29
Mercedes freezes. Clutches the rope as blood rushes to her head. Feels herself lurch in the darkness.
‘Tatiana?’ she calls.
Her voice is soaked up by the walls, the ancient air. Muffled. Dead.
‘Tatiana?’
Silence.
The sound of a bolt being pulled across the door.
She shouts louder. ‘Tatiana!’
Silence.
Oh, God. Oh, God. She sways on the step. It’s so dark. She can see nothing at all.
‘Tatiana?’
Mercedes feels her way back down to the landing. Finds the door, grips the latch, lifts it. No give. Nothing. It’s as solid as a wall. There’s not even a crack of light to show that it’s there. Tatiana has pulled the tapestry back over. She’s alone.
*
Time vanishes. I have vanished, she thinks. If they open the door again, I will have disappeared.
She takes several breaths. Counts to ten. Feels the blackness swim back into focus.
Something scuttles on the steps below.
Stop it.
I don’t know. I don’t know what’s down there. These stairs go all the way to the cellar. To the dungeons.
I don’t know what’s below me. I don’t know what’s coming up.
Stop it. Stop it.
Panic chills her despite the heat and her palms are slippery on the rope. She wants to scream.
If I scream, whatever’s down there will hear. It will know I’m here.
She mutters a prayer beneath her breath and waits. Fucking bitch.
The stairs below her have vanished. They have receded into the wall. All there is below her now is a straight drop to endless black.
A sound breaks from her throat, somewhere between a sob and a wail.
Shut up. Shut up.
Movement again. Down there. In the dungeons.
Run. Run.
To where?
There is no reason in the dark.