“I take it the school wasn’t your favorite place.”
“I fucking hated it. Then the People’s recruiter came in when I was a junior. They brought in a caged vampire and let us try one by one. The feeling when I first realized I could control it . . . I can’t describe it. It was right. For the first time in my life, something felt right. I made the undead unlock the door of the cage and then I chased my darling classmates with it. The recruiter wasn’t strong enough to take it away from me. They ran from me. It didn’t matter how rich they were. It didn’t matter what their name was. Their august grandparents couldn’t save them, because if they had been there, they would’ve run from me, too.”
Ghastek smiled, a bright happy smile. “Some of them begged me to stop.”
He looked so happy I tried my best to scoot a little farther away from him in my restraints.
“They expelled me within the hour.” He laughed. “By the end of the day, the People brought my parents a check totaling more than they’d made together in the previous three years. A hardship fee to make their lives a little easier if I chose to leave home and study with the People. But my parents didn’t want to let me go. The money made no difference to them.”
“They loved you,” I guessed.
He nodded. “They did. I put the check in their hands and walked out of the house. I wanted the power. I wanted respect and money too, but most of all I wanted power. You asked me why I’m a navigator. Because I love it. I love when my magic makes that first connection. I love the precision of it, the subtlety, the art of it. If you could pilot, you’d understand.”
Oh, if he only knew.
“It’s like being connected to a spring of pure power. It nourishes you. I have risen so far. I’m now ranked seventeenth in the Golden Legion.”
The Legions were Roland’s top Masters of the Dead. Gold was the top fifty, and Silver was the next fifty. “I thought it was the Gold Legion.”
“They changed it last year,” Ghastek said. “‘Golden’ sounds better. Navigation is like anything else. It takes practice and discipline and eventually the hard work pays off. Every year my power is increasing. I could be in the top ten, but I choose to not make the bid for that spot.”
“Why not?”
“You wouldn’t understand,” Ghastek said.
“Try me.”
“No. Enough to say that I worked for years and now all of my efforts have brought me here. To this . . . hole in the ground. I’m going to rest now. I’ve talked enough for today.”
Ghastek grew quiet. Minutes passed. His head dropped.
I could picture him in the yard of the school, a skinny kid in cheap clothes sending an undead after the people who looked down on him. Who knew?
I closed my eyes. It was all I could do.
We would get out of here.
Curran would come for me. Of course he would.
• • •
A FIREPLACE LIT the room, and warmth flowed from it, so luxuriously hot and soft that for a long moment I simply basked in it. I was warm and dry. The savory scent of seared meat floated through the air. Food. This was heaven.
“Hey, baby,” Hugh said.
Heaven just got canceled.
I turned. He was sprawled in a large wooden chair, leaning against the back, big legs in blue jeans stretched out in front of him. His shirt was off and the firelight played over the sharply defined muscles of his chest and arms. A small pendant hung around his neck on a plain steel chain. I liked how he was sitting, all loose and relaxed. It would make it harder for him to dodge and there was a lovely heavy chair next to me.
I grabbed the chair.
Except I didn’t move.
And I didn’t have any arms or legs either. Awesome.
Hugh chuckled.
“Let me guess, this is one of those special dreams.” At least my mouth still worked.
“Something like that. It’s a projection.”
“Aha. But the magic is down.”
“Nope. Came back about fifteen minutes ago. You’ll feel it when you wake up.”
“How long have I been in your little prison cell?” Might as well get whatever information I could.
“Three days.”
That long. Hell.
“How’s the water?” Hugh asked. “Getting cold yet?”
Asshole. “So that’s how you teleported out of the burning castle? Did you have water on you somewhere?”
He touched the pendant hanging from his neck and lifted it. The light of the fire played on the glass of the bullet-shaped pendant. Water sloshed inside.
“I always have one on me. It takes a second to crush. Once the water touches you, a power word pulls you through to the source of the water.”
So the water Jennifer dumped on me had come from the shaft where my body was currently floating.
“Teleporting is a last resort,” Hugh said. “It takes a few seconds for the transfer depending on the distance. If tech hits while you’re in transit, you’re dead. But you left me no choice.”
“What did you promise Jennifer to betray me?”
“Power,” he said. “She was supposed to drench you in private, so nobody would suspect her once I triggered the teleportation. You would disappear and she’d use the time while everyone was running around looking for you to solidify her hold on the clan. In a week or two one of my people would take out Desandra for her, which would’ve made things easier. Except she fucked up, and then her boy screwed the pooch even further. I imagine they’re fitting the stone on her grave about now. I told you before: shapeshifters are difficult to train. You’ve got to get them young.”
“You’re a sick fuck.”
“I know.” Hugh nodded at the table next to him. “Hungry?”
Food covered the table. Fresh bread, still warm and crusty from the oven waited on a cutting board. A rib eye roast, the fat crisped and melting, lorded over a bowl of soup, a tub of golden butter, and a dish of mashed potatoes. The air smelled of seared meat, roasted garlic, and fresh bread.
My mouth watered, while my stomach clenched in pain. How come I didn’t have arms to throw a chair at him, but I still had a mouth and a stomach? The Universe wasn’t fair.
“I’m an hour away,” Hugh said. “If you ask me, I’ll come and fish you out and all this will be yours. All you have to do is say, ‘Hugh, please.’”
“Stick a thumb up your ass and twirl on it.”
He smiled, cut a piece of bread, and spread butter on it. I watched the butter slide over the slice. He bit into it and chewed.