Seraphina drove her heel back, but not into his shin. She threw an elbow into his ribs but pulled the strike. She thought of snapping her head back into his face and couldn’t do it. All her attempts at escape were half-hearted, because this was Idris, and she couldn’t hurt Idris.
They waited for what seemed like forever. At some point, she stopped fighting, but he didn’t release her. She stared at the ceiling, ears trained on every sound coming from outside, Idris’s hand over her mouth almost crushing her jaw, his arm over her middle holding her own trapped. Her two daggers dug into his stomach, but he didn’t shift. He let her go only when he was certain that it was over. Truly over, no one in the village left breathing.
His arms relaxed and fell away from her. He took a few steps back. Seraphina turned to him and shook her head.
“Anytime,” he said.
She huffed and went to push open the trap door.
“You’re welcome,” he shouted after her as she climbed out of the root cellar.
Blood and snow. Torn limbs thrown haphazardly. She saw a leg dangling from a tree branch. Steaming guts strewn in random patterns, strings still attached to gaping torsos. A white canvas painted red, black, and brown. Yellow for piss. Green for vomit.
Seraphina held her breath and started walking. She heard Idris follow. Neither of them spoke. There were no words, and no way they were going to open their mouths and breathe in the foul air to just say nothing.
She found the cottage. The door was in pieces, and inside, the mother, the daughter, and the son had been reduced to a pile of raw meat. They’d saved them to end like this. Her attention was drawn to the boy, Axel, whose upper half was somewhat intact. His eyes were open. Wide, glassy, the brightest green Seraphinahad ever seen. They reminded her of rolling hills in spring. She could smell the fresh grass, damp with morning dew, growing free and wild toward the sun.
“Take his eyes,” Seraphina said.
“What?”
Idris regarded her as if she were insane. He wasn’t far off.
She fixed him with a gaze that left no room for interpretation.
“Remove his eyes, wrap them up, and find a way to keep them from spoiling. Please. Do this for me, and I will tell you everything.”
Chapter Ten
The compulsion throbbed behind her lids, an ache that intensified with every beat of her heart.
“I’m a surgeon, not a butcher,” Idris said. “I would never mutilate a body if there’s no reason for it. Seraphina, I thought you were different. They call me a ghoul because they think I dissect for pleasure. It’s always for science, always to learn more so I can save lives. The vessel is sacred, and even when I cut and remove parts, I praise its sanctity and pray for forgiveness.”
“What if I told you we’d be giving his eyes to someone who doesn’t have any?”
Idris sucked in a breath, then promptly regretted it and pressed his sleeve to his nose and mouth.
“Tell me first. Everything. And I’ll consider what you’re asking.”
“Not here. We can’t linger.”
Idris averted his gaze, looked at the walls, at the ceiling, at the Virgin painting on the mantel, anywhere to avoid her pleading eyes and the gore at their feet.
“You’ve known me for fifteen years, you said so yourself.”
He shook his head.
“No more lies, I promise. No more secrets.”
Her own words were more sickening than the scene before them. She meant it to the extent that she could. She would tell him all he wanted to know, except the one thing that would lead to her death and his downfall.
His dark eyes snapped back to her, and he held her gaze for one long, heavy moment. Without a word, he opened his satchel and took out his kit, only half unrolled it, enough to get the tools that he needed, then made his way toward the grotesque pile in the middle of the room, stepping carefully and stretching to reach the boy’s face. It was frozen in terror. His bright greeneyes were the only thing that still made him look human, and Idris started removing them with precise cuts while murmuring a prayer under his breath.
Seraphina didn’t understand it. She didn’t know Arabic.
It only took ten minutes. They walked out of the cottage, checked their surroundings, and moved fast up the hill, keeping low. Bramble was waiting where they’d left him. He nickered affectionately, his ears twitching, and Seraphina rubbed his head and hugged him, relieved to see he was all right. The cart was intact, too.
Idris filled a bucket with snow and placed the bundle that contained the boy’s eyes on top. It was all efficient and mechanical, as if he’d decided not to dwell or agonize over a thing already done. He helped Seraphina into the cart, his hand steady on her lower back, settled on the driver’s plank and steered Bramble out of the copse of birches. Only when the village was behind them did he say a single word:
