She took several deep breaths, her hand moving to her chest, all of her senses igniting. Her eyes took in Claire beside her, staring at her daughter’s blue eyes and blond hair. “Claire…”
“Mommy.” The child’s hand grabbed hers.
Just like any mother, she cared about her daughter’s well-being more than her own. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. Constance protected me.”
“Protected you…? Protected you from what?”
“Everything’s fine,” I said. “We’ll talk about it later.” I ran my fingers through her hair just the way I did with Claire. “You need to eat something and get these pills down.” I helped her to the edge of the bed before I grabbed the tray of food and the pills.
Beatrice didn’t look at the food on her lap. Her hand explored her back, stilling when she found the bandages under her shirt. She froze, eyes wide, everything coming back to her in a heartbeat.
“You’re safe now, Beatrice.” It was impossible to be pragmatic about this, to ignore how traumatic this moment really was, every moment in this place. Watching someone else go through this torture was much worse than going through it myself, and it gave me a sharper lens into the suffering. My eyes moistened, but I kept the tears back, knowing it would just make it harder if someone were to mirror her sorrow back at her.
She must have been in really serious pain, because all she cared about were the pills. She swallowed them dry and closed her eyes, like she had a migraine.
“I know you’re nauseated right now, but you’ll feel better if you eat—”
“They mutilated me…” She inhaled a deep breath, digesting the horror of the memory, her mind elsewhere while her body remained behind. “They wanted to see my wings…and cut my back to find them…” She cupped her mouth and broke into sobs, soul-crushing, uncontrollable sobs.
I stayed in their room for the night.
Claire fell asleep on the couch, her toys around her.
Since Beatrice had slept all day and all night, she was wide awake, grimacing in pain from her cuts. She kept popping the pills, but over-the-counter meds weren’t enough to subdue the kind of pain she endured.
She sat in the chair at her bedside next to the harp, her eyes forever in a daze. She seemed to relive the experience over and over again, even though it was torture, but she had to in order to make sense of what she’d suffered.
But there was no sense to be made of it.
I sat at the edge of the bed, wishing there were more I could do. “We’ll find a way out of here, Beatrice. We just gotta keep our eyes on the prize.”
Lifeless, she stared at a random spot on the other wall.
“I still have my dagger. He didn’t take it away from me.”
Nothing.
“Beatrice…talk to me.”
She finally looked at me, her eyes heavy. “What happened with Claire?”
I glanced at the sleeping child, who was out like a light, tired out from the shitty day. “A Malevolent came in here…tried to get her to take a pill.”
“A child?” She raised her voice and immediately winced in self-punishment. When she spoke again, she was quiet. “Jesus Christ, this place…” She inhaled a slow breath and dropped her gaze. “What happened?”
“I killed him.”
“You killed him?” Her voice rose again.
“Yeah…” Everything had happened so fast that I didn’t really have a chance to reflect on what had taken place.
“How?”
“My dagger.”
“They didn’t take it away from you?”
I shook my head.
“They didn’t…do anything to you?”
I shook my head again. “They just watched me do it, and that was it. They took the body at some point.”
“And they let you keep a weapon?”
I nodded.
“So, they carve me like a pumpkin…but let you keep a knife.” She looked away. “That makes a lot of sense…”
Forneus had known that it was in my hand, that I could have stabbed him in the stomach on the spot, but he didn’t seem to care. He’d known it was tucked into my sleeve when he watched me lie there, and he still didn’t care. He must have thought he was truly immortal or…that I didn’t have the balls to do it.
Well, I proved today that I did have the balls.
“Who bandaged me up?” she whispered.
“I did. I cleaned the wound, so you shouldn’t get an infection.”
“Where did you get the supplies?”
“Forneus.”
She stared at me, skeptical. “He just helped you?”
“I couldn’t believe it either.”
“Consider yourself lucky, because Amon…that would never happen.”
I wanted to ask about her demon, but that felt insensitive right now. Besides, I had all the information I needed to know. He was psychotic. He made my sneering demon look like a fucking clown.
Her expression glazed over once again, her eyes lifeless. “If he helped you with that, what else would he help you with?”
“I don’t know…haven’t considered it.” My time spent with Forneus hadn’t allowed me to understand him better. I understood him less, if anything. But it was conclusive that he was relatively harmless compared to some of the other demons. Never thought I’d be grateful for that sick, twisted smile. “Take my dagger next time…and kill him.”