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And I, like my father before me, am the only true monster here.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
HANNAH
“Thing,” I ask quietly, not wanting to startle the gentle but still volatile many-armed giant who stands in front of me. My valiant protector. “What did you mean when you just said I bear kit?”
I can’t look at Abaddon. I can’t think about the trust he’s just destroyed between us. I also can’t stop rubbing my neck where he gripped me and held me in the air.
Obviously, I stirred up something for him earlier when I brought up his father’s abuse. I mean, he’s done some intense things between us but there’s always been a line. And I… I was even starting to—
But now he’s gone and stampeded past that line in a way I’m afraid might be unforgiveable.
Focusing on what Thing said is far easier to bear. Even though I’m almost equally terrified of its implications.
Thing doesn’t turn his head toward me. He’s still watching Abaddon, who’s crumpled on the floor. I’m glad he has eyes on him because I still can’t look.
“Kit,” Thing says. “Brother’s seed planted in belly. Grow now and become kit.”
My eyes shut as I feel the weight of his words slam into me.
Oh shit.
My hands drop from my neck to the stiff cloth of the old apron and my stomach beneath. Holy shit. “You mean I’m pregnant? How do you—”
“He can scent it,” comes Abaddon’s broken voice from the floor. “It’s one of my imperfections. I cannot scent as well as my brother. Hannah-consort, I did not mean to—”
“You meant exactly what you did.” Fury fills my chest. “Your actions have spoken for you.” I still can’t look at him.
Is this really where my wish for a miracle has brought me? To the doorstep of a demon who will lash out at me when he cannot handle his own feelings?
“Give me the keys to Thing’s chains,” I say quietly.
“You cannot—” Abaddon starts.
I just fucking lose it. “You’re the only one who’s ever hurt me in this place!” My scream echoes off the filthy walls. “He has only protected me! So I choose him as my protector for now. Now give me the goddamned key!”
My anguished words echo around and back again in the stone of the dungeon.
There is silence after the echo finishes.
And then the sound of Abaddon getting off the floor. Still, I keep my face averted. Even when he says, “I will go get them.”
He’s only gone a short time.
“I am sorry,” comes Romulus’s voice at the back of the dungeon. “He will not know how to ask for forgiveness.”
“I don’t fucking care about that right now,” I spit.
“No,” Thing says. “No forgive.”
“I said I don’t care!” I’m biting back tears that are about a second from turning into sobs. I don’t know for whose sake I’m trying to hold them in, but I bite the inside of my cheek hard rather than showing weakness, and I’m glad, because moments later, Abaddon returns with keys clanking on a ring.
“Please take them from him, and I’ll free you. We can go upstairs and find a more comfortable room for you.”
A hum of agreement comes from Thing’s wide barrel chest. Eyes still averted, all I see is Romulus’s tail whip around forward. And then the dexterous tail comes around before me, a large circle of ancient looking keys hung carefully on the strange leathery tuft at the end.
“T-thank you,” I say to Romulus. I hate the tremulousness of my voice. I hate Abaddon getting to see how much he’s shaken me.
Then I step close to Thing and put the key in the first of the eight cuffs securing Thing’s limbs to the wall, six for his arms, two for his legs. The lock is difficult to turn, but I manage it. These look like new locks, huge and brutal.
It takes both my small hands to slide the arched shackle up and free of the loops of chain. The cuff comes free of Thing’s forearm with a rusty crack, and clatters to the floor. But finally, one by one, I begin to free him.
He shakes one wrist free and then another, and another.
Finally, I kneel at his feet in supplication. I ignore Abaddon’s grumbling growl, only a little bit away from us.
“Please don’t attack him once you’re free,” I murmur to Thing, looking up into his red eyes. He only offers me the quickest of glances. Evidently, he doesn’t want to take his eye off Abaddon.
I’m probably being just as foolish to put my hope in him as I was to put my trust in Abaddon. I mean, look where that got me. Maybe Thing’s just manipulating me so he can get free because I’m the first fool willing to come along and undo his chains.
But no, I refuse to judge someone by what they look like on the outside.
