Page 17 of Merciless
“Baby girl,” he huffed, face flushed as his eyes searched my face. “Did we hurt you?”
I took a moment to answer. I felteverythingnow that it was over. The stretch and ache in my skin and limbs rose to the surface now that the adrenaline was ebbing away.
“Yes, but,” I touched a finger to his lips when his brows knitted, “it’s okay. I wanted to hurt and I feel…okay now. Not good, but better.”
“Hot bath,” Jandro grunted against the back of my shoulder. “You’re gonna be sore for a while.”
“Shit, I thinkwe’regonna be sore.” Gunner pulled me off the bike and folded me up carefully in his arms. “You just about killed us.”
“But it was good,” Jandro added, sliding gingerly off the bike. “I think we all needed that.”
I couldn’t agree more. It didn’t fix anything but the release of tension, of frustration and helplessness, made me feel lighter. After a bath to soothe my aches and pains and a few decent hours of sleep, maybe then I could think of a way to get Reaper and Shadow back.
Seven
SHADOW
Watching Reaper get tortured was infinitely worse than receiving it myself. Like with the men who shared my cage with me growing up, I was powerless to do anything to save him.
Only this time, I had to watch it all happen to my president and friend. No amount of pulling on my chains and yelling at them did any good. Every time they left him in a limp, bloody heap, I fought like hell to escape my own bonds to help him. But not even I could loosen the chains that were bolted to the ground. With the lack of food and water, every day left me weaker.
And every day, Reaper’s breathing got quieter. He moved less after every beating, and I was getting increasingly worried whenever several seconds would pass without him taking a breath.
A few times, the Sha had returned and miraculously healed him, only to have the torture start all over again. Even those days were becoming few and far between. I was afraid to fall asleep in case Reaper stopped breathing altogether.
“Reaper.”
I talked to him as much as I could, just to let him know that I was still there. That we still had a life outside of this dungeon worth going back to. When I was alone in my own dungeon, I would have killed for someone to talk to other than my mother. Even when I knew they’d be going to their death, I yearned for the men who’d be thrown into my cell with me. They weren’t always friendly, but they didn’t hate me and they told me about an outside world that sounded wondrous and imaginary.
“Reaper.” I repeated his name until I got a pained groan in reply. Metal scraped on stone as I pushed my water bowl toward him with my boot. The water was dirty and only half an inch deep, but if it would extend his life another minute, I would make sure he drank it. “There’s water about a foot away from your left hand. Drink it.”
A wheezing, rattling breath answered me and my skin crawled with the sound. It sounded like he had fluid in his lungs. He had a bad cough two days ago. Now it seemed he didn’t even have the strength to cough.
“Drink the water, Reaper,” I insisted. “I need you to hold on. Our whole family does.”
His bloody fingers twitched on the floor at his side but he didn’t move for the bowl. I swallowed, my own throat as dry as a bone, but Reaper needed that water more than me. His hand looked wrong too—swollen, bruised, and probably broken in several places. The guard had taken turns stomping on it this morning.
“Hey,” I called when the cell got too quiet. “You with me?”
“…Yeah…”
It was little more than a huff of breath, more weak and defeated than any sound I’d heard from him before. Fuck, he would surely die without medical treatment soon. How far was the Sha willing to go to break into his mind? Had that not already been accomplished yet? I wanted to ask Reaper these questions, but more importantly, I didn’t want to waste what little remained of his strength by making him talk.
The Sha had tried to pry into my head a few times since being here, but whatever protection our companion gods had over us didn’t allow the Sha inside. It felt like an outsider was pounding on my door every day but never making it inside my house. I could only hope the case was the same for Reaper.
I had a sense the Sha was growing frustrated at being unable to mentally break us. But even if he didn’t succeed, he could kill us even easier. Able bodies were apparently disposable and easy to replace. That was all humanity was to this thing—a means to an end.
Our cell door opened with a series of metallic clanks and a guard walked in, carefully holding a metal bowl with both hands. I was guarded, alert and tense as I watched him approach Reaper, who was painstakingly trying to move away, but there was little movement anymore that didn’t hurt him.
“Look at this,” the guard said with a smile I did not like at all. “A full bowl of fresh water. Just for you, puppy.”
A smell hit me that I couldn’t place. Something sharp and bitter that definitely was not water. Reaper’s cracked, bloody lips parted with a soft pant. He knew better than to trust our captors, but he was also badly dehydrated. His brain heardfresh waterand now he wouldn’t be able to think of anything else.
The guard stood in front of him, waving the bowl from side to side in front of Reaper’s face. Of course Reaper couldn’t smell it when his nose was broken in several places.
“Reaper, don’t drink that,” I warned. “It’s not water. It doesn’t smell right.”
The guard clicked his tongue at me. “Sounds like your buddy just wants it for himself. Can you imagine how good a drink of clean, filtered water will taste?”
