Movement. I got only a one-second glimpse of him as he surged out of the blackness. I dropped to both knees, calves and feet tucked under me, as his arms reached for where I’d once been. His feet hit my knees and he fell forward as I leaned back, so far back that my head touched the grimy floor, and at the same time, thrust up with the dagger. His hands hit the bars. He groaned.
Warm drips hit my face. The scent of iron was thick and nauseating.
His blood slid down the hilt of the dagger and onto my hands, trailing over my forearms. I stayed still, breathing heavily. Not moving. The cells went quiet. My back and stomach muscles strained as he slumped his weight onto the dagger. My arms burned, but still I didn’t move. And then suddenly he twitched. Three seconds later his body transformed to smoke and disappeared into that invisible updraft. The weight was relieved from my body, and I collapsed back onto the floor.
I rolled to my side, disbelief flooding me. Quickly I wiped my bloody hands on my jeans and then shook them hard, trying to relieve myself of the trembles. It didn’t help. I shoved the dagger back into the backpack, wiggled the key out of the lock, and then eased out of the cell.
The way to freedom was lit from my cell to the stairs, but I turned away from the light to face the blackness of the corridor. Every nerve ending I had was firing, urging me to run, but I stood still, heart hammering, and said loud enough for them to hear, “I’m out.”
Lights from the cells appeared again, just bright enough to reveal the hallway. I went to the cell across from mine, but it was empty. The next held the guy who had spoken to me. He was standing at the bars, waiting, his gray eyes bright with anticipation.
I gasped when I saw his face. “Oh my God.”
He frowned. “What?”
“Nothing,” I said, hands shaking and going to work on the lock. “You just remind me of someone.”
The door popped open. He stepped out. Tall, like Sebastian, those gray eyes boring into mine. His face was covered with a shaggy black beard and his hair was long and tangled, but there was no doubt in my mind. It was like looking at Sebastian, only aged by thirty years. He urged me down the hall.
I went to each cell, unlocking and not really looking too closely at the occupants. They all looked the same. Dirty, with wild, tangled hair and ratty clothing. Only their eyes burned. With fear. Fright. With a taste of freedom, but too scared to hope just yet.
I came to the next cell, and this time stumbled back, my heart in my throat.
“Hurry!” the bird voice hissed.
I gulped and moved to the lock, hands shaking worse than before. Its claws wrapped around the bars and its sharp, curved beak was inches from my face as I worked the key. The lock popped. I glanced up into round black eyes, ringed in yellow, but in some small part I saw humanity there. Sadness. It blinked. “Made,” it said quietly, almost ashamed.
I pulled the door, stumbling back as the six-and-a-half-foot-tall harpy walked out. There was no other word in my vocabulary to describe it. Humanoid, bird, and scary as hell.
Two more cells left.
I opened another cell, this one completely black. A woman with the body of a black spider from the waist down scurried out. All the blood drained from my face. “Thank you,” the creature said, and gave me a nod that spoke volumes.
The last cell. I kept going. I had to. It was the only thing preventing me from hysterics.
I did a double take. “What?” The person inside had not even come to the bars. His silhouette showed him sitting back against the wall, one leg drawn up. “We can’t just leave him.”
“He is a ????? hunter. Like the one you just killed. He put some of us in here. He does not leave.”
A slow, icy feeling sank into the pit of my stomach. I glanced from the figure to the bearded guy, an unexplainable dread mixed with something very similar to sorrow. He was a ????? hunter. One of Athena’s grunts. Who knew what he’d done to displease her, but it felt wrong to leave him. Wrong, wrong, wrong. I shook my head.
“Hurry!” the harpy’s urgent voice came from the steps.
Older Sebastian grabbed the keys from my hand and walked away. My feet seemed to grow roots. I couldn’t move. I looked to the shadowed figure in the cell, feeling as though my heart was shrinking. “I—”
“Just go,” came his gruff voice. It was the same voice that had told the harpy to “shut the fuck up.” “I belong here.”
“Girl! Come on!” came Older Sebastian’s voice again.
I swallowed as hot tears cut through the dirt and grime on my face. “No one belongs in here,” I said.
“Killers do. Just go. Take the trail behind the old slave quarters. It will lead to the road back to New 2. You might have enough time to hide. But it won’t stop Her. She’s already broken the compact with the Novem by sending her hunter into the city. And she’ll send more. Don’t give up your dagger. It’s the reason you just gained your freedom. That blade is the only thing capable of killing a hunter. Keep it safe and secret.”
I hit the bars, wanting to scream for the keys back.
“Hurry. You’ve little time left.”
“Thank you.” It sounded totally inadequate, but I said it anyway, my voice breaking. The hunter didn’t respond.
I ran, feeling like I had just done something wrong, something I knew I’d always regret. I flew passed Older Sebastian and took the steps two at a time.
No one was in the house as we raced out the front door.
I took the lead, heading across the large yard and underneath the canopy of oaks to the buildings behind the main house, the three-quarters moon lighting our way.
When we rounded the corner to the restored slave quarters, I stopped, my lungs straining and chest heaving. My eyes scanned for the trail and found a small footpath that led into the swamp, a jumble of vines and palms and cypress trees.
A low, anguished cry brought my attention back to the group.
The spider woman was on her knees, all woman now, completely naked, her face thrown back to the light of the moon and her arms limp at her sides. Tears of relief and joy streamed down her face as some of the others helped her to stand.
“I have been unable to shift for two hundred years. Thank you.”
I met the woman’s dark eyes. She was gorgeous in a Queen of the Night kind of way, with long dark hair and sharp, seductive features. “You’re welcome,” I said, trying to sound normal, but it came out broken and high.
Her eyes narrowed as she took in my white hair and teal eyes. “You are ?????” she asked.
I opened my mouth to say no, but then hesitated. I wasn’t sure how to answer, or what the hell I was doing out here in the middle of nowhere. “I don’t know what I am,” I finally answered.
Older Sebastian placed a soft hand on my shoulder. “You’d know if you were Made. Some who are Made, like Arachne here, have the power to shift back to human form.”
“This is where I leave you all.” Arachne turned back to me. “If you ever have need of me, just call my name. I will hear.”
She nodded once to the others and then darted into the blackness of the swamp.
“This is where I leave you as well,” the harpy said.
Its large head leaned close to me, eyes intense, beak almost touching my nose. A claw reached out, the point touching the small crescent tattoo on my cheekbone and then poking at my hair. It laughed. “Freed by a Beauty. Figures. I was like you once. Don’t let Her get to you, girlie. I take my chances in the swamp.” Closer, the beak grazed my cheek, sending a cold shudder down my spine. Then it whispered in a voice only for me, “Say my name out loud, and I will hear no matter the distance.” It paused and whispered a name.
The magic in that word made goose bumps erupt on my skin.
The harpy unfurled her massive, leathery wings and took flight. The force blew the leaves around my feet and stirred my hair.
She was gone.
