Page 53 of Whispers of Wisteria (The Garden of Eternal Flowers #5)

Bianca POV

I was afraid to drift. I had a feeling that if I slept now, it would be a long, long time before I ever woke up again.

My ears were buzzing as I curled up on my side. I should have had the foresight to wear more clothing. The only thing keeping me from freezing to death was the red cape that—despite everything—had remained tied around my neck.

Whose was this? It wasn’t mine.

Gloria’s.

My whole body shuddered. The haze that had been covering my thoughts shifted.

“Bianca.” One of the strange, buzzing sounds began to make sense. Maria.

I rolled to my stomach and pressed my head on my folded arms.

“Hey, babe,” Maria’s voice was soothing. “Come back now.”

I didn’t want to.

Everything hurt, even my fingers and toes.

I pressed my cheek against the ground. It was warmer here, where something red lay splattered across the floor—it was sticky against my cheek.

Red…

My arms and legs shook as I pushed to my knees.

The crimson cape seemed to go on forever. It rolled in waves at my waist and across my lap. It was longer than I remembered, stretching across the mud-and-stone floor, even reaching—at some points—across the cell.

I blinked once, then rubbed at my eyes with my fists until my vision cleared.

That wasn’t the cape at all—at least not most of it. It was blood.

The bodies of my assailants were nearby.

“Bianca, don’t look at them,” Maria was saying. “Look at me.”

But her frantic demands couldn’t hold my attention for long. I couldn’t stop.

“Damn it,” Maria cursed, banging on the bars of her cell.

Ada was on the floor with one arm wrapped around her knee. “She’s in shock.”

“I know that, Ada,” Maria growled at the hyena. She kicked at the bars.

“Titus is going to kill us,” Ada replied calmly.

“I don’t even care about my cousin right now,” Maria snapped, pacing. “She’s my friend first before she belongs to him.”

“How very feminist of you.” Ada tilted her head. After a moment, when Maria wouldn’t stop stomping around, the hyena sighed. She lowered her leg back to the floor and pressed her hands onto the ground. “I like her too.”

Maria spun to face the other girl, a retort ready on her lips, but she froze as the two shifters exchanged a long look.

“Better?” Ada asked. “Because you’re the only one with enough authority to reach her enough to make her move. We won’t get another chance. She’ll die the next time anything happens.”

Maria swallowed, then nodded before she faced me once more.

“Bianca.” Her voice was like honey, languid and thick. It dragged me back from the edges of numbness. “Bianca, look at me.”

This time, I did what I’d been avoiding before, ever since all of this started, and met her eyes.

“Good.” She sounded happier, and a warm feeling welled up in my chest.

I wanted to make her happy.

“Babe, can you talk to me?” she asked. “How do you feel?”

I stared at her, completely at a loss for words.

How could I describe this when I had no idea what this even was?

“Okay…” Maria’s voice wavered, and a panic began to grip at the edges of my senses. “Okay, no!” She pressed forward, and my doubts fled. “Bianca, you’re not chained. You need to get to Gloria.”

As I looked at the wolf shifter, my vision wavered and an ache began to pound at the base of my skull.

Gloria was still shackled against the stone wall, unconscious. Her long hair was a tangled wave over her shoulders, and her head rested lightly against her left bicep.

I’d bet her arms were asleep. That would really suck—I’d always considered paresthesia to be one of the worst feelings in the world.

Except, maybe, a concussion. Or being maimed.

Actually, there were a lot of things worse than tingly limbs.

“Focus, Bianca.” Maria’s voice soothed my scattered thoughts. “The sooner we get home, the sooner I can show you where Titus stashed the best part of his collection.”

“Are you bribing her?” Ada sounded astonished.

“She’s not thinking clearly,” was Maria’s quick reply. “You need to appeal to her instincts. All fae like shiny crap, and they’re really competitive.”

“She’s not going to…”

But Ada’s rebuttal ended as I staggered to my feet.

What was this all about?

Hadn’t I already seen the best? After all, it’d been my jewelry we used in Pretty, Pretty Princess. What could be more awesome than my stuff?

Was Titus hiding something even better?

“Unbelievable.” Ada scoffed. “And a bit frightening.”

“You need to hang out with more fae,” Maria replied.

My body didn’t feel like my own as I crossed the length of our prison. I could hardly feel my legs or my arms, and my mustered strength finally gave out when I was a foot away from my target.

My toes dragged along the floor, and I fell forward, directly into Gloria. She was soft and still breathing, at least. And she’d definitely grunted when I slammed into her.

My thoughts were beginning to clear, but my limbs refused to listen.

“Bianca?” Gloria groaned into my ear. “How are you…”

I braced my hands against the wall, putting some distance between us. My head was spinning, and my knees were weak. If I tried to stand now, I’d probably fall.

“Have you lost your mind?” Gloria looked past me. “She’s not one of yours to command.”

“She is right now,” Maria responded, then the calm took over again.

“Good job, Bianca,” Maria continued, speaking to me. “Now, can you reach the shackles?”

No, I really couldn’t. I couldn’t control my arms, and my teeth chattered.

But…

My focus wandered past Gloria’s face as she glared at Maria, to her wrists.

Up close, the shackles looked different from mine had been. Not that I was any expert, per se. This was just my novice opinion. The black surface was smooth and cold, and almost shiny.

“It’s no use, it’s obsidian.” Gloria’s voice rang loud in my head as she talked to Maria.

“Do you see a latch?” Maria asked.

My hands seemed to move on their own accord, pressing along the smooth, flat surface, until, barely discernible, was the tiniest of openings where a key would fit.

There was no latch.

I breathed in heavily, stumbling forward, and I pressed my face into the place below where her neck met her shoulder. Blackness began to shadow the edges of my vision.

“It’s not going to work without a key,” Ada was saying. “Unless she knows how to pick a lock.”

“I’m aware,” Maria sounded frustrated. “Why would she know how to pick a lock?”

My fingers were so numb that I could barely feel the thick coarseness of my hair, but it was clear my braids were ruined.

That was a shame. At the beginning of the night, they’d been so perfect. This was going to take forever to fix.

Why couldn’t I have silky-smooth locks like the fairies in art?

Heck, even my own past life had hair to kill for. If I had to inherit anything from Mu, why couldn’t it have been that? But no, I’d been stuck with this wild, crazy mess. Not even a million bobby pins had been enough to hold my monster curls at bay.

I stared at the brown hairpin in my fingers, the world a blur of color around me.

Picking a lock? That was easy.

Especially when one wasn’t being zapped by evil energy metal.

“You have got to be kidding me.” I could barely hear Ada. I was already focused, tiptoeing to get a better vantage point for the most effective lock-picking techniques.

“That’s because she’s awesome,” Maria said. My hand slipped an inch at the pride in her voice. “That’s why she’s my friend.”

“Screw you,” Ada replied. “She gave me chocolate. I’m claiming her.”

“Ladies.” Gloria’s chastising hiss cut through my throbbing head. “This isn’t the time to discuss custody arrangements. I assume you have a plan?”

“Of course!” Maria chirped as the lock released. Gloria’s right arm dropped back to her side as I moved to the left manacle.

“It’s easy,” Maria said. “When the wolves come back to check on their friends, you shift and make them regret even messing with a real Alpha.”

Gloria’s breath hitched, and her reply was instantaneous, “No.”

“But…” Maria began, and my heart skipped as the second lock released. “Why not?”

“Maybe you can after Bianca opens the doors? You two shift and take on the wolves,” Gloria offered.

“That’s so unnecessary,” Maria said, sounding annoyed. “Besides, these doors are on an electric timer. She’d have to get to the controls over there.”

I glanced at the metal box near the dungeon door. It was too far away—plus it wouldn’t have mattered, our door was closed again.

“Bianca’s going to collapse in about twenty seconds,” Maria argued. “It’s not her job to get us out.”

“Plus, that’s just stupid,” Ada snapped. “You could end the fight in thirty seconds. They are rogues. They’re going to submit to the highest-ranking wolf around, and that is you.”

“We need to think of something else!”

This was the first time I’d ever heard Gloria truly panic. How strange.

Her weird fear of Damen held nothing to this.

The second lock was released.

My knees buckled and I fell, my teeth chattering and ears popping with a burst.

“Bianca!” Gloria knelt in front of me, and her fingers dug into my shoulders as she eased me onto my back.

At least, I think that’s what happened. There was no way to tell which way was up and which was down. But I wasn’t breathing in dirt, so that was a big giveaway.

“Bianca, can you get up?” Her voice prodded at me, desperate yet firm.

But then she answered her question.

“No,” she said. Her fingers lightly traced over my cheek. “She’s already past her limits. We need a necromancer.”

Why would we need a necromancer?

I couldn’t remember why that’d be important. But that did remind me of my necromancer. Julian’s gentle, blue eyes flashed against my closed eyelids.

Guilt twisted at me, and my stomach churned painfully. Why did it feel like there was still something missing between us?

We should spend more time together once Titus and I made it back home.

But first, a nap.

My hair pressed against my cheek, and another stone dug into my shoulder. Why would I sleep here? This wasn’t comfortable at all.