Hawk charged and William froze. The furious hunter tore the whip from William’s hand. Hawk ran back to the diseased.
A stinging throb on his right hand from where the razor metal had torn a gash in William’s finger. What must it have been like as a boy to receive a lashing with that thing? The scars on Hawk’s body said it all. And for those who needed a demonstration …
The first crack of the whip tore a shred of the diseased’s left cheek away. The creature’s dark mouth spread wide as it screeched.
Another lashing, Hawk ripped a deep gash down the creature’s chest. Like Hawk, the diseased stood topless.
Every time the whip cracked, the diseased yelled and cowered away. Several attacks later and the creature had fallen to the ground and curled into a ball. But Hawk continued tearing gashes into it. The weak light in the room cast deep shadows along Hawk’s tense face. His next attack tore the skin on the creature’s side, the cut so deep it exposed its ribcage.
Hawk screamed and cried. Snot and spittle sprayed away from him as he drove attack after attack into the creature. He’d torn its entire left side open, but he carried on, whipping until he’d shredded its arms.
By the time Hawk had finished, at least a third of the creature’s skin had been flayed from its bones. The dead diseased lay in a pool of its own blood, glistening in the poorly lit room. Hawk spat on the thing and threw the whip down on top of it.
His attention on the ground, Hawk passed the other three on his way out.
“At least we now understand why he didn’t want to come down here,” Olga said. “Hopefully the ointment’s in the next room.”
Chapter 20
Monica’s cackling laughter called from down the corridor, taking Max’s words from him.
“If I were you,” Gracie said, stepping several paces back, “I’d let her think you’re a guard. At least then she’ll have a reason to keep you alive. She’ll believe someone will be coming for you at some point. You need to hold onto that power for as long as you can. It could be the difference between life and death.”
Max’s hands were numb, tingling streaks running down each of his forearms when he wriggled his fingers. “Surely you can let me out now? I can say I got out and overpowered you.”
Gracie shook her head. “She won’t believe that. Firstly, I’d kick your arse in a straight-up fight.”
He breathed in through his nose and clamped his jaw to help him bite back his response. The steps of those outside got closer. “And second?”
“Where do you think Monica’s just been? She’s been in this place a long time and has a lot of friends. There’s no chance she’s coming back alone. We’d be taken down the second we tried to break out.”
Barp!
Monica’s cackle subsided and the footsteps closing in on the cell came towards them in stereo. How many more women did she have with her?
A final step away from Max, Gracie stood in the shadows as if she’d been there all along, a guard to watch over their prisoner, ready to report anything untoward to Monica.
The ratty woman in the dirty white top burst into the room and sneered at Gracie. “You get anything out of him?”
A shake of her head, Gracie said, “Nothing at all.”
The footsteps that had joined Monica now took form as they entered the cell. They would have been hard to see were it not for the woman with the steel wheelbarrow filled with glowing coals. The deep orange light revealed the dirty faces of the ten or so women who now made up Monica’s entourage.
With this many women around, Max had no chance of getting Gracie on her own again. But maybe she’d just shown him she could be trusted. After all, she’d spoken the truth about the extra inmates.
“This is the guard I was telling you about,” Monica said.
One of the smaller women. In her mid to late twenties, she was almost as wide as she stood tall. Shaped like a ball, she rolled close to Max and dragged in a snotty sniff. “Sure smells like a guard.”
“I’ve already told you,” Max said, looking over the head of the short and round woman at her ratty leader, “I’m not a guard.” Even though he didn’t look directly at her, Max still caught Gracie’s wince. And he definitely caught her words.
“Look at him,” Gracie said, a twist to her features as mean as any of the women in the room with them. “You can tell he’s lying.”
“Why don’t you go fuck yourself, G … you ginger bitch.” Heat flushed his cheeks. Had Monica picked up on him nearly saying her name?
A slight twist of her head, Monica chewed on her bottom lip. She looked from Max to Gracie as if trying to read their connection.
Her eyes wide, Gracie retreated another step deeper into the shadows.
A long steel bar protruded from the hot coals in the barrow. Monica used it to stir the embers, sparks floating into the air and dying. The glowing end of the pole had more resilience. Bright orange, it lit up Monica’s wicked grin.
The pins and needles in Max’s arms buzzed so hard they damn near hummed. He worked his fingers, and while the movement radiated stinging streaks, the buzz eased.
The glow of the bulb close to Max’s face had nothing on the tip of the steel bar. Monica brought it to within an inch of his left eye. The bar quietly hissed, and his skin itched as his pores released sweat.
“When will they be letting you out of here?” Monica said. “We need to get the hell out of this place, and you’re our ticket to freedom.”
“Which means you need to keep me alive.”
“You can still be alive and in pain. I can make you wish you were dead.”
Max’s stomach lurched. What if he told Monica about Gracie now and how she said she’d help? Would it take the attention away from him? But if it did, what would it achieve? It wouldn’t change the fact that Monica wanted information that he didn’t have. He pressed his lips tight and shook his head. “I’m not a guard.”
Gracie’s head dropped.
Monica pushed the tip of the steel bar through Max’s top covering his left pec. The smell of burned fabric gave way to the acrid stench of charred pork. The reek of his own seared flesh.
His jaw clamped, sweat running into his eyes, Max screamed, twisting and turning. The chains holding him in place rattled as the wooden baton swayed.
Although she’d looked at the floor, Gracie focused on Max again, her face twisting as if she experienced his pain. Like she had any fucking idea how he felt.
Monica might have pulled away, but his pec continued to burn as if she’d left the poker in his flesh. The insides of Max’s thighs were damp with his own urine.
Barp!
“You either know where the key is to get out of here,” Monica said, “or you have friends coming to get you. Which one is it?”
The moan leaving Max’s lips sounded like it came from someone else. Febrile and grovelling, he whimpered as Monica pressed the fiery pole against the inside of his right thigh. Spasms ran up into his groin, and had he not already pissed himself, he would have lost control of his bladder at that point. The hiss of his own flesh mocked his struggles, joining Monica as she laughed harder than ever.
Gracie pressed her hands together, imploring him to give it up. Give Monica something. Maybe he should hand over the rat in her group? She wasn’t doing him any good in that moment.
The swish of the coals in the barrow, more sparks kicked up from where Monica stirred them.
Trembling where he hung, his eyes stinging with sweat and tears, his breathing ragged, Max said, “I don’t know when they’re coming back for me.”
A sudden halt. Some of the tension left Monica’s back before she turned to face him. One eyebrow raised, a half smile revealed her top row of oversized yellow teeth. “I knew it! You are a guard.” She handed the red-hot steel poker to the small round woman on her left. “He lied to me. Not that I should have expected anything less. The guards in this place are the lowest of the low. But at least you’ve told me the truth now. And at least we have
a way out of here; we just don’t know when. But we’ll get that from you.”
As Max shook his head, his restraints wobbled again, clattering and rattling. “Honestly, I don’t know when they’re coming.”
Barp!
“I’ll be the judge of that,” Monica said.
“How can you be—”
“Burn his other thigh.” Monica nudged the short fat woman in Max’s direction. “Just to be sure he has nothing else to tell us.”
“My pleasure,” the woman said. “I hate the guards nearly as much as you do.”
The hiss of the pole burned into Max’s left thigh. He faced the ceiling and screamed so loud his throat burned nearly as much as his leg.
Chapter 21
As he’d done with every other room, Hawk charged off ahead of them and burst through the final door on the left side. Like with the others, it slammed against something inside the room with a crack! William walked on tired legs, and from the way both Olga and Artan maintained a walking pace and no more, they felt as exhausted. It had been a long few days with very little rest. When would it end? When would they—
A diseased screamed.
Olga led the charge, Artan next, William at the back, Jezebel raised. But he didn’t need his axe.
The tonk of Hawk’s boot slammed against skull from where he stamped repeatedly against the diseased’s head.
Even now, after all they’d been through and seen, William’s stomach spasmed when Hawk’s final stamp crushed the diseased’s cranium, his boot slamming down against the stone floor in a wet mush of brain matter and blood.
Where Hawk might have tried to hide it before, he now cried freely and spun full circle, taking in the room. It looked like a workshop. A large wooden bench on one side, a forge on the left of it, where they must have worked with steel.
While wiping his nose with the back of his sleeve, Hawk stopped turning. A large green curtain hung across a corner of the room. Other than Hawk’s panting breaths, they stood in silence. Slow and deliberate steps towards the curtain, Hawk visibly trembled.
The shing of metal rings sang as they ran over the curtain rail. Seven boys aged from about six years old to about twelve rushed forward, slamming against the bars of their prison.
Small atrophied arms reached from the cage. Snapping jaws. Bleeding eyes. Several of them might have had cherub faces, but the horror of the disease stared from the soft surroundings. Their intent burned with cruelty.
Several seconds passed where Hawk shook his head. His words grew louder. “No, no, no, no, NO! After everything that’s already happened to them.” He stamped his foot.
All of the boys brandished the same scars as Hawk. Lashings around their neck. They’d all seen what that whip did to flesh. Although none of them had his rope burns.
“I can’t take this,” Hawk said, stepping away from the cage. “I can’t take this anymore. I need to get out of here.”
William pressed a hand into the centre of Hawk’s sweating chest, halting his exit. “Wait.”
Hawk shifted his weight from one foot to the other, his eyes roving as if to settle on anything in that room would invite madness.
“Just wait a moment,” William said.
The shing of the curtain being closed made Hawk jump and raise his sword.
Olga lifted her hands in submission. “I’m sorry. I thought it was better closed. Now just hear William out.”
“Look, Hawk, I can see how hard this is for you.”
“What do you know?”
“I didn’t say I understood. You’re right. How could anyone possibly understand this unless they’d been through it themselves? I can see why you didn’t want to come down here, and I’m so grateful you changed your mind. I recognise what this has taken from you, and it means a lot that you put yourself through this.”
With every passing second, Hawk swayed more vigorously, hugging himself for warmth as he shifted his weight from his left foot to his right foot to his left foot.
“We’ve come this far,” William said. “Can you please now show us where the ointment is for me to take back to Matilda? Please.”
The darkness in Hawk’s eyes lightened a little. He blinked repeatedly, his strong brow relaxing. His stare continued to move from left to right, not fixing on any one point. He looked at the ground as if he tried to find himself in the darkness of his mind. “Okay,” he finally said. “Okay.”
The room had a workbench and many cupboards. Hawk went straight for a small one in the corner and crouched down in front of it. The top of the clay pot rattled in his shaking grip when he placed it on the bench. He pulled the lid away and sniffed. For a moment, the darkness returned to his eyes, staining them like a burst of squid ink. “That’s the stuff,” he said. “I don’t know what they make the ointment from, but it works every time. When I was younger, I saw some of the boys brought back from near death because Grandfather Jacks had beat them so severely.”
The lid rattled again when Hawk replaced it, carrying the pot over to William. He gently placed the round clay container in William’s hands. “I need to wait outside, so I need you to do me a favour.”
William nodded. “Anything.”
“Put those kids out of their misery. They’ve suffered enough, and it’s too dangerous to be leaving that many diseased alive down here.”
The request sank through William and his throat dried, cutting off his words.
“Of course,” Olga said, moving behind Hawk and ushering him out of the room. “You go and wait for us outside. We’ll be out in a minute.”
Before Hawk reached the door, his shoulders shook and he trembled. The back of his hand to his nose, he fell out into the hallway.
Her face ashen, Olga lifted her sword. “We have to do this for Hawk.”
The stoic Artan turned even more so. A knife in each hand, he stepped closer to the cage.
Jezebel useless for what they needed to do, William walked over to the large wooden tool bench. A steel pole about three feet long and an inch thick. The end had been fashioned into a spike. Cold to touch and heavy in his grip, what had they planned to do with it? What did it matter? This room and everything in it now belonged to history.
Olga said, “Ready?”
Artan nodded. William shrugged.
Shing!
Olga ripped open the curtain and the diseased children rushed forward. All of them hit the bars head first, their prison completely invisible to them now they’d seen prey.
Several of the diseased fell back from their self-inflicted blows, but four of them remained pressed against the bars, reaching through.
While holding the steel pole in a two-handed grip, the wet schlop of Artan and Olga dropping diseased at his side, William moved closer to the boy directly in front of him. He had open wounds around his neck. They glistened with a white milky pus. What pain must he have been in before he turned? What pain must Matilda be in right now?
Close enough for the tips of the boy’s fingers to scrape against his arms, William lined up the pole’s spike, gripped the shaft tighter, and drove it into the boy’s left eye.
The steel sank into the kid’s face by half a foot, turning the creature limp. William tilted the pole so the kid slid backwards from it. Another life taken from this world far too soon.
Chapter 22
The short spherical woman came at Max again, the glowing end of her steel poker drawing traces in the air. At the winter solstice, all of Edin stayed up late and had small fires. They lit sticks so they glowed like the woman’s pole, and they drew lines through the sky with them. Max always boasted he could spell his name before the traces from the first letter died. His brothers always humoured him. In truth, he couldn’t even complete the M before the traces faded.
Wincing away from the approaching woman, Max jumped when Monica barked, “Stop!”
The short round woman must have heard her, but she kept coming.
“Sally, I said stop!”
Still Sally came fo
rwards.
The tip of the pole shot up in the air, hit the low ceiling in the damp cell, and rained down a shower of sparks before it landed on the ground with a clang!
“What the fuck was that about?” Sally said.
Gracie had kicked the pole. She pulled her shoulders back and leaned over the shorter woman. “Monica told you to stop.”
And it might have escalated had the ratty Monica not stepped between the two. Ushering Sally back behind her, she looked Gracie up and down. “Taken a shine to him, have you?”
“Who likes seeing someone get burned?” Gracie said. “Maybe after I’ve spent years in this place, I might lose my empathy for others, but I’ve not been here long enough for that. I won’t watch someone suffer unnecessarily.”
“You’ll do what I say!”
A tilt of her head to the side, Gracie showed she wouldn’t.
Thankfully Max hadn’t ratted her out. She’d help him when the time came. He had to trust her. Outing her to Monica wouldn’t help any of them.
Monica’s yellow teeth were so prominent it looked like she acted up to her rodent appearance. But if she did, she remained deadpan the entire time. “You must need a rest,” she said.
The insides of Max’s thighs and his left pec still burned as if the poker remained in them. He nodded, his voice weak. “Yes. Yes, I do.”
“And you won’t try any funny business?” Monica had to stand on a step beside Max to untie his right hand from the bar above him.
“Not at all,” Max said. “I just want to get out of here.”
The sting of pins and needles intensified as the blood rushed back down Max’s arm. He opened and closed his right hand, balling it as he stared at Sally. She’d get hers soon enough.
His left hand now free, Monica stepped down from the box. “After all, we need to make sure you’re ready for when the other guard comes and picks you up.”
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