Counting the days down until she became mine.
Chapter17
RAYVEN
The sky turnedblood red as it grew darker. Was this supposed to be dusk?
It would be night soon, leaving me only two days to escape. Frustration twisted my insides. I’d accomplished so little.
It started to rain again, saturating the ground and making muddy puddles. I was water-logged and freezing, and it only got colder as the sky grew darker, bloodier.
Pain lanced up through my legs as I slowly made my way through the winding paths of the labyrinth, hoping to find a way out.
“You look awful,” one of the heads in the brambles said as I hobbled past. He was missing his nose and half an ear.
“At least my body is still attached,” I grumbled, trudging past him.
Another corpse gasped up ahead. “How rude.”
“So rude,” the one behind me called. “See if I help you find the garden.”
I froze in my tracks, whirling around to face the head that had insulted me. “The what?”
“The Master’s garden,” he said, and I took several cautious steps toward him. He stared at me with milky white eyes and a lopsided grin. “That’s where you’re headed isn’t it?”
“I’m looking for the exit, but the garden could be useful,” I mused. “Does he plant food there? Fruit? Or only flowers?”
“You’ll find a fine plum tree there.”
My stomach fluttered at the thought of the juicy plum I’d eaten and everything that had transpired afterward. Dirty thoughts exploded to life in my mind, images of a throne and chains. Wine and wax. My cheeks flushed as I recalled it all. I was starving for food, and other things…
“That’s perfect,” I said, my spirits lifting. “Can you tell me how to get there?”
The head’s forehead crinkled. “Get where?”
“The garden,” I bit out. “Can you tell me how to get to your Master’s garden?”
He pursed his lips. “I don’t know of a garden.”
“But you said…” The disappointment in my voice was obvious, and I hated how much I’d gotten my hopes up, if only for a brief second.
“I said nothing. The maze is making you crazy.”
“Loony as a tune,” another head said, making the last vestiges of my patience snap like dry spaghetti.
Stupid, useless fucking corpses. Before I could stop myself, I reached for the decapitated head, grabbing hold of its crusty hair, and wrenched it from the bush. It screamed, a raspy, choked noise.
“I’ll show you loony.” I dropped the head and punted it as hard as I could, sending it flying down the path and rolling into a puddle. It gurgled, twitching in the water.
With a huff, I glared at another head a few feet away. “Want to join him?”
“No, thank you, maiden. I’ll just eh, be quiet. Mind my own business.”
“That’s what I thought.”
Annoyed, I kept moving, making a right at the fork ahead. Maybe plucking all the severed body parts from the bushes wasn’t such a bad idea. It would help me mark the paths I’d been down—like the breadcrumbs from Hansel and Gretel but fucked up.I considered it for a moment then dismissed it.If the paths kept changing, it wouldn’t make a difference.
The rain eventually stopped, and the sky got darker.
