Savage Saints (Monsters of Saint Mark's)

“All right,” I say, bored. “I’m done with this witch.” I direct my gaze to Tarq. “Can we just get on with this, please?”

“Don’t you even want to know how?”

“How what?” I ask her.

“How I profited from your death?”

“Well. I’m not dead, so I’m pretty sure you didn’t.”

“Aren’t you?”

“Oh, please.” I sigh. “Have you been talking to Grant? It’s not going to work. I called Jacqueline from the gas station. Hello? I’m real.”

The queen smiles, then tries to turn her head to see Tarq. She barely manages. His grip on her throat is tight. “No one told her?” The queen laughs. “So I get to be the one to break the news? Oh, that’s perfect.”

“Stop playing games, witch!” Again, Pell’s reverberating words stun me. “And tell us where the wood nymphs are. We’re not leaving here without them.”

“Fine!” the queen says. “Take them. Why would I care? I already told you, it’s not me hurting them, it’s him.” Then her gaze shifts from Pell to me and I get one of those really bad, sinking feelings in my stomach. “But you can’t leave so soon, dear sister. It would be such a waste to have gone through all that trouble—the whole charade with the bonus and the—”

“What? What did you just say?”

“—and the new home. You’re not a very clever girl, are you?”

“What are you talking about?” But that sick feeling is curdling the acid in my stomach. Something is very wrong here and I’m on the verge of finding out what it is.

“Why would I care if they leave? Why would I care what any of you do when I have you in a cage?”

“Me?” I look at Tarq. “What the hell is she talking about?”

“Look over there,” Callistina says, nodding her head in a direction across the room. My eyes follow and find a weird dome-like object on a stand next to her throne. “Go pull the cover off, Pie. Go pull it off and see what I’m talking about.”

“Don’t do it,” Tarq says. “It’s a trick.”

“Not a trick,” Callistina snickers. “Not a trick at all. There is a cage under that cloth cover, Pie. A cage just big enough to fit something very specific.” Her smile is pure evil.

“No.” I shake my head and say it again. Louder this time. “No.”

“Oh, I’m afraid so, dear. It was a piece of bad luck, your gifts. It made you so vulnerable. I mean, look at how long it took you to get here. And this is but the first stepping stone to your goal.”

I’m walking towards the throne as she talks, only half listening. But still, I want to stop and ask her questions. How long it took me? And what goal?

But these are floating thoughts. My eyes are on that covered cage.

“Pie!” Pell says, running up and grabbing my arm. “Don’t do it. Stay here.”

But I jerk free. Not even his rumbling, breathy words could stop me now. I know what I’m going to see under that cover. I know, I know, I know…

And still, when I pull the cover off, I almost fall to the ground when I see her lifeless body limp on the floor. “Pia?”

Pell catches me before I actually collapse. He holds me as I just shake my head. “No. No, no, no. This is not happening.” I pull free of Pell again. Then whirl around and yell, “You can’t kill her!”

“Oh, but I can. And I have. And that is you in that cage, dear sister. Your magic is gone now. What a dumb thing to ask for. To put your magic all in one place. It’s so—”

But I can longer hear her. Everything has gone red for me. The entire room is nothing but red.

This is what Pie’s anger looks like, I think to myself.

This is what Pie’s despair looks like.