Now You See Me

Thirty-One: In Memoriam

The next time I came around, I wasn't where I expected to be. I had a vague recollection of recent events, but my thoughts were foggy and kept escaping me. My head was pounding, centring at a point on the right side of my skull. Tender exploration with shaky fingers found a bloody, sensitive lump the size of an egg there.

Now that I thought about it, I definitely did remember getting knocked out.

I sat up, and had to steady myself as my head reeled. My palms rolled on grit and cold stone as an icy breeze whipped over me. Goose-bumps chased each other across my arms and neck.

I looked round. I was in a cave, and I'd seen it before – Vashde's attempts at abducting me were still fresh in my mind despite my disorientation. Panic slipped in on the tails of dread and fear as I computed this, and by the time it had registered I was hyperventilating.

Why was I here? I was certain this hadn't been the plan; maybe there'd been a fault with the portal. Maybe it had been intercepted when I fell through, though God knew I couldn't guess how that might work. I stared up at the enclosed rock ceiling, so far away I couldn't make anything out in the blackness. As I slowly turned to try and deduce some kind of significant feature – a door handle, perhaps – I heard the scrape of metal on the stone and the whispering rattle of a chain.

Thinking for one bittersweet moment that I'd forgotten that Chris was here, it was a harsh blow to find the cuffs empty. They were swinging in the breeze wafting in through the smallest gap in the high wall. It also provided me with a beam of unreachable sunlight that only emphasised his absence. Tears of panic pricked my eyes and I resisted going over there to see if the makeshift skylight might lead anywhere; even if it did I'd never reach it. I clung to the hope that Leia had already realised the error and was working to get me out of this mess, but an insidious little thread of doubt was weaving itself through my thoughts when I remembered what I'd unwillingly witnessed when I fell unconscious. Could I trust her? Was that memory a warning, a sign? Just an accident, plain and simple? I didn't want to believe that it was any more significant to me personally than that. I was quite prepared to believe that Leia had been a rebellious teen and done things her parents didn't agree with.

There was just something about that younger girl that rubbed me the wrong way.

I looked back at the empty chains, drawing my knees under my chin and wrapping my arms around them. Aside from those cuffs, the only other feature in the room was a small pool lit with an unnatural turquoise glow. Whatever had happened in between falling and waking, Vashde had been expecting me.

This idea didn't surprise me as much as I wanted it to; instead of wondering why and how I was here, I was more concerned with what was going to happen and where Chris was. Vashde had already said he was still alive, which was one small reprieve from the terror, but I had no idea in what state he was, or whether they'd done anything since I left St Martin's that made his survival even more uncertain.

The best case scenario was that they'd already let him go free because they had me, but I didn't dare allow myself to think that.

To distract myself from waiting for something to happen – the claustrophobic space made me feel weak and helpless – I crawled towards the pool and looked in. It wasn't extravagant by any standards; it was shallow and small, lined with smooth tarpaulin weighted down by stones.

But it was filled with seawater.

I could tell before I'd smelled it or really gone anywhere near it. Small bits of seaweed still drifted in it, grit from the bottom and the occasional small animal twitching along. I reached towards it, so close I could almost feel the wet on my fingers, but pulled away from touching it at the last moment. It surely wouldn't have just been here out of consideration – perhaps it was a trap.