I continue digging, my eyes watering from the dust, from the way my fingers cut into the rocks. I can feel blood dripping down my wrist—a tickle, a bother. But I’m making progress. I am.
I may be small, but I can survive. I will. I won’t ever give up.
“Bane,” a deep voice says, and I stiffen, keeping my gaze forward, hiding the tool in my hand. “Bane.”
They approach, dark, foreboding. A deep, oppressive shadow.
I feel a hand touch my shoulder, steady, warm.
Familiar.
“Umnyashka. Come back to me.”
I blink and turn, sniffling loudly when I see who’s behind me. Georgiy. Not that shadow, not Death.
No, it’s my reaper. He’s down here with me. Hunched over, his hair brushing the filthy ceiling. He came all the way here to rescue me.
“Where are you?” he asks, and I open my mouth and close it, trying like hell to find the words. I don’t know where I am. The past, the present? Who knows anymore?
His palms cup my cheeks, and he holds me steadily, his thumbs stroking just under my wet eyes.
“I lived here,” I whisper.
“Yes.”
“He kept me here.”
“Yes.”
“Death.”
“Mm.”
I rub my cheek against his hand, and he pulls me into his chest, the scent of him grounding me.
Safe.
Georgiy is safe.
This was never my home; it was just a holding area. But the man holding me now is my haven. He’s what I’ve craved for so long.
I let him hold me against him as I try to make sense of all of this, realizing I led myself down here, and attempted to continue to dig. To find a way to escape.
It was like I’d never left.
This dirt prison. This hell.
But Death isn’t down here with me now. He’s far away.
I’m safe.
“Come. We don’t need to stay. We are leaving,” Georgiy says as he guides me back to the ladder, a flashlight in his hand. I can’t help but look around, taking it in. The scratches in the walls, the holes in the floor. My eyes catch on an alcove, and I remember sleeping there.
So many days and nights here. So many that they blur together.
How long was I here?
Why did he put me down here? What did I do?
