Page 12 of The Bloody Ruin Asylum & Taproom (Sam Quinn #7)

Seven

Sam!

I worried we were going to smash into the front door, but it opened as he hit the steps.

He slid to a stop across the marble entry as the door was closing.

Pulling me around his body, he set me on my feet, holding me steady until I could stand on my own.

A twinge of pain broke through Clive’s pain removal, but then it was gone.

Should we tell them to be ready, that Vlad will be returning soon? I asked him.

No. Vlad’s business is his own. He may not want the Guild to be aware of his comings and goings.

He placed his arm around me, surreptitiously taking my weight so my limp wasn’t too pronounced. He knew I wouldn’t want to be carried in front of a bunch of vampires and their minions.

“How was dinner?” he asked, which was a nice, bland question when we knew there were always people listening.

“Excellent. I found a place willing to feed me even though I was arriving so late. If you have time while we’re here, I’d like to take you. It’s across the river.”

We turned down the side hall toward our bedroom. “It’s a date. I’ll check with Sebastian on the schedule going forward.”

Once behind closed doors, he picked me up and carried me to the sofa.

“We haven’t even been here twenty-four hours.

” He shook his head, rubbing my sore leg.

“I selfishly want you with me, but neither the Guild nor the town are safe for you.” He brushed the back of his hand over my cheek.

“Our plane is here. You don’t need to stay, darling. I’m sure Fergus misses you terribly.”

I put my hand over his and squeezed. “No fair bringing Fergus into this. Partners stick together and my leg’ll be fine. I just need to rest it. Not to mention I wanted to come. All these places you’ve visited countless times and I’ve never been. I wanted to see Budapest.”

“And instead, you’re stuck in a vampire-infested, rotting asylum in a town filled with wolves who will attack on sight because of me.” He gave me a look that had me smiling.

“Cheer up. It’s an interesting new experience. Is it a good one? No, it is not. But it’s new.”

When he leaned in to kiss me, his phone buzzed. He closed his eyes a moment. “I believe the meeting is reconvening.” He gave me a quick kiss and stood.

“How’s it going? Are the other kids playing nice?” I struggled to extricate myself from the axe holster while sitting on a couch. Suddenly, Clive was there, easing it down my arms and placing it on the coffee table.

“For the most part,” he responded. “Frank and Delores often bicker with one another, and both tend toward solutions to hypothetical problems by punishing all involved. Ava has no idea what she’s talking about but does so love to throw around platitudes in an attempt to cover her ignorance.

Oliver sits quietly, ignoring everyone, until he’s asked a direct question.

When he is, he gives a complete and reasonable response. ”

“So you’re the star pupil, huh?” I said, grinning. “I knew it.”

“Let’s not go too far,” he said, bringing me an armload of water bottles, protein bars, and assorted snacks.

“Where’d you get those? I checked. None of the food stores were open.” Thank goodness. I didn’t have to go through that tunnel every time I was hungry.

“Darling, humans are employed here. There’s a kitchen and I raided it for you.”

“That reminds me,” I said, “why do some humans wear white shirts and some black?” The Renfield situation bugged me. I was sick of the little shits giving me dirty looks, and I needed to know what I was dealing with.

“Ren—oh, the human servants? Just as the nocturne back home has Norma, the human liaison, the Guild also has humans who can deal with situations, bring in supplies, whatever needs doing during daylight hours. The ones in white shirts want to be given the dark kiss and so are trying to prove their worthiness, mostly to Sebastian. If any of the Counselors take a liking to a white-shirted Renfield,” he said on a grin, adopting my term for them, “they may offer to take on the responsibility, with the promise of eventually turning them.

The ones in black shirts already belong to a specific vampire.

They have been claimed and are beginning to be fed blood by their Master.

Not enough to turn them, but enough to give them some enhanced abilities and to create a stronger allegiance.

“The white shirts should help you or answer your questions. I say should because most of them, like the dead one this morning, are going to be hostile toward you, believing it makes them more—I don’t even know what—trusted?

appreciated? by a vampire protector. You’re smarter and stronger than either type, but I recommend staying away from both.

Weak men desperate to prove themselves to other men rarely make good decisions. ”

He dropped a kiss on my nose and then headed for the door. “Try to get some rest.” He tapped the side of his head. “If you want to eavesdrop, feel free.” He left as his phone started buzzing again.

I grabbed one of the bottles of water and took a big swig. I considered changing into my pajamas, but I didn’t feel safe here. Locks were child’s play to vampires and, for all I knew, the Renfields had copies of the room keys. No. I needed to stay fully clothed and able to defend myself.

Tipping over, I reclined on the couch, putting my head on a pillow. I was so damned tired.

The lamp on Clive’s side of the bed flickered. I didn’t have the energy for this. I had to stay and let my leg heal, so the ghosts could fuck right off. “Listen, if you want to play with the light, could you just turn it off completely? The flickering is going to give me a headache.”

The light went out. Cool.

I was starting to locate the green blips in my mind, wanting to find my guy and listen in on the vampy drama, when I heard him shout, “Sam!”

I was up and running across the room before I had a moment to evaluate the likelihood of Clive shouting for my help. Halfway down the hall the sconces flickered and went out. The hall was pitch dark, but I kept going. Clive needed me.

A few steps later, I realize that the sound is all wrong. The hall is carpeted and yet I hear the echo of my shoes slapping against stark tile. There’s a sickly, yellowish light. The electric sconces are gone. A gas lamp stands on a side table that wasn’t there a few minutes ago.

I’m surrounded by the same industrial white tile floor of the asylum, the white walls, the white metal doors with scratches and dents.

A scream makes me jump. I turn to see an old woman through the small square of glass embedded in her door.

Her withered face fills the glass as she curses at me in Hungarian.

Frantically rattling the knob, she bangs her head against the door, over and over again, making the glass crack. Blood trickles down her face as she shrieks.

A wail behind me makes me jump. I spin to the door opposite the screamer’s and find a woman whose face is burned. It looks as if hot grease was thrown on the left side of her head. The wound isn’t new, but it’s angry and red. The desperation in both women’s eyes makes me break out in a cold sweat.

“Nem, Apa!”

Wait. I know that one. Nem means no. Apa? I’m walking again. The voice seems to be coming from the reception area. Isn’t apa father? Or is that Korean? I remember something in a book…

Another woman bangs on her door and curses me with words I don’t understand.

I move faster to the end of the hall and turn right, almost running into a gurney left against the wall. The woman strapped on it stares blankly up at the ceiling, her jaw hanging open, revealing discolored teeth. The stench of death overwhelms me. She’s been left here to rot for hours.

Another woman, this one an attendant in a long gray gown stained with sweat rushes past me and down the hall I just left.

She makes a fist and bangs on the cursing woman’s door, shouting something in response, and then goes down to the screamer’s door, taking a large ring of keys out of her apron pocket.

She pounds the door, shouts something, and then unlocks the door and opens it. The screaming gets louder before it cuts off with a crack.

Stomach twisting, I turn back to the entry. A teenaged girl, well-dressed, is clinging to an older man in an overcoat. They appear to be the only two people who don’t work here, the only two not wearing some type of uniform.

The man in the overcoat has the same blue eyes and reddish-brown hair color as the teenaged girl, who has succumbed to tears, her words lost in sobs. He yanks his hand away from her with a look of disgust as he turns to speak with the man in the white coat.

It's the leering man who was leaning over me in that nightmare, the one who was standing on the front steps of this building in the bleeding photo.

The man in the overcoat hands the white-coated man an envelope and shakes his hand.

The white-coated man nods to a woman bent over the counter, writing something behind the reception desk.

She, like the other attendant, is wearing a long gray dress, this one with stains at the hem. Moving forward, she speaks quietly to the teen, hooking an arm tightly around the girl’s shoulders and turning her toward the hall where I’m standing.

Two men, also dressed in gray, stand in the entrance to the hall on the opposite side of the reception area. Presumably, that’s the way to the men’s dormitory. I don’t like the way the men are watching the girl, their gazes predatory.

One of them pushes off the wall with his shoulders, sauntering over to the desk and checking the book the female attendant was writing in. Grinning, he taps something on the page and turns to the other attendant, nodding and walking back to the men’s side of the building.

The teen struggles with the attendant, trying to get the attention of the man leaving her at the asylum. “Apa! Kérem,” she pleads.

He never looks back, striding out the door into the night.

“Shh, Léna. Mi gondoskodunk rólad.” The doctor? Director? Superintendent? The man in the white coat shakes his head, pocketing the envelope and walking into an office behind the reception desk.

The girl— Léna—screams and I follow her. She’s taken to the room Clive and I were first taken to. The cell is white with only a thin, soiled mattress on a metal frame. Terrified, the poor girl is looking everywhere at once, clearly trying to find an escape, to find anyone who can help.

Her gaze slides over me. Everyone’s has.

Two female attendants strip off her coat and shoes, throwing them out into the hall. One pulls off Léna’s ring and pockets it, ignoring the girl’s tears. The other takes the silver comb holding back her hair, letting it fall loose to her waist.

The ring thief goes out to the hall and returns with a pair of large shears. Léna’s eyes get big as she fights to get away. The comb thief wraps her meaty arms around the waifish Léna, holding her in place while the other hacks off her hair to above the shoulders.

Léna closes her eyes tightly, as though this is all a bad dream and she’ll wake soon.

One of the women laughs and the other rolls her eyes. They strip off Léna’s dress, leaving her shivering in only a chemise and drawers, then march her barefoot down the hall, dropping her dress on the pile they’ve created of her belongings.

I follow them down the hall, unable to break away. They turn right down the larger main hall and go almost to the end before slipping through a door on the left and down a flight of stairs. Léna is stumbling, but they have her arms locked in their own as they drag her down.

At the bottom, they push through another door and take her down a cold, dark passage. The sounds coming from behind the locked doors fill me with dread. This poor girl shouldn’t be here. No one should.

They take her to the door at the end, one of them kicking it open. A large metal tub sits in the middle of the room. One of them turns the faucet while the other seems to give the girl instructions.

I watch the women, looking for any sign of sympathy, even simple concern, and find none. Dead eyed, they wait for the bath to fill and then force the girl in. She squeals at the cold, but they ignore her, shoving her down into the icy water.

One takes a thick bar of hard soap and scrubs the girl, while the other holds her in place. When they finish their cursory wash, they dunk her under and then drag her up, her underthings plastered to her frail body.

Like this, it’s clear to see that Léna is pregnant.

She presses her hands to the growing mound, trying to hide, but the women see and jeer.

They drag her out of the bath and take her, shivering and wet, back through the hellish passage, to the stairs, and return her to her room, where they push her in and lock the door.

I’m not sure how long I stand in the hall outside her door. I want to leave, but I can’t make myself move. Eventually, I hear footsteps. Not the female attendants. I’ve learned the sound of their treads. These are heavier.

The two male attendants come around the corner, looking up and down the hall. Seeing no one, the one who’d looked in the reception book takes a ring of keys from his pocket, unlocks Léna’s door, and the two slip in.

I’m in the room with them. The girl’s curled up tightly on the filthy mattress, trying to get warm, tears still fresh on her cheeks. When the men walk in, she jumps up, cowering on the far side of the bed, her arms out, warning them away.

I know what’s about to happen and I scream for her. Running at the men, my claws out, I try to rip their heads off, but I rush through them, slamming against the far wall instead. Howling, I try again to slash at them, but I’m not there. There’s nothing I can do to stop them.