Unhooked

by Lisa Maxwell

  Then almost as quickly as the pressure started, it’s gone, leaving me breathless and shaking from the force of it. Little by little, the darkness eases, and as my eyes adjust, I realize this is not the same unnatural darkness that flooded the bedroom. Instead, it’s simply night. A night so brilliant with stars, I can’t stop myself from gasping at their unexpected beauty.

  Though we are no longer falling, the air continues to stream past at a dizzying speed. It takes a minute for me to understand why—I’m flying. Or rather, whoever or whatever it is that has me slung over its shoulder is flying.

  My head feels muddled, and pain pounds behind my eyes, and I’m still not exactly sure what happened. But the sharp bite of the claw-tipped fingers holding me steady tells me that I’m not dreaming. And if I can feel pain like this, I know I’m not dead.

  That single thought bubbles up, dangerously hopeful in its promise. If I’m not dead, I still have a chance.

  I’ve barely started to figure out how to use that chance, when light begins to break over the horizon. It starts soft, a glow just barely illuminating the edge of the night, but as it grows and the sky begins to ease into a dawn, I realize I’m surrounded by a swarm of dark beings, each one like the intruder that has me. They are so dense, I cannot see the ground below us, and though they are shaped like men, that’s where the similarities end.

  Each of the beings has inky skin covering their well-muscled limbs. Some have wild manes of ebony hair that whip about like small whirlwinds, and each has a pair of massive wings that move like liquid against the rushing wind. They look like dark angels or, maybe, like nightmares come to life.

  But they are faceless nightmares. Where eyes and noses should be, there is nothing but a gaping black emptiness on each of their faces. They don’t have mouths—at least not that I can see—but I can sense their hunger as they fly on, determined, toward some unknown destination.

  A thought slices through me: maybe I’m dreaming and can’t wake up. Or maybe I’ve been drugged, and this is just one horrifying hallucination. But if not—if I’m really seeing what I think I am seeing—I was wrong. I’ve always been wrong.

  All those times I told my mom that the monsters weren’t real. All those times I thought she was crazy—the times I treated her like she was crazy—for believing something was after us. For trying to protect me. I’d been wrong.

  The danger was out there.

  The monsters are real.

  I think of the window I opened, the lamp I put out, and I know that this is all my fault.

  I don’t know how long we have been flying when chaos erupts. Out of nowhere, a ball of flame bursts up from below, and the dark creatures begin darting around in a disordered panic. The next burst comes so close, I can feel the flash of heat on my skin. My attacker dodges sharply left to avoid it, and my heart races as I realize what’s happening—they’re under attack.

  We’re under attack.

  The once-rhythmic flapping of the creatures’ wings becomes a confusion of frantic, uneven bursts. The fireballs continue to come quickly, with hardly a break. One hits a creature nearby. It tears through the broad, dark chest and leaves a gaping hole that doesn’t close. The creature wails a rusted, inhuman screech of pain before its wings jerk with a body-shaking convulsion and fold, leaving the heavy body to plummet gracelessly to whatever waits below.

  But even with the chaos around us, the creature that has me never falters. He—it—tightens its hold as we dart through the confused swarm, deftly maneuvering around falling bodies and the panic that surrounds us.

  The farther it flies, the thinner the swarm around us becomes. The creature’s huge wings pump powerfully, and for a moment I think we might actually make it. For a moment, I’m almost happy that we’ll escape. But just as I see the blue of the sky beyond the edge of the swarm, my attacker jerks like a top that’s gone off course. A thick, heady stench like the smell of burning leaves overwhelms me, and we both begin to fall, plummeting through the sky, past the other dark bodies to whatever waits below.

  The monster clings to me at first, its claws digging into my leg in a desperate hold, but then the pain stops. And it’s gone.

  And then I’m falling, tumbling into the bright blue of daybreak. I’m weightless. Boneless. And for a moment I think I’m flying too. For the space of a heartbeat, I imagine the impossible.

  But mortal hearts aren’t meant for flight, and human bodies are made to break. In one breath I’m falling through the night, and in the next I’m in the blinding brightness of the day. And when my body shatters the icy surface of the water below with a skin-splitting crash, it knocks every last bit of breath from my chest.

  At first the boy did not realize his mistake. At first there was only the safety of training for what lay ahead. His brother was already at the front, but the boy found in the company of other lads a new sort of comfort. When it rained, they sat in their tents, listening to the pitter-patter of the drops and made up curses so devilish, that the boy struggled to keep from turning red. Because innocence was a weakness, and he refused to be weak. . . .

  Chapter 7

  IS IT ALIVE?” THE VOICE is young, male, and only a prelude to the sharp poke at my side.

  “I fink so,” another voice answers when I moan at the ache.

  “Hey,” says the first voice. Poke. Poke. “Wake up, you.”

  My brain feels impossibly thick, and my arms impossibly heavy.

  I’m not sure what’s happened to me, but even before I’m completely conscious, I know that it was awful and unbelievable.

  They are still talking about me, poking at my tender skin, but I keep silent and still, my eyes closed tight, and I try to remember what happened.

  It comes to me slowly. The terror in that dark room. The icy cut of the water. The peacefulness of floating free as I watched the brightness of the world recede above. My last burning breath as the water rushed into my lungs.

  From the ache in my back and the incessant poking that continues to shoot sharp pains through my side, I know I’m not dead. My leg screams from the wounds made by the dark creature’s claws, and my skin feels as taut and fragile as an overripe berry. But I am not dead. And for a moment, that is enough.

  I take stock of what I can without moving or letting them know I’m awake—I’m still soaking wet, so I haven’t been out of the water for long. My arms have been freed, but something heavy is cutting into my ankle, weighing me down and pinning me in place.

  Not rescued, then. Still a prisoner. But the voices around me now sound human, not like the buzzing, accented voices of the monsters that took me. Still, I don’t know who those voices belong to, or what they want from me.

  “Leave it alone, Phin. We don’t know iffen it’s dangerous, now do we?”

  The poking stops, but they’re still in the room—whoever they are—close enough that I can smell the sour sweat in their clothes. I’m not sure what they’re waiting for, but if I play dead just a bit longer, maybe they’ll go away.

  “Come on, then.” It’s the second voice again—male, too, and a bit older than the first, but also clearly human. His rough cockney accent is also nothing like the guttural, accented words growled by the monsters. “We best tell the Cap’n it’s waking.”

  I listen to their footsteps retreat and, instinctively, I reach for the cold stones around my wrist, breathing a sigh of relief when I find them intact. I’m wearing little else—only my pajamas—but at least I haven’t lost my mom’s bracelet. The fact that I still have it makes me feel better for some reason. Like I’m not so alone.

  When I’m sure they’re gone, I sit up and take in my surroundings. I rub at my swollen, tear-crusted eyes, but they are so tender, it hurts too much to clean them. I can almost make out the room, anyway. Not that there’s all that much to see—it’s more of a closet than anything else. The floor is wood, darkened and worn smooth with age, and the only light comes from a narrow slit in the sloping wooden walls.

  There is a heav
y metal cuff around my ankle, as I’d suspected, and it’s attached by a chain to a ring on the floor. I give it a good tug to see if I can loosen it. I’m not sure when my new captors will be back, and I’d rather not be tied down when they get here. So I make another effort to free myself by pulling hard at the chain, but it doesn’t even budge.

  It’s only when I finally stop struggling with the chain that I notice something that makes my stomach drop. The room is moving. I didn’t notice it at first, but now the motion—a constant, gentle rocking—is unmistakable. This is not just any room, I realize. I’m on a boat of some sort. Which means, even if I could get free from the chain, there might not be anywhere to run.

  Refusing to believe that, I start jerking the chain around my ankle again, to try and loosen it from its bolt on the floor. I don’t stop, not when my ankle is numb from pain or when my fingers start to ache with the effort. I don’t stop until I hear footsteps just outside the door.

  Just before the door opens, spilling light into the dark space, I turn away and curl up into a ball to protect my tender stomach from the poking and prodding I’m sure will follow. Forcing myself to breathe slowly and steadily, forcing myself to ignore the way my pulse thunders in my ears, I wait. At first nothing happens. But then sure, heavy footsteps enter the room, stopping just beyond me.

  “Come now,” a new voice says. “I know well enough that you’re awake.” This voice too is male and human, but compared to the others it’s lower, older. It’s also tinged with the hint of an accent I can’t place. Maybe Irish? But it’s an accent that sounds like it’s been softened by years in other lands.

  “Get some water, Will,” the new voice says. The command is soft, but it holds such a thread of authority, even I flinch.

  After a flurry of movement and scuttling footfalls, rough hands flip me awkwardly onto my back, and before I know what’s happening, water slops over my face. The second it hits my mouth and nose, the terror of the sea floods back to me in a sudden flash. I struggle to gasp for air and to get away from the wet that’s threatening to drown me again, but my muscles are so tired that all I can do is cough and sputter, flailing as uselessly as a fish in the bottom of a boat.

  “Christ! You’re going to drown her,” the newest voice snaps.

  The water is gone, and unseen hands thump me roughly on my back. Panic laces through me as I struggle to pull away again, but the hands have my arms in a sure and steady grip.

  “Make sure that she’s ready, aye?” He gives me another rough pat, and I cough up the last of the water. “I don’t need you drowning her again.”

  I try to pull away when I feel the brush of something wet against my swollen eyes, but firm arms hold me fast. Gently, so much more gently than I would have expected from the steel in that voice, someone washes away the crust of seawater and tears until I can open my eyes almost completely.

  “There now,” he says. “Come have yerself a drink.” The voice has gentled, but its words are still a command. Whomever the voice belongs to is clearly accustomed to giving orders. And having them obeyed.

  I look up to refuse—the last thing I want is any more water—but the rejection dies in my throat.

  They’re just boys.

  I’m not sure what I was expecting, but the youngest can’t be much older than ten or eleven—there’s a worn-looking Batman T-shirt peaking out from under his too-large coat. The other of the two boys is older—more my own age. His reddish-brown hair is short and unevenly chopped, and he’s wearing jeans that are ripped on both knees and a dark long-sleeve shirt that’s pushed up to his elbows. Down one shoulder is a row of what look like rusted safety pins, and his left wrist is wrapped in a thick stack of bracelets made from strips of leather or twine. He’s scowling down at me as he holds the bucket of water, like I’m the one who’s done something wrong.

  I assume the third is their leader. He’s not as tall as the one with the reddish hair holding the bucket, but he seems older—maybe a year or two older than I am—and the way he holds himself makes him seem even more mature, even more commanding.

  He has a long lean face with a straight nose, and his sharp chin is tipped with the barest shadow of a beard. His hair—a black so dark and shiny, it’s almost blue—is longer on top and brushed straight back from his face in an old-fashioned style. It looks like it might fall lazily over his forehead if he ever let it. Somehow, he doesn’t look like the type who ever would.

  From the tightness of his eyes to the grim set of his mouth, everything about him reminds me of flint. Still, he might have almost been beautiful if an icy-white scar didn’t run a jagged course over the length of his left cheek and across the outer edge of his lips.

  His sooty black eyes are narrowed at me, and for an instant, I have a disjointed memory of those eyes hovering over me as the brightness of the day pulled me back into this world. But if he was the one who saved me, he definitely doesn’t look ready to save me now. Not with the blade he has pointed at me. It’s longer than a dagger, but not quite a sword, and its burnished blade is triangular, rather than flat. I don’t doubt it’s wickedly sharp.

  Without lowering the knife, he has the other boy offer the water again. This time I don’t even consider refusing. I take the ladle with shaking hands and sip carefully. I don’t intend to drink that much, but when the liquid hits my tongue, I shut my eyes and let the coolness slide down my throat. I can’t believe how parched I am or how sweet the water tastes. It’s gone before I’m even close to satisfied.

  Frowning, I hand the dipper back to him. He motions for the taller boy to offer me another ladleful. Then another, until the uncomfortable tightness in my stomach makes me force myself to stop.

  “Now then,” he says, when I refuse another drink. “Let’s start by you tellin’ us just who it is that you are and why you came to be here.”

  I can’t help but stare—his voice has an almost musical quality with the way he rounds some of his vowels but clips the end of you so it comes out ye. In any other time, in any other place, an accent like that would have had my stomach flipping in anticipation. Still, even through the shock and the fear, my face has gone warm.

  With his face just inches from mine, I can smell the warm spiciness of cloves on his breath and the scent of the wind and salt water that hangs about him. This close, I realize his eyes are actually a deep chestnut brown flecked with gold. Until now, though, I’d never realized gold can be just as cold and unyielding as steel.

  As if to underscore just how dangerous he is, he presses the sharp tip of his strange knife against the soft underside of my chin and forces me to look up at him. I struggle not to tremble, because I can already feel the bite of it and I’m afraid even the smallest movement on my part will draw blood.

  “Not much for conversation, are you, lass?” He lowers the knife, and I collapse back as I take shuddering gulps of much-needed air.

  “Please . . .” I hate the breathy whine of my trembling voice, but I can’t seem to stop it. My throat is still too raw to do anything more than whisper, and I am so close to giving in to the tears that it hurts. “Please,” I tell him, “just take me back. I’ll give you anything you want.”

  His brows rise a bit, and genuine surprise—perhaps even amusement—flashes across his face as he cocks his head. “And what is it you think I’d be wanting from you?”

  After what I’ve been through, I can imagine any number of things he might want from me—some more awful than others. The memory of the warm wetness of a tongue tracing the line of my neck rises up in my mind, dark and chilling, and then I’m shaking again.

  He scowls at my pathetic quaking before turning to the other two with a flash of violence that shocks me into stillness. “Can no one use the ounce of sense the good Lord gave you? Get the girl something dry to wear before she catches her death.” He glances back at me once more. “I’m not sure I’ll be wanting her to die quite yet.”

  The boy with the Batman shirt looks completely confused for a moment, an
d in that moment, he finally looks like the small boy he is. “What should we get it, Captain?”

  “It is a her, Phin,” he says with some impatience. “Get her something more appropriate than the bit of nothing she’s wearing now.” The one they called the Captain appraises me once more, his cold eyes calculating. “She looks about the same size as Wren. Take some clothing from him.”

  Neither of them moves.

  “Go on!” he snaps, his voice still soft but unmistakably threatening.

  The younger boy jumps then, but the scowling one sends the Captain a questioning look before going to fetch what’s been asked for.

  I flinch away when the Captain raises his hand.

  “Easy, lass,” he says softly, making his voice almost soothing as he sets his blade on the floor next to him and reaches slowly toward me. I have the oddest sense that he’s done this very thing a hundred times before.

  I still again and wait, my jaw tense and aching from my attempt not to show just how scared I am. He’s still reaching for me, slowly, like he’s afraid to spook me. I meet his eyes and tilt up my chin with a courage I don’t really feel, but he ignores my pretended bravery and touches me so softly that, at first, I barely feel the smooth leather of his gloved hand on my arm.

  He probes one arm, lifting it and maneuvering the joints, like he’s checking for injuries or broken bones. Satisfied with what he finds, he moves to my other arm and starts the same process. When he comes to my left shoulder, his hand stills over an old scar I have. He presses gently on its raised surface, but I wince all the same at the pressure. He glances up to meet my eyes once more, a question clear on his face.

  I know what he’s seeing—a small raised welt about the size of a quarter. The ugly, puckered mass of skin hasn’t faded white, like his scar. It’s still an angry pink that makes it look new, even though the mark is so old, I don’t remember getting it. It’s why I rarely wear sleeveless shirts, even when I’m running.