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Chapter 24
Jarvissatonthecold stone floor, counting the minutes. If he was right, then the guard would come in about five minutes to bring him water. He did that once a day at exactly the same time, about ten minutes after a shift change.
Well, the shift had changed five minutes ago, and if Jarvis was correct, the water would be arriving soon. This time, he wouldn’t let this opportunity pass.
Jarvis had spent six days in this dungeon, with nothing to do but think, with no one to talk to but himself. The darkness and the loneliness were suffocating. He spent most of his days sitting quietly in the dark, thinking over his plans of escape, and dreaming of his Olive.
What was she doing now? Did she think he had abandoned her, left her in this cruel world after he’d used her most crudely? He would have gone insane in this dark cell without the thoughts of her.
After a few days in the darkness, he’d started hallucinating and even talking to himself. It was inevitable. And if he wanted to preserve the remnants of his sanity, he had to escape this place.
He had conserved just enough energy for one swift fight. And then he’d be free.
Boot heels echoed through the empty corridor. Jarvis stood and slowly walked to the side of the door.
Three… Two… One…
The door opened, and Jarvis hit the guard on his arms, causing the glass of water to hit his face. As the guard sputtered, Jarvis jumped up and slammed down the guard’s back with his elbows. The bandit fell to the floor, and two more filed through the doorway.
One of them swung for Jarvis’s head. Jarvis ducked and kicked him in the shin. The man cried out in pain and doubled over. At the same moment, Jarvis caught him in the nose with his knee. An elbow to the face of another one, and all three men were groaning in pain. Jarvis slipped out of the room, shut the door behind him, and ran through the corridor.
That was way too easy. He should have tried it earlier.
The entire wing of the building seemed empty. There were no windows, and the doors were all shut. Jarvis spotted the door at the end of the corridor and ran toward it. He carefully ascended the steps and put his ear to the door.
Everything seemed quiet. Was it possible that beyond that door lay salvation?
Jarvis pushed the door open and… collided with the huge man in front of him.
“How considerate of you to welcome us,” said Hades. “We were just coming to fetch you.”
Someone threw a thick burlap sack over Jarvis’s head and bound his hands behind his back. Jarvis felt a cold, metallic blade placed at his back.
“If you make a sound, you die,” one of his captors growled.
Jarvis wanted to live, so he kept silent. They led him through another long corridor, then out the doors, and finally, he was seated in a carriage.
Two burly men sat on either side of him, and he could hear more people settling in across from him. The struggle was futile.
Where were the Shadows? Weren’t they going to attempt to rescue him? He’d risked his life for their missions every night, and yet the people who’d sent him there had no interest in his survival, it seemed.
Yes, he had been told to sit quietly at home and not go out between the hours of dusk and dawn. Still, he was one of their own.
And then he realized something. He knew nothing about the Shadows except for very basic things nobody would be interested in. He had no secrets to divulge. Therefore, he was expendable.
The thought wasn’t comforting, but he finally understood all the secrecy behind the Shadows. If one of their members got caught, he had nothing to give up. No secret location he knew the directions to. No roster of names. No list of missions. He knew nothing.
He’d blindly trusted the secret society and done their dirty work without inquiring anything in return.
If he got out of this scuffle alive, he would endeavor to change that.
But one thing at a time.
First, he needed to survive, then bide his time. When the opportunity arose, he’d run away.
He rubbed his hands together. The rope they’d tied him with wasn’t pulled tight, so there was wiggle room. As the carriage swayed and turned, Jarvis leaned to one side and then the other, disguising his attempts at trying to free his hands.
The carriage took another turn. Where were they taking him? If he correctly ascertained their direction, which he wasn’t certain of, they weren’t going out of town. They weren’t going toward Grosvenor Square either.
