Page 49 of Blue Embers
“Benjamin?” I said, suspicion tightening my brow.
He didn’t answer with a word that time. Instead he replied with a moan. One that sounded in pain and raspy. I accelerated into a jog, my boots loud on the marble floors.
Reaching the doors, I pushed them open and ran into the exhibit. There was one lamp light on the other side of the room, creating an eerie, orange hue that cast shadows across the floor. Extending my hand to the wall beside me, I flipped on the light switch and watched the chamber brighten. Before I noticed anything else about the room, the smell of burning herbs re-entered my senses. I quickly scanned the space, but before completing it, Ben’s sob pulled me around the large dragon statue toward the stairway leading up to the offices.
As soon as I veered around the statue, my boots hit a slick spot on the floor and both of my feet almost slid out from under me. I grabbed the statue’s large platform to catch myself, looking down at a smear of red blood under my soles. I started to breathe rapidly, each breath caked with concern as I followed the red trail toward the stairs. I saw papers strewn about like they’d been tossed from the balcony. That wasn’t the worst of it, though.
Hanging from the railing of the second story walkway was a man’s body. Ben’s body. He was in his usual brown suit, one foot bound by a loading strap from one of the shipping trucks. Blood was dripping from his head and down his fingertips, forming a large puddle beneath him where he was suspended five feet off the ground floor.
I pressed my hand over my mouth, my breath getting lodged in my throat, but before lingering too long in my shock, I rushed forward. I couldn’t tell where he was bleeding from, but there was so much blood. I didn’t have time to figure it out. I knew I needed to get him down so I tried. I was skinny and Ben was an average sized man, but I had to attempt something. He whined again when I reached him. It was a weak, incoherent sound.
“Ben,” I said. “Can you hear me?”
He just kept moaning. I stood in front of him, tapping his cheeks with my hands to try and rouse some other response out of him, but he was falling out of consciousness fast.
“Hold on,” I said, quickly running toward the stairs.
I climbed them as fast as I could, noticing Ben’s phone on the second to last step as I did. I grabbed it, slipping it into my pocket before coming to the tangled mess of nylon straps that bound Ben to the railing. I tried to untie them, but the weight of his body kept them taught. I could barely find a way to loosen the knots.
“Hang on, Ben,” I said with a shutter.
I clawed at the straps before I was sure the only way to free him was to cut the damn things. I turned to the office, hoping to find something sharp, and discovered a mess of papers and debris as if someone had let a wild bull in to rip the place apart. Stepping over dislodged drawers and tipped chairs, I rummaged through the chaos looking for a letter opener. A box cutter. Anything. There was nothing. Then I remembered all the weapons downstairs in the display cases. At that moment, I didn’t care that they were ancient artifacts. All I could think about was getting Ben down.
I reached the first weapons cabinet and could think of nothing else to do but tip it over. Grabbing the edge of it with one hand, I used my other to pull Ben’s phone out of my pocket again. I found Killian’s number in Ben’s contacts quickly and lifted the phon to my ear. Using my entire body, I pulled the display case off balance.
“Hello?” Killian’s voice said through the phone.
Just that one word from him made me feel ten times better. Considering the circumstances, however, that wasn’t saying much.
The glass shattered on the floor and I stepped into the shards to grab Killian’s blue knife.
“Killian,” I said, frantic, glass crunching under my boots.
“Persephone,” he said, tense but controlled. “Where are you?”
“The museum,” I answered, out of breath as I climbed the stairs again, ripping the metal sheath from the blade. “I don’t know how I got here, I just...I’m here and Ben’s hurt.”
“What do you mean he’s hurt? Areyoualright?”
“Yeah, but I’m scared. There’s blood everywhere and...”
I grunted, reaching over the railing toward the straps where they were taught enough to sink a blade into, but now I realized cutting Ben down from that height could hurt him further. My head was spinning. I was doing everything wrong and there was no time.
“I can’t get him down,” I whimpered, wondering if I could even act fast enough at that point to make a difference.
“Persephone,” Killian said. “I’m coming. Stay on the phone with me.”
I took a deep breath, trying to get a hold of myself, and turned to run down to the first floor in an attempt to reach the straps from down low so I could somehow catch Ben when he fell. Dammit! None of it sounded good to me. Ben was already hurt and I felt like I might just hurt him more, but I knew that letting him hang upside down would only make him bleed out faster.
“Please hurry,” I said, but as soon as I came to the bottom of the steps, a dark shape caught my attention in my peripheral. I jumped back, startled by the figure, and gasped loudly into the phone.
“What’s wrong?” Killian asked.
Standing a few steps away was a woman. Tall with a strong, solid physique. Pale, ash-blond hair trailed down her back in a braid that reached past her hips. Her skin almost glowed with a strange, silver hue and her eyes...they were unforgettable. They were so black they looked empty. She was striking and utterly terrifying all at once, her body dressed in a pair of black pants and a dark, red overcoat that hung almost to the ground in the back. She wasn’t human. Not completely, anyway, but there were no female Draak and she certainly wasn’t a Zephyre. My thoughts rattled trying to figure out what exactly I was facing.
“Killian--” I said, cut off by the woman’s advancement.
I stepped away, trembling, and she just cocked her head at me like a cat watching a mouse.
