Page 172 of The Sinner's Bargain

Not there, but the window creaked, nudged by a stray breeze.

No. She wouldn’t.

I rushed to the ledge and peered into the settling dusk.

It had been raining all day.

The ledge was damp, the trellis slick.

The swamp and lake overflowing.

Naya was running blindly straight to her death.

If she wasn’t already dead at the bottom. Her beautiful body a broken mess in the dark.

“No...”

Every drop of blood rushed to my head, filling it with a high-pitched shriek even as I was spinning and running.

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

NAYA

I made it.

I found the familiar stone arch with the rusty gate. It was a miracle given the vast nothing that pushed in all around me. But I tore up the uneven path, crying out once when a jagged chunk of rock cut into the underside of my foot.

I didn’t stop.

I fumbled with cold, stiff fingers, fighting with the latch.

“Open!” I snarled at it.

After several tugs, the rusty latch gave, and the barricade swung open with a shriek that nearly sent me sprawling into the muck. Mud squished between my toes and slipped beneath my feet as I scrambled up the Widow’s Back. Most of the light was gone, but I had just enough illumination to reach the top and the open mouth of darkness created by the canopy of branches knotted overhead, keeping the world at bay.

I know the path, I reminded myself. I’d walked it a dozen times. I just had to stay straight.

Blood roaring between my ears, I sprinted forward. The chilly drizzle dampened my hair and clothes and found the exposed skin between my neck and collar. Twigs and rocks nicked my heels and stabbed my toes, but I hobbled forward. The other gate wasn’t far. Once I got to the village wall...

The realization froze me on the spot.

I didn’t have keys. Not for the gate. Not for the store. Cyrus had them.

Heart pounding as I reorganized my mistake, I stood at the center of the path, torn between pushing forward and heading back. Neither was going to save me but if I went back, maybe I could hide somewhere on the grounds until morning.

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