“The bitch already knows my fears,” Rune said, hoping her voice didn’t shake. I can handle anything but the crawlers.
And anything but Z’s torture.
And anything but brain in a jar…
Fuck.
His eyes were steady. “Take me with you when you go.”
She frowned, then slid her fingers over her face to her swollen, broken nose. “I won’t force you to stay here.”
His thin black hair slid across his pale skin as he shook his head. “I mean when you leave this world.”
She said nothing. Was she willing to expose her world, her people, to a man such as Nikolai Czar?
“You don’t trust me,” he said, when she remained silent.
“Of course I don’t. Why would I trust you?”
“There are different levels of trust. You don’t trust me not to harm your world.”
“No. No, I don’t.”
“If I live there, Rune Alexander, I will help take care of your world. I wouldn’t destroy that which assured my survival.”
“That would be a stupid thing to do,” she agreed.
“It would. And I am not a stupid man.”
She leaned slightly away from the cold, stained wall. “There are many reasons you might want to destroy my world. Maybe you’re secretly the witch’s bitch and she wants to send you as a plant.”
His laughter was sudden and real and she could only stare in amazement. The sound was so out of place in the dungeon of horrors that she couldn’t at first understand what it was.
Laughter.
Someone groaned, and that sound of agony echoed off the stone walls, overriding the burst of amusement the Death Shimmer lord had released.
After that, the plop, plop of water dripping from the ceiling to the floors was the only sound in the hellish place for a long, long moment.
“Please,” Nikolai said, finally. “This is not the world in which I should spend eternity. Even with Damascus gone, this is not the world for me. I’ve lived here too long and I need out. For my sanity’s sake, I need out.”
“What about your shimmer. Your people. You’d desert them?” she asked.
“I was Death Shimmer hand before our lord sneaked away with his tail between his legs. It is time he came back to take over what is his. My leaving will force his hand.”
“And if it doesn’t?”
“Then the people will manage.”
“I won’t stop you,” she said at last, “unless you give me a reason to.”
“Nikolai.” The voice was masculine and tired. “The sun of her world will kill you. You would trade the sun for a different place to exist?”
Nikolai didn’t answer.
“You do believe she’ll redeem us,” someone said, a whispery, raw voice laced with pain. “You believe it.”
No matter how hard she tried, Rune was unable to penetrate the thick, black shadows to see the speaker, but the voice was oddly, dreadfully familiar.
She closed her eyes. “I know you. What’s your name?”
There was no answer, only stubborn silence and shallow breaths.
“Be careful,” Nikolai warned, “that you don’t ask a question you really don’t want the answer to.”
She had a feeling he wasn’t talking about the mysterious speaker.
“I’ve been getting fucked-up answers all my life,” she replied. “I can handle it.”
He didn’t look convinced.
“You haven’t been hurt yet,” someone said—not the same voice as before. Not a voice that sent shivers of recognition down her spine.
“She’s been hurt plenty,” Nikolai said.
“Not here. She’s new.”
Rune wasn’t sure but she thought the speaker was female. The voice was soft, refined. Gentle. But beneath that was something terrible.
“You enjoy it,” Rune guessed. “You like the pain.”
Nikolai raised an eyebrow. “You’re very intuitive. Not that I’m surprised.”
“It’s in her voice.”
He leaned his head back against the wall. “Some of them were…”
“Wicked,” the woman said when he hesitated. “Yes. Some of us were already wicked.”
“Their time here has forced them to change to deal with their punishments. The darkness, the agony, the humiliation. It’s how they have survived.”
Rune shuddered.
“How long have you been here, Abby girl?” Nikolai asked the unseen person.
She was silent for so long Rune thought she wasn’t going to answer at all. But finally, she did.
“Fourteen years,” Abby said. “Give or take a year. The witch hauls me out when she wants to use me for something…fun.”
“My God,” Rune said, aghast.
“I am not your God,” Abby replied, her voice stronger. Perhaps she enjoyed the break in the monotony. “But if you have one, you should beg her for help.”
“The witch will break you,” the other person said. “No matter how tough you think you are.”