Page 90 of Elanie & the Empath
“I know.” Maximus’s wide eyes practically vibrated out of his skull. “Isn’t it exciting? It’s so unendingly dull down here that sometimes I want to stick my finger in a glowlight socket just to feel something.”
I only stared. I was about to follow the instructions of a man who regularly considered electrocuting himself for a cheap thrill.
He sensed it, squeezing my arm gently. “Is trying to escape any more insane than spending the rest of your life down here toiling while your woman moves on without you? Of course it isn’t.” He made ashooinggesture. “Now, get going.”
This would very likely be a suicide mission, but Icouldn’t stay down here. I had to find her. I had to tell her that I hadn’t left, that I never would have abandoned her.
I rose to my feet. Or tried to, just barely catching myself on a washing machine when my knees buckled. “I can’t believe this is my life.”
Maximus grinned, revealing crooked, yellowing teeth. “Good luck, Portisan. You’re gonna need it.”
Before I left, I ran my hand through my hair one last time, groaned at the soft swoopiness I was about to sacrifice, then asked, “Happen to have any scissors?”
Standing asnaked as the day I was born under a metal tube that would likely be my final resting place did not fill my mind with happy thoughts. But Elanie was up there, so I needed to go swimming.
Reaching the junction, I felt behind the pipe for the lever to block the water. When I found it, my hand jerked away so violently I hit my funny bone. Hissing a curse, I rubbed the ache. But really, I was just stalling.
I wasn’t ready. I needed to psych myself up, to fill my lungs with sweet, sweet oxygen for one more minute. I needed to burn Elanie’s face into the backs of my eyelids so if I did meet my end, at least she’d be the last thing I saw.
But I needed to do it fast. Any moment now, someone could come walking down the tunnel, and my current situation would be very difficult to explain.
Praying to all the Saints I’d ever known, even the wicked ones my mother told me never to ask anything of, I pulled the lever and listened for the water to stop flowing. While a rush became a whirl, then a hiss, then nothing, my heartkicked into a gallop. I flipped open the hatch, took a steadying breath, and crawled inside.
It was the longest minute of my life in that pipe. While metal creaked and water dripped, I counted out the seconds.Fifteen, sixteen, seventeen…
I was a sitting duck waiting for the cold, dark deluge to fill in around me. But it wasn’t too late. I could still jump out and scamper back to my cell. Sure, I might die there, old and alone and miserable, but at least not, like, right now. My skin crawled, breaths barely making it out of my chest. I couldn’t do this. I couldn’t fucking do this. I had to get out?—
Is she worth it?a voice in my head asked.Is she worth the risk?
My count reached forty-five, and as I stared straight ahead into the never-ending nothingness that awaited me, my breathing calmed and my heartrate slowed. Because Elanie was worth the risk. She was worth every risk. And I would do everything in my power to survive so I could finally tell her that.
A roar shook the pipe, shaking me inside it.
“I’m coming, sweetheart,” I whispered into the darkness. Then I took a final breath, held it tight, and slammed my eyes shut.
Fifty-eight, fifty-nine, sixty.
34.ELANIE
Maland I worked out a preliminary plan to infiltrate the underground. We would hide the morning’s clean linens in my hut, then he’d inform Gol that the laundry shipment had never arrived. Apparently, Gol detested visiting the underground. So if Mal offered to find out why the shipment was late himself (and as long as he could keep his lie-dancing to a minimum), he predicted an 85 percent probability that Gol would let him. Especially when I conveniently showed up to tell Gol that I was finally feeling better and ask him to take a walk with me. In the opposite direction of the entrance to the underground.
It was a thin plan, and I gave us a much lower chance of success than Mal did. But I was beginning to realize that I liked defying the odds.
Grover had clung to me all evening, demanding to be held and scratched like he knew something was about to happen. But now, while I stared up at the stars through our skydome, even with Grover’s warm weight on my belly, even with a plan in place, a familiar loneliness settled over me, pushing me into our bed, crushing me. And just like theydid every night since Sem had left, tears filled my eyes, spilling warm and wet down my cheeks. Only tonight I wasn’t crying because he had abandoned me. Tonight, I was crying because I had abandoned him.
I still didn’t understand how I could have believed Gol so easily. Where had my logic gone? It was like being in love had altered my cognitive capacity, reduced my processing speed, hacked my CPU to run a subroutine indexing every shade of blue. Cobalt, cerulean, indigo, navy, midnight?—
Footsteps padded quietly over the sand beside my hut, and I bolted upright, throwing my hand over Grover’s beak before he could make a peep.
The hairs along my arms rose as my skin pulled tight. They were faster than usual, quieter too, but I knew those footsteps. Those weremyfootsteps.
My heart thundered, my entire body humming as if lightning had struck the hut. And when Sem slipped silently in through our door, dripping wet and…completely naked, I whispered, “Is this a dream?”
Taking my hand from Grover’s beak, I rubbed my eyes. When I opened them again, he was still there, still wet, still naked.Oh my gods.
“Hi, Elanie.”
My systems failed all at once in a catastrophic surge. His voice, his eyes, his skin. His smile alone triggered a cascade of internal alarms, a few of which I’d never even seen before. I was paralyzed, still sitting in my bed, tears streaming down my cheeks. The only thing I managed to blubber as my circuits fragged themselves was “They cut your hair.”
