Was I the only one in here? “Hello?”
The sound of dripping water greeted me.
I’d come in here stinking of sewage, and now I smelled of pee. Possibly my own. Hopefully my own.
This wasn’t quite what I’d been picturing when the Ankou had suggested I join him on his mission. Then again, there was a reason I didn’t trust men. Especially not the beautiful ones.
“Hello?” I tried again.
“Oh you’re awake now, hah? You were snoring for hours. Kept me awake,” a woman brayed in an American accent. “I can’t see you, honey. What did they throw you in for?”
I wet my lips, then swallowed. Gods, I needed water. “Nothing, really. Well, apart from that I shot them.”
“Oh yeah, that’ll do it. What kind of creature are you? Demon of some kind?”
“I’m a fae.”
“Me too! You don’t really smell fae, you smell like… You know what it is? It’s like when you leave the flowers in the vase too long and they get moldy, and then you finally have to throw them out and you just want to retch at the stench. I threw up in the sink once from that. That’s what you smell like.”
“Thanks.”
“You’re American.”
“No. Not really. I mean, I lived there for a very long time.”
“Southern,” she added.
“Tennessee. Okay, can you tell me what’s happening? Are we in America by any chance?”
“We’re in a dungeon. Hang on, I didn’t tell you my name. My name is Debbie. Dungeon Debbie hahahahaha! Gods, you know, I’ll tell you something, I have been making myself laugh over the years. Just me and the rats. Havin’ a good time.”
I tried to move my face away from the part of the floor where I’d puked. “How long have you been in here?”
“I don’t know. Couple of years maybe. Could be forty.” She coughed. “Give or take. It’s hard to keep track of time in a dark hole of your own filth, you know what I mean? And to be honest I really have no idea where we are. Dungeon seems kinda old for America though. Could be China.”
“Does the Ankou ever come down here?”
“The what? I don’t even know what you’re talking about.”
“The big man with the crown. Does he come down here?”
“Oh, I’d remember that if he had. I’ve been getting mighty lonely in here. He’s a big man, you said? Like are we talking muscular or what? Does he have meaty hands? I like meaty hands. Get a good grip on your haunches.”
“Never mind.”
Something was dripping on my forehead, and I inched my body back, away from the gate. My back brushed against a rough, slimy wall.
I’d made sure the Ankou was pretty clear on the Gina oath, but I’d been less demanding of the other oath. I’d demanded safety after I helped him find what he was looking for, but I’d said nothing about the living conditions before.
“What are you in for?” I asked.
“Well, you know it was the funniest thing. I was in a bar, right, like a real dive bar in Boston with a bunch of old men, and this woman spilled her beer right down my shirt. And it was my favorite shirt, like it has a green shamrock on it, and it says Irish today, hungover tomorrow. And I just thought that was a hoot. You know, I do like drinking, and as fae we all come from Ireland originally, right?”
“We come from the British Isles,” I corrected her. The fae were fallen angels who’d ended up in Ireland, Scotland, Great Britain, and the islands. Long ago, we were angels who’d decided we actually kind of liked the pleasures of earth better than heaven, and we indulged in enchanted food and dance. Over the centuries, most of us had lost our wings—but not everyone.
“Right. Whatever. So as an Irishwoman, I feel pretty proud on St. Patrick’s Day, even though I actually have no idea who the hells he was. Some snake guy. So anyways, I had the shirt on, and some college girl spilled a beer on it. And I got kinda mad, right? So I enchanted the bitch to stab herself in the eye, right into her brain. Eye popped right out, she dropped to the floor.” My new friend broke into howling laughter. “You shoulda seen it. She was like AHHHHHHHH. It was hilarious. But I guess people got kinda mad. The humans were weirded out by eyes coming out or whatever. Called the knights to come get me. Anyway. Now I’m here! Hoping to meet this guy you said had meaty hands.”
What was a polite way to say, “I wish I’d never begun this conversation and I would vastly prefer silence?”
“Thank you for that.” I cleared my throat. “I’m going to go to sleep now.”
My skin itched as a bug crawled up my thigh, but with my hands bound, there was nothing I could do about it. It was mingling with the cold sweat on my back and tickling me uncomfortably.
I shut my eyes again, trying to imagine Gina. I’d never been in the Savoy Hotel, so I had no idea what it was like inside. In my mind, it was a grand place with gold-rimmed mirrors and four-poster beds, and probably celebrities swanning around a ballroom. Gina would be able to phone for room service, tell them about the nut situation, and they’d bring her what she needed. Then she’d wake up in the mornings, get her cab to school, and she’d show up well-rested enough to bring up all her grades. She’d pass chemistry. She’d get into college! I could picture her now, sitting in an ancient Oxford hall, the sun streaming in, a stack of books on her desk as she chewed the end of her pencil and wrote something brilliant.
Maybe not entirely realistic, but I needed fantasies right now. This was fine. I could pretend.
That’s what I needed to focus on right now. Not the bug that had now worked its way into my little undershirt, and was crawling over my left breast toward my nipple. Ugh.
Sadly, in my pocketless ensemble, the comb I needed wasn’t with me. Not that I was near a river, anyway. I had no power here.
“Gods!” I tried to yank my wrists out of their bindings to get the thing off me, but I only tore at the skin more, and scraped my arm against the rocks.
I deeply regretted that the Ankou hadn’t stayed dead. I’d figure out how to destroy him at some point.
As the bug scampered over my breast, I let the image I’d conjured of the Savoy Hotel bloom in my mind again. I was pretty sure it was near a park of some kind. Maybe the Thames.
When I opened my eyes again, a bit of movement in the corner of the cell caught my eye. A rat scuttled around on the damp stone.
Then, the hairy thing turned to look at me. Its dark, beady eyes fixed right on me, and it ran for me. It scampered over my face, and I gagged, rolling onto my front for a moment to knock it off. I rolled back to my side and glared at it.
The rat was now staring at me from a dark corner of the cell. I had the distinct impression that he wanted to eat me, but I wasn’t sure if that was possible. I bared my canines, snarling at him. He did not seem impressed.
A pile of rat bones lay in another part of the cell. I had the unsettling feeling that this larger rat had eaten his brother.
With my arms wrenched behind my back, my shoulders ached. First thing I needed to do was find a way to get myself out of these restraints. They were made from magic, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t break through them with enough effort.
In the dim light, I spotted a jagged bit of stone protruding from the walls. I scooted my bottom across the floor until I sat closer to it.