Page 134 of Moonlight Hearts

“Can you tell me the time?”

She glanced at the watch, and her smile faltered.Her sharp teeth—I’d not even noticed them, but she bared them once more, screeched, and pulled her arm back.I felt her scratch my cheek in the process, but the oppressive feeling, that thing that had made us freeze here, it vanished as she took several steps back, hissing and screaming at the watch.

I didn’t even think.I kept my arm up, grabbed Thaeros by his jacket, and dragged him up the stairs with me.He had to be able to move somewhat, because I wouldn’t have been able to do that otherwise, and Elias, thankfully, also moved with me.

We made it up the stairs to the fire exit.I lowered my watch arm to pull it open, and once we were through, we ran.Well, it was more a stumbling along, and we weren’t all that fast.Elias moved with me, like a baby elephant holding on to an adult, and Thaeros was breathing heavily as if he’d run a mile or more.

I looked around, trying to find an exit.Then I remembered that we’d come up through the exit, and that the elevator might not be safe if the witch went downstairs.I also remembered that the witch was out to hurt Soyer, and that helped me shake off the last bit of whatever she had done to me, whatever she’d done to scare Elias and Thaeros out of their senses.

“We have to find the others,” I said, not sure whether Elias or Thaeros were in any shape to be of help at all.

“Amory…I…I really want to go home,” Elias said.

“Yeah, but we can’t right now.Just hold on to me.”

Thaeros was looking over his shoulder.I didn’t have to; I heard the door to the staircase open behind us.We didn’t have too many options.I went for the nearest door to us, and luckily it was open, spilling us out on the other side.It was very red here.So red.

Chapter Thirty-Eight

ThethingaboutSoyer—evenabout Elias and certainly about Vico—was that they seemed largely normal.If I’d passed Soyer on the street, I’d have thought nothing of it.He wore all black, sure, but he dressed pretty normal.Elias wore his suits, but he wasn’t too unusual either.Of course, Soyer’s home, when he’d first taken me there, had seemed normal, if lavish.Only his cabinet of curiosities was strange, but even then, it was just a room he had but didn’t seem to spend a lot of time in.

With the experience I’d had, seeing what I was seeing in the room in front of me—the grandeur of a bygone age—was an anachronism that shook me to the bone.

There were Persian carpets spread out on the floor, so many that the boring gray concrete had vanished.In the middle of the room, a sort of tent had been erected that was open on one side, and the roof of it was hung with fancy metal lanterns that all looked fake Eastern.The tent itself was decorated all over with red and orange silk scarves, a gold one peeking through here and there.

In the center of all of that, on a dais surrounded by scantily clad attendants both male and female, sat Caecilius.I recognized him by what he was first—the tail, the scales traveling up from it to his belly and shoulders, running over his arms and all the way up to his cheeks.However, I also recognized the face, though it was changed.It was the same as it had been in the photograph Soyer had kept in his apartment before it had become ours.

Our eyes met, and Caecilius recognized me right away.

“What a turn of events!”He gestured.“Darlings, bring refreshments for our lovelyguest.”

He had an accent not dissimilar to the lawyer’s, also British.He said guest as if it were the vilest insult, hissing as he did.

“I’m not your guest, Cecil,” I said, hoping that would irk him.

It did.I saw him flinch.He wasn’t even trying to hide it.“No?Maybe not.But you came here.Now, what shall we do with that?”

I turned to look at the door, but it hadn’t opened.If the witch was still following us, she was taking her time.

I focused back on Caecilius.“Where are the others?”

I realized how stupid a question that was when I saw his face.He was surprised, then annoyed.

“What others?Have you brought any of those sycophants you’ve amassed around my Leas?”

One of the attendants, a blond boy who looked like he was barely out of his teens, held up a metal tray.There were no drinks on there though, just a withered branch with thorns that looked so sharp, so thirsty, it made me flinch back.

“No, thank you,” I said to the boy.

He cast his eyes down.“But you have to.You have to take it.”

Caecilius cackled.“Oh, you will.Or you’ll wish you had.What others, Amory?”

“My guards,” Elias said.

Caecilius’s eyes flicked to him, annoyed again.“Oh.You.Well, that’s annoying, but it won’t matter much.What are a few less Hawthorne lapdogs?You lot will pick up just about anyone and welcome them to your bosom.”

The boy raised the tray a fraction.“Please take the branch.”He sounded scared.Scared in a familiar way.The fear of getting hurt by someone who had power over your existence.I knew that fear.I’d grown up with that fear without even knowing it.