by Lizzy Ford
I do not have time for that, she thought in frustration. She would have to walk in, assess everything from the layout of the corridors to hiding places, the responsiveness of the guards, the Hanover leader’s schedule, ideal places to stash her weapons, an escape plan …
The more she thought about all she had to do, the less hope she had at succeeding.
“One thing at a time,” she told herself at last. She would now know how futile her efforts would be, until she determined the layout of the corridors and whether or not she would be able to hide within them. Every other part of her plan would hinge upon those passageways existing, being accessible, and Tiana’s information being accurate. The most critical part of her plan was to survey the assassination location under the exact circumstances she would be in next Sunday, when it was time to execute the plan.
Aveline concentrated on using her ability to track heartbeats to find a way into the pyramid. She ignored the Shield members, who likewise paid no attention to a lowly slave.
The slave entrances were all busy. Disappointed, she chose the one nearest the private elevator leading to the top of the massive structure and braced herself to experience the pain of being around too many people. By the time she was ten feet in, her head was killing her. Aveline pushed herself onward. Rather than go straight up, she descended to the less traveled halls beneath the pyramid and stopped in a quiet hallway to breathe. The pounding lessened enough for her to refocus on where she was before she began to make her way through the hallways she had explored when bored.
She went to the laundry area and entered the steamy, hot bay where dozens of slaves labored over cleaning the clothing and linens of the elite. Wincing at the pain, Aveline took a more direct line to her destination than she would have normally. She pawed through several bins of dirty slave laundry before a flash of green caught her attention. Yanking the sash out that marked her as being a slave to the Hanover’s, she exited the busy laundry room quickly.
After another break to ground her senses again, she ventured from the maze under the pyramid onto the main floor. The moment she set foot on the main floor, the hammering at her mind began. She staggered and leaned against the wall, waiting for a group of elite kids to pass. When they had, Aveline trailed them at a distance towards the servants’ elevator.
She glanced towards the Hanover’s private lift as she passed it.
The Hanover leader was exiting his elevator, escorted by three Shield guards. He headed towards the center of the pyramid.
My luck is turning, Aveline thought. She took note of the time and gauged she had an hour, maybe two, before he would venture into the corridors, if Tiana were correct about him being there around midnight.
The kids peeled off from ahead of her, also heading towards the center of the pyramid. Aveline all but ran towards the private elevator that would take her to the Hanover’s private residences. She stepped in with another slave in green who eyed her before returning his attention to the linens he carried.
They left the ground floor, and Aveline breathed a sigh as the heartbeats of those people crowding the bottom of the pyramid faded. She sensed the two guards awaiting them long before the elevator stopped.
“You need help?” she asked the slave beside her.
“No, I –”
She grabbed half the stack of linens before he could finish. The slave glared at her. Aveline did not have the chance to assure him she was not trying to edge him out of his job before the doors opened.
The two guards outside the Hanover apartments regarded both of them closely before waving them past. Aveline released her breath, grateful they remembered her and that Tiana’s father had not thought to put out an alert for the guardian of his daughter. He most likely assumed she would be with Tiana in the forest.
Aveline handed the linens back to the other slave, who grumbled a curse at her, before entering the utility room where extra linens and other service items were kept.
Aveline headed towards Tiana’s old room, listening carefully for the heartbeat of anyone present. She heard no one and relaxed.
The door to Tiana’s old room was nailed shut.
Aveline studied it then her bear claw and rested it on the door. Her deformed hand was much larger than her normal one, and she hoped, stronger. She used the long nails to slide between the door and the frame, drew a deep breath, and wrenched the door open.
Nails popped out of place and landed with the tinkling sounds of metal on marble behind her.
Impressed by her own hand’s strength, Aveline collected the nails before she opened the door and entered Tiana’s quiet room.
It was even smaller than she recalled. She gazed around in distaste, remembering the weeks she spent there as well as the incident with Tiana and Matilda. The room had been scrubbed clean of even the smallest sign of blood from the incident. With the window boarded up again, it was dark, and Aveline turned on the light to the bathroom.
She went to the closet and opened the door.
Frowning, she looked over the wall where the entrance to the passageways had been. Wood boards over fresh concrete blocked off the passageway, and Aveline debated what to do. The passage had run around the cul de sac of the apartments, to Matilda’s former room and Arthur’s. She had explored its length once and did not recall any other entrance into the crawlspace.
Aveline touched the new wall. Breaking through it, or attempting to, could very well take a week and tools she had no idea how to sneak up to the Hanover’s apartments. The sound of destroying the wall alone would guarantee her discovery or capture.
A heartbeat reached her.
She left the closet and turned off the light, listening and waiting as it approached. It paused in the hallway outside the door before continuing into what she judged to be Tiana’s new room.
Aveline peeked out into the hall and saw Tiana’s door open. Satisfied it was a slave and not a guard, she closed the door and waited for the person to leave. A few minutes later, the person exited and retreated down the corridor leading to the personal quarters of the Hanover’s.
After another moment of debate, Aveline left Tiana’s old room and stood in the center of the hall. She had never been in Arthur’s room or in the Hanover leader’s quarters. Tiana’s passageways had run from her closet to Arthur’s room on one side and Matilda’s on the other. She said she heard her father move around beyond the corridor. Given the layout, it was logical to assume, if there were a second entrance into the hidden passage, it would be through the Hanover leader’s quarters.
Aveline went to his door and tried the knob. She was not surprised to find it locked. Unlike Tiana’s door, she would need a gentler approach than prying this one open with her bear claw. She pulled the lock pick kit, which had been part of the fancy weapons Arthur gave her. Within seconds, she had the door unlocked and pushed the door open.
Aveline stepped into the Hanover leader’s quarters, tense and ready to confront anyone lingering inside, even knowing no one was. She did not know what to expect of his quarters, but it was not to find the immaculate rooms to be normal. The décor was masculine and far more subdued than Matilda’s gilded chambers had been. The windows were opened, and the room smelled of a combination or roses and citrus cleaner.
Uncomfortable knowing whose room it was, Aveline gave it a cursory search before going to the wall where she suspected a passageway entrance would be. The Hanover leader’s quarters were smaller than Matilda’s with three separate rooms off the main living area and two bathrooms. The apartment floors were all padded with expensive rugs and the walls bedecked with drapes and antiquated paintings Aveline guessed were from the Old World.
In order for Tiana to hear someone on the other side of the wall, she would have had to have been parallel to Arthur’s room, which put the passageway at the end of the apartment away from the bedroom.
Unlike the other rooms, there was no window to provide light in the small area. Aveline turned on a light in the hallway and pushed th
e door open fully. She entered. The room had been turned into a museum or treasure room by the walls packed with paintings, domed glass over jewels and ancient books, and other trinkets and objects cluttering every inch of surface space available.
Ignoring everything, she concentrated on the wall neighboring Arthur’s quarters. She went to use two hands to explore, but her bear paw was too large to do what the fingertips on her other hand could. She traced the space between paintings with her fingers, searching for any sign of a hidden passageway: cracks in the wall, breezes where there should not be any, or anything else to give away the entrance.
Close to the corner of the wall this room shared with Arthur’s quarters, her fingers slid between two paintings – and kept going. She pushed farther, waiting to meet the wall but did not feel it.
Aveline wiggled her fingers to determine how much room she had then carefully slid her bear claws into the space.
“Don’t fall,” she told the paintings on either side. She wrapped her fingers and claws around the door behind the art displays and pulled.
It did not give. She shifted her hips to give her more leverage and tried again.
The door leading to the hidden corridor slid open to reveal darkness.
Thrilled to know Tiana was right, Aveline stepped through the entrance. A faint pattering against her skull reached her the moment she did. She pulled the door closed behind her, wary of being discovered by a slave. Confident the Hanover leader would not be returning until later, she stood still, waiting to see if any light source would become apparent.
None was, and she stretched her hands out straight in front of her, walking forward until she found the wall of the passage. She turned left, away from the direction where Tiana’s hidden corridor lay, and began to move slowly down the hall. Her hands trailed on either side of the passage. Without knowing what kind of flooring was installed, or if there were obstacles, she placed her feet carefully, one directly in front of the other.
She counted twenty feet before her toe hit something solid on its way down. Aveline used her foot to feel around before settling it on a stair. The heartbeat was becoming stronger, not fainter, and she paused on the bottom stair to read the senses she was not comfortable with yet. It was possible someone was in the Hanover leader’s room, whose wall she walked inside. But it felt like the heartbeat came from ahead of her, not the side or behind.
It was not Tiana’s father ahead of her; this much she knew. She did not fear meeting anyone else and planned on leaving before she stumbled upon a slave or anyone else.
Her pulse quickened, and she drew a knife, just in case she needed to threaten a slave. She took another step, then another and another. The stairwell was the same width of the passage – narrow enough for fingers to touch both walls when she held out her hands – and spiraled as it led her upward, into the steeple of the pyramid.
Someone was definitely ahead of her. Aveline continued, her senses listening for any sound the person had begun retreating down the stairs towards her. The devil’s blood inside her stirred with its eagerness for confrontation, and fur crept across her body.
The heartbeat remained where it was. Aveline crept forward, pausing at intervals to ensure the person had not moved, and she had time to escape if someone did.
The spiraling stairwell was dark and silent, aside from the brush of her boots against stone, until the curling of its ascent stopped. Light – candle or torchlight by its warmth – edged a door at the top of a straightaway directly ahead.
It was then she noticed the second heartbeat. It came from behind her – and was closing fast. She had been too focused on her destination, and the person ahead, to pay attention to what followed. The heartbeat that trailed her was strong and steady, and it struck her that the heart ahead of her seemed … weak, fluttering in comparison. Arrhythmic. It had not moved at all since she first sensed it.
Whoever was ahead of her was not … normal. She had not noticed the difference until she contrasted it with the normal heartbeat of the person climbing the stairwell behind her.
A shiver worked its way down her spine.
Uncertainty fluttered through her. She had not thought about why the passages exited or why Tiana’s father sneaked away from his guards and family weekly to enter them.
Who – or what – was secreted away at the top of the pyramid?
The unnerving sense of her bicep expanding in response to her emotions reminded her how important it was for her to remain in control. Aveline stretched and steadied her breathing, aware of the progress of whoever followed her. His heart remained slow, his step unhurried, as if he did not yet know she was present.
She searched the area around her before realizing that she faced only two options: straight ahead or back the way she came.
Aveline began to climb again on her tiptoes. With luck, the door ahead of her hid an apartment much like the others with multiple rooms. She would have a chance to hide before the person following discovered her.
What about whatever is ahead of me? She gripped her knife harder, unable to make sense of the unusual heartbeat awaiting her.
By the time she reached the door, every inch of the skin on her neck was engulfed with fur, and it had spread down her chest to her stomach. With another deep breath, Aveline opened the door a crack and peered through it.
Only one room appeared visible. A fire burned in a hearth opposite the door, and she smelled herbs. No one was present in her restricted view.
She pushed the door open more fully, eyes roving the area and knife ready to strike. This room was well lived in and consisted of two chairs, a small table, rugs, the hearth, and two wardrobes. A second room, which had been beyond her initial ability to see, branched off of the small space. Sweat popped out on her forehead and body. The air was heavy and hot, similar to the laundry rooms beneath the pyramid. But it was not just this that left her skin crawling and her devil’s blood agitated.
Charged energy. She felt like she was standing beside Tiana the day the Hanover girl killed Matilda. The sensation was thick enough, Aveline found herself shaking out her arms, as if she could push off the energy bombarding her.
The heartbeat behind her grew nearer.
Aveline closed the door behind her and looked for a place to hide.
Someone stirred from the other room. The heartbeat remained faint, fluttering, its rhythm unlike anyone else’s she had heard.
Did it belong to an animal? If so, why had she not noticed her horse’s heartbeat? Or the hearts of the rats infesting the inner city? She could think of no other explanation for what it was, or what else the Hanover leader hid in the attic of the pyramid.
After meeting the mad, if enigmatic Hanover leader, she did not think he would be hiding an animal up here. Whatever it was, he hid it here for a purpose.
Aveline inched forward rather than retreating to hide in a wardrobe, agitated by the energy and perplexed by what her newly awakened senses were picking up.
She reached the doorway of the second room and froze. Her mouth dropped open. How long she stood there, she did not know, until someone spoke from behind her.
“Little assassin. We meet again,” Tiana’s father said.
Before she could react to the words, Tiana’s father had touched her. Lightly. On her arm.
Hot energy shot through her, stirring and feeding her devil’s blood. Aveline staggered and dropped to her knees. Pain and power roiled and swelled within her. It was stronger than her, fed by Tiana’s father – and familiar.
As she writhed on the floor, Aveline recalled when she had first experienced it, the day she arrived to the Native’s village. The day she could not remember.
“Why is my daughter’s protector here without her?” the Hanover leader mused. He stood above her, relaxed, with his arms folded across his chest. “You are both eighteen this night. Congratulations. You made it.”
Aveline fought to control the instinct to transform, triggered by the Hanover magic. She convulsed, b
ewildered by the sensitive senses of an animal that were overtaking hers.
“I cannot have you talking about what you found.” Tiana’s father said with a glance into the room. “But I cannot kill you, either.” He leaned down and touched Aveline again. “It is said killing a skinwalker brings years of bad luck upon someone.” His amused smile chilled her to her core. His charged energy shot straight through her again. Her devil’s blood roared to life, destroying her attempts to control it.
“Find my daughter. Return her to me,” he ordered quietly. “Quickly.”
Aveline’s clothing ripped. Fur raced across her body, while her muscles bulged and expanded to several times their normal sizes. The necklace bit into her neck without snapping. The transformation was agony. Her body tore itself apart slowly only to begin rebuilding seconds later. Her scream turned into a roar, and her hot tears dripped down the long muzzle that replaced her nose.
She screamed until her throat was raw.
The Hanover leader’s words pummeled her brain, searing themselves into her mind. The compulsion to obey was as strong as the instinct to attack him. For several moments, as she transformed, the conflicting urges warred within her – his will against hers. Finally, her body ceased bucking and changing and went still. The image of Tiana was forefront in her mind, and the desire to fight fell away.
Aveline hauled herself to her feet. Her animal senses and human senses clashed, rendered her surroundings a blur of color, smells and sounds she could not fully make out.
“Go. Now,” Tiana’s father commanded her.
A whisper crossed her mind, a memory, a reason why she should resist.
It was swallowed up by animal instinct and the compulsion to obey, fueled by the Hanover magic corrupting her devil’s blood. Aveline turned and barreled away, out of the room, and into the dark stairwell.
“Run, assassin!” the Hanover leader shouted after her.
Chapter Thirty-Three
The night before, Arthur’s dreams had consisted of the vision of his father destroying the city. Over and over, until he could feel the ground beneath his feet tremble each time the city collapsed.