Numbness had set in again by the time Fuzzball rode out of the grey mist—so dense I could only see my husbands on either side of me—and the nightmares threatened to drag me into even worse daydreams. I felt it in an abstract way when Death reached across to cover my cold hand with his, and when Madde almost fell off Sana in order to kiss my cheek.
Cold bit through the numbness when I saw the moors road where I’d first met Death, Tor, and Miz on the back of these same horses. When I thought they’d come to kill me, before I learned about Nightmare, her cult, and all the evil she had planned for us.Cruelty’sevil. Rage and hatred attempted to emerge, but it was sucked down into the cold well of my emotions, drowned.
Until we reached the top of the road. Until the gates swung open on a ghostly wind to coax us inside. Until we rode down the snaking, tree-lined road with Rosalind Woods watchful beside us, its skeletal branches clacking together like finger bones. Until we reached the end of the road and found Cruelty and Violence waiting for us.
The slashes on my body erupted with remembered pain. The bruises hurt worse than they had all night. I didn’t look at Violence, didn’t dare to. But also because Cruelty stood beforethe backdrop of Ford’s imposing campus with a beaming grin on her face, bright blue eyes glittering like stars. She clapped her hands together, setting the butter-yellow broderie anglaise of her dress dancing.
A ray of warm sunlight broke through the grey clouds above us like she’d planned it, setting her golden hair aglow.
And my numbness finally shattered when I bared my teeth at the bitch whodaredto wear Honey’s face.
CHAPTER 13
CAT
Ileapt down from Fuzzball before my brain could catch up to my action, my hands shaking, armsvibratingwith fury. I barely noticed my beautiful shadow horse melting into the mist, only registering her teeth clacking together when she jerked her head forward in a threat, as if she’d rip out Cruelty’s throat.
“Howdareyou wear her face,” I snarled, and propelled myself at Cruelty.
The psychopath laughed, a trilling, high sound that would have been beautiful from anyone else. From her, it grated my temper until sheer wrath erupted.
“Cat,” Death breathed, catching me around the waist and pulling me back. My legs kicked in the air, and I stretched out my arms, hands eager to strangle the goddess of cruelty until not even ascrapof her life remained. “We have to be careful, little bride,” he murmured in my ear, and the words were like a bucketof ice water. Because I’d thrown myself at Cruelty, but she didn’t stand alone. Her brother, my torturer, was right beside her.
I exhaled a shuddery breath, the numbness creeping back in.
“I’m so happy you’re here, Kitty,” Cruelty said in a rush, as if she didn’t hand me off to her brother to cut and punch and whip, as if I didn’t try to end her tainted life. “Iknewyou’d come. Besties can never be separated.”
“I’ll separate your head from your neck,” I spat when another flash of wrath made it through the ocean of numbness. I didn’t look at Violence, even if I knew he loomed there, a solid stack of muscle and threat driven by a hunger to inflict pain, to tear screams from his victims’ throats. I had to lock my bones to suppress a flinch.
“I’ll help,” Madde said eagerly, pressing close on my left as my men surrounded me, Pain and Miz on my other side. “I’ve been waiting for a chance to crush all your bones until you’re just a skin bag.”
“Not particularly smart to threaten my sister.” Violence’s voice hit me like a punch to the solar plexus, and I recoiled into Death.
“I’ve got you,” he promised, both arms encircling my waist.
“Especially given we have yourfriend,”Violence sneered.
I went still, even as Misery lunged forward, a rattling hiss in his throat. “Where is he? What have you bastards done with him?”
“We’ll tell you,” Cruelty said sweetly, Honey’s voice carving through me like a knife.“Ifyou play our game.”
“What game?” Pain demanded in a voice far colder than usual.
Cruelty swept her arm out in an elaborate gesture and a rush of ice went through every limb in my body when students, identical in Ford uniforms—but blood red, not green—emerged from the arched doorway to Milton Hall. They separated intofour lines and spilled down the pathway, walking with the synchronised precision of a dictator’s army. The beat of their footsteps made my skin prickle.
My stomach compacted into a tight knot when they stopped all at once behind Cruelty and Violence, the faces among them familiar. There were Wil, Duncan, and Justin. There were two people from a lecture I couldn’t even remember the name of, let alone the content of, and the guy who dressed as a vagina at the Halloween party. But the way they moved… it wasn’t training, wasn’t natural. This wasthem,the twisted magic of the death gods. Every student at Ford was under their control.
“What game?” Cruelty laughed. “Well, school, silly.”
CHAPTER 14
CAT
Pretend to be a normal student, pretend everything was ordinary as we attended classes, and they’d give Tor back to us. My mouth was dry when I rasped, “We’ll do it.”
“I knew you wouldn’t let me down, Kitty,” Cruelty preened, beaming from ear to ear. Because she’d won and she knew it. Tor’s life was on the line; we couldn’t say no if we wanted to. And fuck did I want to.
I wanted to turn around, summon Fuzzball, and ride far, far away from this cursed place. But Tor was here, and as long as they held that over us, I would never walk away. Neither would any of my men.
