I lifted my head—and bit out a curse at the tender ache in my neck1—to look at my hands chained above my head. My arms were going to hurt like hell when they were released from that position, but there was nothing I could do about that. If this even worked.
"No doubts, Hala," I whispered. "Doubts are the death of hope."
Another thing Vann used to say to me; he had a whole cache of motivational phrases.
I flexed my fingers, and groaned when they barely moved, all the blood drained out of them and my fingertips numb. But that tiny flicker of motion might be enough. It had to be, or I'd die here.
My nightmare reminded me of one thing: I might have been through hell, but I survived. I gotout. I hadn't died in the hutch, and I wasn't about to die here in the void.
So I fought to get a steady breath in my lungs, ignoring the way the room swayed slightly around me, and sank into my bloodsoaked memories. They were close to the surface after my nightmare, so it didn't take much effort to remember. Power rushed up my arms on the heels of the remembered pain, and I flexed my fingers, focusing on the chains wrapped around me.
"Please, please," I whispered, straining with all my concentration to guide power to the chains, and muffling a frustrated scream when I couldn't get enough strength to dissolve the metal.
"I'm stuck here forever," I moaned, staring at where the chains hooked into the top of the wall. "With a shadowkind who wants to keep me and a monster who can get into my head."
Plus whatever tentacle nightmare Mav was.
"No," I hissed, dragging in a stronger breath and straightening my spine, more with stubbornness than strength. I was so weak, so tired, but I was trained to survive situations that would kill a regular human. Icoulddo this.
"I've got this," I said confidently, and crooked my fingers again, dragging up memories of my keeper, of the other weapons all lined up for inspection, all of us braced for pain at the end of a cattle prod.
A pink glow covered my hands and relief threatened to weaken me as my magic latched onto the metal links of the chain. It felt different from when I poured my magic into a shadowkind, with none of the buzzing euphoria, but freedom was its own kind of drug when a link melted and the chains broke apart.
I crashed to the solid concrete floor hard enough to daze me, but a victorious2laugh bubbled up my throat and rolled off my tongue. I did it. I broke the chains. I was free.
Kind of.
I was still locked in a basement and guarded by three monsters. And splayed on the floor, as weak as a newborn kitten.3But I was trying to look on the bright side.
Gritting my teeth in a wince, I pulled my arm into my body, testing if I dislocated it on landing, but I was relieved to find I wouldn't have to shove it back into its socket. Still, pain throbbed in half a dozen different areas, and I clenched my jaw hard when I pushed to a sitting position, my eyes landing on the table of torture instruments.
For a minute, they blurred and tilted in my vision, but after a while my eyes focused. Or I stopped swaying—but either way…
I tasted blood when I wrapped my hands around the chains at my ankles, burning through the links. But like with my hands, I was left with a cuff around my ankles. I couldn’t turn it to a pool of acid and magic without burning myself, and I was already hurt badly enough.
"Ugh," I grunted, pushing to my feet and grabbing the wall when I wobbled. My hand slid down the black stone, weak and bloodless after being hung above me, and gravity tugged on me until my knees gave out.
“Shit,” I hissed, losing my balance, strength, and sanity in the same second.
I twisted my body in time to rest my back against the stone and push myself back up,narrowlyavoiding hitting the floor again.
"First step," I whispered, the silence grating my nerves as I glanced around the black, empty basement. "Get strong enough to walk without falling over."
God of the Void—as he called himself—had been true to his word and returned with food, but I had no idea how long ago that was. A long time, judging by the gnawing of my stomach. If I could find some food on the way out of the basement, that would be amazing.
"As if," I huffed to myself, flexing my fingers to bring blood into my hands and gritting my teeth at the prickle of pain. But at least I could feel them now, and my arm stopped being numb. "Okay, Hala, you've got this."
I pushed off the wall and successfully4approached the torture table this time, grabbing two knives and a scalpel. The monsters took my shoes, but not my clothes, so I stashed weapons in the waistband of my leggings and in my bra,5and kept a knife in my hand.
"Okay, escape time. Chin up, Hala," I said, echoing Vann's words.
I let his memory surround me, let the pain of losing him cut deep into my chest, and the knife in my hand flashed faintly pink as my hand glowed. Holding my breath, I touched the tip of the knife to the handle of the solid black door and gasped, jumping back in surprise when the handle melted.
"It worked," I breathed, half laughing. "It really worked."
I’d expected it to resist my power; this wasthe void. But I was free; the lock melted.
Tentatively, I pushed the door, wincing when the chain still around my wrist chafed. The skin underneath was raw, but I could handle it. As long as I got out of here, I could handle it.