My legs grow stiff. I’m stretching them out when two guards appear and reach for my cell door. It swings open with a creak.
I knew they would realize their mistake. I dive for the exit.
“You really want to make this hard, don’t you?” one of them says.
It all happens very fast. One of the guards yanks my arms over my head and wraps a chain around my wrists. The other one gets me onto my back. And then the needle is in my neck again, and my cell door is slamming, and I try to sit up but discover that my chain is also wrapped around the bars. I’m trapped.
“They can’t do this to me,” I say into the dark.
I wanted to say it out loud so that I could hear the confidence in my own voice. But instead, all I hear is the tiny quiver underneath my words.
They can’t do this to me.
I don’t understand why they are.
THREE
I WAKE TO THE CHIMING OF THE CATHEDRAL BELLS. AGAIN.
It’s incredibly rude of them to interrupt my dream. Ale and I were at our wedding reception in the courtyard of his family’s manor, surrounded by a rapt crowd. I looked, somehow, even more stunning than I usually do. We were making the first cut into our massive wedding cake, and I swear I can taste the creamy frosting and the toasted pecans now.
Last night, full of pre-wedding jitters, I ventured down to my family’s kitchen to check on the cake. A maid was perfecting the white frosting. I stuck my finger in it for a taste, and she went pale with horror and scrambled to fix the dent. I waited until she turned her back. Then stuck my finger in again.
The cathedral bells die off, and the noise of the watercrea’s tower seeps back in. Somewhere below, someone else’s chain is scraping against the bars. The person next to me is still taking long, labored breaths. I wish they would hurry up and die. The sound is rattling my bones.
I just want to be out of here and in the House of Morandi. I want to be clean and warm and sipping sugary coffee in a parlor with my best friend.
The cathedral bells chime again. I close my eyes and count.
Five bells.
I wait.
Six bells.
This is getting ridiculous. I clearly don’t belong in this cell. If I did, my omens would be halfway across my body by now.
Seven bells.
I need to relieve myself, but I’m not going to just do it all over my legs. That’s humiliating.
Eight bells.
Well, I can’t hold it any longer. This is the guards’ problem now. They’re the ones who will have to pick up my grimy body when they carry me to freedom.
Twelve bells.
That doesn’t seem like the right number of bells.
One bell.
Three bells.
I’m thirsty.
I hear a strange clinking noise. It takes me a long moment to realize that somebody is undoing the chains around my wrists. My cell door creaks open. I try to sit up, but my head is spinning and my body is aching and the next thing I know, I’m in somebody’s arms, being cradled like a child. The guard holding me smells like sweat and salty blood.
“Leaving?” I croak out.
We’re moving.
“Am I leaving?” I press.
“Quiet,” he says. “I’m taking you to the watercrea.”
The watercrea. I remember the sharp shadows of her face in the cathedral chamber. I remember her dark, cold eyes.
“No,” I whisper.
“She wants to see you,” he says. “You don’t have a choice.”
I should have anticipated this. Of course she wants to see me. I’ve defied her for ten years. I’ve lived longer than anyone with omens should.
I struggle to take in my surroundings as we move up the stairs. We pass tiny cell after tiny cell, and in every single one, there’s the shadow of a person. Most of them are slumped on the floor, and I can barely make them out.
But then I see the girls. In the cell nearby, there are two little girls crammed into the same space. They’re naked and shivering, and they’re sitting up, watching me.
My insides turn cold.
“Why—” My mouth is dry. “Why are they in the same cell?”
“We need more blood,” the guard says.
There are so many people in here that they’ve run out of space. The watercrea’s tower is supposed to be a quick death.
“How long will they live?” I say.
“Until we can’t take any more,” he says.
I wonder how long that takes. I wonder how much blood I’ve already lost and how much more I’m going to lose once the watercrea gets ahold of me.
I’ve had quite enough of this tower.
I throw myself out of the guard’s arms and hit the stairs. I’m sure it hurts, but I’m too cold and numb to feel the pain. He scrambles to grab me back, and the moment his hand touches me, I grab it and shove his fingers into my mouth.
I bite down. Hard. It crunches, and he screams, and it’s disgusting and satisfying all at once. I’m already on my feet. I’m snatching the keys off his belt and scrambling for the cell with the little girls. I unlock it, but when they push on the bars with their tiny hands, I push back.
“They’ll come after me,” I tell them, breathless. “Stay hidden and wait for your chance.”
Their eyes are huge and terrified in the dark. I only have an instant
