Cardinal Tower (Trinity Central Book #1)

Chapter 34

I wake up in a six by six cell, barely enough room for me to lay down. The walls and floor are concrete, excluding the metal bars closing me in, and a monotonic buzz is filling my head with an overwhelming use of my amplified senses. Even though the only light shining on me is a blue panel overhead, I still coil away, the smallest glare magnifying the pain of my migraine. It takes a moment of regaining consciousness to realize the wound on my right leg is healed, and Devon's seated in front of my cage.

"Awake?" He stands up to stare down at me in front of my cell door. "Oh, your leg?" he asks, referring to my confusion as to how my stab wound was miraculously healed. "We had one of our special assignment Karmas deal with it, her Telum species is healing."

"Telum species?" I scoff at the phrase. "Exactly how many type fives do you have stashed away?"

"Enough to get the results we desire. It's a shame you're not as useful as she is. All you can do is inflict damage whereas she can fix what you destroy."

I ease myself against the wall so that our conversation can continue with us facing each other. "What am I doing here?" I ask, growing tired of the small talk we've done thus far.

"You're the key to our success, I'm sure you're aware of that. But what else do you know?"

"I know Dad's alive." Devon's jaw tightens at the mention of our father. "I don't know how, but I know he is. I know you sold me out for a pretty penny, sure hope it was worth it. And I know you'll rot in hell for it, even if I have to put you there myself."

He chuckles at my threats, "My, my, what bold language for someone behind bars right now. I don't believe you can do anything to me from there, especially without your gun and knife."

I remember him stealing my weapons earlier, and snarl at my sudden helplessness. He missed the hidden blade I keep in my boot, but I can't use it until I coax more information out of Devon. Maybe one of my powers can break me out of here instead. My flames were of no use in or out of this cell, so I doubt it can burn through the iron, but I might be able to change the state of it to water.

"Don't bother with any of your abilities either," he says as if reading my mind. "That light above you neutralizes any type five phenomenon. Good luck breaking it too, it's a ten-foot high ceiling." Dammit.

"I have the only key, and I promise you, you'll never get it. Face it, Cas, you're trapped." He laughs in his maniacal manner, his face contorting into a grotesque grin of satisfaction at his final victory over me.

"What do you want, Devon? Why are you helping Dad? I thought you hated him as much as I did."

"He's our father, of course I love him. Besides, filial piety aside he offered me the cushy life you've been living at Cardinal. He tried to give it to us earlier but you just had to quit the Karmas. Not only that but you hid all of your payments from me."

"To protect you."

"Bullshit!" he yelled, his voice resonating through the surrounding empty prison cells, "They gave you cantos, and you never told me about them. Do you realize how great of a life we could've been living? How many years we wasted groveling in a Tetra province? How many death threats we could've avoided had you just agreed to stay?"

"Is that what you care about? Cantos? A higher social status?"

"What more could we want?"

"My sanity!"

"Don't be so demanding." Devon's pacing in front of my cell, moving out of view every now and then before turning back seconds later. He looks as he did when I was first brought into Cardinal, and his behavior then is suddenly much more clear.