Page 87 of Such a Feral Little Lamb
I don’t say anything. Mason’s shoulders tense. I can’t grapple with all the consequences of knowinghe’sthe necromancer, not right now, not here. But my stomach is churning all the same, a strange pressure building behind my eyes.
“Dane—”
“I can keep you safe. I can make sure no one ever bothers you again. All you have to do is give yourself to me. Surely it won’t be that much of a hardship—you spread your legs for this piece of shit, after all. I don’t mind fucking a slut, as long as you know you belong to me.”
Mason finally makes an outraged sound behind the gag. Dane laughs and lets go of his shoulder, knife never moving as he unfastens the piece of cloth and drags it from Mason’s mouth.
“Yes, let’s hear it! What have you got left to offer him now?”
“I’ll kill you before you ever lay a finger on him,” Mason growls. He doesn’t look away from my face. “He’s not yours to touch.”
Fuck, it shouldn’t, but the words calm me. Mason is here. He’s here and he’s alive, and he can’t be as helpless as all that, can he?
Autumn is quietly crying next to him, leaning her body as far away from Dane as she can without leaving the chair. I can’t get between her and Dane, much as I want to.
Dane sneers. “I guess you had your mouth too full when you were alone to tell him just what you’d done, huh?” He shakes Mason’s shoulder. “Now’s your chance. Tell him.”
“It’s true?” I ask. I don’t know why I’m asking. I already know it is.
“Yes,” Mason says, eyes hard. “I was the first one here to have any power. I was the one to raise the dead. And then I—”
“You lost control,” I say.
“Yes.”
“And he’s never got it back,” Dane says, smiling at me again. “Look at him. He’s not even in charge of this fucking place!”
“Nia is more than capable,” Mason says, and Dane snorts.
“That bitch? She didn’t have a clue what I was up to, and neither did you.”
Mason’s jaw clenches. “No, I did not.”
Dane laughs again. He looks away when he does, and I take another step closer. Still not close enough. Not when Mason can’t get out of the way.
“You caused all this,” I murmur. “You didn’t… You said you wouldn’t lie to me.”
“I didn’t. You never asked who the necromancer was.”
“You said they were long gone.”
“The boy I was—the boy who caused all this—is gone.”
“The zombies?” I ask. I shake my head. It doesn’t need to be a question. “That’s why you were there the first night.Youwere going to kill us.”
For the first time, Mason looks away. “Yes.”
“And why didn’t you?” Dane says. “Why did you let us go?”
Mason is silent. Dane’s fingers tighten on his shoulder, and he presses the knife harder against his throat.
“Why?!”
“Because of you,” Mason says, looking at me. “I couldn’t kill you.”
Dane shakes his head. “You—”
“None of you worked it out. We knew you wouldn’t. You couldn’t find the zombies, no matter where you looked because we call them only when we need them.”
