“Your clumsy footwork will be the death of us, you know.”
A frustrated sound tears from my throat. “Well, you’re not exactly the most encouraging person to be tied up with.”
“Under different circumstances,” he pants, “I promise you I’m much more fun tied up.”
My cheeks flush as I roll my eyes, fully knowing he can’t see them. “Not. Helping.” I feel his back shake with laughter. Ignoring him, I plant my feet, preparing myself. “Okay, let’s try this again,” I breathe before pushing against his back to try to get my feet under me.
“There you go, Gray,” he murmurs. “Come on, just a little more.”
My legs are shaking as they strain to stand with him. This is far from our first try, making me both tired and frustrated all at once. Standing to my feet has never been such a challenge. I push against his back, inching my feet beneath me to ungracefully stand on the cold prison floor.
“It’s about damn time,” the bastard sighs. “Now for the fun part.”
I glance at the jagged stone jutting out from the wall, nearly four feet off the ground. He takes a step toward it, yanking me behind him in turn. “Ow,” I hiss. “A warning next time would be nice.”
“Fine,” he says stiffly. “I’m walking to the stone now.”
And with that, he all but drags me as I trip backward toward the wall. I huff when my feet are finally planted on the floor again, wishing he could see the glare I’m wearing. Then he’s lifting our hands, guiding the rope to rest on the sharp stone.
My arms are pulled behind my back, bent at an uncomfortable angle. And it only gets worse when he begins sawing the rope against the stone. Back and forth. Back and forth. I hang my head toward the floor, watching my hair fall into a messy halo around my face.
“You all right back there, Gray?”
“Oh, I’m just great,” I say, my voice muffled with hair. “My neck has never felt better.”
I can hear the sound of rope rubbing against stone, feel Kai doing most of the work. “How about we play a game? To take your mind off things.”
My head shoots up at his offer. It’s startling—him caring. Didn’t he vow to never do that again?
The Enforcer orders me a step closer to the stone.
But this isn’t caring, is it? No, he’s using me to escape and save his reputation. I’m a means to an end.
“All right,” he sighs, still sawing at the rope. “I’m seeing something gray. Guess what it is.”
I snort. “Everything in this Plague-forsaken place is gray.”
“Well, then, you’d better be specific.”
I sigh through my nose. “Okay. The wall.”
“Guess again.”
“The bars?”
He tugs at the rope, testing its strength. “Wrong again.”
“The ceiling?”
“You’re not very good at this—”
Echoing footsteps cut off his words. This time I’m silently tugging him back to our spot on the floor where I all but fall, pulling him down with me. The guard rounds the corner into the eerily empty hallway, stopping only to fish a key from his pocket. He doesn’t look at us as he steps inside and places a metal bowl of water beside the barely touched stale bread.
It’s a struggle to stifle my scoff. We’re expected to lap up the water like dogs. Further proof of their hatred for us Ilyans.
The door locks behind him with a heavy click, and I watch his shadow slither down the length of the hallway. We are quiet for a long moment before I feel Kai’s hand pat my lower back in silent command. I take a deep breath, preparing myself before struggling to my feet.
Then it’s back to the stone and tedious sawing. I hang my head again, resting my sore neck as I mumble, “The tray.”
“That’s more silver.”
I frown. “What about my hair, then?”
“I don’t know, Silver Savior,” he says slowly, “you tell me.”
“I think it could pass for gray,” I argue.
He laughs. It’s deep and dark in a way I’ve come to recognize. “Your hair could pass for moonbeams before it passes for gray.”
“Careful,” I say slowly, “that almost sounded like a compliment.”
I hear him huff out a laugh. “Maybe I’ll give you a proper compliment if you can actually manage to guess correctly.”
I glare at the floor. “I’ve named every gray thing in here.”
“Obviously not.”
He pauses his sawing long enough to tug on the rope. I feel it loosen slightly around my wrists and sigh in relief. Not much longer until I’m free. “What could I have possibly missed?” I huff, lifting my head to scan the cell again.
“That stone over there,” he says casually, as though he doesn’t sound insane.
I try to bite my tongue for as long as possible. I really do. But before I can stop myself, I’m blurting, “I’m sorry, do you mean the stone on the other side of the cell that I can’t see?”
He’s quiet for a moment. “That’s the one.”
“That’s completely unfair.”
“I told you to be specific,” he says slowly.
A frustrated sound climbs up my throat, to which he has the audacity to laugh at. Shockingly, I manage to keep my mouth shut, slouching silently with my arms being pulled back and forth. When my eyelids begin to grow heavy, he stops to test the strength of the rope.
“I’ll be able to break it now.” His voice is gruff, body begging for sleep. “We can rest until the guard gets back.”
Nodding, I sluggishly pull him back to the center of the cell and slide to the ground. “And then we’ll get out of here.”
“And then we’ll get out of here,” he repeats softly.
My head finds the back of his shoulder, slumping against him despite my best efforts. My body aches, every inch of my betraying being begging to curl up against him, to be held by him.
At my weakest, I wish for him. And at my strongest, I wish I could say it wasn’t the same.
He rests his head on mine, gentle and grounding. I hate that he feels like that. Feels like comfort incarnate.
“Can we pretend that it’s okay not to hate each other in these moments?” I ask quietly, if only to ease my conscience.
He sounds as though he might have laughed if he wasn’t so exhausted. “Yes. Pretend.”
I’m quiet until I’m not. “Do you regret any of it?”
His voice is soft, soothing. “Regret what?”
“Us?” A pause. “Regret what happened between us? Even the more recent things?” I whisper, recalling our moment of weakness on the rooftop.
He’s quiet for so long that I doze off, only waking when he murmurs, “Sleep, Little Psychic. Regret in the morning.”
I wake to the sound of groaning metal.
My eyes flutter open at the feel of Kai patting my lower back in warning. Through hazy vision, I watch the guard step into the cell, clutching a stale loaf. I blink awake, preparing for the plan that is about to unfold.
It all happens so quickly that I almost forget the part I’m meant to play. As soon as the guard bends to place the bread between us, Kai shifts his body and slips a foot beneath the tray. The metal meets the man’s face when the prince kicks it up, hard enough to hear the guard’s nose crack.
“Pull against me, Gray,” Kai grinds out, straining as he tugs at the severed rope still binding us together. I throw my body weight forward, nearly smashing my face into the stone wall when the rope snaps, setting my wrists free.
I scramble toward the moaning guard now clutching his broken nose. I’ve slammed his head against the wall before his eyes have even widened at the sight of me. He’s out cold as I fumble for his pocket, finding the rusty key within, and stagger to the cell door.
Kai is right behind me, watching as I reach a hand through the bars to unlock the door from the outside. We step through the open bars, rubbing our raw wrists. My eyes sweep over the wall of empty cells, relieved to find not a single familiar face within.
Lenny and the others aren’t here. It seems that only the prince and Silver Savior were worth Rafael’s trouble. And I’m momentarily comforted by that realization.
But it’s the sewer grate at the end of the hall that now captures my attention.
“So far, so good,” Kai murmurs, taking off at a soft sprint toward the sewer. I’m on his heels in an instant, head swiveling as I search for any sign of oncoming guards. My heart races, head pounding, as I focus on keeping my tired legs pumping toward freedom.
“Grab the other side,” the Enforcer orders when I skid to a stop over the grate. My fingers slip on the grimy metal, but I lift as hard as my strained arms will allow. “Come on, Gray,” Kai grunts. “You can do better than that.”
The grate is impossibly heavy, and the growing sound of pounding boots isn’t helping my focus. I take a deep breath before yanking upward, hoping Kai will do the rest. I’m tempted to thank the Plague when he manages to slide the lid halfway off the dark drop into the sewer.
We’re greeted with the sound of rushing water, and the stench of bodily fluids. I gag despite my best efforts but manage to keep the few bites of stale bread down. Distant shouting has my head snapping up, eyes straining in the dim light to see just how many guards are racing toward us. I count seven before my eyes find Kai’s across the yawning mouth of the sewer below.
And with a single nod, I step off the ledge and into darkness.
I land with a splash, thankful to find that it is mostly water sloshing around my calves. Kai quickly drops down beside me despite something clanking around his shoulders. He doesn’t give me the chance to ask before he’s grabbing my hand and sprinting through the tunnel.
“They’re coming!” he shouts over the sound of rushing water. “We need to move fast!”
I give him a nod he can’t see, all while trying to ignore the fact that this is the extent of our plan. This is as far as we plotted. Sever the rope. Knock out the guard. Get the key. Escape through the sewer.
Except, we don’t have the slightest idea what awaits us at the end of this tunnel.
My legs feel heavy, like trying to run through honey. “The water is rising!” I yell, panic quivering my voice. It’s rushing around my knees now, fast and forceful.
“Just keep moving!” His order echoes off the tunnel walls, forcing my legs faster in the current.
It’s so dark down here that I can’t see Kai wading through the water in front of me, but his hand is firm in mine as he leads me straight through the tunnel. Stretching out my stray hand, I drag my fingers across the grimy wall beside me, feeling every passage we could have turned down.
The thick water laps around my waist now. I can only see shadows and outlines, feel freezing water and paralyzing terror. I’m slipping with every step, trying to keep up with Kai as he pulls me behind him.
The liquid rises rapidly as we run, daring to drown us with every inch.
Drowning has never been ideal, especially not in a sewer. I know I’m moving, but I can hardly feel my legs beneath me. Chills rack my body, chattering teeth now joining the symphony of rushing water—rushing water that keeps rising.
“Just a little farther!”
I hear his shouted encouragement, but I don’t bother to believe it. We’re blindly running through sewers, being pursued by both water and guards driven by greed. Our odds are hardly favorable.
My hands are numb, fingers frozen by the water now circling my elbows.
Maybe this is a better fate than the one awaiting me back in Ilya.
Maybe this is where Death finally catches me, finally gets to cackle at the sight of me drifting into a watery grave.
Or maybe he’ll embrace me like an old friend.
I slam into something solid, splashing freezing water over whatever part of me was still dry. Kai’s back is blocking my path, but I’m close enough now to hear the string of curses he’s spewing. “Dammit,” he breathes, dropping my hand.
“What? What’s going on?” I feel my way around him, pushing forward until…
My palms meet a grimy wall.
I slide frantic fingers in every direction, feeling for some sort of opening in the darkness.
Nothing.
Water is lapping at my rib cage, and I’m struggling to breathe from both the frigid water and fear tightening my chest. “No,” I say simply. “No, there has to be a way out.”
I can hear Kai running his hands across every wall, splashing as he searches the tunnel beneath our feet. Ignoring the echo of shouts growing closer, I continue to feel every inch of stone trapping us down here. My fingertips can barely brush the ceiling looming over us, forcing me to jump as I search for any sort of escape.
I’m panting, panicking, pounding on the walls. My fists find the stone in front of me, again and again. “There has to be a way!” I’m not sure who I’m shouting at. The wall. The prince. The shadow of Death I can feel looming over me.
I’m tearing at the wall with cracked nails, slamming raw fists into rock. I can’t see anything, and I doubt I’ll see anything again. The water reaches my breasts, beating against me as I struggle to breathe. I think I might be shouting with every slam of my hand into the wall. I think I might be scared of death.
“That’s enough.”
His voice is calm, so damn calm that I want to slap him across the face I can’t even see. I ignore him, as per usual, and continue to pound against the wall. A tear slips down my cheek, mingling with the water splashing across my face.
“I said, that’s enough.” He grabs me around my waist, yanking me away from the wall. I fight against him, feeling like a feral animal as I thrash in the water. “Paedyn!” My name echoes off the walls, stilling me for a moment. Then his face is beside mine, his cheek wet and cold against my own. “That’s enough.”
I hear it then. Hear the defeat in his voice. He’s giving up.
“No, it’s not enough!” I shout, struggling against the arms wrapped around me. “No, there has to be a way out. There has to be a way….”
His hands slide from my waist, delicate and deliberate, as though he’s memorizing the feel of me. Calloused hands slip up my arms, spinning me around to face him. I can’t see his face, but I know exactly what I would be looking at.
“Paedyn…” The water seems to still for his soft voice.
“No,” I say sternly. “Don’t do that. Don’t go saying my name because you think it might be the last time you ever will.”
He has the nerve to chuckle. “Your name seems like a good word to die with on my lips.”
“Kai—”
“I don’t regret it.” His words are a rush, a confession he’s clung to. “I don’t regret you, or what was between us. And I don’t regret kissing you on that roof. But I know I’ll regret what I have to do to you for the rest of my life.”
Water licks at my collarbones as I blink at his words. The words of a man staring death in the face, determined to have the final say. “Do you regret it?” he asks, voice urgent. His hands roam up my neck to feel my face, fingers trembling over my cheekbones.
“I…” My hands find his arms, cupping his wrists. “I regret not doing it right. And I regret not being what I’m supposed to be.”
He strokes a thumb across my wet cheek. “I’m sorry you have to be anything at all.”
I know it’s all talk of a dead man. All confessions of two people suddenly aware of their imminent doom. But I melt at his words, mourn what could have been. And now I’ll drown in the regret that is him.
The tunnel is filling with water, forcing me to tip my chin up and stand on my toes. I feel hopeless in his arms, as though nothing mattered before I was wrapped in them. There is no past, no future.
Just him. Just us. Just this moment and what we decide to do with it.
Death emboldens. The end initiates.
His hands tug my face closer until I can feel his breath on my lips. Water drips from his hair to splatter onto my suddenly heated skin. His pulse pounds beneath my fingers wrapped around his wrists.
My heart aches. Aches to be reunited with the piece he’s stolen from me.
My nose brushes his.
“Pretend,” I whisper against his lips.
I am recklessness incarnate. Until the very end.
My mouth meets his.
He tastes like longing. Like regret and relief. Like nothing matters but this moment.
It’s fervent, like a sinner’s final prayer.
And maybe that is what this kiss is.
Repentance.
