Twisted - Esme Devlin Page 0,18

strung across his shoulder.

“Lie down on your stomach,” he says, nodding down to the sand.

Normally, on those mornings where I’d had my breakfast and my bath, and the world outside is busy, I’d have done it straight away. No questions asked. And why not? I’m the special one. The one who doesn’t get hurt. Not really hurt.

This morning, I don’t especially feel like listening to him.

“Why?”

He sighs. “What is wrong with you? It’s as if you’ve been switched with a changeling. Get on the floor.”

“Denim?”

“Now. Do not make me fetch Maxim.” His face is set in a hard line, telling me he’s quite serious.

I get down on my hands and knees, then drop to my stomach, tilting my head to the side so I can watch what he’s going to do.

The sand is cold beneath my skin and shifts around my cheek like a pillow. Denim crouches down and takes hold of my ankle, bending my knee and pulling it back until it connects with the top of my thigh.

I can’t really see what he’s doing, but I can feel it.

He’s tying me up.

Thick straps cover my ankles, which he secures to my wrists with interconnected chains. Then I hear the click of a lock, a padlock?

“What is this?” It’s hard to breathe like this, never mind speak, but I manage to grit the words out.

Denim takes a step back and throws a metal loop with a few keys on. The set jingles in the air and then drops into the sand several feet away from my face.

“Practice,” he says. “Free yourself.”

I take a second to steel myself. I’m used to having eyes on me, hundreds of eyes on me… but somehow his single pair feels worse than a whole crowd-full.

He’s standing feet planted a shoulder-width apart in the sand behind me, arms crossed over his chest. His face is hard.

“The longer you wait to begin, the longer this will take.”

With a sigh, I start trying to work my way toward the keys.

The muscles in my thighs strain as I try to use my knees as frog-feet. The only thing I achieve is turning myself ninety degrees in the wrong direction.

Maybe I can roll toward it?

Inhaling a deep breath, I edge my position until my legs are almost flipped, but my shoulder gets in the way and stops me. I roll back into the sand on my tummy but use the momentum it creates to push back.

This time I manage to flop over onto my back, my body weight crushing my ankles and wrists.

The next roll onto my tummy is easier, and I make three more rolls before I have to stop for breath.

“Go,” Denim says.

I continue until I land on top of the keys and then have to do an extra flip, squirming around in the sand until I feel the cool metal between my fingers.

There is one lock, and five or six keys.

I try.

I try.

And every time they slip through my fingers before I can even get the key to fit.

Each time it happens, I lose track of what key I’m supposed to be trying next.

My arms ache and I’m panting when Denim looms over me.

“Disgraceful,” he says. “I’m going to lunch. Come and find me when you’re free.”

Hours later, I sit on top of Emerald’s cannon with my legs dangling down over the side, watching the world around me.

An hour ago, the space was awash with bright colors and glittering costumes.

Now Ruby is outside performing, and everyone else has gone back to their dwellings to rest before the bidding begins. Maxim has already deemed that like last night, there will be no final performance tonight.

Which makes me the final performance.

The fact that I spent the entire day practicing getting out of those ties means I’ll be expected to do it tonight. Neither Maxim nor Denim have told me that, but I can work it out.

This is my punishment, no doubt.

For what is more embarrassing than being tied up and forced to flail around in front of a hundred pairs of hungry eyes? You can use force or you can use pain, but nothing puts a woman in her place quite like humiliation does.

They’re teaching me a lesson, of that I’m certain. But there is another possible reason for this, and it’s been nagging at me all day. Last night was only different because the honored guest, Baron, appeared to be bored. And now I cannot shake the feeling that all of this is to mitigate against the