Low chanting crept into my ears and I leaned forward to look at the figure on the other side of the old lady. The person’s hood had slipped back a little, and from his profile, I could tell it was a young man. His lips were moving frantically, and his attention was focused on Diamond’s skinny body as Peter lifted her in the air and tossed her against a stone column like a rag doll. I squeezed my eyes shut, unable to watch as she heaved herself onto her hands and knees with blood spilling from her mouth.
“Why is he doing this Sam? She’s shown them everything she has. She doesn’t have any more power. He’s going to kill her.” I snapped my lips shut again to stop their quivering.
Sam’s hands curled into a fist. “It’s not Diamond he’s testing, Grace.”
I followed Sam’s stare and realized that Valerie was beginning to convulse on the sand. Her eyes rolled back in her head as Peter dragged Diamond’s broken form and waved it at Valerie’s contorted face. His jubilant tones echoed around the amphitheater. “That’s right, my little Spirit Child, show us what’s hiding in there. Show us what gifts you have, and your friend will be offered our grace.”
A scream was ripped from Valerie’s lips, and the world around me warmed and shivered. Emotion rolled over me like a warm mist, and I grabbed Sam by the wrist and twisted myself to look into his eyes. “I don’t care how dark your soul is. I don’t care what you’ve done, or what you do—I want you, and I know that makes me sound weak, but when you touch me I feel as though I could set the world on fire with a flick of my fingers.”
Sam dragged me into his arms and crushed my lips against his—as if he could drink me, as if he could melt our bodies into one. I felt his fingers slipping under the cloak the guard had given me to wear, suddenly aware that I was half-naked beneath the thin layer of linen, but I felt none of my usual fear and nervousness. I wanted to feel his hands on my skin. I wanted to press myself against him so that there was nothing between our hearts but bare flesh.
Peter’s cry of triumph tore through the air and shattered Valerie’s spell. I slid off Sam’s lap with burning cheeks and tugged my cloak back into place, conscious that all around the amphitheater people were returning to their seats with baffled faces. Only the Circle on their podiums appeared unaffected. Peter raised his hands in the air and addressed the crowd. “The Heart. We have found the Heart.”
The crowd responded in unison with chants of thanks and praise to the Circle. Valerie scrabbled to her feet and scurried to Diamond’s side, curly dark hair brushing against the blood soaked blond locks of her friend. Tears flowed down her cheeks as she kissed Diamond’s forehead.
Peter placed a hand on Valerie’s shoulder, and she raised her chin. “You said you would offer her the grace of the Circle. Please hurry, her heartbeat is so weak.”
“Let me lift her, child.” Peter scooped Diamond in his arms and held her up to the crowd. “We offer this child the grace of the Circle.”
The old woman beside me hissed, and I stared in her direction. The young man beside her was gripping her hand tightly, his lips moving in a desperate frenzy of silent words. The skin under my silver binding burned and itched, and I had a sudden flash of recognition. I knew why his face was so familiar. I reached out to touch his arm, but the sudden scent of rotting and decay drew my attention, and I gaped in horror at the sun shaped hole in the center of the ring as the Spirit Demons began to funnel toward it. My chest pounded. I knew that smell. I pinched Sam’s arm. “It’s the darkness. The energy I felt at the Silent Home.”
Sam pressed my palm against his mouth as Peter raised Diamond’s body in one hand. In the other his blade glinted.
Valerie’s scream tore through the air, joined by mine and the old woman’s, as Peter arm swung through the air and severed Diamonds head from her body. The Spirit Demons descended like a tornado and swept her tiny body through the gaping chasm, leaving only her head to watch us through sightless eyes.
Chapter Twenty-Four
“The Circle will see you and your companions when their sleeping spell wears off.” The guard nudged his foot in the direction of Cain’s sleeping body and pointed at a tray set on a low stone ledge. “Make sure your friends eat before the Circle greets them. It will be easier for everyone that way.”
He didn’t look back before he snapped the door shut. The sound of the keys grating in the lock scraped across my eardrums, and I waited until the echoing footsteps had faded into the distance before I turned to Sam. “Sam, the old lady on the bench—”
“Was Anna, the woman Diamond called a crazy old hag? I guessed that myself. Potion maker. How did she end up in this mess? She’s too old to be Demon-Born, and she didn’t look like one of the Circle’s devoted Angelic followers. Greedy bastards. Pretending they want pure blood to cleanse the sins of the earth, all they want is a world they don’t have to share.” Sam ground his back teeth together.
I shook his shoulder. “No. Well, yes, but not just that. The guy, the one who was with her, did you see his face?”
“I saw him praying, or trying to do some sort of spell, for all the good it did.” We both stared at the ground for a moment, before Sam took a breath. “Why?”
I chewed on the inside of my cheek. “I think I know him.”
“No. Please, Grace, don’t start with the conspiracy theories. I just can’t.” Sam’s brow creased, and he crushed his thumbs against his temples. “No.”
I grabbed his hand. “Listen! When Gabriel sent me here through the portal, he said I wouldn’t be harmed because—”
“Please! Just leave it for a minute, Grace.”
As my name left his lips, a moan came from a pile of rags on the opposite side of the room. Sam wrapped his fingers around my wrist as the moaning became a hoarse cry, muttering the same thing over and over. Grace. Grace.
I felt the cold cell slip away.
I took a faltering step toward the crumpled bundle of clothes and the stick-thin limbs, with my hand pressed against my lips. My heart told me that I knew what I would find, but my head begged me to be cautious. As I edged closer to the groaning figure, their head lolled to one side, revealing the painfully familiar profile.
For a year, I had imagined seeing a glimpse of her face in every crowd I passed through. I had stared into my bathroom mirror and practiced the speech I would make, but as I crossed the cracked concrete floor, none of that mattered. Nothing mattered. I was home.
The tears had already begun to spill over my cheeks and drip from my chin as I carefully rolled Eve onto her back. Her head hung to the side at an awkward angle, and I bit back a sob. The fine bones of her face, always sharp, protruded through transluscent skin. I pulled her body onto my lap and cradled her in my arms, begging her to open her eyes, praying to a god I couldn’t believe in.
Eve moaned again, and her eyelashes fluttered against my palm. I sat up straight, staring at Sam. “Get her some of that water. And a cloth. And food, some of that bread, she’s so thin.”
“Grace?” Eve’s eyes swam in her face as if she had forgotten how to focus on any one object. She struggled to pull herself into a seated position. I helped her to sit up but didn’t move my arm from around her shoulder. She reached for my cheek with fingers as brittle as twigs. “My Grace?”
Sam’s touch was soft as he dabbed a wet cloth over Eve’s forehead, dislodging some of the dirt and grime that was embedded in the furrows in her skin. Eve stared at him with a look of bewilderment. He picked up the pitcher and one of the bread rolls and offered them to her. “I’m sorry, they told us to eat these, but there’s no glass. Just the water and food.”
Eve’s pupils contracted, and her hand shot out, knocking the food and drink from his hands and across the cell floor. Sam pulled away, and I raised my palms in surprise. Eve shook as if she was suddenly waking from a dream. She heaved herself onto all fours and crawled
to the wall, using the rough brick to drag herself into standing position. “Poison. All of it. They just want you to suffer. To break you, so you’ll reveal your true self.”
Her words came in ragged bursts. I cringed at the sight of my foster mother struggling to wrap her tongue around each syllable. I reached out to hold her hands as her body trembled from the effort of the remaining upright, but she shook her head fiercely. “Grace, you must leave this place. Samuel, I’ve seen your heart, take her home. Keep her safe.”
Sam dropped his eyes to the floor and shoved his hands into his pockets. I screwed my eyes closed. “Eve, we’re not here to save—” I snapped my mouth shut over the words, and tried to steady my breathing before speaking again. “We didn’t even know you were here. One of the Shadow Children betrayed us. Deirdre found us, and Peter had us put in here.”
A strangled cry escaped from Eve’s lips as she caught sight of Cat’s slight frame wrapped around Dawn’s sleeping body. She wavered for a moment before sliding down against the wall.
“No.” Her face was a mask of pain, and her moans of agony tore at my heart. “Please, no. Not my girls.” She lifted her chin to stare at the ceiling, and her voice became a scream. “I’ll give you anything you want. I’ll do the test again. I’ll give you all my power, but don’t take my girls. Not my girls.”
I looked to Sam for support, but his eyes were riveted on Eve’s face. An imperceptible shadow clouded his expression, and I ripped at the silver band on my wrist, craving access to my power so I could sense his energy. He turned away before I could interpret his hunched shoulders and downcast stare, leaving me to settle Eve alone.
I steeled myself and reached for her bony hand, stroking her arm the way she had when I was young and frightened. My throat swelled, making it hard to swallow. “Eve, it’s okay. We’re going to be okay.” I tried not to choke on my well-intentioned lie. “We haven’t been hurt, and we’re going to come up with a plan to get out of here. The others will realize we’re missing soon, and they’ll come look for us.”
The others. Panic and bile flooded by mouth and I took a deep breath to stop myself from gagging. I had no idea what had happened to our friends since we left them on Grandfather Mountain. Paranoid suspicions shot through my mind like poisoned arrows. I twisted my head in Eve’s direction. “Did you find your daughter?”
My words hit Eve like a slap in the face, and I regretted them immediately. She dropped her gaze to the floor. “No. Peter said… He lied. She’s not here. They would have used her by now if she was. The Circle would use anything to try and unearth the hidden powers.”
“We saw.” I closed my eyes and tried unsuccessfully to purge the memory of Diamond’s face from my brain. Eve flinched and nodded her head. Sam stared down at Cain and Cat’s unconscious bodies, and I knew he was thinking the same thing I was—we needed to escape. Immediately.
The sound of footsteps coming closer drew Sam’s stare in my direction, and he bounded across the cell and positioned himself in front of Eve and me as if he could form a shield of flesh and bone. I thrust my chin up and stepped to his right, so that we stood shoulder to shoulder, with Eve hidden behind our backs.
I folded my arms to conceal the tremor in my hands and prepared to face Peter and the Circle. The door creaked open a crack, and a hooded figure slid into the room, locking the door hastily behind itself. The cloak fell back to reveal a youthful face, and I crushed my shoulder against Sam’s.
My dry lips cracked as the spoke his name with sudden certainty. “Jonah.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
“Seeker, I’ve been waiting for you.” Jonah examined me with curious eyes. Up close, he appeared even younger than he had in the photographs on Niamh’s bedside, and I wondered how old he had been when he first arrived in this world. I narrowed my eyes at him, but it was Eve who spoke first.
“Why have you come again, stranger?” The words scraped over Eve’s dry lips, but her stare was steady.
The Demon gave a lopsided grin as he kneeled down on the stone floor and began to trace his fingers through the dust, searching for the grooves between the block work. “I’m afraid we have no time for riddles today, my friend. I have respected your wishes to remain captive until now, but I can no longer indulge your free will. The Circle are preparing to test you again. Now that they have leverage,” Jonah lifted his face and examined Eve and me with deep hazel eyes, “they will break you. There is no time to waste.”
He spread his fingers wide and began to wipe furiously at the layer of dirt covering the floor. He snapped his fingers at Sam. “Reaper, onto your knees.” Sam’s eyebrows shot into a V, but the stranger either did not care or did not notice. “Count the blocks, Reaper; we need to determine the precise location of the center of the tower. I would rather not have my skull crushed by falling rock when we level this place to the ground.”
Sam stared at the top of Jonah’s head for a moment, before dropping to his knees and beginning to count the stone rectangles. I shoved my hair out of my face. “You’re Jonah. Niamh’s—Gabriel’s friend.”
“You don’t need to ask who I am. That is your gift.” He sprang up from the floor and pressed his face close enough that I felt his breath on my cheek. “And if you do not begin to embrace your gift soon, Seeker, there will be nothing left for any of us to know.” He turned away from me abruptly and pointed at a jumble of items strewn in the corner of the cell. I recognized my backpack and the clothes I had abandoned in the cave. “Pack your belongings. We leave nothing that the Hounds could use to track you.”
Eve reached out and wrapped her fingers around the Demon’s lean wrist. “The silver. Can you remove it?” She nodded at my arm and down at the unconscious bodies on the floor.
Jonah pressed his lips together tightly. “I can. If you can assist me.” His mouth softened. “I know that your body is weary and your heart is sore, but we do not have the luxury of time.”
“I have never desired luxury.” Eve slipped her other hand gently inside mine. “I will do what must be done.”
The stranger dipped his head and gave her a solemn glance, heavy with emotion that was beyond my understanding. He closed his eyes and leaned his head back, drawing a deep breath into his lungs. “Seeker, we will remove the binding from you first, then the Reaper, then the sleeping adults, finally the sleeping children. You will present the bindings, while we complete the ceremony to shatter the bond. Can you keep the others calm, when they are woken? There will be no time for explanations—they must trust without questioning.”
“I think so,” I said. Resting my gaze on Dawn’s peaceful face, I wondered was she in the cell or was her mind soaring far from us.
Sam jabbed his finger at a spot on the floor and drew a target in the dirt. He wiped his hands on his jeans. “Yeah, why not go with blind trust in a random stranger? Worked out great for us last night.” Jonah smirked in apparent amusement, and Sam stretched himself to his full height. “There you go, Demon. That’s the center of the cell.”
“I hope you are more accurate than you are charming, Reaper.” The corners of Jonah’s eyes creased as he spoke, but the sound of footsteps in the corridor outside froze his lips into a grim line. I pressed my fist against my mouth and held my breath until the noise passed our cell and faded to nothing.
My heart thumped painfully, and Sam pushed me toward the center of the floor. “Please. Unbind her so she can escape if they come before we’re ready.”
Jonah grabbed my wrist between his two hands, and Eve began to chant. Her voice rose and fell, the tempo increasing with each repetition of the spell until Jonah joined with her and their voices melted together in an overwhelming crescendo of power and light. Their magic surged over me like a river bursting its banks in a summer storm, and I groaned as my energy tore free of the binding and cours
ed through my veins.
“Reaper, now you.” Jonah pushed me out of the center point of the room, barely catching his breath before he began again. I gnawed at the corner of my lip as I watched Eve’s sunken eyes focus on shattering the bonds holding Sam’s power captive. As soon as he was finished, Jonah called for the others, and Sam and I lifted them into the circle to have their bonds broken and the sleep charm removed.
One by one, they woke and stared in confusion around the cell. For the longest moment, Cat remained crouched on the floor, staring at Eve with wide eyes. She blinked and twisted her face in my direction. I pressed my lips together and nodded. Cat burst across the room and threw her arms around Eve’s thin shoulders, sobbing and laughing in the same breath. Sam slipped his fingers between mine and squeezed my hand.
Cain paced the floor and wrapped his fist around the bars on the narrow window near the ceiling. His stare flicked over Jonah’s face. “I’m going to assume we have no time for a recap—do we have an escape plan?”
Sam and I looked to Jonah, and he beckoned us into the center of the room, gently nudging Eve and Cat to one side. They broke apart, and Dawn slithered between them and wound her arms around Eve’s waist. I forced myself to focus on Jonah, blinking away the tears burning the corners of my eyes.
“You need to get us out of here.” Jonah shoved me against Sam’s chest so that both of us were standing within the circle marked in the dirt.
Sam drew his eyebrows together. “What?”
“Reaper and Seer, you need to get us out of her,” Jonah repeated.
I squinted at him. “Can we slip out of here? I thought the city was in some sort of vacuum, or pocket. Gabriel said—”
Jonah silenced me with a flick of his wrist. “Yes, yes, the entire city and the surrounding lands are entirely sealed. It’s impossible to escape. These cells are protected by the most impenetrable charms this world has ever known. But we have two things in our favor. One, we have one of the gifted pairs, and two, the man who built the city left a secret chink in each cell.”
The Shadow City (The Demon-Born Trilogy Book 2) Page 16
