I’d turned to Sadie.
Spitting on a scrap I’d torn from my ruined shirt, I’d wiped the crusted blood away from her nose, eyes, and mouth as best I could. After she looked better, I’d torn off more strips and wrapped them around a couple of the deepest cuts on her arms and legs.
Then, I’d worked on my leg.
Half my thigh had been cleaved off.
I’d started to wrap my shirt around it, then I’d realized the missing skin would regrow in the material. I’d quickly ripped the fabric away.
Head spinning and vision tunneling, I’d started to pass out, so I’d lain flat on the floor and tried not to think about the wound. It burned horribly and sent stabbing streaks of pain down my leg. Ignoring it was easier said than done.
That was the last of my healing efforts.
Now I lay on the floor between Sadie and Jinx, my leg propped up against the wall with the half-missing part of my thigh out of harm’s way.
“Wake uuuuuup,” I said morosely as I reached my tired arms out and slapped at their sleeping faces.
I knew they needed rest to recover. However, I also knew that we were trapped in a room full of dead bodies, and I was scared.
I had not gone through hell for them to just sleep it off while I suffered.
“Wake up!” I shouted and clapped my hands, going for the surprise effect. Sadie startled, and I turned my head with excitement.
She snored.
A stray eyeball rolled across the floor.
I gagged.
“You’re losing friendship points right now,” I groaned as I closed my eyes and tried to pretend I was on a breezy beach somewhere, drinking and smoking.
The problem was my leg throbbed and I was in agony.
Also, the room reeked.
Sharp rocks bit into my back uncomfortably, and it was oppressively warm.
This beach sucks.
My heart skipped a beat as I realized the worst thing yet—I was missing my pipe.
Patting around the gushy floor with my eyes closed, I desperately searched. Please sun god, I prayed. Since you literally didn’t save me at all, at least save my pipe. It’s the least you can do.
My fingers trailed through something fleshy, and I pretended it was a rock covered in wet sand (I was 100 percent aware that it was someone’s detached spine).
I couldn’t find my pipe.
Despair settled in my bones that all was lost.
“No,” I whispered dejectedly into the darkness.
There was only so much a woman could take before she broke.
I touched my face—my pipe was still in my mouth.
I breathed in enchanted smoke greedily.
I held both Sadie’s and Jinx’s limp hands in mine, and my chuckle turned into a broken plea. “Please wake up.”
I waited in silence.
It felt like an eternity passed.
Hope was fading.
Sadie suddenly woke up with a scream. She lunged forward and wrapped her hands around my neck. “Who took my bread roll?” she bellowed groggily.
It was too much.
I burst into tears and wrapped my arms around her in an awkward hug as she choked me.
“Aran?” she asked with confusion as he stopped choking me. “What happened?”
I opened my mouth, then closed it as I thought about what exactly had happened.
In all my melancholic despair, I’d forgotten to plan an explanation for how the handle of my sword had slammed into her forehead and knocked her unconscious.
“Wait a second,” she growled, and her fists pummeled against me. “Arabella Alis Egan, how dare you!”
I squealed and protected my fleshy bits.
“It isn’t what you’re thinking,” I yelled in defense.
She stopped punching me. “So you didn’t knock me out because I wasn’t listening to you?”
I pursed my lips. “It’s exactly what you’re thinking.”
She whacked me across the top of the head, but the blow was glancing and filled with love.
“What’s going on?” Jinx asked groggily, and I froze midwrestle.
Sadie gasped, “What’s Jinx doing here?”
Why had I wanted them to wake up?
“You have some explaining to do.” My voice cracked and it felt like I was falling.
The pieces were already clicking together in my mind, but I needed to hear her say it aloud.
Jinx grimaced as she stared at her mangled fingers and nodded curtly. Sadie’s eyes cast a red glow and illuminated the three of us.
We sat in uncomfortable silence.
Jinx coughed, a harsh rattle. Still staring down she said softly, “Twenty-five.”
The room was stuffy with heat and too quiet, as if the dead were holding their breath and listening.
She didn’t elaborate further.
Sadie asked, “What?”
A bead of sweat streaked down the side of Jinx’s face. “I recently turned twenty-five years old. My species goes through puberty differently because I’m not from these realms—I’m a soulmancer.”
Sadie stiffened.
Jinx continued, “On the Creature Classification Scale, the High Court labeled me a six when I was just a toddler. The scale only goes to five. They shackled me to repress my abilities.” She held up her bare wrist where I’d seen the gold cuff had glowed.
Neither of us breathed.
Jinx didn’t look up as she spoke. “When I was a baby, the High Court confiscated me from traffickers. However, my saviors,” she spat, “didn’t integrate me into society because I was deemed too dangerous. I was caged and held until my purpose could be discovered.”
She laughed without humor, and it came out as a wheeze. Something rattled in her chest.
Jinx continued speaking like she was far away, lost in some horrific distant memory. “At least the former occupant of my cage was a human monster who had the decency to not be a complete moron—they’d given him a bookshelf filled with treatises on philosophical discourse. As you can imagine, it was the only thing that kept me sane.”
“No,” Sadie rasped.
Jinx jumped and looked up like she’d forgotten we were present.
Sadie shook her head. “I can’t imagine how that kept you sane. When I was being tortured as a child, I just wanted to read fantastical romances filled with smut and depraved acts. It calmed me down.”
Jinx sniffed. “Shocking that a woman of your intellect would turn to such drivel.”
Her haughty demeanor was ruined by another coughing fit.
Sadie either missed the point, was in denial, or was purposefully trying to break the somber mood. She beamed at Jinx and offered, “When we get out of here, I’ll give you a list of book recommendations.” She winked (or twitched; it was hard to tell because she had two swollen black eyes). “Now that you’re twenty-five, I can give you the real dirty recommendations. Let me tell you, you’re going to be sweating.”
“Are you serious right now?” Jinx stared at her incredulously.
Sadie smirked. “It depends on how queasy you get at the word moist. We’ll start there.”
Jinx tried to turn her back to Sadie, but she winced in pain as and gave up by flopping back onto the rubble.
The three of us sat in silence.
It was nice.
“So?” Sadie asked. “What’s the rest of the story? I’m invested.”