The Merciless (The Merciless #1)(30)

Alexis starts chanting again. “Sanctificetur nomen tuum . . .”

Next to me, Grace closes her eyes and lifts her hands to the ceiling in prayer.

“Again, Sofia,” Riley says as she kneels before Brooklyn. This time, when I light the match, I let the flame burn down until it’s almost to my fingers. It dies in midair before hitting Brooklyn’s skin, and I feel an instant rush of relief.

Brooklyn barely notices when the blackened match drops on her leg. Her eyes are on Riley’s knife.

“More threats?” she asks in a choked voice. “That’s getting old.”

Riley turns the knife so its blade catches the candlelight. “I read about this method of exorcism called bleeding,” she explains. “If you harm the host body enough, it scares the demon away.”

Riley presses the knife into Brooklyn’s exposed thigh and pulls the blade toward her knee. She moves the knife so slowly that I hear the skin rip seconds before a thin red line of blood appears on Brooklyn’s leg.

Brooklyn presses her eyes closed and her jaw clenches, but she doesn’t scream. Blood bubbles up just above her knee and winds around her leg.

“Riley,” I say. Another match burns to life, but I’m so distracted that it dies in my hand, stinging my fingers. I drop it with a start.

“Don’t worry, the cuts aren’t deep,” Riley says. “We don’t want to kill her—we just want the demon scared.”

Riley pulls the knife across Brooklyn’s opposite thigh, just as slowly. I imagine the knife biting the flesh on my thighs, tearing my skin. It stings.

Brooklyn’s mouth falls open in a wordless sob. Her chest rises and falls rapidly, and tears cut down her face, leaving behind murky gray trails of eyeliner. Next, Riley drags the blade over Brooklyn’s shins—first the left, then the right. Blood drips to the floor.

Alexis falls to her knees, chanting louder. “Adveniat regnum tuum!”

Riley stands, the bloody knife still clenched in one hand. She brushes the hair from her forehead, leaving a smudge of red above her eyebrow.

“Sof, could you hand me the salt?” Riley asks, wiping her bloody fingers on her jeans. “I don’t want to get blood everywhere.”

My body moves before I tell it to, like someone else has control of my arms and legs. Grace is still swaying, her arms in the air above her, her eyes clenched shut. I walk past her and crouch next to the faded backpack lying against the wall, finding a bag of salt in the front pocket.

When I turn back around, the pool of blood beneath Brooklyn has oozed beneath Riley’s bare feet. She doesn’t notice, and when she walks toward me, her toes leave bloody prints on the concrete.

“Thanks,” she says, taking the salt from my hands. Riley pushes a lock of my hair back behind one ear. I feel something wet and warm against my cheek. Brooklyn’s blood.

Riley opens the bag of salt and pours a handful into her palm. I want to close my eyes, like Grace, so I don’t have to see what she’s about to do. But fear keeps me from turning my head or pressing my eyes shut. It’s the same fear that keeps me from telling Riley to stop or trying to wrestle her knife away. I don’t want to be next.

Riley crouches in front of Brooklyn again. Blood soaks through her jeans where she kneels. She takes Brooklyn by the chin and forces the salt past her clenched lips.

Brooklyn’s eyes fly open. She tries to pull her head away, but Alexis comes up behind her and grabs her by the hair to hold her steady. Riley covers Brooklyn’s mouth with both her hands.

Brooklyn whips her head to one side, then the other. Alexis tightens her grip on her hair, and Riley pushes her hands up against her face, until Brooklyn can’t move at all.

“I’ll let go when you admit your sins,” Riley says. Brooklyn goes still. Her eyelids flutter, but they don’t close.

“Are you ready to submit before the Lord?”

Brooklyn nods, and, slowly, Riley leans back. Alexis pulls her hands out of Brooklyn’s hair, a few spiky bleached-blond strands still clenched between her fingers.

Brooklyn heaves forward, vomiting the salt onto the floor. Still bent over, she lets out a low sob, then spits to get all the salt out of her mouth.

“Well?” Riley says. Brooklyn shakes her head and mutters something too quietly for the rest of us to hear. Riley grabs her by the hair and pulls her head up.

“I didn’t hear you.”

Brooklyn inhales shakily. Riley leans in closer.

A tense, hushed silence stretches between us. Wind presses in against the window. The fabric on Grace’s sweatshirt rustles as she moves her arms. A brief, faint hope sparks in my chest.

Please. Please just let this be over.

Brooklyn lifts her dark, hate-filled eyes to Riley and parts her lips. Blood spatters her nose and drips down over her teeth.

She lunges forward, grabbing a chunk of Riley’s face between her teeth.

Riley’s horrified scream cuts the silence. Brooklyn’s lips are coated with red when she pulls away. She spits, and a blood-covered chunk of skin slides across the concrete floor.





CHAPTER TWELVE


“You f*cking bitch!” Riley stumbles away from Brooklyn, clutching her face with both hands. Blood appears in the cracks between her fingers.

“Riley, oh my god!” Alexis tries to pry Riley’s bunched fist from her face, but Riley shoves her away.