Rune frowned, her skin prickling. The Blood Guard had been getting more and more creative with their holding locations, which made it more difficult for Rune to guess where they were keeping captured witches. Normally, though, there were more guards than this.
Crouching, she tried to see down into the first level of the mine and caught a shimmer of light in the distance.
Someone’s there.
Still, Rune hesitated, unable to shake the feeling that something was off. But if Seraphine was down there and Rune walked away right now, they would transfer her to the palace tonight, and Rune might never get another chance to save her.
And if they’d already transferred her …
I’ll just go down and look around.
Rune touched the small knife she’d strapped onto her thigh, drawing courage from its freshly honed steel. With her feet on the rungs, still cloaked by her Ghost Walker spell, she lowered herself into the darkness.
It got colder and damper the lower she went, and the ladder rungs were slick beneath her hands. As soon as her feet touched the ground, she let go and turned into the pitch black, her gaze seeking the warm glow in the distance.
There was a rush of air. Movement in the dark.
The hair on her nape rose. Trap, said her brain, seconds before her body caught up.
Rune spun to grab the ladder and haul herself up, when a hand seized her wrist and clamped down with viselike strength.
“Gotcha.”
Rune swung with her fist, but the darkness made her assailant as invisible as she was, and she missed his face.
Before she could try again, he seized her other wrist and forced her to her knees. Rune quailed at the strength in him as he easily wrestled her to the ground, pressing her cheek into the cold rock and pinning her there with his knees on either side of her hips.
Immobilizing her.
The smell of fresh-cut cedar and gunpowder overwhelmed her.
“You have no idea how long I’ve waited for this day.”
The voice was unmistakable.
Gideon.
White-hot anger burned in her breast. He’d set her up. Baited the trap and waited for her to step into it.
I am such a fool.
And now he had her pinned. Defenseless. Exactly where he wanted her.
But how did he see her?
He doesn’t, she realized. This level was so dark, he couldn’t see anything. Neither of them could. He must have heard Rune coming down the ladder.
If she survived this, she would need to tweak her spell to muffle her sound.
“Your friend isn’t here.”
I gathered that, yes, thought Rune, crushed beneath his weight. He’d planted both palms on her shoulder blades, immobilizing her. Her hands were still free, but because of the way he pinned her, she couldn’t use them to reach for her knife.
“Someone got your tongue, little Moth?”
No way was Rune talking. If it was too dark for him to see her, she might still have a chance of keeping her identity intact. She’d have to wait for him to let her up before she tried anything. He couldn’t keep her pinned forever.
And if he has a lamp?
Ghost Walker kept Rune shielded so long as someone didn’t know she was there, by nudging their attention away from her. The spell could try its hardest to force Gideon’s gaze away, but he was sitting on top of Rune. He knew exactly where she was. Her spell could no longer deceive him.
And if Gideon had a lamp, the moment he lit it, all he’d have to do was yank her cowl down and pull back her …
There was the soft hiss of a flare. Then a red glow, like an ember, behind her.
No.
Panic zipped through her.
As the flare sizzled and the glow brightened, he reached for her hood. The moment he pulled it back and set free her hair—a red-gold shade he would instantly recognize—it would mean the end for Rune.
In order to hold the flare and pull back her hood, though, Gideon had to remove his hands from her. With the weight of him gone, Rune was free to reach for the knife strapped to her thigh. So she did.
Her fingers wrapped around the hilt.
He tugged at her hood, sliding it back from her forehead.
Rune drew the knife from its sheath and stabbed hard, not caring where the blade went in, so long as it went in deep.
Gideon howled and rolled off her.
Free, Rune stumbled to her feet and ran.
She’d never been inside a mine. She knew nothing about them. One thing Rune was pretty sure of, though: there was only one way in and out. And she was running in the opposite direction of it.
Rune quickly found the source of the light she’d seen from above: a lamp hanging midway down a narrow tunnel. The ceiling was so low, Rune had to duck to keep from hitting her head on it.