Problem is I’m pretty sure I’m bleeding out.
My eyes drift to the statue and find the demon draped across Hercules’s arms, like some kind of irreverentMadonna della Pietà. It doesn’t move, pierced through by the overly phallic club.
I chuckle to myself, and then everything goes black.
When I come to, everything is numb, but at least the pain is gone. I know there’s some reason I should be panicking, but my brain is too fuzzy to remember why.
Until I open my eyes and find myself face-to-face with Secretary of Health and senior member of the Reapers, Adam Waring. Again.
“Finally,” he says, unblinking amber eyes fixed on me. “You’re back with us.”
I jolt to get away, but I’m tied down to what looks like a hospital bed. I’m in no hospital, though. Judging by the decor, I’m guessing I’m still in the museum.
I quickly try to take stock of what happened. Waring said “finally,” so I’ve been out for quite some time. He also said “us,” meaning he’s not the only person in the room. And I’m still in the Getty Villa, so Hecate’s probably here. My head is strapped down, so I can’t look around to check.
Which brings me to the most unsettling part of all this:My head is strapped down.
If they just wanted to keep me prisoner, they only had to handcuff me to the bed. Without tools, my only escape would be to break my thumb, but since Waring can transmute matter, he could fix the bone before I even had a chance to slip free. But both my arms are strapped down, my head, and—hold on, just wiggling my feet to check—yup, my legs too. Which means they don’t want me to thrash.
Which means they’re anticipating me trying to thrash.
I take a deep breath.
“Glad I’m awake so you can start your torture?” My voice is hoarse, and it warbles because, I’m not too proud to admit, I’m terrified.
As always, Waring is in a bland but well-tailored suit, with a gelled side part and a shave so clean his bronze skin looks waxy.
“I’d just like to have a conversation,” he says, then smiles. “Although some of my colleagues in the Cabinet would say my conversation is torture, I’m hoping you’ll be interested in what I have to say.”
I huff. “I’d be more interested if you didn’t have me strapped to a table.”
He looks at me thoughtfully. “Well, technically, it’s a gurney.”
I blink, suddenly remembering I should have a whole host of injuries. Broken bones. Probably glass embedded in my spine. At the very least a concussion. But I don’t feel injured. In fact, I don’t feel anything at all.
Waring must see the panic in my eyes, because he lays a hand on my forearm. “Healing can be quite painful, so I’ve temporarily blocked most of your nerve endings. Your life-threatening injuries have already been taken care of. All that’s left is to pop your shoulder back in.”
I can only watch out of the corner of my eye as he passes his hand over my left shoulder, chanting something low in a language I don’t understand. There’s an intense pressure, then apopand asquelch.
“There,” Waring says, voice soft. “All done. Now, once I restore sensation, you will feel some pain, but it should be manageable.”
He hovers his hands above my head, chanting. This spell is different but no less incomprehensible. As he passes his hands down my body, the numbness fades and is replaced by a pain that is “manageable” in the loosest definition of the word.
I let out a groan.
Waring sits back into a chair, legs crossed, and watches me with an unsettling gaze.
“Well?” I prompt.
Obviously, the healing was a means to an end. I’m guessing this is going to be some kind of interrogation. I wonder if the others are in separate rooms, but I know better than to ask. Best to pretend I acted alone just in case everyone else got away.
Waring smiles. “I suppose I’ll cut right to the chase. We know you were after the grimoire.”
“Who’s ‘we’?” I ask. If we’re going to do this, I need to see who I’m facing.
He stares at me for a moment longer, then nods to someone behind him. Hecate comes into view.
See? I was right.
