Page 98 of Bought to Break
After Sorin freed him, Kane helped her up. Vineri’s chair was indeed vacant. The coward had fled.
Dugal still stood by the wall. He smiled at her vaguely as she approached him. ‘I told him you were strong.’
Her hands curled into fists as she thought of what he would have done to her; the things he would have let those men and probably countless others do, and she struck him in the jaw as hard as she could. He fell to the floor with anoomphthat seemed to echo through the room, and Viktor appeared at her side.
He put his hand on her shoulder. ‘Let’s go while we can.’
‘No,’ Sorin murmured. ‘After what they’ve done to me and to Lana and all the others, they need to die. They’re blights on this world.’ He drew one of the soldier’s swords and slid it into the nearest one’s abdomen. The man went down without a sound.
Kane grabbed a knife and did the same until every man in the room was dead.
Viktor tried to lead Lana away from the carnage, but she refused to budge. These monsters had done unspeakable deeds and, even in their helpless state, they deserved death a thousand times over. She’d heard the tales all her life of the Brothers being cold and ruthless killers. And it was true. They were. But she had blood on her hands too. She wouldn’t shy away from it, nor from them.
But as she looked around the room, she couldn’t help but wonder how much she had changed the Brothers. She’d been with them for weeks. Yesterday she would have said she knew these men well, but today, seeing the changes she had wrought so suddenly here, she wasn’t sure. Were the Brothers she’d come to know, even love, real or had she made them?
‘And Vineri?’ she asked.
‘Him too.’ Sorin started for the door. ‘He’ll be hiding with his collection.’
Thankful to have something to do to take her mind off these worrying thoughts, Lana started forward. ‘I know where it is.’
They left the room as a group, the Brothers following her closely as she led them down the halls and stairs to where the door to his Gallery had been. Lana wondered if she should go back to the tower and free the girl she’d found, though she hadn’t seemed as if she wanted to leave this place. When this was over, she would try, she decided.
She found the door without too much trouble, only going the wrong way once, and it wasn’t long before they stood outside the giant room that housed Vineri’s treasures.
She grasped the handle, but Kane pulled her back. ‘He might be waiting for us. We’ll go in first.’
She waited for him to let her go, but instead his grip on her tightened. She looked up at him and, for once, saw emotion in his face. He must have been very afraid for her, she thought as she looked into his dark eyes. She squeezed his arm and then wriggled away. After this was done.
‘Ready?’ Viktor asked.
They nodded and he opened the door. No explosions nor ambushes apparent, they stepped inside the mammoth room of the collection. The door closed behind them with an ominous click.
‘What is all this?’ Sorin breathed.
‘My life’s work, boy.’ Vineri’s voice echoed. But he was nowhere to be seen.
‘Show yourself, you fucking coward!’ Sorin bellowed.
Lana gave him a quick glance. He seemed a bit stronger, though he was covered in bruises and cuts and dried blood. She was sure he shouldn’t be walking about, and definitely not fighting, but they needed to stay together now.
She saw a flicker of movement to the side of them. ‘There!’ She pointed, but there was nothing.
She huddled closer to the Brothers. Vineri had all of these objects because they held ancient power. If he knew how to use even a handful of them … She shivered.
Kane suddenly darted down one of the long corridors of shelves, his sword raised. ‘I saw him!’
‘Wait!’ Viktor yelled. ‘He’s trying to separate us, Kane.’
But Kane ignored him and when they rushed to follow, he was gone. Lana called out his name, but there was no answer. The three of them looked at each other, all trying to suppress their fear. They continued. All they could do was look for him as they did Vineri. They began cautiously walking through the room, down paths with dead ends and routes that looped in on each other, the high shelves on all sides always looming over them as if recording their course. They didn’t find anyone, but they did realise that the room was much larger than it had appeared from the door, and the random stacks and paths made it a veritable maze, which they seemed to be stuck in.
There was a thud behind them and they all whirled around to find both men they sought standing calmly at their backs. They hadn’t even known they were there, not until Vineri had wanted them to. The Collector held a small box in his hand. Kane stood at his side, not trying to kill him, not trying to escape. Nothing. A black cord was tightly wrapped around his neck.
‘I thought you Dark Brothers were meant to be formidable.’ Vineri tutted. ‘But look at your leader, so easily subdued with the simplest of my trinkets.’ He waved a hand in what Lana had come to see was his signature gesture of nonchalance. ‘Kill your Brothers.’
Kane stepped forward and raised the sword he carried. He slashed at the air in front of him. His eyes were glazed.
‘Kane?’
