Fugitive (8 page)

I might never see any of those things ever again.

Terror—real terror—charged through me like a storm. It pulsed through my body, pushing at my skin, wanting to get out. Like my own soul was fighting to be free of me, like my own self couldn’t stand to be trapped here at this moment. It was a surge of blinding intensity, like lightning. Then I fell, panting, my hands braced on the cool floor.

“Stop it,” I said aloud. “Stop this.”

I didn’t have to stay here. The mark was gone and we were free and I could go home—if I could just find a way out. The idea, planted in my fear-frozen mind, cracked my terror like spring warmth. Escape.

After all, I wasn’t dead.

“Yet,” I muttered, and the echo of my voice, soft and velvet, whispered back to me in the stillness. I closed my eyes tight, counted to five, and opened them. And I looked at the place that was going to be my prison.

The foyer stretched up like a bell tower. A shattered chandelier lay three feet away, crystal droplets spread like frozen tears across the marble. Light slanted into the hall through arching windows, illuminating the rest of the room and striping the broken furniture and torn books with golden sunlight. In the middle of the room, papers and quills lay scattered around on the floor. It was as if a great monster had gone into a rage and shredded the room, and then fallen into a peaceful slumber after exhausting himself.

Behind me lurked a gloomy hallway, lined with doors.

I was stuck in this house. My friends couldn’t help me. Drew couldn’t help me. My father wouldn’t help me.

A sigh slipped through my lips as I stood to my feet.

I was alone.

Alone in the house of the Beast.