Chapter 14
Chapter Fourteen
Riley
“So much for saving your ass, you nearly killed me,” I snap at Vero as I hear a few guns fire from the people chasing us. It seems like they’re not quite sure what to do with either of us.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Vero says while he races through a door.
The second I’m through it, he shoves some shelves in front of it and looks at the only door left to go through.
The issue is that this door leads to a winding staircase that will take us straight up into what looks like a huge clock tower.
“Can you fly? Because I’m not quite sure what our plan is from here,” I say as I hurry up the stairs after him.
“I’m going to take you and toss you off the top and see if you grow wings,” he declares.
Why the hell did I even fret over this man? “I just saved your life. Some thanks should be in order.”
He glances back at me. “I’d almost broken myself free.”
I look at his wrists that are bleeding from where the shackles were.
It appears like he’s cut straight through the flesh, and I’m afraid I can see tendons.
“I don’t… I don’t think you were actually accomplishing what you thought you were.
Will you regain your powers now that the shackles have been removed? ”
He’s quiet as he keeps trekking up the stairs. “Stop following me.”
“What do you mean stop following you? What do you think I should do? Go sit on the bottom step and just play dead?”
“It’ll slow them down for my escape, so yes.”
“I’m helping you. And I will forgive you for drowning me, so let’s work together.”
Vero whirls around and grabs the front of my shirt. I think he intends to lift me off the ground with it, but the shirt just slips up and gets caught under my chin. He seems to think this will suffice because his eyes narrow and he nods. “I would rather die than work with a horseman.”
“Fine, then let me escort you back to the fountain where I will personally tie you up and drown you. I can’t fathom that having to live in a state of near death for…
hours was pleasant. I don’t even know how long you were in there.
Three hours? Seven? Fuck if I know. But I bet it was horrible.
So when I was way out there, no longer even in this building and looking freedom in the eye, I ran back for you…
because I’m sorry for what the person I reincarnated from did to you.
It really sounds like I was a horrible person whose only purpose was to destroy the happy lives of so many. ”
He watches me, possibly processing my words, before shoving me away from him.
I manage to catch the railing to keep myself from tumbling backward.
When I look up at him where he’s standing on the steps above me, his face is a mask while he gazes down at me.
Blood runs from the tips of his fingers but he makes no other movement as I hear people beating on the door down below and the noise of the clock ticking reverberates around us.
“I thought you were blind. You lie about that too?”
“No. I am blind.” I hold up Kit in one hand and the pendant in the other, knowing that I’m practically telling him how to take my sight from me, but maybe it’ll help break down the walls between us.
“Magic in this pendant allows me to see through my familiar’s eyes. I can only see what she’s looking at.”
Vero stares at me for a moment longer before he turns around and keeps climbing.
About halfway up, my legs begin to burn as I question what we’re even going to do when we reach the top. We’re sitting ducks up here, but I follow the god anyway.
It doesn’t help that I feel so weak after being without the hourglass for so long. The distance between us begins to grow, and once he’s about twenty steps ahead of me, he looks back at me.
“Why are you so slow?”
“My legs are weak from being away from the hourglass.”
He stops and examines me. Then he stomps down the steps and I’m not sure if he’s going to push me down them or grow a heart and carry me up them. Instead, he clamps a hand over my mouth and nose.
Like what the fuck is this? I tell him I came back to save his life and he plans to suffocate me? I reach for my pendant only for him to remove his hand as he scrutinizes me. It’s definitely not the reaction I expected after some mild suffocation.
“What the fuck was that for?” I demand.
“Why are you so weak?” he asks. “You need air. You feel human. How have you been reduced so far to this? And can we do it to the others? Fascinating. If I didn’t recognize your magic, I never would have even realized you were a horseman with this fragile body of yours.”
And then he grabs my wrist and drags me up the stairs for a while. I wouldn’t say it’s helpful, but at least I have some momentum pulling me up.
“I will tear them apart piece by piece and weaken them to this state, and then I will peel their skin from their flesh.”
“Oh, that’s fun. What are you planning on doing with their flesh then?”
“I will hang their flesh as a warning to the other horsemen so they’ll know I’m coming for them,” he declares.
“Gruesome. Bet that’ll start to smell quickly.”
“I’m going to test it out on you if you don’t shut up.”
“Fun,” I say as I finally see the top. I’m dying by now, but the god is pulling me along without a care in the world.
I’m like eighty percent sure he intends to toss me off and see if I’ll splat, but the other twenty percent has me hoping Vero has a plan when we reach the top.
He sees a ladder and I discover that this isn’t the end of it, nope.
We’re going up to the roof of the clock tower, so up the ladder we go until we reach the hatch which he opens and climbs out.
I barely manage to drag my exhausted and trembling body through the hatch before I collapse.
“Are you throwing me off now?” I ask.
“Do you want me to throw you off? Because I’d be happy to oblige.”
“Not really,” I say as I push my wobbly body up onto my even wobblier legs. Then I walk over and grab his shirt, not really wanting to fuck up the one I’m wearing, and try to tear it. I manage to do absolutely nothing but wrinkle and stretch out the side of his shirt.
“What the fuck are you doing? What is this move?”
“I’m trying to rip your shirt.”
“You are trying to have sex with me? We are mortal enemies! I will not have hate sex with you, even if you are irritatingly attractive in your new body…” His eyes narrow like he’s now thinking that there may be a possibility.
“Dammit, no, I’m trying to get some cloth to bandage up your wrists.”
“Your kindness disgusts me. I would never have sex with you.”
I gawk at him as I decide that my ability to understand gods is nearly nonexistent. Annoyed, I just tug at his shirt until he pities me enough to rip off the bottom of it for me.
“I don’t need medical attention. I’m a god.”
“Yes, a god who is currently bleeding everywhere. Do you have a plan now that we’re up here?” I ask.
He stoically stands on top of the hatch while I attempt to swiftly tie the makeshift bandages around his wrists. My tremors are letting up now that the hourglass is back, but they’re still present. The god just stares at my hands the entire time as I finish up.
Then Kit hops off my shoulder and gallops the perimeter, looking for something to help us. There’s next to nothing, but she still runs around looking for any way down. But aren’t the stairs we just came up the only way down?
“Vero, was it? What percentage would you give for our chances of success at dealing with all of them?”
“I will crush all of their skulls,” he claims.
“Realistically, what percentage?”
“Two,” he says, which sounds significantly different from the “all” he’d stated. “Their guns shoot bullets that immediately immobilize any magic in your body. It takes days to recover.”
“Even for a god?”
“Even for a god,” Vero confirms.
“So your powers right now are nonexistent?” I guess.
“Correct.”
Kit cocks her head and I know she hears them coming, but then she hesitates and hurries to the edge of the tower right before a bird flies up and lands on my shoulder. It’s a large hawk that I quickly realize is undead, likely made by Mickey.
Kit rushes over and I see it has a little piece of paper tied to it. Once she’s up on my shoulder inspecting the creature, I pull the paper off and hold it in front of her so I can read it.
I’ve stolen your man and plan to never return him. Haha. JK unless you die. Torin said to trust him and make the jump. If you splat, I’ll revive you. XOXO Lots of love. Your best friend, Mickey.
What the fuck does any of this mean?
The bird takes off, though not before trying to grab Kit like it’s just going to feast on my familiar.
I shoo it off as a highly displeased Kit dives into my shirt right before I hear them bang on the hatch that the god is standing on like a statue.
I’m not quite sure what he’s planning on accomplishing by standing there.
Kit jumps down and rushes over to the edge where I see Torin far below doing something.
It only takes me a second to determine that he’s making a Door that’s horizontal to the ground…
does he expect me to just jump off the fucking clock tower and through that Door?
There’s no fucking way.
I feel an influx of power as the white magic I’ve come to realize is my Death magic bristles. But if the people trying to get up here don’t have magic… no… I don’t want to hurt more people.
Vero whirls around when a different Door opens, one that’s on top of the clock tower with us.
I grab Vero’s hand and jerk him back as a horse and rider step through the Door.
The skeletal black horse watches me with dark eyes, and the rider on its back wears a ragged cloak that flutters out behind the rear of the horse.
It tosses its head while the rider looks over at me.