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“You haven’t,” he bites out.
I want to cross my arms around my chest, feeling exposed under his stare, but I can’t with the ties around my wrists. “Then why?”
“You…” he pauses, turning his head away, breaking eye contact first. “Remind me of someone.”
It’s as good of an answer as I deserve, but I take note he didn’t help me out of some moral obligation. This was personal, but isn’t everything?
“What will they do with us?” I ask. My voice comes out with a crack, no longer defiant.
He clears his throat and runs a shaky hand through his hair. He knows I understand and shakes his head. “Your family is safe. This storm will rage for weeks, maybe longer. Just get through that first.”
“But—“
He grabs my arm, pulling me closer to him and placing his lips against my ear. I feel him take a shaking breath, warm air spreading across my cheek. “Stop. Asking. Questions.” When he releases his hold, I let out the breath I’ve been holding, and I nod.
Another few floors pass, and I look back at him but keep my lips clamped shut, nervous I might utter a word. Light casts downward over his forehead and across his eyes that flick to the corner of the elevator, straight at a camera pointed in our direction.
My chest tightens with each breath, and my arms cuffed behind me don’t help. It feels like I’m suffocating, and the deeper we move, the less air fills the space, making me take in a shuddered gasp.
I’m shaking, but I can’t stop the steady trembling of my body. Every time I close my eyes, I see that figure coming toward me in the rain, coming to take me.
Was that real?
My heart thuds, blood rushing to my head, making me dizzy, and I stop trying to fight it. I’ll allow myself this moment to let fear and worry take over, and pull it together when the elevator stops. Once my feet step out, I’ll find my way through this new world.
Weeks.
We can do anything for weeks.
We can be anybody for weeks.
The air grows warmer, and he shrugs off his wet jacket, droplets falling to the floor. “The Eminent won’t hurt your family. You’re a… guest.”
He’s wrong, but I don’t correct him.
The movement slows to a crawl until a clang sounds from the front walls, and the doors slide open, sending light through the space. “We’re here,” he announces, stepping forward through the doors.
I don’t miss the symbol branded on his bare arm when he walks through.
Waves that intersect with a circle and a twisting of flames throughout.
Chapter Two
Don’t Scream
Ifollow,becausewhatother choice do I have? My family is here, so I make myself step off the elevator and into the arms of these devils.
These hallways don’t surprise me now that I know who rules the underground. Its stark differences from our life on the island or the Thalassa only justify the truth said to me without words.
Reflective walls flash with their leaders’ images, faces that send a brick of dread into my stomach. Eyes of the Assembly of the Eternal’s patriarchy watch every step I take as I follow my rescuer. Men who would preach seven days a week about the wrath to come, scaring families and children. Families that gave them every penny and resource they had before the men they trusted ordered them to an early grave while the cowards in these portraits hid safely underground.
They built this place with the money of dead believers.
My sister’s money.
Sam’s money.
I fight the urge to spit on their faces and bite the inside of my cheek instead. My teeth clamp so tight that I slice my skin, and the taste of copper splashes onto my tongue.
