Chapter 33

Rosabel La Rouge

It took a while for things to spring back into existence again—for my senses, that is. I was never really knocked out, always conscious through it all—through the reappearance of the room, the half-ruined ceiling, the walls that were white and motionless, the doors that didn’t exist, the table and chairs and piano in pieces, the people covered in dust and broken concrete.

It took a while to realize that a thick piece of it, from the ceiling or the walls, had fallen on my leg, too—the same one Hakim had stabbed—and longer still to wiggle it free a little at a time.

I could move, which was the first surprise.

My bracelet was still around my wrist—the second.

But nothing surprised me more than when I sat up, only barely, and I found a black hole where the Devil’s cell used to be.

No more shimmery veil of magic—or screen as Aurelia had called it. No more view of the prison cell where that man— Alejandro Amizz —had watched us, had played puppet master with us until he couldn’t anymore.

No more anything—just a hole in the dirt, and it was falling. Big chunks of it were falling all over, and more concrete pieces were falling from the ceiling on this side of the room, too, and I needed to get out of here.

Goddess, I needed to get out of here right now.

The problem was that my leg was a mess, and I didn’t really want to test the other. When I saw a naked arm attached to a bloody shoulder underneath a huge piece of concrete that had fallen from the ceiling, I really didn’t need to do anything other than crawl.

Crawl all the way to him, as fast as I could. Push away the debris and make it to the other side of these huge holes that had simply appeared all over the floor and get to him—as fast as I could.

And when I did, I was crying, but that didn’t mean I stopped. I was crying and I was sitting up and I was pushing that piece of concrete off him with all my strength.

I couldn’t tell you for how long I pushed, but eventually I saw most of Taland’s back where he lay face first on the floor, and I saw that he was breathing. If it took me a year or ten or a single second, I got that piece of concrete off him and I pushed him on his back and I called out his name. Over and over and over, I touched him and kissed him and begged him to open his eyes, until he did.

Screw the Iris Roe— this was the most terrified I’d ever been in my life. To see him lying there, powerless, weak, barely breathing. To see him struggling to open his eyes and manage to do so only halfway.

Taland was trying to tell me something, but all I wanted was for him to stand up. Forget the wound on my thigh. Forget that Hill might still be here somewhere or that the Devil might return. Forget everything and just take him out of here, and then I’d be back. By the goddess, I’d be back for everyone else—and to make sure that the Devil remained where he belonged and that Hill didn’t get to escape this room at all. I would be back.

But not without making sure that Taland was out of here first.

My jaws were almost locked completely while I chanted a healing spell for him just to get him to start moving. The magic that left me, even through the bracelet, was minimal. Weak.

I’d exhausted it—and my body—completely, and so Taland had to wait for someone else to spell him properly when we got out.

“Can you stand?” I managed to ask him.

And he said, “ Run, run, run …”

I didn’t waste energy arguing. “Can you stand, Taland?”

He nodded. I grabbed his face and I looked in his eyes. He was struggling to keep his focus on me. I had no idea where he was hurt, if his bones were broken and his skin cut, but it didn’t matter. If I looked now, I’d just panic, and I didn’t want to panic, not while we were here.

So, I said, “I’m going to get you out of here, Taland. Please, stand up and lean on me.”

I said this even before I knew that I could stand. My leg was a mess and my energy minimal, but the thought of Taland dying here gave me all the strength I needed.

I stood up. I pulled him up with me. He was so much heavier than I’d ever realized when I put his arm around my shoulders and dragged him forward.

So heavy.

Sweat on my brow. Goddess help me, I prayed, and I looked around the ruined room, and I saw them—Aurelia and Hakim and Bes—I saw them lying on the floor, covered by debris. I promised them I’d be back and I planned to keep that promise, but that was before I managed to get us all the way to the door that wasn’t there anymore, that the siblings had blown off its hinges when they first came here.

I promised them before I realized that there was a chance I wouldn’t even make it out of the building with Taland because the stairs were ruined, and the floors were full of holes and the walls were dented in, like the entire house had been shaken to its foundation, not just that room.

“Please, don’t stop,” I begged myself and I begged Taland as we went.

“I…” he said, and he tried, he really did. He tried to carry his whole weight, but he couldn’t. He simply couldn’t.

Eventually, when we were almost all the way to the top of the ruined stairs, crawling and hopping and holding onto the walls, he said, “I love you, Rosabel.”

It was unexpected, and for a moment there, it was almost like he was saying goodbye. That did make me panic. I couldn’t help it—I fucking panicked.

I pushed him against the wall and grabbed his face, and I told him, “Don’t you dare. Tell me that when we’re out of here.” Because if he thought this was the end of us, he was wrong. He had to be.

He attempted to smile, Taland. Looked down at my lips. Raised his hand, rested it over mine for a moment, then slowly reached out his finger to tap me on the nose.

My heart broke.

“You are the colors that paint my world, sweetness.”

More tears sprung out of my eyes. I was barely standing but I still had enough energy to cry.

“Stop talking,” I told Taland. “And tell me everything when we’re out there.”

“We—”

“ No,” I said. “ Don’t. Speak. ”

Putting his arm around my shoulders again, I took us forward, even though the pain that shot up my body through my wounded leg made me wish I could let go.

Never, though. I had my hand around Taland’s wrist and the other arm around his waist, and I was not going to let go until I passed out.

Such a long way outside.

It felt like months and years before we made it into the hallway, before there were windows, broken, that let in a bit of light from the sun that could have been setting already.

Bodies all over the floor—the same people that I’d seen in the house when coming in.

The house that was mostly in ruins, the walls groaning and the floors shaking every now and again, as if to say that they were almost— almost falling apart completely.

By then, I didn’t think about making it out or going back or if Taland would get a healing spell in time. I didn’t think about anything but the next step. The next hole in the floor, the next piece of concrete we had to move around to get to that door.

That fucking door that must have been moving away from us on purpose.

Eventually, though, we found it. It was broken right through the middle, and two men were lying in front of it on their stomachs. They were breathing, I thought, though I didn’t look too hard. Goddess help me, I walked right over them and took Taland with because there was nowhere to go and we wouldn’t make it if I tried to push them away. I simply didn’t have the energy, so we stepped on their backs and to the other side, and right through the half-broken door.

The air outside was lighter.

Almost, I thought I said, but I couldn’t really hear my own voice.

Almost, Taland, almost…

We were moving—that’s what mattered. And I didn’t think about the fact that there would be a whole neighborhood to get out of before we found the car—like I said, my attention was on the next step, and I blinked my eyes to clear the view of our surroundings, to see where we were headed, to see the fastest way out.

What I saw shocked me all over again.

Holes in the ground like someone had broken it for real. The yard all around the house was cracked in too many places to count, and people, at least five that I saw, were unconscious, spread all over the place like fucking decorations.

What the hell, what the hell, what the hell , I thought, but the daylight had begun to fade as the sun set further behind the horizon, and I needed to get us out before the dark claimed the sky completely.

Taland called my name whenever he could gather energy, and I said his whenever I had enough of mine, but that’s all we said. That’s all we could say, but somehow it was enough.

Halfway to the fence gate, I noticed movement ahead. I noticed a dark figure that was coming toward us, and I panicked. Goddess, I panicked so badly because I knew that this entire place belonged to the Devil, and whoever found us first, they were going to kill us. They were going to ask what we did, how this whole mess happened, and then they’d kill us because neither me nor Taland could lift a finger to stop them.

Please, please, please don’t…

“By the goddess.”

A deep, thick voice, one I recognized.

I’d have screamed if I could, but the best I could do was blink my eyes until the face of Radock Tivoux became half-clear in front of me.

My chest must have exploded, or maybe my heart just burst inside my ribcage. That’s what it felt like to me to recognize him

“H-h-help him,” I managed because Radock hated my guts, but Taland was still his brother. His little brother who had betrayed him—for me —but still his brother.

“Please,” I said, and my voice sounded so strange.

Radock was still right there, coming closer, brows narrowed, that beautiful face of his pale as a sheet. His hand was on my shoulder and he was looking down at me when he could see that Taland was there—right there.

“ Please, ” I said again, and to my horror, Taland’s body gave up right then, and I wasn’t strong enough to carry all of him on my own. I wasn’t strong enough, so I hit the ground on my knees, too.

“Help him,” I repeated, and in my mind I said it another ten times. Help him, help him, help him, please…

Goddess, I was dying.

“Let go,” Radock said, and he must have said it a few times before the words made sense to me.

I blinked those damn tears away—didn’t they know that I could hardly see without them as it was?!

“I got him,” Radock said, and he was no longer touching me.

More people around us—could they see us there? Would they let Radock take Taland away?

Please, please, please…

“Rosabel, I got him. You can let him go now,” Radock said again. “Let go.”

I got him.

The words finally registered, and I tried to relax my hands that were completely numb from how tightly I had been holding onto Taland. My fingers refused to move as if my body was still afraid that we weren’t safe, and it took me a moment to release my grip around him.

I got him, Radock said, and I chose to believe him, to believe that that was enough. Taland was safe, even if I couldn’t make good on my promise to go back to the others. The Devil and the bracelet, and Hill and his plans—none of it mattered in those moments.

Taland was going to make it.

I finally let go.

—THE END

Thank you for reading Anchor !

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Sincerely,

Dori Hoxa