Chapter Nine
Justin had no idea how long he’d been stuck in this cell. It could have been months, or maybe weeks. It could have been just a few days.
Well, that wasn’t true. Initially, he’d attempted to keep up with the days. He’d counted how many times he saw the sunset outside the cell window. He’d stopped counting after twenty, when it had been evident that he wouldn’t be getting out of there anytime soon. He wasn’t sure how long ago that had been, though.
Initially, he’d expected Anya to leave him in the cell for just a few days, maybe a week. She’d wanted to scare him by sticking him in here with Mynor, but the joke was on her because Justin liked the demon. There wasn’t anything else for them to do but talk, and that was what they’d been doing. At this point, Justin suspected that Mynor was the person who knew him best in the world. He’d told him things he had never said to any of his brothers.
Anya came once a week to try to convince him to change his mind. She failed every time. She also hadn’t sent anyone to hurt him, which was good, but it made him wonder if she’d forgotten about him. Maybe she was too busy squashingAlphan’s rebellion. Justin hoped the demon wouldn’t get caught, but he was glad because it meant that Anya was focused on something else.
Unfortunately, that didn’t help him. He couldn’t get out. A few days after he’d arrived, he’d been desperate enough to try pulling at the bars of the window, but they hadn’t budged. Leaving any other way was impossible because of the guards, so there was nothing Justin could do. He hated that. He had hope that Calyx would eventually realize something was wrong and would find him, but so far, it didn’t look like he had. It was hard to hope—almost as hard as it was not to.
“I don’t understand why Yancey got so angry,” Mynor said. He was frowning.
They were sitting next to each other. In the first few days, Justin had kept some distance between them, but that had quickly stopped. The cell was cold, especially during the night, and they didn’t have blankets. After two nights of having to listen to Justin shiver in his sleep, Mynor had flopped down next to him and pressed his body against his without saying a word. Justin had never been afraid. He’d never wondered what Mynor was doing or why. He’d accepted the comfort and warmth, and since then, they’d been growing closer to the point where Justin had told Mynor about the fight that had caused him to make the stupidest decision he’d ever made in his life.
He sighed and pressed his shoulder harder against Mynor’s. “It’s just how Yancey is.”
“That doesn’t make sense. Your mother decided what to do with her belongings before her death. If she’d wanted Yancey to have the house, she would have left it to him.”
“I know that, you know that, and Yancey knows that. I don’t think he’s actually angry at Calyx. I don’t think he’s angry at Caitlin for leaving the house to Calyx, either. I think he’s pissedbecause she’s gone, and this is the only way for him to let that emotion out.”
“But why would he take it out on Calyx? The poor man lost his mother, too.”
“Yancey has never been great with feelings. Most of us have problems with that, actually.” It probably came from their past. Justin had been lucky because, even though he’d lost his father, he’d known him. He’d known he was loved. His father hadn’t abandoned him. He’d died. The same couldn’t be said for his brothers. He imagined it would leave a wound that might not heal. Caitlin had tried, but losing her had sent all of them spinning.
“But he risks losing someone else who’s important to him,” Mynor pointed out.
“He’ll only realize that when he comes close to losing Calyx. You don’t know Calyx, though. If there’s one of us who will always be there for the others, it’s him. Even if it takes Yancey ten years to finally apologize, Calyx will welcome him back into his life. It’s just the kind of person he is.”
“He loves you.”
“We love each other.” And Justin might never get the chance to tell his brothers that.
He bumped the back of his head against the stone wall and glanced at the window. “I know you already said there’s no way out, but you really can’t think of anything?”
“If I could, I wouldn’t still be there,” Mynor murmured. “I’m really sorry you ended up here with me.”
“Not your fault.”
“I thought Anya would have gotten you out of here a while ago, honestly. I’m not sure what she’s trying to do.”
“I’m pretty sure that she’s forgotten about me.”
Mynor hummed. “That might not be a bad thing.”
For either of them. No one had come in to hurt Mynor since Justin had been left in his cell. The guards still came to bring them food, but they mostly ignored them. One of them kept looking at them with something lecherous in his expression, but while it gave Justin the creeps, the guard hadn’t tried hurting them.
There was no way to know how long that would last. There was no way to know how long it had already been. All Mynor and Justin could do was survive and wait for Anya’s next move.
No matter when it came.
“Dinner’s here,”Pythom declared with a shit eating grin.
It was enough to tell Mynor that something was up, but he didn’t know what that something was until he realized that Pythom only had one tray. He pushed it through the opening in the door, then stood there, waiting. Justin had gotten up to grab the food, and he frowned, looking down at it.
“There are two of us,” he said.
“Are there?” Pythom asked.
