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I groan and kick the door. Pain vibrates up my leg. “Why did you bring me here?”

“Can’t this wait?”

Like waiting for my death with Kelter? A fist clenches my heart. “No, it fucking can’t. I don’t like waiting.”

He tilts his head and flashes his bottomless brown eyes at me. “Maybe I like to make you do things you don’t like.”

“What?” I smack my forehead into the bars. “Tell me why I’m here.”

“Is it not enough to want my little prisoner all to myself?” He taps his finger on my nose, gives me his back and strides off.

“Get the fuck back here and let me out!” Dread plummets to my gut. “Elivander,” I plead. Being trapped behind these bars—with myself—is more than I can handle right now.

“I don’t take orders,” he says with a quick glower over his shoulder at the sound of his full name, disappearing through the first door on the left with Sypher behind him.

I stumble backward into the wall and slide down it. The cell is empty except for a broken stool, some rags and two buckets like the ones in the shower room—one empty, one with soapy water.

What about Kelt? He’ll be taken back to the temporary school. He’ll be alone. He hates being alone. He had his own place, but I can’t count the number of nights we climbed the ladder to my roof with a pillow under one arm and spent the night under the stars, traffic humming below.

He never questioned me about my past—about the streets I refused to walk down to avoid seeing my old homes and schools, or about my lack of family—so I did him the same favor.

I only had the guts to reveal I wanted to find my parents once I hauled him beyond the city’s edge into my forest, and he let me, without judgment. I showed him my collection of folders that night, every incomplete and mismatched document, like holes in a map that kept me from finding my way.

Eli and Sypher are away for a long time, leaving me alone with my thoughts and the visions that force their way in. I breathein the strengthening scent of peppery cloves, over and over until my eyelids grow heavy enough to let me escape.

I’m still sitting against the wall when I wake up, shivering in the cool dawn air. I pull my dress over my toes and tuck it between my legs to keep the cold out, but it’s useless with all the rips in it. The door closest to the stairs swings open. Eli comes out, still in his blue jumpsuit, walking through the main room toward the hallway with loose limbs and a relaxed face. A light wind hits me despite being underground, and I stop shivering, warm from head to toe. Sypher enters the main room, leaning against the wall next to the stairs.

I return to the metal bars and call out to Eli. “Why am I here?”

He stops mid-step, as if he’d forgotten he had a woman stowed away in a cage in his basement. He takes one look at me, and I almost regret reminding him. Almost. I want answers.

He makes his way to the cell door, his brows rising, a teasing smirk piercing the side of his cheek. “Why do you think you’re here?”

I consider the possibilities. “So you can kill me yourself. Maybe you changed your mind about wanting me alive.”

Though…he would have killed me already if he was going to, right? Why not smother me with that hand on my mouth and leave me in the woods for the animals to feast on? Maybe he wants to do it slowly, torture me first.

I squint at him. “Maybe you hate me for all those nights you had to sleep on the floor.”

“Maybe I do,” he says slowly, “but not nearly as much as you think you hate me. And I don’t want you dead.”

My whole body lightens. “You don’t?”

“I could change my mind if you ask too many questions. Guess again.”

“Jerk.” The gears in the back of my mind turn, connecting pieces and grinding out thoughts. “You plan to say I escaped and get rewarded for turning me in?”

“I’ll be punished for your disappearance on my watch.” He rubs his chin and waits for me to continue.

“How? Do I get to watch?”

“I’m not surprised you’d enjoy that,” he says. “Try again.”

“You brought me here to…” No—but he’s warped enough for it.

“To what?”

I take a step backward. “To fuck me whenever you want.” I might as well find out now if they’re all baseless threats or not.