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I’ve kept an open mind up until now, certain that each place was a better alternative to Mother Chilson, or the perils I’d face out on the Deadlands. I’m not so sure here. A niggling feeling tells me I need to be cautious with this man, and to have an escape plan.

An unbidden memory of my father sitting on the porch beside me, telling his stories, surfaces in my mind. Know the lay of the land and its weak spots, he always said, as if he somehow knew I’d be at the mercy of this world. “Would it be alright to explore my home?” I ask.

Remus’s brows wing up. “Of course! It’s your home, and I assure, you are quite safe to roam freely.”

With as demure a smile as I can muster, I nod. “Thank you.”

“Yes. Yes, enjoy yourself.” He steps aside for me, and I lower my gaze as I pass. “And Thalia … Agatha and I … we’re very happy you’re here.”

Scratching the back of my neck, I offer one more nod and keep on out of the prison block and back down to the lobby. At the sight of guards gathered at the front door, I back myself toward a door behind me that wasn’t included in my brief tour with Remus.

The dark stairwell beyond advises me to turn back around, but my feet carry me forward, down, down, into what must be the lowest level of the prison. When I reach the bottom, a dim light flickers over another door. Always a door. Beside it is a stool, and an ashtray filled with cigarettes paints a picture of a guard standing by.

Opening the door leads to a long corridor with one flickering bulb. At each side of the hallway are more doors, white steel ones with small windows, and it’s only because of the whispers that carry through those tiny windows that I feel compelled to peek inside.

Rising up on my tiptoes, I peer through glass to find a dark void on the other side.

The door thumps at the same time as a mutilated face steps into view.

On a gasp, I stumble backward, my view widening on the thrashing Rager snapping his teeth at me. Heart pounding in my chest, I exhale a held breath and close my eyes to settle my rattled nerves.

Jesus.

As the growls die down, the whispers grow louder, and I move to the next door in search of them. Rising up as before, I recoil on reflex, anticipating another Rager. At the stillness on the other side, I peer inside to find a massive figure slumped against the wall. Only the light directly behind me gives enough illumination to see it’s Titus on the other side. His wounds still glisten with blood from the earlier battle, and he doesn’t bother to acknowledge me staring in at him.

This is where they keep him locked up like an animal. A sad and lonely beast of a man, who happens to be the reason I’m breathing, chained to a dirty stone wall. My heart aches at the sight of him.

The whispers keep on, drawing my feet toward the next door.

“Hey!” The sound of a commanding voice turns my spine to ice, and I twist to find a guard standing in the doorway, one hand on the weapon at his hip. “You shouldn’t be down here.”

“I’m sorry. I just …. I was just …” Abandoning my curiosity, I shuffle toward him, and he steps aside, allowing me to pass.

Darkness gives way to light as I hustle up the staircase toward the door at the top, and as I push through, the sight of Remus waiting there nearly sends me tumbling back down. I clutch my chest to catch my breath.

“There you are! Come on, Thalia. I’d like you to join Agatha and I for dinner.”

* * *

It takes a woman to recognize the distaste sketched in the subtle facial expressions of the blonde sitting across from me. Agatha shares the same bright blue eyes as the man at the head of the table, but where his carry a vacancy to them, hers are shrewd and perceptive.

A bowl of soup, which looks to be mostly water, a few chunks of meat, and potatoes, is set before me, and I glance up toward the serving woman, who smiles warmly, resting her hand on my back as she places a spoon into the bowl. Silvery hair and wrinkles puts her somewhere in her late sixties, maybe seventies, and her almond-shaped eyes remind me of the gypsies with native blood back at home.

“Thalia, this is Lisbeth. She and her sister, Aiyana, do all the cooking and washing.” The cordiality in Remus’s tone is unnatural and unfitting, like a sharply pointed square trying fit inside the smooth curves of a circle.

Offering a friendly smile, I nod. “Hello, Lisbeth.”

Lips sealed, she nods back.

“She can’t talk. Her tongue was cut out,” Remus adds with the nonchalance of a true psychopath, as he feeds a spoonful of soup into his mouth with his clawed fingers.

After another light pat on my back, Lisbeth hobbles toward a tray of bowls set off to the side, retrieving one and placing it in front of Agatha.

Gaze on me, Agatha leans in just enough to drink the soup from her spoon, before setting it down into the bowl with the kind of dainty grace that contrasts her lover’s obnoxious slurps. “Remus tells me that you were born in Szolen.” The innocent curiosity in her voice betrays a knowing look in her eyes, telling me I need to be careful with this one and choose my words wisely.

“I was.”

“You’re a Daughter. The chosen pure.” She spits the words like they’re a bitter taste on her tongue.