“Thank you,” he said, as I attempted to wring out the soggy folds. “This is the best entertainment I’ve had since Phelps lost hold of a chicken a few months ago.”
“So glad I could amuse,” I said coldly. I was starting to think that Saul Gregor wasn’t the nicest person. On the other hand, being wired to a table for a length of time that was almost certainlynota year couldn’t be good for one’s personality. “So the chickenswerefor you.” I had been pretty sure, but it was nice to have confirmation.
“Yes.” His amusement faded. “Halder figured out that birds were better than animals for his purposes.”
I had a pedantic urge to lecture him that birds were also animals and the word he wanted wasmammal, but I squelched it. “What purposes?”
“Keeping me alive. Barely.”
I had no idea how either one was keeping him alive. I pictured him biting into a chicken instead of a squirrel.No, the feathers would get in the way, wouldn’t they? Although the fur should have as well…“What’s the difference?”
My skirts were as wrung out as they could get, which arguablygave us something in common. My drawers stuck clammily to my skin. I felt unpleasantly as if I had wet myself.
“Oh no,” Saul said softly. “Halder won’t win that easily.”
“Huh?” I looked up, but he had pressed his lips together and turned his eyes to the ceiling.
Fine. Be that way.I tested the board again with my shoulder, and thought I felt a very slight give, but now the damn rock was in the way, and it was too large to fit through the gap. I cursed under my breath. Saul continued to say nothing.
I was not going to get angry. I wasn’t. You don’t get angry at people who have been imprisoned and tortured. You just don’t. Even if they are being weirdly cagey about things that might be important. They are obviously not responsible for acting oddly under the circumstances, and getting angry is counterproductive and… oh. Hmm. I had apparently just knocked a chip out of the pan by bashing it against the rock. Hard.
“You may be exactly what you say you are,” said Saul abruptly. “But Halder has been trying to pry things from me for a long time, and I haven’t… I think I haven’t… told him anything. If putting you in here with me is his way of trying to trick me, I’m not falling for it.”
It was the hesitating “IthinkI haven’t” that made my anger fall back and slink away in shame. God only knew what Halder had done to him, and if I thoughtmydelirium had made me an unreliable observer, how must Saul feel?
Besides, what would knowing do to help me? It certainly wouldn’t get us out of this shed any more easily.
“You don’t have to tell me anything,” I said. “Unless you know a better way to dig.”
“Sorry.”
I scraped out more dirt and dumped it atop the dead animals. It occurred to me that this had to be quite recent, because Phelps would surely have noticed the growing pile of corpses. “So they haven’t been feeding you long,” I said. “The flies, I mean.”
“No. Not long.”
I scrubbed at my face and only barely stopped myself from tearing a hole in the netting trying to scratch. “Maybe it’s more like ants and aphids than caterpillars.”
Saul turned his head to look at me. The flies had settled again, but he didn’t seem to notice and I pretended not to. “Ants?”
“Some ants keep aphids. Ant cows. They feed the ant cows and then the ant cows excrete a substance that the ants eat.”
“I don’t know if being an aphid is much better than being a caterpillar.”
“I’d much rather be an aphid. The aphids aren’t being devoured from the inside out.”
Saul stared at me. His eyes were pale green in the lamplight, and their expression was suddenly so cold and empty that I realized just how supremely tactless my statement had been. I began to stammer out an apology when the door to the shed slammed overhead.
Both our heads jerked up. I thought,No, wait, it’s too soon, the lantern hasn’t burned down, it’s still daylight—and then Phelps came down the stairs, saw us both, and shouted, “Get away from him!”
CHAPTER 19
My captor had a much larger lantern in one hand and another basket over his arm. He set the basket down on the step with exaggerated care, reached into his vest, and pulled out a gun.
The barrel winked in the orange light. I stared at it blankly. My brain saidPrussian blue and burnt umber for the metal, antimony orange for the reflections.This was not helpful under the circumstances.
“Move away from him, Miss Wilson,” Phelps said, leveling the gun at Saul. “He’s dangerous.”
“He’s chained to a table.”
