Page 6 of The Deathless One (The Gravesinger #1)

He took her offered hand, and he hauled her out of the muck like she weighed nothing at all. She landed on her hands and knees on the walkway, staring through the grate at the dim murk below her. Neither of them offered to help her stand.

They turned from her, walking into the darkness as though the dim green light was plenty for them to see by. She could barely see her own hand held up in front of her eyes. But she tried to follow them, with her hand on the wall and her breath shuddering in her lungs.

She’d lied to them—and to herself. Jessamine needed so much more than help getting out of the sewers.

She needed a safe place to stay, someone to listen to her who wouldn’t sell her out to Leon’s men.

What if she’d been asleep for a few days?

Her knees were shaky enough to make her think something strange was happening here.

She shouldn’t have been able to survive the fall, let alone live through the water filtration system.

Swallowing hard, she recognized she couldn’t say any of this to these people. She didn’t even know if they were leading her out of the sewers or deeper into the darkness. What if they weren’t trustworthy?

Suddenly she noticed the twitchy way Anders kept looking back over his shoulder. Pike kept touching her ring in his pocket, rolling it between his fingers as he looked back at her as well. For some reason, the constantly rippling fabric made her nauseous.

What were they thinking? That she would be easy to rob? Were they going to betray her?

Like everyone else.

The air in her lungs froze as her heart rate sped up.

She couldn’t think beyond the utter terror that she’d trusted the wrong people again.

But who could she trust? It seemed everyone in this damned kingdom would give her up to Leon in a heartbeat.

Someone had introduced that man into the castle.

Someone had to have been working with him, because there wasn’t a chance that he’d flipped her court so easily on his own.

Killing the queen should have made the guards rise up. Someone should have fought against Leon. There were plans in place in case someone tried to take the life of a royal. Her mother wouldn’t have let that happen without reason .

There was no air left. She was suffocating in the sewers, and these people would do whatever they wanted and then they would toss her body back into the sea.

A dark voice whispered in her mind. A voice like the sound of rustling velvet and slithering snakes. I want to see you burn your kingdom down and rebuild it in my name.

She’d made a deal.

She intended to keep it.

The first ladder they passed by was her opportunity.

Neither man looked at it. In fact, they’d crossed the channel long before the ladder came into view, slogging through the muck to get to the other side.

Hiding the ladder from her? Perhaps. She swore she could hear the moaning sounds of the infected echoing down the tunnel, and she refused to allow yet another person to trick her.

“?’Ey!” Anders shouted the moment he noticed her bolt in the opposite direction.

The water was up to her waist this time, harder to get through. But adrenaline rushed through her veins, strengthening her, urging her forward. Jessamine hauled herself up onto the other side and lunged for the ladder.

She clambered up so quickly she thought the others might not have even gotten across yet.

All that was left of her was a faint smattering of black sludge as she grabbed the ring of the vent above her head, twisted it in a circle, and shoved hard.

The opening flooded with light, burning her eyes and sending the world into sparkles, but she didn’t care. She was free.

Jessamine tumbled out onto the street, turning at the last second to close the vent behind her. Instead of the two people she expected to see, all she saw was a dark figure standing at the base of the ladder.

The frightened, fluttering heart in her chest recognized him before her mind did. She knew that dark shadow, the broad shoulders and thick fingers that held on to the rungs. But this time, she could see his eyes. Nothing else. Just those black, soulless eyes that stared so deeply into her own.

Looking at him was like looking into oblivion.

Then she heard it again. The thunder of her own heart, beating in her ears and casting out all other sounds, warning that she stared at a predator. She was looking at death itself, and she needed to go. Jessamine, why aren’t you moving?

With a gasp, she shut the heavy cover and locked it so hard she felt her bones grind together. Scuttling back from the entrance, she didn’t stop until her back slammed into the stone wall of a building behind her.

She realized that she was in an alleyway. To her left was the sea, the waves lapping at the stone that angled beneath them. To her right, men and women were setting up stalls filled with fish. The scents overwhelmed her. Ocean, fish, blood. There was so much blood.

Jessamine lifted her hands and realized she was sitting in a river of it.

Red fluid, all coming down from the fish stalls in streams on either side of the street.

Her palms were stained crimson like her mother’s dress after blood had fountained out of her wound.

Red like her palms when she’d tried so hard to stanch the bleeding around her own neck, praying that she wouldn’t die before she hit the waves so hard they felt like stone.

Cold water poured over her head, dousing her entire body with icy seawater. Spluttering, she stood, shaking off the droplets and blinking through the stinging ache.

A round woman stood in front of her, a now-empty bucket clutched in her hands. “You’re filthy, love. Just helping you out.”

Helping her out? By dumping a bucket of dirty water over her head?

Jessamine couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t think. The tall buildings loomed over her head, drawing closer, sinking tighter, until she could barely see the faint strip of sunlight through the gap between the stones. They’d bury her alive. She’d die again, and she’d made a deal .

Stumbling away from the woman and the laughter of the fishermen, she found the next alleyway and disappeared into it. Frantically turning left, right, straight, whatever way led her farther and farther from people.

Until she found a small nook between two empty crates and tucked herself there. Shivering, terrified, and utterly alone.