Screaming. Groping hands. Laughter.
Miranda struggled against the sweaty, covetous hands that gripped her, her wounds tearing and bleeding again, desperation overriding pain. She could taste blood in her mouth and feel it oozing down her legs . . . she was so weak . . . but she wouldn’t be taken alive. Not this time. She screamed again and redoubled her efforts, but it was no use, they had her . . . they were dragging her to the lake to throw her body in . . . she felt the sickening lurch of flying through the air, and the freezing water was like a thousand knives in her lungs.
She tried to scream a third time but couldn’t take a breath. The world was fading to black. In the background she could hear shouting, crowd noise, screams. Classical music. The chaos of a hundred songs played in the recesses of her brain.
Then she heard the sound of metal sliding against something, like a sword being drawn. A swish, and a thump, and her vision filled with a pulsating red light. The din around her cut off abruptly.
She woke to a pool of moonlight over her bed and the taste of blood lingering on her tongue.
The fire had died down to embers, but the room was still perfectly comfortable. It took her a second to remember it was high summer and she really should be burning up.
Strange—she hadn’t realized the room had a window. Turning her head for a better look she saw there were some kind of metal shutters over the outside, just now slanted open so she could see the moon. To the left of the window, on the wall near the sill, there was a black button that she assumed operated the shutters. Had someone been in to open them while she was asleep?
More questions along those lines began to occur to her. She was clean—who had bathed her? Someone had bandaged her and dressed her, which meant someone had touched her naked, unconscious body. The way her palm was wrapped suggested someone knew what they were doing. Should she be angry about that, or grateful that they had taken care of her? Had it been David Solomon? The thought made her shiver. He’d claimed he didn’t intend to assault her, but why should she believe him? What kind of crazy fuck took in a strange woman he’d just seen kill four people?
God. Oh God.
Miranda sat up slowly and painfully and put her head in her hands. That night came to her in flashes of fear and nausea, just like in her dream, but now it was punctuated with images of men at her feet, begging for their lives.
The scale was balanced, David had said.
Did she believe that?
No.
She couldn’t think about it right now. There was too much, and it was too hard, and she was too fragile—it wouldn’t take a lot to send her wailing over the edge, shield or no shield.
Instead, she focused on her body, and on moving it. She slid carefully over to the edge of the bed and dropped first one foot, then the other, over the side. Her feet didn’t touch the floor; it was a tall bed, queen-sized, and she had never been a large woman. She was afraid that her legs wouldn’t support her, but testing with one foot she found she could stand, more or less, as long as she held on to the bedpost.
First, she tottered over to peer out the window, wondering where on earth she was. She expected to see buildings and busy streets, but the view presented to her was one of rolling hills, endless trees, and, closer to her, an expanse of gardens contained within a tall iron fence. Outside the fence, she could make out the silvery shapes of deer grazing along the treeline. There were several smaller structures as well, all built in the same style as where she was. She figured out, by craning her neck to the left and right, that she was on the second floor of an honest-to-God mansion, somewhere in the Hill Country.
Her knees felt weak at the realization that wherever this place was, it was definitely no-one-can-hear-you-scream territory. There wouldn’t be any buses running out this far. If she wanted to leave without a ride, she’d have to hike in the Texas heat.
Without shoes. She looked down at herself, noticing her attire for the first time. They’d dressed her in a white T-shirt and black cotton pants that were too long for her legs. Her hair was hanging loose and her feet were bare, their chipped raspberry toenail polish poking out from the pants. Had they thrown away her clothes? She hoped so, although she’d liked her beat-up old tennis shoes, and she’d been wearing her favorite blue panties with the stars all over them . . .
Flashes. Hands. Pain. “You’ve got the sweetest little * I’ve ever fucked . . .”
She swayed backward and had to half turn and grab the bedpost to keep from passing out. She wanted to go back to sleep . . . she wanted a drink . . . she wanted to die. Anything to make it stop, to leach the memories from her and leave her alone.
Shaking her head hard against her thoughts, she turned her attention back to her surroundings and set about a slow exploration of the room.
It was about the size of her apartment bedroom and had the indefinable feel of a place that was kept clean but never used. The furnishings were expensive but not overblown, fairly traditional in style but not ornate. Bed, chair, matching sofa, fireplace, chest of drawers. Her guitar and purse had been left atop the latter.
Out of habit more than interest she opened the case and checked to see that her guitar had survived. It had, without so much as a broken string. Small favors.
She rifled through her purse and dug out her cell phone, which turned on obligingly even though the screen was cracked. No missed calls, no messages. She snorted softly. Who exactly would miss her? If she had died in that alley, it would have taken days for anyone to notice her absence. Mel at the club would probably be first, after she missed her next performance. The cops would probably identify her body from her driver’s license and old student ID, then call her father, whom she hadn’t spoken to in years. Eventually her sister, Marianne, would hear. Would anyone call Kat? Would Kat blame herself for not staying with her despite her protests that night?
It doesn’t matter . . . you’re alive. Sort of.
Nothing appeared to be missing—they’d even found her lip gloss. It was pearlescent mauve. Had there really been a time she’d cared about having shiny lips?
She wasn’t sure exactly who they were, except that David had said we when speaking of the Haven, so it stood to reason other people lived here, too. He was obviously someone important, but it made no sense to her, and deep down she had a feeling she was better off not knowing.
One door: a small closet, empty. Another door: a small but well-appointed bath. She frowned. There was no mirror above the sink. Someone had, however, stocked the little room with new toiletries and towels, even including a package of elastic bands for her hair. She dug one out and reached up with stiff, aching arms to arrange the curly mass into a hasty braid.
She returned to the chest and looked in the drawers: there were two more sets of clothes identical to what she had on, plus some socks and brand-new underwear the same brand and size as her old ones, but all in white.
Miranda pondered taking a shower, but first she had to finish her inventory: there were two more doors.
The one that David had disappeared through she figured went out into the hallway, so she started with the other . . . but to her confusion, she opened the door to find herself looking into a marble-tiled hall lined with other doors.
The door immediately to the left was flanked with a man and a woman in black uniforms, each wearing a sword in a sheath down to their knees, and each with one of those silver bands on their left wrist.
The woman saw her and smiled, then actually bowed. “Good evening, Miss. My name is Helen and this is Samuel. Shall I call for your dinner?”
“Um . . . no . . .” she sputtered. “Just looking around, sorry.”
“If you need anything, just ask one of us,” the guard said. “We’ve been instructed to look out for you.”
“By . . . by whom?”
The two exchanged a look. “By the Prime, of course,” she replied.
“Oh. Okay. Thanks.”
Miranda closed the door. She had absolutely no idea what the woman—Helen—was talking about. What the hell was a Prime? Who were these people?
And if this door went into the hall, where did the other one go?
She hesitated with her hand on the knob, then eased it open a few inches, almost dreading what she was going to find.
More weirdness. Beyond the door was simply another bedroom, this one enormous; the bed alone dwarfed hers, and was surrounded by heavy curtains. The far end of the room was a sitting area with a couch and two chairs facing a fireplace twice the size of the one in her room. Bookshelves lined the walls, laden with volumes and assorted objects from a variety of countries and time periods.
She felt rather like someone digging up relics from the Titanic, but ventured into the room anyway, careful not to touch anything. The books were not dusty, so either they were routinely read or there was one hell of a maid running around. The usual suspects were in attendance: Shakespeare, Milton, Thoreau, Keats; philosophy, history, even physics and engineering; but there were also at least two dozen software manuals spanning the entire life of computer technology, kept in meticulous chronological order, the most recent being a tome devoted to something called PHP.
Several weapons hung on the walls, all blades, including one that looked something like a samurai sword and a couple of long knives crossed over each other.
Ninja computer programmer?
She completed a circuit around the room, finishing at a large desk with a precise arrangement of electronics. Phone dock, MacBook, a set of Bose speakers designed for use with an iPod. Wireless mouse. Two external hard drives. There were also a few standard office supplies, including a slim silver pen that lay in a groove cut into the desk’s surface. The pen was engraved, and she risked picking it up to read the inscription: PRIME DAVID L. SOLOMON, PHD.
Ninja computer programmer doctor?
“What the hell are you doing in here?”
Miranda’s heart stopped and she spun around, or at least tried to, though her body wouldn’t fully obey and she nearly ended up falling over. The voice had come from the doorway to her room, and she turned around to see the speaker standing with arms crossed, glaring at her.
It was a woman of Asian descent with long black hair in dozens of tiny braids, her brown eyes staring daggers at Miranda. She, too, wore the black uniform of the guards in the hall, but with the addition of a series of small silver pins on the collar, and several extra weapons—also blades.
Miranda started to stutter out another apology, but the woman cut her off. “I could be out in the city hunting for insurgents, but instead I am sent to check on the Prime’s new pet.”
Miranda felt the apology die on her tongue with a flash of irritation. “I haven’t lifted my leg on the furniture yet.”