Page 372 of Shadowblood Souls
But as Riva gazes back at me with the taint of sorrow in her bright brown eyes, a renewed sense of resolve grips my chest.
It’s better to try than to give up, right? We definitely aren’t getting anywhere if we all throw up our hands and roll over.
I want to turn the sadness in Riva’s expression into hope.
I reach out to take her hand, leaning closer as if with a lover’s intent. But really it’s to make it harder for any outside party to spot the ruddy gleam I know comes into my eyes as I slip into her memories.
She doesn’t have all that many of Clancy, considering we’ve only been here for a matter of weeks and his appearances have been sporadic. I flit through the images that I know don’t match our arrival yesterday, wincing inwardly at a glimpse of a bedroom where Zian crouches with obvious agitation in a corner.
There. We’re walking down the main hall in a line, Clancy in the lead, me with the blindfold I’ve only worn one other time—when I first woke up in the facility.
I linger in the recollection, focusing as Riva did on the grim white-haired man Clancy pauses to talk to. Etching his doughy features in my own memory.
To look for him again, I don’t have to know his name. I only need a clear sense of his presence.
When I’m sure I’ve absorbed every detail, I pull back out of Riva’s skull, squeezing her fingers as I do. She returns the gesture, studying me.
“We still have each other,” I say. “That’s what’s most important.”
And we’ll keep working with each other to get away from Clancy. Let her hear that underlying message, the one I don’t dare say out loud.
Clancy makes no further appearances throughout the rest of that day and the next. When I’m ushered into my stone-walled bedroom in the evening, my stomach churns with impatient tension.
He expected to be sending us on his new mission within a week. We’re almost halfway through.
How can I get a glimpse inside his mind without him realizing that I’m up to something? If he catches me at it, I have no idea how he’ll punish me… or the others, knowing their torment will hurt me more.
I sprawl on my bed and stew on the problem, running through possibility after possibility for both bringing him to me and ensuring he’s otherwise occupied enough that I can get a good fix on his memories. Maybe I’m not giving up, but I still have to make sure I consider every angle if I’m going to do this right.
It must be at least a couple of hours before an inspiration strikes that I don’t immediately dismiss. I turn the idea over, poking and prodding at it.
It’s by far the best I’ve thought of, but that doesn’t mean it’sgood. Fuck, I wish I could talk to Dominic for his thoughtful insight, or even Jacob with his incisive logic.
Even if I could see them, I wouldn’t be able to talk about this, though. So it comes down to me.
I take a few slow, deep breaths, summoning the image of Riva’s face in my mind. Reminding myself of why it’s so important that I get this done.
Then I wrap my arm around my abdomen and double over on the bed.
A fake groan spills from my mouth. I twist and shudder as if in the grip of a wave of nausea.
The play-acting isn’t enough. I need a blast of reality to really sell the performance.
I’ve told my friends dozens of stories from the minds I’ve dipped into over the years, across our early missions. Always picking the amusing or intriguing.
But there’ve been darker memories I’ve uncovered, that I never wanted to think about myself, let alone inflict on anyone else. Moments of the violence and horror humans are just as capable of as monsters.
They linger on in the back of my head where I’ve buried them as deep as I can. I dredge up one of the worst now and hug my belly tighter.
Gore. Gurgled cries. Slashes of a knife. A spray of blood, and organs jumbling?—
I lurch right over the side of the bed to vomit onto the floor. The acid sears my throat as I gag and sputter.
The guardians have been watching me, because of course they have. I’ve barely had time to let out another groan when the door to my room hisses open.
Two guardians lift me onto a rolling hospital-style cot, murmuring urgently to each other as they do. I keep my eyes closed and jerk one way and another as if in the throes of internal agony.
They hurry me to a room that holds brighter lights and a woman who speaks in puzzled tones as she takes my temperature and a blood sample. I figured they’d have a doctor on staff somewhere in this place.
