by Ann Atkins
I felt like I was in Hell’s zoo, and after this I was pretty sure I’d never want to go to a real zoo ever again. The evil and malevolence directed at us was almost overpowering, and I had to get away from it. Matt apparently shared this sentiment and stayed close on my heels.
I kept my head down and quickened my pace barely even glancing in the bars anymore; I was pretty sure that anything worth saving would be down another hallway, but a loud, keening wail snapped me back to attention. An old, wrinkled woman with light gray skin and silver hair watched me from milky-white eyes. She wore a long gray robe that seemed to float around her as she moved closer to us. She wrapped her gnarled fingers around the bars and pressed her face against the cold steel as she stared at us, and then she started to laugh.
I didn’t stick around for the punch line of her secret joke, because her laugh was almost as terrifying as her wailing. I reached behind me and grabbed Matt’s hand as I began to jog down the hallway.
We finally turned a corner and found a few cells that were double or triple the size of the others, and it was obvious why. The occupants of these cells were huge, and dirty, and smelly. Most of them were extremely hairy with warts covering a good portion of their bodies, but when they saw us all they managed were a few unintelligible grunts. This section was filled with ogres and trolls, so we turned in yet another direction.
Another hall housed wendigos, who looked human, except for their bat-like wings and skeletal frame, and the smell of decay around them was very pungent. A little further down, the empty, black eye sockets of several hags peered out at us, and I fought against the memory of the night I was attacked by one, but the next hall was my undoing.
An incubus stared at me hungrily, and a succubus rubbed against the iron bars seductively trying to draw Matt closer. They usually disguised themselves as beautiful men and women, but since they could not access their power, they appeared, as they truly were—demonic.
In an instant I was back in that dilapidated house—naked, afraid, and completely at the mercy of a sexually depraved monster. I could feel his mouth and his hands on me; I could feel the sting of his claws and the unbearable pain in my arms and legs as he broke my bones. Shame washed over me as I remembered the things he’d done and the things he had planned to do to me. Was it my fault? No. Was it rational? No, but I felt it just the same. My entire body began to tremble, and I stumbled backwards down the hall we’d just left.
“Allie?”
“We need to go a different way. This place is a labyrinth of hallways; we’ll find another one,” I said much more calmly than I felt.
“But why? We’ll just be wasting time. They can’t get out, Al. Just close your eyes and hold my hand until we’re past them.”
I didn’t move.
“C’mon, Allie.”
“I said no, Matt.”
“What’s wrong with you? You’ve made it past everything else, but a pair of horny monsters is too much to handle? They seem more interested in humping our legs than slashing our throats,” he said with a grin.
“I’m not arguing with you! You can either follow me or stay here by yourself!” I said as I turned in another direction.
“Allie, wait,” he said, reaching out to me. “What is it?”
He wasn’t letting it go, and we were running out of time, so I did the only thing I could do; I told him. “When I first started staying with Mason and Sarah I’d been attacked, but not in the way you all thought.”
He looked confused, and I finally just blurted it out.
“Matt, I was almost raped,” I said, fighting tears.
He looked stunned, and then stunned faded to concerned, and concerned faded to angry.
“By one of those?” he asked. I nodded. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I was trying to forget it, and talking about it didn’t seem like the best way to do that. Now, can we go?”
“Yeah,” he said, reaching for my hand. “And, Al?”
“Hmm?”
“I’m sorry.”
I squeezed his hand in return.
We walked down three more hell blocks with nothing but hideous monsters, and most of them I didn’t recognize, but there were a few I remembered from Sarah’s books.
I saw a cage full of hairy, smelly little men and remembered that they were called boggarts. There was also a cage full of little gremlins. They had sharp spikes all over their dark gray hide and ran in circles growling at us, which was almost funny since they were so little.
There was a cage with a large pool for the aquatic kelpie. Horses with glossy black coats and manes and horrible blood-red eyes. These horses are seriously creepy, living near water and luring unsuspecting strangers to climb onto their backs. If anyone was stupid enough to do so, they were magically stuck there, and the horse would dive under the water—drowning them. I had read that they could even take on human form, and a shiver crept up my spine as I watched them.
I had begun to despair of ever finding a creature worth saving down here when I heard Matt gasp.
I looked up to see a cage full of the most beautiful birds I’d ever laid eyes on; the colors of the birds varied, but they all had one thing in common; they seemed to glow. Some were brighter than others, but that was not unusual for this species. They would eventually grow so bright that their feathers would start to smolder, and they would explode into flames. A new baby bird would come forth from the ashes of the old and start the cycle all over again; they were phoenixes.
I looked down the rest of this hallway and saw more of the same. There was a cage full of baby bakus that ripped at my heart, and I immediately ran over and knelt down to pet them. I reached both hands through the bars as they crowded closer and started making that strange almost purring sound. My eyes filled with tears; I wouldn’t be leaving them behind either.
This room was full of beautiful creatures and some of those appeared very human. There was a cage full of beautiful women with pointed ears that I recognized as elves. Nymphs and dryads were also crammed into small cages together. There were centaurs and minotaurs, and even another pool with several mermaids in it.
But at the end of the hall were the two cages that interested me the most. There was a cage full of unicorns and one of faeries. How did I know they were faeries, well … some of them actually had wings that were a beautiful iridescent white.
“Allison?” one of the faeries asked. She was tall and pale with dark blue eyes and long, curly, white-blond hair.
“Do you know me?” I asked as I walked toward her.
“No, but I knew your mother. You should not have come here, but I knew that you would,” she said with a sad smile.
“How did you know?”
She smiled again. “The same way that you knew where to find us.”
“I thought magic wouldn’t work down here.”
“It doesn’t, but the visions are beyond my control, and somehow, they still find me.”
I heard a familiar whinny and turned to see Snowflake staring at me. I smiled and walked over to his cage, and he slowly limped forward. I ran my fingers through his mane and they came away stained with a pale golden liquid. I looked at the friendly faerie with sadness and confusion. “What has that bastard done to him? And what is this?” I asked holding out my gold-stained hands.
“He’s been subjected to every sick test that that man can think up to perform on him; it’s taken its toll.”
“And this?” I asked again, showing her my hands.
“It’s unicorn blood.”
My eyes filled with tears as I looked at him, and my body vibrated with rage. Two other unicorns were in the cage with him—a beautiful, glittering black one, and a shiny silver one—and they didn’t seem to be in much better condition than Snowflake did.
“What’s your name?” I asked her.
“Ella,” she answered.
“Ella, I’m going to get you out of here—all of you,” I said fiercely.
“It’s too late
, Allie,” Matt, who had been quiet until now, suddenly whispered.
And when I turned around, I saw David with an army of henchmen standing behind him.
He smiled at me and ice crept through my veins. “Allison, darling, welcome home.”
Chapter Thirty-Three
Trapped
I immediately moved to stand protectively in front of Matt as I cursed my own foolishness. He had been right; I shouldn’t have come alone; I should have taken the time to plan this out. Many of them would have died, true, but at least I’d have been able to save some of them, but now … I wasn’t going to be able to save any of them. I was certain that he’d somehow been responsible for the dream I’d had, and I had walked, willingly, right into his trap. Stupid!
I was a fool for relying solely on magic and the words in books, and I swore to myself that if I made it out of here alive, I was going to take some kickboxing or self-defense classes or something. Heck, I might even drink blood—in small doses, of course—to try and improve my strength and speed. Right now, I would do just about anything to get Matt out of here safely. I wasn’t worried about myself—like I said, it’s my life to risk, but I was sick over the fact that I might’ve cost Matt his.
“You are a sick, disgusting, perverse excuse for a human being!” I spat at him.
“Well, that’s not a very nice way to speak to your father,” he said, feigning surprise.
And as I looked at him, I realized he was actually enjoying this. He had always been very stern with me in the past, but he was reveling in playing with me now. There were no longer any lies between us. I knew everything he’d done to my family, and he knew I knew it, and he was more than happy to rub my face in it. I had only ever seen half of the monster that was Dr. David Chamberlain, but my vision had just gotten a whole lot clearer.
Some of the creatures in here were the stuff of nightmares, but seeing his glee over the pain he’d caused me, and the pain I knew was still to come; I couldn’t see any difference between them. He is human in name only; he is evil incarnate, and if it’s the last thing I ever do, I swear I’ll send him back to Hell—where he belongs.
“I never knew my father; you made sure of that!”
“It was his dogged pursuit of your mother and you that killed them. His love for you both was his greatest weakness, and that is what destroyed him, not me!”
“Love is never a weakness; it takes great strength to sacrifice your own life for the life of another, but I wouldn’t expect someone like you to understand that!”
“I disagree, because the only reason your attacks have been verbal instead of physical—is because of him. You’re afraid that he will get hurt,” he said as he trained his cold eyes on Matt. “I’m betting you’d be willing to gamble with your own life, but never his. You’re as big a fool as your father was!”
“Yes, and you are more of a monster than anything you have behind these bars. You’re the one who belongs in a cage, but I’ll settle for seeing you in your grave!”
“The only thing you’re going to see is the inside of a cell. I have big plans for you little girl,” he said with a smirk.
Some of my anger faded, only to be replaced with fear, but I tried not to let him see that. “And just how are you planning on getting me in there?” I asked stubbornly.
“Oh that’s easy,” he scoffed, not impressed by my false bravado. “Gentleman!” And with that one word, the twenty or so armed men behind him aimed their guns at Matt.
“No,” I screamed, throwing myself in front of him. David simply rolled his eyes and motioned five of the men forward. Three of them kept their guns trained on me, while the other two attempted to restrain me. I began to struggle, and of course, Matt came to my aid.
One of the men slammed the butt of a gun into his head, and he went down hard, with his head bleeding all over the concrete floor. I immediately stopped struggling, and David started to laugh.
“Good girl, Allison. Now, which section of the laboratory would you like to be housed in?”
“Screw you!” I yelled at him.
He nodded to the man standing closest to Matt, and Matt cried out as a steel-toed boot slammed into his ribs; I would be extremely surprised if some of them weren’t broken.
“Don’t hurt him,” I pleaded. “If you let him go, I’ll do whatever you want me to.”
“I’m afraid that’s impossible; the boy knows our location, and he would not hesitate to return here with an army. No, I’ll keep him as my own personal insurance policy, and if you should become belligerent and unmanageable, he will pay for it. And when I am done, he will not even be recognizable as human. Then, I will throw his rotting carcass in the cell with you as a reminder of what your actions have wrought. Do you understand me?”
My eyes filled with tears at the sight of my friend lying on the floor bleeding and struggling to breathe, but not a single tear fell from my eyes as I turned my hate-filled gazed back to the man I’d once called dad. I wanted so badly to unleash the full force of my fury upon him, but all that would accomplish was more pain and suffering for Matt, so all I did was nod my head.
“I want her in one of the cells in the back—in isolation—and if she doesn’t like that, she can share a cell with the incubus.”
I had to concentrate all of my energy on not gagging, because I would rather be dead than get anywhere near that disgusting creature, and judging by the look on his face, he knew it.
The two men holding my arms in a death-grip began to pull me away, but I dug my heels in. “Wait! Please! I have one more question for you,” I said desperately.
He motioned for them to stop. “All right, but make it quick,” he said impatiently.
“Will you allow one of these vampires to heal the white unicorn?”
“Whatever for? It has proven quite useless; they all have. Their magic has to be given; it can’t be taken, and they haven’t been in much of a sharing mood lately, so if they die, it is no great loss,” he said coldly and turned his back on me.
The two men started to drag me away again and I panicked; Snowflake wouldn’t last the night without help, and I wasn’t even really sure if vampire blood would heal a unicorn anyway, but I had to at least try.
I’m not really sure where the words came from, but they were out of my mouth before I could stop them—surprising him almost as much as they did me.
“Then let me do it! Please?”
He froze, and slowly turned back around to face me. “You can do that?” he asked speculatively.
“I don’t know,” I answered honestly. “Why don’t you consider it your first experiment; can a half-vampire’s blood heal? Can it heal other creatures besides humans? It seems to me like that’s something you’d want to know.”
A loud sigh was my only response as he stood there studying me, but I could practically see the wheels turning in his head, and I knew that I’d won.
“Fine! Let her go!” he instructed his goons, and I cast a baleful look at them as I walked toward Snowflake’s cage.
The only problem now was embracing my inner vampire, which is a lot harder than it sounds. I don’t even know if I have fangs or not. The only vampiric trait I know I possess is coercion, but that isn’t going to help me now.
I reached my hand through the cold bars and he limped closer to nuzzle my hand. I closed my eyes and tried to figure out how to get my fangs to come out, but nothing happened, and I didn’t think I could bite through my wrist with my normal teeth.
I thought about asking for a knife to cut my wrist, but I knew David would never allow it. The only reason he had indulged my request was to see me get all fangy, and I was in serious danger of blowing it.
I don’t know exactly how long I stood there, but I finally opened my eyes and gazed into Snowflake’s sad blue ones. I wanted so badly to help him, but I just didn’t know how. “I’m so sorry,” I whispered to him as I finally broke down and cried into his mane.
A lot of things happened very quickly in the ne
xt few moments. I felt rough hands grab me and start dragging me away at about the same time that Snowflake collapsed. I struggled as I tried to get back to him, but my captors were just too strong.
“Please,” I sobbed. “Please let me stay with him.”
My cries were completely ignored by everyone but David. He looked at me with disappointment and anger. “You have done nothing but waste my time with your histrionics! And that—as well as your disobedience—will not go unpunished!”
“Take her to her cell, and then shoot the animal in the head!” he instructed his men.
I was startled by an animalistic growl, until I realized I was the one who’d made the sound. I somehow managed to break away from goon one and goon two as I backed toward Snowflake’s cell.
They advanced quickly toward me, and another low rumble vibrated in my throat. Pain shot through my jaws and my gums started to throb, but I wasn’t afraid; I was exhilarated. The coppery taste of blood filled my mouth and two sharp points poked my tongue, and I knew my fangs had finally burst forth.
I wanted so badly to rip their throats out, but there were too many of them and only one of me. If it weren’t for Matt and Snowflake I probably would’ve tried it anyway, but instead, I turned to David and said, “Call them off!”
“Stop!” he yelled. “Leave her be!”
I immediately turned and fell to my knees in front of Snowflake. I bit into my wrist without hesitation and pressed it against his muzzle. It felt like hours—but was probably only moments—before he started to respond. His breathing grew less labored, and the wound in his mane completely disappeared. His dull coat began to sparkle, and his eyes slowly fluttered open. He stood up and leaned down to nuzzle the top of my head, followed by a gentle blow that ruffled my hair.