Page 25 of Knave

“Follow me and find out,” Mouse taunted. With that, she leapt from the bridge while Ferris cursed above her. A sparkling white light flashed, the portal sucking her inside, her body falling through glittering darkness. Mouse’s stomach rose to her throat as she plummeted, the adrenaline rush singing in her veins until the portal opened, spitting her out on the soft white earth of Ivory.

Ferris grunted when he landed on his stomach beside her. “That was fucking awful.”

“Saved us time though, didn’t it? Another good reason I came.” Mouse smiled, pushing herself up from the ground. She brushed off her hands on her dress and stared straight ahead to where silver and white trees turned to ones of red. But not like the trunks in Scarlet. These were a deep red that was almost black with not a single leaf growing from any of their gnarled branches.

“So, this is Red? It looks positively lovely,” Ferris said with sarcasm.

“It is, isn’t it?” She laughed softly.

As they crossed into the forest, the scent of rain enveloped her. It was known as the Broken Forest of Shattered Blood because it was where the Red Queen had brought whoever she desired to die. She would break them into pieces, then hang their body parts in the trees as decorations. In many ways, the Red Queen was like Imogen.

The ground below their feet was a sandy red texture and squished as they walked. Up in the branches, bald owls hissed, their beaks filled with sharp black fangs.

“Well, aren’ttheyfriendly?” Ferris rolled his eyes.

“They’re like the crows in Scarlet. Leave them alone and you’ll be fine.” She shrugged. “Otherwise, they’ll peck away and eat your flesh.”

The rainy scent of the forest changed to something else… A metal smell wafted through the air, caressing her nose.Fresh. A mixture of vampire, human, and werewolf.

Mouse’s fangs dropped on instinct and when she peered at Ferris, his were too. They took a few steps forward while surveying the area. A rustling came behind her, accompanied by a deep growl. She yanked out her gun from her boot, whirling around just as Ferris’s went off. The werewolf thrashed, its obsidian fur turning gray and orange as its body disintegrated to fiery ash. Another growl sounded, shaking the trees surrounding her.

A twig snapped to Mouse’s left and she pulled the gun’s trigger, blasting a white-furred werewolf with its fangs bared. Its form changed to ash just as another came barreling from her right. But Ferris gunned it down, its body quaking to the ground while falling to pieces.

“Should’ve expected rogue werewolves to slum it up here,” Ferris grumbled.

Mouse listened closely for a sign of any others. Werewolves weren’t ones to stay hiding—if there was a threat, they would all come. But only bugs and small animals made any noise. Through the silence, the scent of blood became stronger.

She walked a few steps behind Ferris as they padded past thick tree trunks to where several piles of bones rested, licked clean of any remains. Blood splattered the ground, a vampire’s head on its side, but the rest of the body was gone.

A gurgling sound caught her attention and she crept behind a tree to find a male form beside another pile of bones. He was without one arm and both his legs had been ripped off.Human.

By the sounds of his uneven breathing, he wasn’t going to make it. Mouse’s hunger stormed through her veins, her eyes fluttering.

Ferris lowered himself and whispered in her ear, his hot breath tickling her neck, “Go on, luv. We are what we are.” Her eyes fluttered more, but for a different reason. He then gently nudged her forward. “The mortal won’t make it anyway.”

Taking a deep swallow, Mouse nodded and peered down at the human, his wide blue eyes. His words came out garbled and she couldn’t make out what he was saying. Her hunger grew ravenous as she knelt beside him, but she attempted to rein it in, to control herself. Not be Rav’s monster and tear the mortal apart even more.

“Sleep. There will be no more pain after this,” she murmured, then lowered her teeth to his neck, piercing his flesh, giving in to her instincts. Warm blood flooded over her tongue and she drank, giving the man what he needed.

Death.

Chapter Eleven

Ferris

When vampires referred to Red as a wasteland, they weren’t full of shit. Burnt patches and brittle, dead brush dotted the red clay. Even the distant sky was tinted red with the amount of dust the wind blew into the air. Ferris, with a hand on Mouse’s lower back, steered her around the skeleton of a large cat-like creature while reveling in her warmth, wishing he could take more of it. But Mouse assured him that they were almost at the palace and he needed to focus.Skeleton,he thought to himself, staring at the dead animal to keep his mind on track. These weren’t the first remains they’d come across—small birds had been littered about too. Even a human—or a vampire—curled up against the trunk of a decaying tree. Mansions had caved in on themselves while other buildings were completely gone, leaving nothing behind but their foundation.

Despite the obvious disrepair of the entire territory, Ferris wasn’t prepared for the sorry state of the palace. He paused, Mouse beside him, and they stared at the polished red sandstone. Whatusedto be polished, anyway. Now it sat in crumbling heaps and gold flecks glittered up from the larger chunks. Two stories still stood with what looked to be at least two more having partially collapsed.

Shattered glass crunched underfoot as Ferris picked his way through what once must’ve been a glorious courtyard. Bricks in varying shades of red were laid in massive overlapping circles with the base of a huge statue at the center of the largest. The base was carved from black stone and only three marble feet were left attached to it. One woman’s heel and two old-fashioned men’s shoes with broad buckles. Whoever the statue was of—likely the dead king and queen of Red—had been reduced to pebbles. The king had died long before the queen, so Ferris absently wondered if this was her monument to him or if it was created before his death.

“Do you think there’s anything worth salvaging?” Mouse asked quietly.

Ferris scowled at the palace. It wasn’t like Red was overrun with bandits. Everyone was dead or gone, but there was no telling what happened as soon as the royals had died. If the groundswereraided, it would’ve been for jewels or other nice ass shit—not conspiracy theories about the fucking Jabberwocky.

“Only one way to find out,” he answered.

Mouse slipped her hand in his and his heart gave a little jump. The memory of holding her hips as she ground on top of him rushed to the surface. The urge to have her on top of him again pulsed through his body. He wanted his mouth on hers, to feel the weight of her breasts in his hands, to slide into her. To thrust. Hard.Sohard that she would know how much he wanted her.Neededher.

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