The guard’s warning to his queen circled in my head. If the glacier melted, what would happen to the prisoners? Would it kill them or… release them?
A clanging noise came from above, metal slamming shut. There was only one open door I had seen on my journey: the entrance to the dungeons. My entire body stilled. Had Flóki locked me in here?
Craning my neck, my gaze pierced upwards, as if I could see through the layers of stone and into the courtyard above. Instead, I noticed crimson blotches covering the ceiling—blood.
Get out get out get out. My heart beat with the command.
Sprinting towards the ladder, I stumbled over a mound of cobblestone jutting out of the putrid water, catching myself on my knees. The torch landed on top of it, on a round iron cover punctured with four small holes. My fingers froze as I reached for the stick.
Those were air holes.
I leaned in to get a closer look at the words embossed in the metal. Kistuleitarinn.
This was his oubliette.
I jumped back, the frigid muck swishing at the frantic movement.
Oh my God, could he see me? Hear me? Smell me? Did he know I was in here?
A menacing curl of laughter slipped through the holes, its deep rumble shaking the ice. Flakes of snow drifted to the ground.
“Come, child. Do not be scared.” The voice slithered through the chamber like the low howl of the wind on a stormy night. I could taste the rottenness of it in the air, heavy on my tongue.
But I didn’t dare move.
“Your heart is beating so fast. And your blood, the way it’s rushing through your veins…” A sigh tickled my spine like a sharp claw running up it. “The living body is my favorite symphony.”
I flinched as if his words had touched me.
That unearthly chuckle echoed throughout the room once more. “Let me at least get a good look at you, child. I haven’t come across another one of my kind in far too long.”
My kind. I huffed. Source pulsed from my fingertips, sloshing water into the holes.
I crouched down for him to see. “We are not the same.” My glare drilled down into the pit of black.
Shadows moved in the depths. A smoky black plume shot out, caressing my cheek. “We’re more alike than you’d care to admit.”
“Yeah? How so?” I brushed the wispy cloud—his Source, him—off of my face with a little too much force, my hand slamming into my own jaw when my fingers met only air.
“We’ve committed the same sin.” He casually blew out the last word, as if it were the smoke of a cigar giving him a high. Dread razed my insides. “Murder is a very unique bond—very unique indeed.”
“That was an accident,” I snarled, the scene from that fated day at the beach when I was eight swimming into my mind. I’d worked hard on freeing myself of that guilt. I wasn’t going to let this demon make me carry it again. “I got caught in a rip current and my mom swam out after me. I didn’t murder her for sport.”
“So, when you killed the teratorn and Finis, you did not feel an ounce of satisfaction?”
“That’s different.” The grate rattled beneath me. I was shaking with cold, unforgiving rage. “They were demons.”
“Perhaps then, but demons are not born. They were something else before.”
I swore I saw a hint of color in the darkness: the whites of eyes.
“Alright,” I said, my hands dangling between my knees, getting comfortable, even if the panic was like a parasite trying to burrow its way under my skin. “I didn’t make this trek for the small talk. I need something. If you can’t give it to me, I’m out.”
“Forgive me, my Nephilim sister. It’s been so long since I had a visitor.”
“Don’t call me that.” My nostrils flared. “We are not kin.” But even as I said it, the truth festered inside of me: all demons were once angels.
He sighed. “So go on. Tell me what you wish to know.”
