“What’s your name?” Stalwart’s gruff voice asked from behind me, even though Eran’s brisk pace was rapidly reaching mine.
“Eran…Talor.”
“You took that well, Eran,” Stalwart noted.
“Air transport doesn’t bother me,” he stated impassively. “What does is that I don’t know the layout of this house. Anyone want to fill me in?” He came into view at my side then, so I figured it was up to me to answer.
“There is a parlor off to the right, a set of stairs to the second floor in the entryway, and a basement below the structure. Wish I had more details, but I haven’t been past the parlor.”
Eran gave me a fleeting look. “If that’s as far as you’ve gone, how do you know there’s a basement?”
My response was flat, wanting to end the questioning so I could focus entirely on the house, and any potential risk that might suddenly emerge from it. “Because that’s where Jocelyn and Maggie are being held.”
On that assertion, neither of us bothered to slow our pace. At the door, my foot landed just to the left of the handle, and its accompanying thrust opened it, spraying wood splinters into the house. I expected there to be at least one Vire waiting on the opposite side. There wasn’t. Instead, we were met only with a dark, vacant foyer.
Eran entered first, stopping just inside for a look around. The lights were off, and it was silent. Even the grandfather clock in the parlor had ceased its ticking. “Is this house unoccupied?”
“No,” Stalwart and I answered, both of us grumbling at the realization that we should have met some resistance by now.
Again, I got the feeling we were being led into a trap. This scenario brought me back to the first time I visited Lacinda’s house. We hadn’t faced any opposition then either, not until the end, when it suited The Sevens best.
Eran sensed something was wrong too because his arm flew backward, fingers extended. “My sword,” he said in reference to the weapon one of Stalwart’s men had picked up after Eran’s wrists were bound. “Now.”
The man waited for Stalwart’s approval, and handed the sword to Eran. This spooked the other one who muttered something that sounded like the beginning of a cast, “Eye of bat, tongue of cat…”
Eran and I didn’t wait for him to finish.
“Stairs,” he said.
“I was thinking the same thing,” I replied.
We went in search of them, any flight that would take us down, not up. The rooms of Lacinda’s first floor were empty of furniture and lacked any sign of descending stairs. They were also silent, each consecutive one unsettling me more as the lack of Vires caused me to wonder what in the hell was going on here.
A possession as priceless as Jocelyn wouldn’t be left unguarded.
Having now come full circle, we ended our search back in the entryway.
“Maybe they moved them,” suggested one of Stalwart’s men.
“Yeah,” said the other one, “yeah, maybe they learned you escaped and, for caution’s sake, transferred them to another location.”
“That’s possible,” I said, “but it doesn’t feel right.”
Eran shook his head, perplexed. “No, it doesn’t. I feel… Magdalene is close by.”
The first one who spoke snickered. “You say you feel-”
“Shh,” Eran snapped.
This was good because if Eran hadn’t quieted him I would have done it. What Eran honed in on was the same thing I’d picked up on right before Eran shut him up. It was faint, but distinguishable.
“You talking about the whistle?” asked Stalwart.
“Yes,” stated Eran, both of us approaching it simultaneously. “I am.”
I held out my hand in search of the breeze squeezing through the opening in the wall, while Eran began pushing against the panel. As he moved farther left, the wall gradually swung open, making a quiet scraping noise and revealing the hidden staircase behind it. More importantly, the walls were made of chiseled rock and glistened with water.
The staircase spiraled downward for a good fifty feet until reaching a dark hallway where yellow light flickered from the sliver below the door at the end. We opened it to find three cages lining the back wall, the cell bars made of rock.
I didn’t recognize the woman in the first cage. A passing evaluation of her told me only that she was dark-skinned and elderly. She stayed directly in the center, unmoving, ready and suspicious. The next cage held Maggie Tanner, who immediately leapt toward us, her hands wrapping around the bars that held her in. Her eyes were eager, harboring the same intensity Eran had when it was clear he was thinking of her. The last person who came into my view was Jocelyn.
I crossed the room before my mind knew what my body was doing. She reached out to me, her arms coming through the bars that kept her trapped. Then I felt her chilled body against me, and her struggle to hold on through the cool bars separating us. The dress she still wore from earlier left her arms bare, leaving her exposed to the cold, which made infuriated me. That feeling only grew as she trembled against me.
I tore the black shirt – a standard issuance of the Vire uniform – off me and pulled it around her. The cavern air hit me, and only made me more vengeful toward Lacinda for leaving Jocelyn under-dressed. Jocelyn didn’t seem to mind any longer, though, as her eyes settled on my chest.
She cleared her thoughts with a few blinks and then said, “How…” She paused, seeming to struggle with the fact that I was standing here. “How did you find us?”
“The water,” I said, my gaze flickering to the shiny walls behind her. “Seepage from the ocean waves….”
One side of her lips rose in a half-smile. “On the stage…in Mexico…” She laughed through her charming little nose. “I should have known what you were doing.”
“Yes,” I chastised, teasing. “You should have.”
She smiled to herself and muttered, “Memories can be potent.”
“Especially when they concern a prison cell,” I added. “It’s time to get you out of here.”
I kissed her, delicately, intending it to be swift, but my need for her brought on an abrupt surge, pressing my lips momentarily harder against hers. But it seemed to leave her happily stunned.
I pulled away with a deep sigh, partly because I didn’t want to let her go and partly because this was where my plan ended. I knew she would be enclosed in a cage, but I didn’t know where to find the key.
“How dense are these bars?” I asked out loud, taking hold of one to feel the stiffness against my grip.
“Dense,” the firm voice of a woman answered. It came from the first cell, closest to the door, the one holding the woman I’d never seen before.
She pointed to a bar that she had dented while chipping away at it. “This took me five years, and I don’t think we have that much time.”
I stopped to evaluate her, which she openly acknowledged by standing her ground and doing the same back. Her confidence was admirable. It couldn’t be easy living as a spectacle in the confines of a cage. And I was certain that was how Lacinda treated them. Pets to be toyed with, manipulated for entertainment.
“So you’re Kalisha?”
Her eyes widened, slightly, but she didn’t shift from her rigid pose. “If you know who I am, then you know what I was?”
“Yes, I’m aware you were a Vire.”
Stalwart and the two men behind him darted their eyes in her direction.
“Then you’ll be leaving me here,” she said as if this were a foregone conclusion.
“No, Kalisha,” I replied, and summed up the offensiveness of her assumption by adding, “We aren’t The Sevens.” I took a step back to assess the cells further. “But you’re right about one thing…we don’t have five years to chisel you out. We’ll need to think of something else.”
Eran followed my footsteps, doing his own review of the cells. “Damn stone,” he muttered with a shake of his head. “If they had left just one piece metal….”
One of Stalwart’
s men snickered. “And that would have made it any easier?”
“Yes,” replied Eran, flatly, irritated at having to answer.
Maggie, in support of her boyfriend, mentioned, “Eran has a way with metal.”
Expressions of curiosity rose around the room, but we didn’t address the oddity of her statement. There was a more important issue at hand. Unfortunately, with my back to the door, I didn’t see it coming.
“You can stop your pondering,” Lacinda suggested, her tone thick with sarcasm. “You’ll find no way in.”
My immediate reaction was to groan in annoyance.
Turning, I found her entering the room with an air of authority, dressed in some kind of gown, the usual kind…flimsy, and nearly translucent. She had on earrings that dangled to her shoulders, blue to match her dress. It was obvious to anyone with eyes that she had put some thought into her appearance tonight.
Her eyes scanned the room, narrowing slightly at Jocelyn, before landing on me. “Nobilisss…,” she said with her traditional hiss at the end. “You’ve come to save your woman in a daring escape? How very…noble…of you.”
I wondered if she knew how ridiculous she sounded.
“You two know each other?” Eran interrupted, casually.
Lacinda’s head snapped in his direction, her face stiffening as she barked. “Silence him.”
The command initially made no sense. She had entered the room alone. And there was no one but her interested in shutting Eran up. Then the feeling that we were entering a trap returned full force, as Stalwart’s men moved to seize Eran’s arms.
Stalwart did his part also, by bringing a blade to Eran’s throat.
“NO!” Maggie screamed and launched herself at them only to be stopped by her cage.
Disturbingly, the bars remained steady. Maggie’s frame was small, but her lurch didn’t result in even a slight quiver through the bars.
Eran, to his credit, didn’t seem concerned about the knife at his neck. He kept his gaze on Lacinda, and I sensed it was because he believed, as I did, that she was the key to opening the cage doors.
Regardless, the distance between Stalwart and me was too far. He’d slit Eran’s throat before I made it two steps in his direction.
“Traitor,” I muttered, although my depiction of him had no effect. Stalwart kept his attention on Lacinda.
She noted our interaction and drew in a sharp breath before giggling. “Oh, you mean, you thought he would assist you? Oh, Nobilisss…. Now that must be upsetting.”
She leisurely strolled to me and placed one of her hands on my chest. Her head tilted upward, attempting to meet my eyes, which were positioned on the wall behind her.
“Such rampant testosterone in this room,” she whispered. “Each of you men expels it with such vigor.” She leaned in to purr a sigh, even as I turned my head away. “Mmmmmmmm, I can almost feel it coming from you.”
Something touched my throat below my chin and I jerked back, taking a step to add distance. Only after I searched for what it was, and saw the fury in Jocelyn’s expression, did I know Lacinda had placed her lips on me.
And I understood the purpose of it instantly. We were in her den, this was her game, and she was going to use it to her advantage.
She clucked her tongue at me. “Nobilisss, so sensitive…. Such a virile man can’t have issues when a woman gives him a kissssss.”
“He can when you are the woman,” I claimed, which sent her confident expression plummeting.
“You honestly don’t see how good we can be for each other, do you? No vision of how the two of us can reign over our world, together, the Surveyor and the Nobilisss.”
“The Sevens reign over our world, Lacinda, or has the weight of your earrings somehow blocked the blood flow to your brain?”
Her fingers rose to toy with them, their sparkle catching in the reflected light from the flickering torch above Jocelyn’s cell. “You like them? They’re made of my family stone.” Before I could deny her a compliment, she continued. “I saw you coming…tried to veer you away, make you second guess your conclusions on where Jocelyn might be hidden. But you had to find her, didn’t you, Nobilisss? Because you are that good. Oh, give in to me…,” she pleaded, tilting her lips at me. “We are so strong together. Give in to me….”
I groaned in disgust, my upper lip lifting before I had any control over it.
Those were the very words I had once used to convince Jocelyn of my love for her. It sickened me to hear this woman apply them to the two of us.
“Jocelyn and I were meant to be together.”
“Oh,” she said and exhaled loudly in apparent disgust. “Who says? Some ridiculous, old piece of parchment paper? You know better than to believe in a destiny that isn’t driven by your desires.”
I swiveled my head to lock eyes with Jocelyn. “She is what drives my destiny, Lacinda, because she is all I desire.”
The tension in the room rose several degrees, entirely caused by Lacinda. Her fingers came to my cheek, only to be blocked by my hand. She used what leverage remained, her fingertips being the only part able to move, and pressed my head back in her direction.
“Lacinda,” I said carefully. “You believe in the records as much as I do. I’m tired of playing your game. You’ll need to open the cells now.”
“No,” she sighed, wistfully. “That’s not going to happen. I’ll tell you what will. You’ll release me, we’ll go upstairs, and we’ll plan our rise to power.”
“You are delusional.”
Disregarding me, she continued, her tone darkening with each word. “Your friend here, the one with the blade to his neck, will find it slit across his throat, and Stalwart will return with his men to the Ministry where he will inform Sartorius that your precious Jocelyn has died in the midst of the conflict to apprehend him.”
“Which would be false. And you, being the Surveyor, are fully aware of the consequences you’ll face for lying to The Sevens.”
She paid no attention to my warning, instead uttering her own threat in response. “No, Jameson. That part of the message, the one about Jocelyn’s life, will be entirely true.”
Impulsively, my hand flew to Lacinda’s neck, squeezing, making indentations deep enough that she was forced to lift her chin. My fingers tightened, and I felt something shift beneath her skin.
Bones.
Yanking her toward me in a motion that sent her hair flying forward, my demand came out as a snarl, “Release her or you die.”
Stalwart made a move toward me, but I stopped him.
“Any closer and Lacinda’s neck gets crushed. And I doubt Jocelyn will be much in the mood for healing the one who imprisoned her.”
The truth in my words being starkly evident, he remained in place.
“Now your men will step away from Eran, and you will follow them to the wall, where you will turn and face it.”
Stalwart motioned for his men to listen to my order and each of them retreated to the door.
“That’s far enough.”
As this took place, Lacinda became increasingly agitated. I thought, at first, it was because she was losing her grip on the situation. Her prisoners were about to be freed. It was her attempt to scream at me that cleared up that belief.
Her voice emerged hoarsely; fighting its way past the pressure of my fingers. “She’s going to kill you! That is her destiny! Let me end her and prevent it from happening!” she pleaded. “Let me take her life to save yours!”
I responded with a roar, which left my hand around her neck precariously shaking her head. It wasn’t intentional, but it did shut her up. I then laid out the reality of her situation clearly so there could be no confusion left. “Listen closely, Lacinda, because your life depends on it. If Jocelyn is harmed by you or by your orders, I will stalk you, biding my time until you least expect it. When your guard is down and no one is around to protect you, I will take you away from all that you know to be safe and true, and I will, with slow, agonizing preci
sion, take your life. The methods I will use won’t be pretty. I won’t spare you, not for a second, no matter the length or depth of your screams. Are you hearing me, Lacinda? Do you understand the warning I am giving you? Because if you don’t I will use on you the skills I learned at the hands of Theleo Alesius.” I suspended my threat long enough for her to recognize the name of our world’s most notorious Vire. “I love Jocelyn. She is the air I breathe, the force that causes my heart to beat, the incentive for the blood to flow through my veins. She is the reason I exist at all. Regardless of your political aspirations, disturbed sense of lust, or for whatever reason you have used to convince yourself that you and I were meant for each other, you will abide me, or you will find yourself dead.”
The silence blanketing the room was deafening. I could actually hear Lacinda’s pulse quickening as my warning sunk in.
Sensing the truth in what I was telling her, she nodded, her wide eyes never leaving mine until they closed and she began to concentrate.
“Lapis terrae vis hominum aperit portam, ita ut iusserit.”
My years of Latin instantly translated her words into what she meant: Stone of earth, power of men, open this gate, as I so command.
Instantly, one side of each cell slowly swung open, and Lacinda’s prisoners slipped through the opening before the bars had time to stop.
Jocelyn rushed to my side but stopped short of touching me. Instead, she stared, waiting for my next move. It came swiftly, completely unanticipated by me…or the recipient of it.
The rage in me surfaced like a tidal wave, suffocating all logic, blinding me. My reaction was impulsive, driven by a maddening desire to inflict insufferable pain on Lacinda for hurting the one I love. And so I flung her in the opposite direction of the cells, sending her as far from Jocelyn as possible, where she ended up with a slap against the wall, and collapsed at Stalwart’s feet.
Lacinda released a whimper but didn’t move.
Instantly, my hands were on Jocelyn’s cheeks, evaluating her, inspecting her for any sign of injury or retaliation she might have incurred since the few minutes we had on the stage, anything that might overpower her ability to heal herself.
Prophecy (Residue Series #4) Page 5