Page 138 of The Cannibal

I felt as I did when I first woke—revived.

But a new sinking feeling, the guilt of a life traded kept me from deliberating too much or else I may hurt myself.

I stared at my laboratory table, now serving as a slab.

A stained sheet covered the body, the neck area blackened on the fabric.

They wouldn’t let me move from my spot, not that I wanted to. My body became small, despite being quite a tall woman. In moments like this, I forgot. Once again I found myself facing the world, unknowing of who would be at my side after everything.

“Where is she?” Silas’s voice rang through the hallway. “Move!” he shouted.

I flinched, thinking he was speaking about me.

He was let into the laboratory, stopped in his tracks by the body on the table.

Luka’s massive body blocked me from view, but I could peek around to see.

Silas’s eyes were so intense, between his constricted pupils and the light casting downward from the ceiling. I could barely hear what Luka said from the blood rushing in my ears.

“She’s there.” His muffled words were confirmed by him pointing to the table.

Silas looked to the table in confusion before staring back at him. It was like he couldn’t understand why he was pointing to the sheet. Then his eyes only widened, stepping beside the body without taking his eyes from Luka.

When his gaze finally fell to the blackened spot on the sheet, only then could I see the glaze over his eyes.

He hooked a finger under the lip of the sheet. A flash of red hair was all he needed to see, choosing not to reveal the rest. His gaze wandered down the length of the table to her toes, then, when he returned to Luka, it was like he was asking for it not to be her.

“What happened?” he practically mouthed, no courage to say it.

Luka shook his head.

Then Silas and I locked eyes as I stared from behind the massive Russian. His mind connected the pieces finally when he saw the blood on my clothes, my hands.

He lunged at me, and Luka pressed both hands to Silas’s chest, talking quickly in his ear, but those cold eyes did not unlatch from me.

If Luka were not there, this may have been when Silas killed me.

I had seen this look before. Only once. There was an aura when someone was deciding whether or not they wanted to kill you. A lapse in humanity, or perhaps it was purely human instinct. The only time I had seen such a look was in the cemetery, baptized in an autumn tempest and pinned to a dead man’s tomb.

He either was contemplating it again, or regretted not doing it before.

Luka gave him a short shove and gripped his shirt, dragging him out as he continued to speak at him in haste.

When he left, I could breathe.

41

THE POISONER

From one room to the next, it was like I just appeared places without knowing how I got there. Not that things were moving fast, but nothing felt quite real.

Among the numbness, a seed of guilt sprouted from my stomach. I forgot what it was to feel well. My skin was so soft and even in tone, my senses were sharp, my mind felt as if it was catching up from lack of blood to the brain. When I moved my body, there was no more pain. My only disgrace being what was traded for such wellness.

The trial had begun, but now for a different crime.

“We are held by few civil laws, and even fewer natural ones,” a tall, gaunt man began. He was dressed in black, a tall stiff collar, and a white cravat. His cheeks sunken slightly, black hair oiled back. His pronunciation was archaic, from older ages of English. He acted as a judge. “No kin-killing, no captive Hosts, and no forced turning.”

The dining room tables were rearranged in a horseshoe. Representatives took their seats around this arch, pens and notepads before them. The skeletal man stood at the head, Mr. Astor to his right as the prosecuting party.