Masquerade (Creepy Hollow, #4) (8 page)

Ryn looks up; his eyes meet mine. “What happened?”

I clear my throat. “Zell’s down, but not for long. We have to get out of here
now
.”

He nods. “Cal,” he says gently. “This is Violet. She’s going to help us get out of here.” 

The little girl turns her face toward me, and all I can feel is surprise. I was expecting someone who looks just like Ryn, but she couldn’t be more different. Her hair is dark blonde with streaks of honey, caramel and gold. Her eyes, currently wide with fear, are gold too. Almost luminous. I’m left with the feeling that she may possibly be the most beautiful faerie child in existence.

As we run for the other room, the prisoners cry out for our help. “I’m sorry,” I shout, unable to look any of them in the eye. “We can’t stay any longer or we’ll be trapped here too. The Guild will send people to rescue you, I promise.”

We hurry into the other room and run past the table—just as the mangled chandelier comes flying toward us. Calla screams. I turn and throw up a shield, then groan and collapse onto my knees as the force behind the chandelier threatens to overpower me. Zell gets to his feet on the table. “I don’t care if I have to break every bone in your body, Violet. You will
not
get away from me this time, and you will
not
take that girl.” He pushes his hands forward as though doing a press up against the air, forcing the chandelier even harder against my shield.
Dammit, he’s so strong!

Behind me, Ryn is speaking to Calla, asking if she knows how to open the stone door.

“Yes, it’s—it’s that stone there. No, the next one. You have to pull it.”

“Ryn,” I gasp. “I can’t . . . hold him off . . . for much longer.” I hear the rumble of the stone door sliding open. Perhaps Ryn and Calla are already out, running for their lives, leaving me here to fight Zell. But then I feel Ryn’s hand on my arm, pulling me onto my feet.

“You have to take Calla, okay? I’ll keep Zell busy so you have time to get away.” He holds his hands up and adds his shield to mine.

“What? Ryn, we can’t leave you—”

“Go! You’re exhausted, Vi. I’m not. I can do this.” He focuses his attention forward, his eyes narrowed.

“Ryn, he’ll kill you. It’s us he wants, not you.” Without looking away from Zell, Ryn pushes me backward. I stumble on my heeled boots, losing hold of my shield as I catch myself against the wall.

“Go!” he yells once more.

I grab Calla’s hand and run.

I sneak Calla out of the kitchen door and into the gardens. Wisps of cloud move slowly across the moon, but the stars are bright, and it’s light enough for us to see our way. “Do you have one of those metal bands on your ankle?” I ask.

She shakes her head. “They were still making a small one for me.”

“Okay, so you have to be very careful not you use any magic, all right?”

“I—I’ll try.”

We creep along in silence while I try to figure out what to do next. When we round a corner and come upon a row of carriages and those long black cars with the stretched middle part, it seems to me that the best way out of here is probably the same way we came in.

I open the back door of the nearest car and Calla climbs inside. I get in after her and close the door as quietly as I can. The light inside the car fades out, but not before I notice the dark patch of blood along the bottom of Calla’s nightdress. “You’re hurt,” I exclaim. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

“I’m not,” she says. “It isn’t my blood. I . . . I did something bad.” I can just make out the tears welling up in her eyes.
Oh, flip.
What am I supposed to do with a crying child? I have no idea what to say! Her lip starts wobbling. “Is Ryn going to die?”

“What? No, of course not.” I take Calla’s small hand in my own. “He’s a really good fighter. He’ll get out of there.” He damn well better get out of there.

“But we just left him with that bad man.”

“Yeah, we did . . .” Something I’m feeling intensely guilty about. It’s not what I’ve been trained to do. Guardians fight together. “But I can’t leave you alone, Calla.”

“What if I promise to stay right here? Will you go back and get him?” Her gold eyes beg me.

“Okay,” I say. I’ve barely got any energy left, but I agree with Calla. We can’t just leave Ryn down there.

I climb out the car and head back to the kitchen. I shouldn’t have waited so long. I should have just hidden Calla outside and gone back to the dungeon immediately. Ryn could be dead by now because I wasn’t there to help him.

 I’m almost at the kitchen door when a shape detaches itself from the shadows and staggers toward me. I form a fist, pull my arm back, and—

“It’s me,” says Ryn.

“Jeez, Ryn. How about you say that
before
you come lurching out of the shadows like some kind of zombie.”

“Why aren’t you . . . gone?” He stumbles like a drunk person.

“Why do you think, idiot? I came back for—Whoa.” I catch him as he sags against me. “What’s wrong with you?”

“Glass,” he says. “In my . .
 
. back.”

I hold onto his arm and turn him. Moonlight glints off the shards of glass protruding from his back. “Seriously, Ryn? Did you
have
to go and get yourself shot with poison?”

“I was trying to . . . piss you . . . off.”

“Well, congratulations. You succeeded.” I half drag him to the car, not allowing myself to panic yet.

Calla opens the door. I try to get Ryn inside, but he collapses before he’s all the way in. I climb over him, grab his arms, and pull. Calla gets his legs inside, pulling one of his shoes off in the process. She closes the door—a little too loudly for my liking. “What happened?” she whimpers. “What’s wrong with him?”

The light fades out again. “Dammit, why won’t that stay on?” I put my hands over the light and feel around until I find a switch. When I can see again, I sit down, pop open the compartment at the bottom of my shoe, and take out my miniature emergency kit. And then I remember that in order to enlarge it I have to use magic, which will set off that blasted alarm. I press my lips together to stop myself from swearing out loud.

I breathe in deeply, noticing the smell of stale cigarette smoke. “He’s been poisoned,” I tell Calla. “See the glass in his back? It’s got poison on it. And I basically can’t do a thing without magic. I can’t send my own power into his body to help him, and I can’t use anything from my emergency kit because it’s currently the size of an acorn. I guess I could wrap fabric around my fingers and try to remove the pieces of glass, but the poison—”

The car door opens. A man with a weird hat pokes his chubby face in. “What is going on in here?” Before I can get across Ryn’s body to knock the man out, Calla grabs Ryn’s shoe and whacks the man on the head. He jerks away with a cry. I jump out after him and force him—with some difficulty—into the front seat.

I whip my stylus out of my boot and point it at him in a manner that’s meant to be threatening. “Are you the driver of this thing?”

“Y—yes.”

“Well then.” I press the stylus against his thick neck. “Drive.”

“Y—you can’t hurt me,” he stammers. “I know you can’t use magic here. There’s a—an alarm or something.”

“You think magic is the only thing I can do with this stick?” I lean close to his ear. “Trust me. Things are going to get extremely uncomfortable for you if you don’t do exactly what I say.” He swallows, does something with a key near the steering wheel, and the car purrs to life. We follow the paved path to the front of the house, around the circle, and down the driveway. The gate is open, but one of the guards stands in front of it. He holds a hand up.

“Slow down,” I tell the driver. “Slower . . . slower . . .” We’re almost at the gate. The guard, looking bored, moves toward the driver’s window. “Now go!” I slide back in the seat as the car jumps forward and passes beneath the glare of the stone dragons.

We’re free!

“Keep going. Don’t slow down unless you want to feel pain.” I write a doorway onto the window and climb through it, arriving a second later in the back seat of the car. Calla is holding Ryn’s arm to her chest, tears streaming down her face. Without warning, he sits up and pulls her into a hug. I suck in a breath of surprise. But then his form flickers and he’s lying on the floor of the car again.

Calla’s eyes meet mine. “I—I’m sorry. That was me.”

“Oh. Okay.” That was certainly weird. “Um . . . you keep holding onto that arm, and I’ll take this one.” I grip Ryn’s lifeless hand, then open a doorway on the floor near his feet. I widen it so that three of us can fit through. “Okay, come around this side.” She moves, never letting go of Ryn’s hand. “Now we’re going to jump in at the same time and pull him with us. Ready? One, two, three!”

We disappear into the darkness. I focus my mind on the largest couch in my sitting room, and a moment later all three of us bounce onto it. Calla topples off, and Ryn’s legs stick over the end in what would most definitely be an uncomfortable position if he were awake to feel it. I push the table out of the way and drag him onto the floor, making sure to keep him on his stomach so the glass doesn’t press into his back.

“All right, Calla.” I remove my emergency kit from my shoe and transform it back to its normal size. “You need to stop crying so you can help me, okay?” She nods, but looks terrified. “You see these?” I hold up a bottle of flat green squares no larger than my pinkie nail. “You need to put one on his tongue every few minutes. They’re going to speed up his body’s healing process.” They won’t do the job nearly as well as my own magic would, but I don’t have much to give him right now, and Calla needs something to focus on to keep her calm. After emptying some of the squares onto my palm, I pass the battle to her.

I fish around in my kit and find a small tweezer. While Calla seats herself by Ryn’s head, I set about the painstaking task of removing the shards of glass. After every few pieces, I pop a green square into my mouth and let it dissolve on my tongue.

When I’ve finally removed every piece of glass I can see, Calla has fallen asleep, and my body has begun to replenish its store of magic.
Time to share.
I remove Ryn’s jacket with difficulty. When I get to his shirt, I don’t bother. I slide my finger from his neck down to the bottom of his spine, neatly slicing his shirt open. Pulling the pieces of fabric aside, I see numerous blue-tinged wounds covering his back. I gently place my hands over his skin, take a deep breath, and try to relax. I also try not to think about the last time I did this—for Nate. He must have already decided to betray me at that point.

Pushing aside my anger and hurt, I concentrate. I can feel the magic leaving my body, like trails of rainwater escaping off the tips of leaves. Slowly, the blue fades away and the wounds begin to seal themselves up. I don’t stop until I’ve almost completely exhausted myself.

I remove my hands. Ryn’s back seems perfectly healed, but I don’t know what’s going on inside him. I can’t do any more though. With an enormous yawn, I collapse onto the floor beside him and fall asleep.