Page 246 of The Seven Rings
“Time,” Owen managed.
“Shit. Distracted.” Trey hit the stopwatch. “Twenty-eight minutes, three seconds. You look like hell.”
“Feel the same. Two more,” he managed as Cleo dropped down to hold him. “We’ve got two more in us.”
“Let me get the doors shut again.”
“Forget them. Let her blow.” Shoving at her hair, Sonya pushedto her feet. “The cold air’s waking me up. Catherine’s next. It’s okay, Yoda. It’s okay. Downstairs.”
Fog laced the floors, but the cold didn’t sting. She’s not as strong as she was, Sonya thought. But neither am I.
She looked down at her hands, at the rings. The one Trey had given her, and all the others.
Not as strong as I was, she thought again.
But she would be.
“Catherine.” Sonya spoke over the banging, the clanging bong of the doorbell, the rush of wind, the snap and sizzle of lightning.
“We need to go to Catherine on her wedding night. Here where she wandered in a trance. Here before Dobbs drew her out into a blizzard and her death. We need to take back what was stolen from her so we can give it back.”
She pressed one hand to her spinning head while Owen gripped the other. With a nod, she went through with him.
The manor held dark and quiet.
“Can’t see a fucking thing,” Owen began. “It’s as dark as dark gets.”
“She came down the stairs, and—”
Then they both saw it.
The single light from a single candle illuminated the woman coming slowly down the stairs. In her nightdress, Catherine walked in her trance, her eyes open and blank, her lips curved in a dreamy smile.
Sonya didn’t hesitate, and didn’t wait, but moved through the dark toward her. “I’m sorry I can’t save you.”
She took Catherine’s left hand, slipped the ring off, then onto her own.
Catherine continued to walk, dreamlike, toward the massive front doors. Opening one, she stepped out into the thick wall of snow.
Owen took Sonya’s hand. “One to go.”
Sonya’s knees wanted to buckle, but she refused to let them. And forgot the weakness when they came back to the dark cut through by a pair of flashlights.
She saw the blood on Trey’s face.
“You’re bleeding.”
“She aimed at me. He got in the way.”
“Just a flesh wound, cutie. Winged a vase at me.”
“At me,” Cleo corrected. “The man moves fast.”
“When I need to. One more, okay, cutie?” He pressed kisses to her face. “Just one more.”
“I know.” Then she let out a surprised laugh. “I feel better. I feel… good.”
“That’s one of us,” Owen said. “How long?”
