Cassandra entered using the key Aneka had provided, then crept up to August’s second-floor office while Hella kept watch out front.
Messy piles of documents spilled across August’s desk, and tall shelves lined the walls, chock-full of overflowing filing boxes, empty bottles of Delirium, and rows of books arranged in random patterns, spines facing both inandout.
As unnerving as the haphazard organizational system was, the board on the wall behind August’s desk was a thousand times worse.
Cassandra crept closer to examine it, and acidic bile crawled up her throat.
Pinned to the board were dozens upon dozens of pictures of human women, their bodies in various states of undress and covered with seeping wounds and purple bruises. None of the pictures showed any faces, and Cassandra couldn’t decide if that was better or worse. As if the women were nothing more than lumps of flesh in August’s eyes.
Shuddering as she turned away from his sickening trophy wall, Cassandra pulled back the hood of her cloak and sunk into a leather chair behind a sculpted cherry desk.
Beams of moonlight spotlighted the veritable mountain of evidence laid out before her. Enough to suggest that not only was Lambros working with the Teles Chrysos, but that he’d been the one orchestrating those attacks.
She plucked up a map of August’s district, tracing her fingers across the hastily scrawled circles around the buildings that had been bombed.
Underneath that was a diagram of a spherical device with a pin through the top, plus instructions on how to activate and deactivate the weapon. A black-and-white sigil underneath the diagram showcased a mountain peak bracketed by two leathery wings. Cassandra didn’t recognize it, but assumed it signified one of the continental territories.
As she rolled up the map and diagram, her gaze caught on a note written in swooping letters she didn’t recognize, its edges blackened. As if it had been singed.
At the bottom of the note was a Teles symbol.
She carefully folded the burned note and placed it in her satchel with the other documents, then stood from the chair.
A creak sounded in the hallway.
Her stomach tumbled to her feet as she tiptoed to the door, then pressed her ear against it, listening for any additional signs of movement.
Silence.
She didn’t dare call out for Hella as she crept back to the window. The backyard was still and silent, no lights suddenly ablaze to chase away the lingering shadows.
As quietly as possible, she slunk back to the door and wrapped her hand around the knob.
Before she could pull it open, it was yanked from her grip and an icy flare of adrenaline scorched through her veins.
August Lambros spread his sapphire wings, his bland face contorted with delighted rage.
She bent to duck around him, but he seized her throat, his cold fingers boring into her skin and crushing her windpipe.
“Oh Ker,” he chuckled, shooting tendrils of wind down her torso. He pulled the air from her lungs with terrible gentleness, savoring the sight of her consciousness slowly slipping away.
“We’re going to have such fun together.”
CHAPTERFORTY-SIX
Fetid water dripped onto Cassandra’s temple, luring her towards groggy awareness.
She attempted to brush the drops aside, but her hands lurched to a stop with an echo of clanking metal.
Iron cuffs bit into her bare wrists and ankles, connected by a chain woven through a metal loop on the wet stone floor. She dragged herself to a seated position, her feet planted and knees bent, arms cradled in her lap. She shivered, exposed to the cold damp in only a lemon yellow bra and panties. August had stripped her of her clothing, her shoes, and her satchel, piled them along a curved wall behind her.
Faint shafts of moonlight trickled in from a grate high above, providing just enough illumination for her to study her surroundings.
The circular chamber, made entirely of slime-slick stones, had no windows. And based on the smell, Thalenn’s sewers were on the other side of the rusted door to her right.
To her left loomed a long, silver table with a wide trough beneath. A cart stood next to the table, but she was too low to see what it held. She probably didn’t want to know.
Panic shuddered through her as she began to yank at her cuffs, trying to pry them over her folded hands.
