Chapter 2

CHAPTER2

At first it was legit medical experimentation. Gallus is a multitalented torturer, after all. He does have some modicum of medical knowledge. He spent the first days of my captivity trying to find out what had already changed within me from Semyon’s injection, and what needed to be done to complete the transformation but with an edge of advantage for the Shadow Realm. I was sicker then, so I lucked out in a way. I don’t remember some of the incisions and blood draws and injections of random-ass shit. I was too busy seizing or passing out, or occasionally vomiting, which I tried to aim at Gallus but usually missed. Usually.

But for every moment that was hazy or dark, there are many more that are bright with glass-like clarity. There has been pain beyond measure. Loss beyond fathom. Rage beyond the fiercest, burning fire. And helplessness, bitter helplessness that has filled every crevice left behind by everything that’s been stolen.

Ember looked on those first few days with a gleam of delight in her eyes. She played nurse to my deranged doctor, passing him scalpels, subduing my limbs with silver shackles. With illness and rapidly waning strength, it’s not like I could fend her off. I did manage to spit in her face once, which was awesome as it was both bloody and stinking since they refuse to even give me a fucking toothbrush. She was not as delighted as I was.

Since they haven’t found anything in me that’s told them what their next steps should be, they started asking me questions, trying to ‘motivate’ me with pain. Maybe they should have thought of asking questions in return for… I dunno… blood. Or clean clothes. Or a hot shower. I might have answered them. Maybe. It’s not like I have much to tell them anyway. I don’t know what was in the witch serum, I don’t know what they were going to inject me with next back in Semyon’s lab. But I’m sure as shit not going to tell them a shred of anything that might help their cause now.

But now, there are no more questions. Ember never shows up to watch anymore. I think even she is too disgusted by my daily sessions here. It’s only me and Gallus. It’s only punishment for my crime. Maybe they think I’m a broken weapon that can’t be salvaged. Maybe they’re just messing around until they find some way to complete my transformation, having their fun while they figure it out. It seems they only keep me alive to put me through this, day after day. And I think they will keep going until the end of time, just like the human myths of hell.

Ediye’s words from the first night I met Ashen ring in my mind as Gallus pries one of my fingernails free of my flesh with a pointed wooden skewer.

It will be a reaping worse than death.

She got that right.

We spend the next hour or so playing this little game, Gallus pulling nails, prying them off with sharpened wooden sticks that leave splinters in their wake, me screaming without sound, my heart breaking. Honestly, I think that’s the worst part. That’s what makes me cry the hardest. No matter how bad it hurts when he’s finally removed the last of my nails, all my fingers and toes bloody and throbbing, my heart hurts even more. It feels bitten with burning venom. It’s so hot with rage and loss and sorrow, so nearly void of any light.

The guards drag me back to our cell when Gallus is done with me. Dirt from the damp stone floor rubs into my raw toes where the nails should be and I try not to cry with the pain. I don’t want Ediye to see my despair as we draw close. I look up at the door and I can see her hands wrapped around the bars.

Ediye backs away as the guards open the lock and fling me inside the cell. I land hard on my side where recently cracked ribs still haven’t healed. I grip my torso with throbbing fingers and roll to my back. The lock clinks shut behind me and Ediye rushes to my side.

I can’t catch a break. Get it? I sign with a weak smile. Ediye’s not looking at my face though. Her eyes well with tears, her gaze caught on my bloody fingers.

“Oh my darling,” she whispers as she takes my hand and examines my fingertips. Her lips tremble. The smile crumbles from my face and I take a deep breath. My own lashes are wet and my eyes sting.

You have to stop fixing me,I sign.

“No.”

STOP, Ediye. Please.

Ediye shakes her head. Tears crest the boundaries of her eyes and coast across her ebony skin. “No, Lu. You have survived much worse. You’ve been burned to a lump of charcoal. You’ve had your voice stripped away. You’ve lived past that weird shapeshifter serum. You’ve made it through all that, and you will survive this too. I can fix you.”

How are you going to fix this, Ediye? I ask, showing her one of my fingernails I managed to swipe from the floor when Gallus released my shackles and pushed me off the exam table. I’m not sure what finger it belongs to, but I press it to the angry, bloody nail bed of my index finger anyway. It fucking hurts. Ediye grimaces as she watches it slide in the blood and sebum to fall onto the floor. If I was a healthy vampire, I’d already be healing. But that doesn’t happen anymore.

Even if you could, I don’t want you to fix me anymore. I give her a long and weighty look. She leans in to hug me and I hold my breath, my throat burning hotter than ever with her closeness. I’m convinced this is part of my torture. The Reapers must be hoping I’ll cave and eat my best friend out of sheer desperation. Then I would be truly finished. My soul would be broken, and I would never recover.

But I am not going to let that happen.

I pull away and struggle to stand, Ediye hauling me up by my elbow and leading me to the bed. I feel scraped out, like a pumpkin at Halloween. I’m not sure if I’m the grotesque husk or the mess that’s left behind to rot.

“Please. Please let me give you some of my blood,” Ediye begs, dampening her smelly rag in the stainless-steel sink and returning to the bed to wipe the sweat from my forehead.

No.

“I know you can stop. I trust you.”

You shouldn’t. I don’t trust myself, Ediye. And there’s no point anyway. It’s only prolonging the inevitable.

Ediye lets out a slow, heavy breath. Deep down, she knows I’m right. We’ve had versions of this argument twenty-nine times now, and every time we’ve come to this same conclusion. She trusts me. I don’t. I won’t drink. We are doomed.

Only now, I’m prepared to do something about it.

Not that I say that, though. I don’t think I need to anyway. Ediye looks worried, more worried than usual. I give her a half-smile, keeping it as lighthearted as I can manage. She totally sees through it.

“What?” Ediye says, suspicion weighing her voice down by several notes.

Nothing, I sign.

“That’s not your nothing face.”

Sing it for me and this can be my nothing face.

“Noooooooo.”

Look at my hideous fingers, I sign with a pout, turning my nail-less nubs toward her and twinkling them like jazz hands. Sing it for my sad little fingers.

Ediye grimaces, glancing at my hands before training her eyes to mine. “They are pretty awful.”

Sad little pinky,I sign before waving one of my little fingers in her face. You won’t really deny naked pinky, will you? He’s missing his hat. Only your song will cheer him up.

“Ugh fine,” she says, rolling her eyes. A hint of a smile casts a fleeting light across her lips. “But I’m only doing it for naked pinky.”

I beam at Ediye and lie down with my head in her lap. She strokes my hair from my face and smiles down at me, but there’s so much sadness there. Her eyes are glassy. I think she understands. These are our final days, our last hours. There’s nothing left to hope for now, other than to spend our last moments together.

“When I was young, I never needed anyone, and making love was just for fun. Those days are gone...”

I close my eyes. I fall asleep, exhausted, broken. And this time I dream of nothing at all.

I hear hushed voices and I drag my eyes open. My head is clutched in Ediye’s lap. Her arms draw me close, like she might shelter me in their shadow.

“I will need to take samples,” an unfamiliar man says. It’s a human. The smell of him makes my throat raw with fire. He’s older, judging by the timbre of his voice. The accent is familiar. Swiss, I think. He sounds nervous and out of place. Aren’t we all.

“We will provide what you need,” a guard says.

I peer through the shelter of Ediye’s arms and look toward the door. The guards flank a small man who must be in his sixties. He pushes silver-rimmed glasses up his nose as he regards me with a look of both pity and disgust, thinly veiled beneath a mask of fear and medical professionalism. He runs a hand over the shining surface of his bald head and then turns to one of the guards.

“Take me to the lab,” the man says, and the guard nods. A scientist then. How fun.

The three leave down the hall, and my heart collapses in stuttering beats beneath my bones.

“What the fuck is going on?” Ediye whispers, releasing her grip on my head so she can watch for my reply.

More experiments, I guess, I sign. I don’t think we’ll have to wait long to find out.

We sit for a while in silence, listening for any sounds down the corridor of boots or keys or voices. I watch Ediye as she keeps her eyes on the bars of our cage. The obsidian necklace tied across her skin has started to rub it raw with its magic. Blisters carve an angry line around the glowing beads. But Ediye has never once complained.

When she finally looks down at me, I give her a smile and choke down the emotion in my throat with a thick swallow.

I love you, Ediye, I sign.

“Shut up,” she says. I can see the tears already glassing her eyes. I don’t think I can bear to see her cry again. I force my smile to grow wider. But with a single sound, it’s yanked from my skin.

A clank at the end of the hall.

There are two pairs of boots down the corridor. The jangle of keys echoes on the stone walls.

My heart claws its way up my throat and I swallow it down as I meet Ediye’s eyes. Her onyx gaze fills with sorrow, replacing the light that was there just a moment ago.

See you soon, I sign before clasping her in a tight hug. Her shoulders start to shake within my grasp.

“I hope so, love,” Ediye whispers, gripping tighter as the key slides into the lock and the iron door squeals in protest. A hand clamps like a vice around the back of my neck and wrenches me out of Ediye’s arms. She lets out a strangled cry and grasps onto my grimy, bloody sleeves. The guard kicks her away and she lands on her back, her helpless expression turned up at me. I look at her face one last time, her brow crinkled in despair, tears streaking across her dark skin in glistening layers.

It’s okay, I try to say, but not even a squeak comes out as the guards drag me from the cage. Motherfucking Reapers. I should have stuck to my plan. I should have burned this whole place to the ground, somehow. Fucking idiot. Everything I said I wouldn’t do, I did. Everything I said I would do, I didn’t. And now I’m fucked. Worst of all, I’ve screwed my best friend over too. That thought overwhelms me every time it creeps into my brain, which is often. I try to push it down but I can’t, and the tears flood my eyes as I say I’m sorry, over and over without sound. My bloodied toes scrape the floor as I try to right myself. I don’t want Ediye to see me like this. But I’m powerless to stop it.

Ediye calls my name as the door slams shut behind me. She scuttles to the bars and my last sight of her is her hands wrapped around the iron. The last thing I hear is her calling my name.