Tempest breaks off our stare to look skyward, his chest heaving on an aggravated sigh. Then he moves so fast, his contact with my chest barely registers before I’m flying into a room and sprawling onto the floor, the hem of my dress close to floating above my head.
The door slams shut behind me.
I scramble upright, my knees and palms burning from scraping against the concrete floor.
An uneven horizon looms above me, sharp tips and smudged faces. Weapons, golden treasures covered histories of bloodshed, paintings of long-dead artists whose works are more coveted than the human flesh that created them.
I’m convinced Tempest shoved me into a room of my nightmares.
Get ahold of yourself. Clutching the collar of my jacket, I inch forward through the shelves of artifacts meant to be auctioned off to the highest bidder. After purchase, these beautiful, violent works will likely never see the light of day, finding their homes in the basements of private wealth and lonely display cases.
A looming, fossilized head of a raptor, its cretaceous teeth appearing razor sharp enough to bite into my throat, is the last thing I see before I find the exit, pushing against the metal bar and stumbling out into the night.