Blood of the Underworld(105)

The door cracked open, without knock or warning given.

“How is my little doll?” Vrashka asked as he stepped inside. He froze at the macabre sight before him, and Zusa gave him no time to recover. She grabbed him while simultaneously kicking the door shut. With ease she flung him against the wall, a hand against his mouth to muffle his frightened scream.

“This little doll is leaving,” Zusa whispered into his ear as she pressed a dagger against his belly. “I suggest you stay calm, and answer me quietly and truthfully if you want to live. You understand?”

Vrashka nodded. If he was frightened, he didn’t show it. Zusa couldn’t help but be begrudgingly impressed.

“How many guards are outside the door?” she asked, then slowly pulled back her hand.

“None,” he said.

She sliced a gash across his forehead, the shallow cut bleeding profusely. That done, she pressed her hand once more against his mouth.

“Every lie you tell me, I cut lower,” she whispered. “Soon it will be your eyes, then your nose. Don’t make me reach your neck. How many guards?”

“None at the door,” Vrashka said, eyes closed against the blood that ran down into them. “There’s only one exit from the prison, up the hall. That’s where the guards are. I did not lie, little doll, I swear.”

“My name is Zusa, not doll,” she said, cutting across his eyebrows. “How many guards at the exit?”

It took a moment for the old man to gather his breath.

“Five,” he said. “There are always five.”

“Is it night or day?”

“The sun has just set. The temple is settling down for bed, my...Zusa.”

Zusa clasped a hand over his mouth, tried to think. If it were night, then her escape would be far easier. Her prison was deep underground, she knew, with no other exit besides the one with the guards. Five armored men would be difficult, especially with how weak she felt, but perhaps she might catch them off guard...

But escape was not the only thing on her mind.

“Where is Daverik?” she asked. “Is he in his room?”

The old man shook his head.

“I passed him on my way down. He said he felt unwell, and needed fresh air. He was hiding something, I could sense it. Looked troubled. Did you say something to him, little doll? Did you make him doubt himself?”

She tried to cut across both his eyes, but her dagger caught on the bridge of his nose so only one was split in half. When she pulled it free, Vrashka screamed, and her hand did little to muffle the noise. Knowing time was short, Zusa hoped that the scream, if heard, would be mistaken as hers instead of his. Blood was pouring from his face now, and Vrashka’s strength drained with it. Despite all the pain he must have felt, he bore a smile on his face.

“You...you make me sad,” he said when she flung him to the floor. “You could have withstood so much. Breaking you would have been my greatest accomplishment. Even the gentle touchers would be proud.”

He stared up at her with his lone eye, and she could tell he expected her to take his life. She almost obliged, but something about the sick satisfaction on his face turned her stomach. It was as if he viewed dying to her as a privilege.

“You’d never have broken me,” she said, grabbing the handle of her cell door. “But I broke you in seconds.”

“You’ll be back,” Vrashka said, laughing as she left. “You’ll still be mine, little...”

She flung a dagger through the air, straight through his remaining eye. Walking over to it, she yanked it out and shook off the eyeball.

“Stupid bastard,” she said. “You could have lived.”

With the door open, there was no way her escape had gone unnoticed. Taking a deep breath, she ran out the cell, hooked a right, and then charged straight down the corridor. There were only four total cells, with each door on her left. She’d been put in the furthest from the stairs, from what she could tell. At the far edge of the stone corridor was the exit Vrashka had spoken of. Five men stood guard, all with a lion painted across the front of their armor. They wielded a combination of short spears and swords, and four scrambled at the sight of her to form a defensive line. A fifth rushed up the stairs, no doubt to signal an alarm. Zusa sprinted faster, her breaths blasting in and out of her lungs.

“Halt!” one screamed.

Laughing at his cluelessness, she launched into the air, her body twisting like a dancer. Spears and swords pierced through the gaps in her arms and legs, catching nothing. Zusa jammed one dagger through a neck, and the other she rammed into the stomach of the man she slammed into. Together they fell, a heap of arms and legs. She rolled free in a heartbeat, spinning so that the nearest guard’s downward stab hit stone instead of flesh. Her heel caught his jaw, her left arm parried a desperate thrust, and then she was running up the stairs after the fifth, leaving the confused rest behind.