A Thief of Nightshade(37)

“We? As in, you’re a prisoner here as well?”

He laughed, a sound worse than the groaning. “Do I look like a Goblin to you?”

“I haven’t a clue. I’ve never seen one.” She recalled vaguely, all too late, Jullian’s stories about Goblins and their specialty in metal works. Nevertheless, he hadn’t spent much time describing them.

“Well, I can promise you I am not, nor will I ever be, a Goblin. Now, will you be so kind as to oblige me with a reply?”

“I’m human.” She didn’t see the point in hiding anything. “What ... are you?”

Cain sat up from his wheeled arm and with his other hand, which rested at the end of a short, stumpy limb, scratched his chin. “Well, I wasn’t always this way.

The Goblins take things, replace them with other—things.”

She gulped. “Things, like eyes and hands?”

“Yes, yes. Now back to business.

What brings you all this way? You’re terribly far north for a human. Hmmm, such a shame, you’ve such pretty hair.”

“What brought you here?” She countered.

“Totally irrelevant.”

She

scoffed.

“No,

completely

relevant. Why should I trust you if you don’t tell me anything about yourself first?”

Cain thought about this, rolling his hinged silver tongue around in his mouth.

It grossed her out. “Well, I’ve been here an awfully long time. I don’t quite recall, really. They took quite a bit of my brain, you see.” He lowered his head, showing her the translucent side of his scalp where no hair grew. Inside, just as he’d indicated, was a hollow space.

“Ugh.” She recoiled, holding her stomach. “Do they ... do that to everyone who comes here? What do they do with the parts they take?”

Two metallic lids fell over his eyes like the shutters of a camera. “Well, they eat them of course.”

At that she rose and started to pace frantically. “I have to get out of here. I have to find my friends. Aislinn! Given!

Can you hear me?” She grabbed the bars of the cell and pulled at them, knowing full well they wouldn’t give.

Cain started toward her, but backed off when she jumped away. “Shut up girl, you’re going to draw attention to us! They get hungry when you start moving around too much. Imagine it a little like going by a table of well prepared turkey and roast and those little baby carrots all soaked in brown sugar, so appetizing just sitting there steaming fresh out of the oven. A little like that.”

Jullian, Jullian! Panicked, she slid down against the bars, her heart racing and without thinking, held her palm against her chest. Suddenly, an image flashed in her mind: Jullian, dressed entirely in white, seated on a silver throne. A brilliant smile graced his features before they suddenly fell dim. He pressed his hand also to his chest, and tilted his head down, his bright eyes searching for the source of the sudden strange emotion. Jullian, please help me!

She screamed again and a cold clammy hand clamped over her mouth.

She opened her eyes as she brushed his hand away and let go of the necklace.

Her vision blurred and she felt like she was about to pass out.

Cain looked her over again. “Stay with me now, passing out won’t do you any good.” He leaned in and seemed to study her hands.

She whispered, “You’ve got to help me get out of here.”

Cain

wheeled

backwards.

“It

certainly would be the polite thing to do, but you must understand, I can’t. There is only one way in and one way out and you don’t want to go that way.”

“Why?”

“Well, because you only go that way twice; once when you arrive and then when they’ve finally replaced all of you.

Then...” Cain grimaced, his tubular brows bending down in mock expression. “Then

they take what’s left of you to work in the mines.”

Aislinn felt like a thousand stones had been dropped on his head. He groaned, regretting once more the weight he’d put on over the summer and wondered what had possessed him to eat so many bison berries that he would pass out. Again. It wasn’t until he opened his eyes and saw the sludge growing on the cell wall that he realized where he was.

He scrambled to sit upright and looked through the bars to see nothing but darkly lit cavernous walls, littered with small trickling streams of water that ran from the ceiling to the floor. Something stirred behind him.

He turned to see Given, holding herself up with one hand on the wet ground, the other pressed against her head.

She was bleeding. “Given, are you all right?” He went to her, expecting to be yelled at for his stupidity in getting them into this mess, but instead, Given seemed too out of it for words. She looked around dazed, but didn’t say anything. “Given?”

She finally turned, confused by the blood that dripped down her forehead. He looked around for something to hold to her head, but there wasn’t anything. In fact, there wasn’t anything for her to dry off with, either. His fur dried far quicker than the slip of a dress she wore, so at least his back and head were dry. She was soaked to the bone and shivering. He could also tell that she was in a great deal of pain and was suffering the final effects of the nightshade she’d so selflessly taken from Aubrey. She’d lost her voice.