Call of Water (Madame Tan's Freakshow #1) - Marina Simcoe Page 0,48
Trez smirked.
He grabbed my chin with his meaty fingers, lifting my face to his. His dark-brown eyes focused on mine for a moment, the long, thin streaks of red gleaming in his eyes menacingly.
“You’re a clever little bitch, aren’t you?” he snarled. With his other hand, he painfully squeezed my hip, then my butt cheek and my side against my ribs, making me gasp at each rough grab. “You’re way too skinny. On a diet, are you?”
“It’s not like you’re feeding me that well in here,” I snapped, a frost of terror spreading down my spine.
“And yet you’re not eating all you’re given. Did you think you could cheat us, huh? Obedience was your last chance to stay alive, and you blew it.” He moved his hand from my chin down to my throat, with cold resentment in his glare. “There is nothing to stop me from breaking your neck, now.”
“No, please,” I cried against his thick fingers flexing around my throat.
“Beg me.” He sneered. “It won’t help you, but it’ll make me enjoy this more.”
Nid and Ulg snickered, obviously getting their share of joy out of my desperate situation.
Holding me by the throat, Trez lifted his arm higher, raising me off the floor. Clawing at his hand, I struggled to reach the ground with my toes.
The world narrowed into a dark tunnel in front of my eyes, with the glow from the tank behind Trez being the light at the end of it.
ZEPH
The water filtering through his lungs had been losing its hostile, menacing quality. It came in clearer with each breath he took.
The headache-inducing hum had quieted for once, allowing for some mental clarity. Like a small, tip-of-the-needle peephole into the reality, it grew wider, as if someone wiped the fog from the window of his awareness.
He began to breathe deeper, letting the clean water flush the poison out of his system. Each breath he took made him feel more connected with the water surrounding him. It was slowly becoming a part of him—his home, not his prison.
Another breath.
The tingle of this re-established connection spread down his arms and legs in currents. He sensed the water stir around him as his body shuddered with returning power coursing through his veins.
He splayed his fingers wide, willing the water to obey, and it rushed in a glowing twirl around him, following his order.
“Faster.”
It spun in a twister, twirling the garment he wore around his legs.
Through the shimmer of light, his vision reached into the room beyond the glass, his world expanding past his confinement.
Tall, burly figures stood out there. The sight of their tattooed arms sent a strong resentment through him, igniting anger.
Bracks!
The urge for revenge bubbled hot inside him. Then he spotted the person one of them held in his huge hand. They were in a process of killing someone. What else could be expected from Ghata’s slaves?
Moving his hands through the water, he tested his returning power. Still weaker than he sensed it should be, it strengthened with his outrage, impossible to contain.
Spreading his arms out, he turned the water into his weapon, sending it outwards in an explosion.
Chapter 17
MY VISION SHRUNK TO the size of a keyhole, the glow from the tank turning into a ball of bright light was the last thing I was going to see before Trez snuffed the life out of me.
Unable to beg or to pry his hand away from my throat, I started to sag in his grip.
Then a loud crash shook the air.
The vise around my neck released, and I dropped to the ground. Clawing at the sweatshirt at my neck and over my chest, I gasped for air, wriggling on the floor in a stream of broken glass and water that seemed to have come out of nowhere.
With no clue about what had just happened, instinct sent me back to my feet. Coughing, I staggered into a corner, away from the man who’d nearly killed me.
Trez lay on the floor on his belly, several long shards of glass spearing his back. Ulg stood on his knees, gripping the piece of glass imbedded deep in the side of his neck. Dark blood dripped between his fingers, his tattoo pulsing bright red.
With a deep roar, Nid rushed past me toward the bar, shards of glass sticking from his arm and shoulder.
The water tank was now gone. Zeph stood on the stand, water sluicing down his hair and body, the long, silver loin cloth plastered to his legs.