The Black Tide (Outcast 3)

Dream had finally ensnared me.

Chapter Twelve

Waking was painful.

My head felt like it was full of roaches trying to claw their way out, and my body was on fire. Sweat poured from my forehead, dripped from my spine, and appeared to be creating an ever-increasing pool underneath me. Pain was a sledgehammer that crashed through every sensory outlet, and it felt like my head was about to explode.

It was a feeling I was familiar with, as I’d suffered the exact same symptoms when Branna had darted me with Iruakandji the day I’d first entered Nuri’s bar with Penny and an injured Jonas. It was a drug that had been developed in the latter part of the war by the HDP, and one that had been rarely used. While it had killed shifters with great alacrity, it had proven unviable in real-time usage. Not only had it been extremely costly to make, but it was also very deadly to déchet, no matter how little shifter they had. Even we lures had not been immune to its effects, although for the most part, it didn’t actually kill us. It just put us through many hours of hell.

But the Iruakandji was not the worst of it, because there were heavy weights on my wrists and my ankles, and a fierce heat burning against my skin. My naked skin, if the cold feel of the concrete against my shoulders and butt was anything to go by.

I forced my eyes open, desperate to see where I was. It was a concrete box little more than six by six with no windows and no obvious air system, although there had to be something here, given I wasn’t suffocating. The bright lights weren’t UV, which was rather surprising, but they were uncomfortably warm and hurt my eyes.

Even so, I could see the cameras. My movements were being monitored.

The door was solid metal, and it was inset into the doorframe, meaning it was sliding and, as such, left no space between the door and the frame. And that meant that even if I could draw a light-blocking shield around me and then become shadow, I would not be able to escape this place.

Jonas said it’s better not to escape, Cat said softly. Wearily. They intend to use this development to bring down Dream.

It was all I could do not to snap my head around in her direction. I hadn’t even sensed they were near—obviously, whatever drug Charles had given me still lingered in my system.

Are you two okay? You sound weary.

Yes, they both said. But it was a long night.

I pushed up into a sitting position—an action that not only sent the roaches into a fever pitch and had sweat dripping down the side of my face, but also had the chains on my wrists snapping tight. Those chains were solid silver and would have burned the hell out of me if I’d been, as my RFID chip said, a full shifter. I wasn’t, so they did little more than warm my skin.

Of course, it also told my jailers that my RFID chip had been tampered with.

I shifted my butt backwards until my spine was pressed against the wall and then hugged my knees to my chest in an effort to keep upright. It was a position that pulled the chains on both my ankles and wrists tight, but I didn’t care. The roaches now seemed intent on eating my brain and the pain was unlike anything I’d ever experienced before. They’d obviously upped the dosage this time. I closed my eyes and breathed in slowly—deeply—until the sensation faded enough to think. Speak.

What happened while I was out of it?

They gave you a truth drug when you started showing signs of awareness. Exhaustion ran through Bear’s mental tone. Hedda Lang was here, interrogating you.

And? I asked, my heart suddenly somewhere in the middle of my throat.

She got nothing about any of us, Cat replied. Not the bunker, not who we are—who you really are—and nothing about Nuri, Jonas, or anyone else. We made sure of it.

A mix of astonishment and pride at their initiative ran through me. How did you manage that against someone like Dream?

You know how we created the deeper connection that allowed us to taste the macaroon? Bear said. We did that, but instead of sharing taste, we were able to curtail what you said.

Oh Rhea, no wonder they were so damn tired! If I could hug you two without making those watching the cameras suspicious, I would. But it was a damn big risk to take with Dream in the room. If she’d sensed you—

But she couldn’t, Cat said. This room is shielded against psychic and magical intrusion. It restricts her.

If that’s the case, why is it not stopping me from conversing with you?

Because we three are one, Cat said. It was only the drugs that stopped you hearing us earlier.

So where are we?

In specialized holding cells under the Ministry of Home Defense building, Bear said. You have been here for two days.

Two days? That wasn’t good, given Nuri’s three days until hell breaks out declaration. If she w

as right, then that event would happen tonight.