Page 90 of The Devouring Time

Who doesn’t seem to be restrained in any fashion.

What have they told her is going to happen? The same lies the Swarm offered them?

The group looks our way, and the dark-haired man rises to his feet. “What have you brought us, Frank?”

“Caine showed up, along with the investigator and some friends,” Myers replies. “I thought you and Mr. Hart might have some use for them, Mr. Vitali.”

The dark-haired man who must be Vince Vitali, head of the bootlegging syndicate distributing the Chrysalis-tainted alcohol, looks us over with an unfriendly eye. My heart pounds in my chest—should I try to fight back with my cold spell? Will it do any good?

Am I about to lose this set of friends like I lost Bianca and the others? Like I lost Emerson and poor James?

“They could be useful as sacrifices,” Hart says speculatively. The past year and a half haven’t done him any favors. He was old when I first saw him; now he’s positively ancient. The last of his hair has left behind a bare skull, and his wrinkled hands are almost skeletal. “Or…hmm. Mr. Evans is a strapping young man. Perhaps I can be transferred into his body and see if I like it.”

So this is what he was promised—the restoration of youth. Perhaps even eternal youth, jumping from body to body. Trying out different ones, accepting or rejecting them like choosing a suit at the tailor. All a lie, but one that’s caught him like a fish on a hook.

“As you wish,” the thin woman says. There’s a strangeness to her voice, the inflections just off enough to raise the little hairs on the back of my neck.

She’s one of the Swarm in a human body. Their representative here, no doubt making sure their human servitors do as promised.

The Swarm member doesn’t bother to look at us when it speaks, clearly indifferent. And why shouldn’t it be? Leaving a handful of humans alive for a bit longer changes nothing.

Myers points toward the farthest point in the cavern from both the ritual space and the entrance. “Tie them up and put them there,” he orders. “Keep an eye on them, make sure they don’t try any funny stuff.”

I’m grasping at straws as we’re herded away at knifepoint. “Sit down,” growls one of the men, and we all obey. The floor here is broken rock rather than sand, and incredibly uncomfortable. As soon as we’re seated, they bind our hands behind our backs with rough rope, except for Mary who is already tied up. She slumps against the wall behind us, eyes shut. Does she have a bad concussion? A skull fracture? I’m no doctor, but she doesn’t seem to be doing well.

The Swarm will simply kill her outright. They have no use for damaged bodies.

Once we’re bound, most of the men leave, except for two guards. I lean against Adrian, sick desperation swirling in my stomach.

“I don’t know what to do,” I whisper, tears pricking my eyes.

He glances at the guards, who stand perhaps ten feet away, looking bored. “Helen,” he whispers, a bit louder since she’s on my other side. Thankfully, the guards don’t hear him, but we have to be careful.

She turns to us and raises her brows in question.

“Do you have any spells to loosen our bindings?”

She shakes her head. “I don’t have any of my knitting, either—everything was in my purse.”

One of the guards shifts and glances back at us. We immediately try to look innocent.

He turns back away, but we’re silent for several minutes, each of us no doubt trying to come up with some plan of escape. Nothing presents itself, and my despair deepens. As I told Adrian, I don’t know what to do. How to make things better.

Adrian, Helen, Dorset, and Mary are probably going to die here. And I’ll be sent back to the past to face whatever cataclysm is coming for the Swarm.

“I’m disappointed in you, Hellion,” Mary whispers from behind us.

61

Startled, I glance back and see she’s worked the gag out of her mouth. The guards haven’t seen, because she’s slumped behind us, out of their line of sight.

Mary shoots me a furious glare. Cursing myself, I turn back to the fore and hope no one noticed my movement.

“This is what happens when you rely too much on sorcery,” she goes on when it seems no one caught my slip. “Wait until they’re distracted.”

Helen parts her lips, as if about to demand what Mary has planned, then presses them back together.

I can’t imagine what Mary has up her sleeve, but anything is better than just waiting to die.