“WHAT SAY YOU?” shouted Ravinia.
The crowd cheered; more than half went to their feet, pumping their fists.
Ravinia and Maxima glanced at one another. Ravinia nodded, as if encouraging him to make the next announcement.
Maxima turned. “The people have spoken,” he said. “The Majority have agreed you are worth living in our world as an equal—your demand will be met!”
“The gauntlet has ended!” Ravinia proclaimed, hand raised into the air again.
The reaction of the room was mixed: some jeered and cursed their disappointment, while most cheered their approval.
“But what of the bets?” a voice called out.
“Yeah!” shouted another. “If the gauntlet was stopped prematurely, who then is the winner?”
“YEAH!”
“WHO IS THE WINNER?”
“IS HE ALIVE?”
Ravinia waited for the crowd to quieten, and then she declared, “Since the fight was stopped due to unforeseen circumstances, all gauntlet bets are annulled!”
The disappointment in the crowd tripled; hundreds of slips of multi-colored paper floated like confetti into the air, their voided bets tossed away with the trash; the people grumbled and cursed and some argued as the crowd dispersed slowly, shuffling down the bleachers and away from the arena floor and toward the exits.
I went to my knees next to Atticus—the only thing I’d wanted to do the past many minutes—and I felt for his pulse. He was still alive. “Atticus,” I whispered, cradling his battered and bloody face within my hands, trying to revive him. “Atticus, please wake up.” I leaned over and kissed his swollen left eye. Then I lifted his shirt where there was a lot of blood, to see a deep wound where a knife had pierced him, just above the hip, and then I saw another in his right thigh—the blade had ripped his pants; and another in his left arm—I gasped; I thought he had only been stabbed once.
I looked up at Ravinia standing over us.
“He needs a doctor,” I said with desperation.
Ravinia smiled.
“I’m surprised being a doctor isn’t on that long list of things you can do,” she said.
“I have some basic medical skills,” I said, “but his injuries may not be basic, and I can’t take that chance.”
Maxima moved over to stand with us.
“If the man is strong enough,” he announced, “he will survive—put him back in the trenches!”
Dread washed over me, and I grabbed Atticus’ hand. “No! He needs a doctor! He needs medical care!”
During my pleading, Kade grabbed me from behind and pulled me away from Atticus.
“Let go of me! I demand it!” I roared.
Kade’s laughter encircled me. “You can’t play that card with me,” he said, the pleasure of revenge in his voice.
“Ravinia!” I called out, hoping she would stop Kade.
But the resolved look on Ravinia’s face told me there was nothing she could—or would—do.
“You’ve proven your worth,” Ravinia said. “And your demand was met: the fight was stopped. But Kade is still your protector. That is until you can protect yourself.”
“Let’s go,” Kade said with a grunt, and dragged me away from Atticus.
I wanted to gut Kade with the knife, but he took it from my hand before I could. I wanted to continue fighting him, but in the end, I chose to submit and not create another scene. Use your head, Thais, I told myself. Struggling and screaming never set you free before—use your head.
And so I walked alongside Kade through the crowd toward an exit, looking back to watch as Atticus was being carried away by two men toward another exit.
I will find you, Atticus. I will find you tonight, and we will leave this place together if I have to burn it down.
63
THAIS & (ATTICUS)
Kade kicked open the door to his room; it smashed into the wall. “Do you have any fucking idea what you’ve done?” He shoved me onto the floor and then kicked the door closed behind him.
I scrambled to my feet, held my fists out in front of me, my heart pounding, my legs shaking. I started to answer, to brazenly tell him I saved Atticus, but he marched toward me with repercussive intent, his dark eyes blazing in the lamp-lit room. Instinctively, I tried to back up toward the wall but was stopped by the sofa.
“Now every person in Paducah will want to fight me for you!” he growled into my face.
I shrank away from him, feeling the heat of his breath on my mouth.
“Should’ve kept your mouth shut!” he ripped out the words. “You could’ve had freedom here with me—safety!—but you royally screwed that up! There’s no telling who you’ll end up with—do you know what you’ve done?” His voice thundered in my ears.
A sharp pop sounded as my hand smacked across the side of his prickly face; his hand flew upward near his eye in reaction to the sting.
I glowered at him, my teeth gritted behind tightly pressed lips. “What I’ve done,” I growled, “is figure out how to change my situation”—(Kade’s mouth snapped shut, and his eyes narrowed with regret for the things he’d told me)—“My limitations are what got me into this mess, remember?” I stepped up to him daringly, now my eyes blazing in the lamp-lit room. “Well, my limitations will not define or confine me. And no one—no man or woman or city full of people—will ever own me!”
A white-hot pain shot through the left side of my head and silver spots flashed across my vision when he struck me with his open hand. I fell backward against the arm of the sofa; the decorative wood gouged into my hip and I bounced off it and fell onto the floor.
Kade was on top of me before I could shake the spots from my eyes. “I do own you, you mouthy little bitch,” he barked. He straddled my waist; one hand moved to lift up my skirt, the other fastened around my throat. “And because I own you, I can take whatever I want from you”—he pressed himself against me between my legs—“and you will do whatever I tell you to do. And when someone challenges me for ownership of you, you’re gonna tell them you want to stay with me, and that even if they won a fight against me you wouldn’t cooperate with them, that you’ll never share your knowledge and skills with anyone but me!”
His fingers had become so tight around my throat I struggled to breathe; my eyes fought to stay open; my hands clawed at his arm, trying to pry it away, but it only made him squeeze tighter.
“IS THAT UNDERSTOOD?” he screamed into my face. Then he smiled like a madman, his teeth bared. “How are those limitations now? How are—”
His ferocious face shifted in a blink to something eerily relaxing; his eyes fluttered as if he were drunk and shocked simultaneously; his lips parted and his hand around my throat loosened. I gasped—I didn’t even have time to let the breath that rushed into my lungs settle—as blood poured down Kade’s neck. His body swayed on top of me; his hands probed robotically at his throat and blood covered his fingers and dripped onto my clothes.