Jared's face was suddenly very close, leaning over me with a fierce expression.
"Jamie?" I breathed again, this time a question. "Jamie?"
Jeb's gruff voice answered from somewhere far away.
"The kid is fine. Jared brought him here."
I looked at Jared's tormented face, fast disappearing into the dark mist that covered my eyes.
"Thank you," I whispered.
And then I was lost in the darkness.
Chapter 15: Guarded
When I came to, there was no disorientation. I knew exactly where I was, roughly speaking, and I kept my eyes closed and my breathing even. I tried to learn as much as I could about my exact situation without giving away the fact that I was conscious again.
I was hungry. My stomach knotted and clenched and made angry noises. I doubted these noises would betray me-I was sure it had gurgled and complained as I slept.
My head ached fiercely. It was impossible to know how much of this was from fatigue and how much was from the knocks I'd taken.
I was lying on a hard surface. It was rough and... pocked. It was not flat, but oddly curved, as though I was lying in a shallow bowl. It was not comfortable. My back and hips throbbed from being curled into this position. That pain was probably what had woken me; I felt far from rested.
It was dark-I could tell that without opening my eyes. Not pitch-black, but very dark.
The air was even mustier than before-humid and corroded, with a peculiar acrid bite that seemed to cling to the back of my throat. The temperature was cooler than it had been in the desert, but the incongruous moisture made it almost as uncomfortable. I was sweating again, the water Jeb had given me finding its way out through my pores.
I could hear my breathing echo back to me from a few feet away. It could be that I was only close to one wall, but I guessed that I was in a very small space. I listened as hard as I could, and it sounded like my breathing echoed back from the other side as well.
Knowing that I was probably still somewhere in the cavern system Jeb had brought me to, I was fairly sure what I would see when I opened my eyes. I must be in some small hole in the rock, dark purple brown and riddled with holes like cheese.
It was silent except for the sounds my body made. Afraid to open my eyes, I relied on my ears, straining harder and harder against the silence. I couldn't hear anyone else, and this made no sense. They wouldn't have left me without a warden, would they? Uncle Jeb and his omnipresent rifle, or someone less sympathetic. To leave me alone... that wouldn't be in character with their brutality, their natural fear and hatred of what I was.
Unless...
I tried to swallow, but terror closed my throat. They wouldn't leave me alone. Not unless they thought I was dead, or had made sure that I would be. Not unless there were places in these caves that no one came back from.
The picture I'd been forming of my surroundings shifted dizzyingly in my head. I saw myself now at the bottom of a deep shaft or walled into a cramped tomb. My breathing sped up, tasting the air for staleness, for some sign that my oxygen was running low. The muscles around my lungs pulled outward, filling with air for the scream that was on the way. I clenched my teeth to keep it from escaping.
Sharp and close, something grated across the ground beside my head.
I shrieked, and the sound of it was piercing in the small space. My eyes flew open. I jerked away from the sinister noise, throwing myself against a jagged rock wall. My hands swung up to protect my face as my head thunked painfully against the low ceiling.
A dim light illuminated the perfectly round exit to the tiny bubble of a cave I was curled in. Jared's face was half lit as he leaned into the opening, one arm reaching toward me. His lips were tight with anger. A vein in his forehead pulsed as he watched my panicked reaction.
He didn't move; he just stared furiously while my heart restarted and my breathing evened out. I met his glare, remembering how quiet he had always been-like a wraith when he wanted. No wonder I hadn't heard him sitting guard outside my cell.