They pulled on my clothes, ripping the fabric off my body.
Leaving me exposed.
They were stripping away more than my clothes.
My cell phone fell out of my pocket and dropped down the chute. I waited for it to hit the bottom, but no sound came.
I sobbed at the possibility of this going on forever.
I’d managed to grab the knife before they’d torn everything away, but the blade was useless, even as I managed to slash at some of the appendages. These hands were already dead. Unlike me, they couldn’t feel pain.
I would never forget this moment. The intense loneliness. Knowing that no one was coming to save me. The feeling of countless cold, dead fingers curling around my wrists and ankles, prying my legs open, sliding up the interior of my thighs. They pinched at my nipples and tugged on my hair. Pulling on me until I thought I might split wide open.
A cry wrenched from my throat when a palm rubbed over my center. I tried to squirm away, but I couldn’t move. Two dozen hands held me still as a thick finger wriggled its way inside me.
“No! Stop!”
The arms started to pull viciously on my limbs. My muscles screamed. There was so much tension I felt like my skin would snap.
“You lied,” I screamed at the knife still clutched in my fist. “You said this was the way out.”
“Death is the only escape. He might bring you back. He might not. If he grows bored…At least he’ll leave you alone to rot in peace.”
I felt so stupid. I’d really thought a fucking letter opener could help me. Now I’d pay for that desperate mistake.
All lingering doubts about this being real were crushed in an instant.
I really was in Hell.
My mind went blank, darkness threatening to carry me away. I didn’t fight it. I drifted into a state of half-consciousness, with only the vague awareness that I was being pushed back up the chute.
I opened my eyes and lifted my face just in time to see the Lord of Bones crouched over the chute’s opening. Reaching for me. The next moment his claws were digging into my scalp, and he wrenched me out of the hole by the hair.
“Let go of me,” I seethed through clenched teeth. To my surprise, he listened and dropped me. I crumpled to my knees beside the pit, and looked around to take in the surroundings I’d been too distracted to notice before.
The walls were lined with prison cells, which were packed with rotting bodies. They were all reaching through the rusted bars of their cells, moaning and grabbing for me.
“What do they want?” I sobbed. “Why won’t they leave me alone?”
The Lord of Bones loomed over me, his intense demeanor choking all the warmth and breathable air from the atmosphere. “You have something they don’t. A beating heart. Warm, perfect flesh.” Countless eyes were on me, but the only ones I became aware of were his, burning into my bare flesh like brands.
“They covet your blood. Your pretty pink cheeks. Your soft lips. They want you.” His voice dropped into a rasp. I had a feeling he wasn’t talking about the lost souls anymore.
I lifted my chin and glared at him through the filthy strands of my black hair. “Why? Why would you keep something like this in yourhome?” My voice was shaking now, with a dangerous cocktail of terror and rage.
“This is hardly my home,” the bone monster growled. “You’ve wandered into the darkest depths of my dungeon, where the most unworthy souls in my charge rot.”
“Then why did you bother to save me? Why didn’t you leave me in that hole to die?”
“Oh no, little thief. These souls are unworthy of myattention.But you? You are going to get so much more of me than all these pathetic souls combined. You get my undivided attention as your personal sovereign of suffering.”
“Why is this happening to me?”
“Haven’t you figured it out by now, little thief? This is purgatory. When you slink through the shadows, you’re bound to be eaten by the monsters within them.”
“Eaten? You mean assaulted.”
His eyes glowed hot, the light in them flaring, and I felt their fire as his attention slithered down my body to rest on my thighs. Bruises where the hands had forced them apart were beginning to form.
