“Lips red as blood, hair black as night,
bring me your heart,
my dear, dear Snow White.”
—Queen Ravenna
(Fourteen years old)
One after the next, strangled cries escaping through gritted teeth rattle my eardrums. Hatred tears through my bones the longer I watch, but I can’t look away.
I’ve never seen it done like this.
Thin streams of blood slip across Griffin’s broad torso. He flexes under the scalpel as Katerina cuts, swirling her hand and making shallow designs like he’s her fucking sketchpad. My eyes are glued to every tick of the blade, my veins strumming with bursts of energy I don’t understand. The scent of fresh blood and sweat thickens the air, his pulse straining against his neck and his skin flushed, and this—this is how I would do it.
Griffin, he doesn’t deserve it, and every cut only makes hatred seep deeper into my chest. But to do this, to dig into the flesh of those orchestrating this whole shitfest, to watch them suffer through each stroke of the blade and remember every single person who died at their hands ... I inhale the stench and swallow it down, letting the sensation fill me. Jesus, I’ve never felt anything so satisfying.
“You’re doing well, Griffin,” Katerina coos. “I knew you’d show me everything through your eyes if I connected to your past. I do wish you’d discuss the boys who gave you these scars, but this is emotion enough.” She smiles, her voice sounding distant. “I believe your pieces might just be the most honest of them all by the time I’m done with you.”
She glances over her shoulder at me, the scalpel still rotating in her hands. “What do you think, Pet? Surely yours will be more beautiful?” I narrow my eyes, but she’s already turning back to the other kid. “Yes,” she hums to herself. “My sweet, sweet pet.”
Katerina halts when the door is shoved open.
No Name taps my side just as Baldy walks in. “Here,” he whispers, extending his palm and dropping something cold and metallic in my hands. “Slip them into your waistband.”
I glance down to see two small silver keys, grimy with dirt ... and shit.
“Quick.”
Tucking them into the waistband of my pants, I drop my hands and lean back against the wall.
Katerina’s hushed voice hits my ears, and I stiffen. “And you’re just discovering that they’re missing now?”
He shrugs and scratches his head. “I haven’t needed to use them for the two days you’ve had this one in here. But now we’ve got that new arrival I mentioned”—he points a thumb toward the open door, where a crate sits. The kid inside is hunched over but alert, flicking his gaze over his surroundings—“and I can’t get into the storage room.”
“I’ll let you in, and we’ll discuss this further.” Her tone is impatient as she leads the way toward the exit, and they disappear into the hall.
I waste no time reaching my skinny arm around the bars and sticking the first key into the lock. When that one doesn’t work, I try the next. The cage door swings open, and I let out the biggest fucking breath of my life.
“No fucking shit,” No Name mutters, a grin stretching across his face.
The first genuine smile in almost two years lifts my lips. I might have pursued this escape for Sofia, but now that the taste of freedom is on my tongue ... I may as well embrace it.
I nod toward Sofia’s cage. “Go. We have probably less than a minute.”
He darts to Sofia’s cage, unlocks it, and she steps aside to let him pass. When she looks at me, I wink. She hugs her teddy bear to her chest, smiling.
Sofia knows the plan. As best as she can anyway. I explained it last night in terms I think a five-year-old would get, and I may have left out the details about what would happen to her mom. She also knows the whole plan could crash and burn before we even get started, and to pretend she knew nothing about it if we’re caught.
No Name pulls open the lid to her toilet. He wets a piece of toilet paper and places it over the overflow pipe, then unscrews the float. After putting the lid back on, he works on the sink, clogging the drains. When Katerina’s heels start clicking toward us, he grabs the handcuffs beside Sofia’s cage and scurries back into ours, closing the door behind him. Neither cage is locked, but we just have to hope she doesn’t notice yet.
Katerina returns to the kid at the worktable, apologizing or some bullshit, and I stare at Sofia’s toilet. Water is already trickling down the sides, but it’s not anywhere near enough to cause the kind of damage we want.
I look at No Name, and he nods. “I know, man,” he whispers from beside me. “It’s cool. I told you I’ve done this before. I just need to get back in there and blast the sink faucets. I mean, it won’t be quick, but I’m gonna check out the pipes too. I can make do with Katerina’s bloodstained tools if I have to. A bunker like this, especially underground, will hold water like a fucking sinking submarine.”
I’m not so sure, but I’ve never tried to flood a place either. And anyway, it’s the best we’ve got.
“All right,” I mutter. “I’m up.”
