At first the boy did not realize his mistake. At first there was only the safety of training for what lay ahead. His brother was already at the front, but the boy found in the company of other lads a new sort of comfort. When it rained, they sat in their tents, listening to the pitter-patter of the drops and made up curses so devilish, that the boy struggled to keep from turning red. Because innocence was a weakness, and he refused to be weak. . . .
Chapter 7
IS IT ALIVE?” THE VOICE is young, male, and only a prelude to the sharp poke at my side.
“I fink so,” another voice answers when I moan at the ache.
“Hey,” says the first voice. Poke. Poke. “Wake up, you.”
My brain feels impossibly thick, and my arms impossibly heavy.
I’m not sure what’s happened to me, but even before I’m completely conscious, I know that it was awful and unbelievable.
They are still talking about me, poking at my tender skin, but I keep silent and still, my eyes closed tight, and I try to remember what happened.
It comes to me slowly. The terror in that dark room. The icy cut of the water. The peacefulness of floating free as I watched the brightness of the world recede above. My last burning breath as the water rushed into my lungs.
From the ache in my back and the incessant poking that continues to shoot sharp pains through my side, I know I’m not dead. My leg screams from the wounds made by the dark creature’s claws, and my skin feels as taut and fragile as an overripe berry. But I am not dead. And for a moment, that is enough.
I take stock of what I can without moving or letting them know I’m awake—I’m still soaking wet, so I haven’t been out of the water for long. My arms have been freed, but something heavy is cutting into my ankle, weighing me down and pinning me in place.
Not rescued, then. Still a prisoner. But the voices around me now sound human, not like the buzzing, accented voices of the monsters that took me. Still, I don’t know who those voices belong to, or what they want from me.
“Leave it alone, Phin. We don’t know iffen it’s dangerous, now do we?”
The poking stops, but they’re still in the room—whoever they are—close enough that I can smell the sour sweat in their clothes. I’m not sure what they’re waiting for, but if I play dead just a bit longer, maybe they’ll go away.
“Come on, then.” It’s the second voice again—male, too, and a bit older than the first, but also clearly human. His rough cockney accent is also nothing like the guttural, accented words growled by the monsters. “We best tell the Cap’n it’s waking.”
I listen to their footsteps retreat and, instinctively, I reach for the cold stones around my wrist, breathing a sigh of relief when I find them intact. I’m wearing little else—only my pajamas—but at least I haven’t lost my mom’s bracelet. The fact that I still have it makes me feel better for some reason. Like I’m not so alone.
When I’m sure they’re gone, I sit up and take in my surroundings. I rub at my swollen, tear-crusted eyes, but they are so tender, it hurts too much to clean them. I can almost make out the room, anyway. Not that there’s all that much to see—it’s more of a closet than anything else. The floor is wood, darkened and worn smooth with age, and the only light comes from a narrow slit in the sloping wooden walls.
There is a heavy metal cuff around my ankle, as I’d suspected, and it’s attached by a chain to a ring on the floor. I give it a good tug to see if I can loosen it. I’m not sure when my new captors will be back, and I’d rather not be tied down when they get here. So I make another effort to free myself by pulling hard at the chain, but it doesn’t even budge.
It’s only when I finally stop struggling with the chain that I notice something that makes my stomach drop. The room is moving. I didn’t notice it at first, but now the motion—a constant, gentle rocking—is unmistakable. This is not just any room, I realize. I’m on a boat of some sort. Which means, even if I could get free from the chain, there might not be anywhere to run.
Refusing to believe that, I start jerking the chain around my ankle again, to try and loosen it from its bolt on the floor. I don’t stop, not when my ankle is numb from pain or when my fingers start to ache with the effort. I don’t stop until I hear footsteps just outside the door.