“The pain is part of the fun, angel.” The man hauled me a few feet forward in the tunnel. “And we’re just getting started.”
I didn’t know what was happening, where they were taking me.
Until I saw the chains on the wall.
“Fuck, yeah.” One of the other men moved closer to help his friend. “Let’s string her up, get off her clothes.”
Panic rose in my throat like bile. I’d known this was possible, had even thought it might be a good thing.
Now I realized how completely powerless I was.
What had I been thinking?
The first man lifted my wrist. “Get the cuffs so we can mark her.”
And then, out of nowhere, another thunk sounded from inside the tunnel walls.
The heat lamps overhead stopped glowing orange, the heat easing off as a hissing sounded from somewhere inside the tunnel.
“What the?— ”
It was all the guy holding my wrist managed to say before the tunnel started filling with smoke.
It was another obstacle, like the water and the heat lamps, and I braced myself to cough, to hold my breath as the smoke surrounded us.
But it wasn’t smoke at all. It was fog.
“Fucking Hawks,” one of the demons said as they disappeared in the fog.
Their temporary distraction was like a jump start to my brain.
I stepped on his foot as hard as I could in my sneaker, heard him grunt, if not in pain then at least in surprise.
His grip on my arm loosened just enough that I managed to pull free in the fog.
And then I was running, flying through the tunnels as fast as my feet would carry me, praying I didn’t slam full speed into a wall or stumble over stray junk or slide on the rocky ground.
I heard the demons shout in surprise behind me but it didn’t matter.
I’d done it. I was free.
Adrenaline pushed me forward, buoyed by the elation of knowing I’d escaped.
Except less than a minute later I slammed into a steel wall that rose up out of the fog.
A shudder traveled through my body, and I would have gone down if not for the hands that closed around my upper arms like twin vises.
I looked up, tracing the wall of inked granite to the hawk mask, glittering amber eyes staring down at me.
“Got you, little mouse.”
11
HAWK
I wasn’t even surprised.
We worked the Hunt the way my hawks worked the fields when they were looking for food: swooping, diving, covering as much ground as possible.
