move.
“Now, Venus,” says the Nomad. “Be a doll and untie me too, won’t you?”
Venus crosses the room toward the Nomad, stepping over the limp body of the first guard, her feet careful, almost…
I see it before the Nomad does.
Not that it does us any good. My hand goes to point, my mouth to shout a warning, but again, I’m stopped by a crippling pain and the curse I should have killed Peter for.
Venus stomps on the hilt of the first guard’s dagger, and it soars spinning into the air.
She snatches it from the air, and before the Nomad can swing the chair at her head, she darts back toward me, grabbing my wrists.
Pain causes my knees to buckle, but she only pulls me closer, the sharp edge of the dagger pressed to my throat.
“You shouldn’t have done that,” seethes the Nomad.
“This is how this is going to go. You’re going to let us walk out of here,” says Venus. “Don’t think I won’t slit her throat if you make one wrong move.”
“Now, Venus,” says the Nomad, cocking his head to the side with a smile that makes my hairs stand on end. “Surely you know this won’t end well for you.”
“You won’t risk letting her die,” says Venus. “I heard you begging. I can’t begin to understand it, but you’re obsessed with her, that much is obvious.”
The Nomad’s face shutters, and though I try to meet his gaze, he refuses to meet mine.
“Move to the side,” says Venus.
The Nomad’s blue eyes turn to ice, but he moves away from the door all the same.
“To the other side of the room,” Venus says.
The Nomad looks as if he’s about to argue, but then he swallows and does as he’s told.
“Move,” whispers Venus into my ear. I walk toward the door, knees shaking beneath me as I try not to focus on the pain in my wrists as Venus clamps her fingers around them. The tears on my face have started to dry on my cheeks, but only from exhaustion.
For the first time in a long time, I am terrified.
Because she’s not taking me to Peter, to someone who will use me but regret doing so.
She’s taking me to people who enjoy inflicting pain.
I want to scream at her, to cut her, to remind her of what trash she is for selling me into a life of pain and slavery, when she knows from experience exactly what that entails.
But I have no words, no hands. My mouth is useless.
Except…
Venus lowers the blade from my throat for just a moment, just long enough to open the door. But when she brings it back, I’m ready.
I jut my neck to the side and sink my teeth into her wrist. She lets out a scream so shrill, it’s likely to carry down the hall, but I only dig my teeth in further, relishing the coppery taste of her blood.
She yanks her hand back, but I don’t let go.
Not until a chair leg breaks over her head, shattering into splinters that fly across the room. Venus releases my wrists and slumps behind me. Her body hits the floor with a thud, and I spin to find the Nomad—the chair having shattered from behind him—fighting with his restraints.
I go to help him, but he shakes his head. “Don’t you dare.”
He drops to the floor and grabs the dagger from the ground, flipping it and working at the ropes tying his hands together until they’re sawed loose.
When he stands, hands free, our eyes lock for a moment, and I’m soon overwhelmed by the urge to cling to his chest, to cry until I have no tears left.
“No time for that, Wanderer,” he says, cupping my face. Then he glances back down at Venus. My eyes follow his, and I wonder if he’ll kill her.
Until I realize there’s something off about her. A mysterious absence of the rise and fall of her chest. The way no air fogs around her mouth, despite the chill of the dungeon.
“I didn’t mean to kill her,” says the Nomad. Regret tinges his voice.
I get the sense that’s only because he wishes her death could have been more prolonged.