9 Chapter 9: A Thread of Hope

Shaye

"Deirda?" At first, I am certain I'm seeing things. Except she's waving at me, standing up from the seat in the visitors' room. It isn't big here with only four tables, each with two seats. No windows and fluorescent lights give everything a yellow hue. But it's cleaner than my cell.

I rush forward, my hands still bound, and I want nothing more than to hug her. We crash together and she embraces me so hard, I lose my breath. She is heavy against me, her breaths hitching like she might break out crying.

"What happened to you?" She eyes the cuts and bruises on my face and neck, tended to by the nurse. "You've only been inside four days and you've already been assaulted?"

"My initiation apparently." I tramp down the hope that she's here to bail me out. Yet, part of me hangs onto the thread that maybe she is. "Do you know if my lawyer has convinced the gods to let me go? No one has contacted me since I got here."

She's shaking her head. "Oh, babe, I'm so sorry. This whole thing is a fucking set up. You wouldn't hurt a fly."

The clearing of the officer's throat has us breaking apart and sitting across from each other on the small table.

My throat is thickening, and I can't stop the tears tracking down my cheeks. I hate being so weak except this is my friend, my roommate for the last two years, the person I've shared everything with since moving in with her.

She smiles, just a slight curl of her lips, and there is pain in her gaze as well. Looking at her is like peering back into my life through a mirror, a future stolen from me because of that asshole Anubis. I still can't get my head around how quickly that small encounter escalated out of control. Who would have thought Anubis, god of Egyptian death was such an ass? Clearly, I should have known and walked away the moment he showed up.

"Oh babe, I'm so sorry. What in the world happened that night?" She stretches her hand across the table.

I lift my bound hands toward her when a loud voice booms behind me. "No touching permitted."

Her brow furrows. "They're strict here."

"This place is hell," I say. "I need to get out." My words are a mere whisper. "Everyone seems to hate me, and they're calling me a god killer. I don't even know how I killed him. I just wanted him off me." I shudder and can't stop the tears. My power has always been weak. It's linked to water I think, that is as far as I can gather. Until I uncover my heritage, it's hard to make sense of my true power. These things don't come with manuals.

"Babe, I wish I could do something. I'd break in and take you with me if this weren't the highest security in the world."

"I don't want you to end up in here too." I suck in ragged breaths. "Life. I got fucking life." And that's why I'm crying, why I feel like my chest is cracking in half. I want to shout out, to demand they release me, to make them see the injustice.

"Shaye, you need to be strong," she says. "Don't let the others see that you're weak. Find the toughest person and befriend them. Find protection."

I'm nodding though my anxiety is growing the more I think about spending the rest of my life here. I can't even pretend this will be okay. All I can consider is getting out, that I don't belong here. While I don't voice it, the notion brews at the back of my mind.

"Have you been watching prison movies?" I ask through sobs and wiping my eyes.

"Every single documentary I can find, and I read a bunch of books at the library about this prison." She leans closer, her eyes flicking to the guard near the door and back to me. "There's mention of an underground layer to the prison where inmates live outside of cells and can buy anything they want in a kind of black market. But only the strongest survive there. Don't go anywhere near there, okay?"

I'm nodding but I'm shaking with nerves and it feels like my insides are filled with broken glass. "Can you read up some more. Has anyone ever escaped here and how?"

"I'm on it." She's half-smiling, trying her best to be strong for me. But I know that the moment she steps foot out of here, she'll break down and cry hard. Gods, I hate this.

"Visitation time is over," the guard calls out.

Deirda is on her feet, and I get up. "Babe, I'm gonna find a way to help you. I'll be back next week." She blows me a kiss and walks past me. I watch her leave the room, her shoulders curve forward, the guard who brought me here standing outside the room, waiting. His gaze meets mine, and he smiles, the brackets around his mouth deepening.

Xanth. The name on his name-badge. Why is he so closed off telling me his god? Most can't wait to tell the world.

I shouldn't feel anything for Xanth beyond him being another guard. Though, I still remember the electricity between us each time he touched me. Fire skitters down my skin like something about him makes my body react. When he stares at me like this, I burn up. No denying the man is handsome. Almost god-like handsome. I can only imagine his relation to a god is stronger than others. Why else would he affect me in such a way?

I swallow hard as his silvery eyes are bleeding with fire. They burn into me. He's powerful and muscular in his guard's uniform, lips red and curling at the edges. Short black hair suits his strong face. If I were anywhere else, I'd run screaming. Here, he's the guard who helped me when no one else would.

He's dangerous, that much I can tell, and I want nothing to do with him or anyone in this place. I just want out.

* * *

For the next two days, I keep my head down but my guard up. I stay with the crowd, even when that means getting punched or spat or kicked. There is no freedom to do what I want. We're shuffled from one task to another like rats in a maze. The walls of this place are closing in on me like a cage. Even at night, I can't relax completely, worried that my roommates will get irritated at the sound of my breathing or the way I lay on the floor.

My gaze sweeps the cafeteria looking for a protector as Deirda suggested. But here it's not always the biggest. I've seen a few fights and sometimes the toughest one isn't who wins. Or maybe I need to go deeper- to the underground level? The idea scares me since I've heard no one talk about it here and I don't want to end up dead.

But I have to do something. Staying in this enclosed space, the routine so mundane I'm screaming inside. Or the fact that any moment I could get cornered like Mattius and his girls did to me. With no one around to stop them makes me feel like I could die any second. That any one of these prisoners could shank me. Stab me and leave me to bleed to death. I shiver, pushing away my food. I might very well die of an ulcer from all my stress before anyone gets to me.

"You're not hungry?" Lene, the nicest of my three cellmates, stops in front of me.

"Not anymore. Want the rest?"

She looks over her shoulder, shuffling her feet from side to side before reaching down and taking my half-eaten food. Then she quickly turns to leave.

She picks at my food. She has gorgeous tanned skin and the palest of hazel eyes. She wears her orange jumpsuit rolled down to her waist and a striped orange tank top.

I whisper hopeful that she'll help me. "Lene, is there an underground level to this prison?"

For a moment I think she's going to ignore me, but she snorts. "You'll die if you go down there." She stuffs the food into her mouth and walks off, but I can't let her go without more information.

Later, if I wait, she might decide it's too risky to speak with me again. I stand up and follow her. "Please. Just tell me where the entrance is. Who's down there? Is there an etiquette to going there?" There are bound to be rules. There are always rules, especially in a place like this. In such tight confines, inmates still claim their small spaces, their territories and protect them ferociously.

She pushes away from me. A whistle sounds and I flinch, thinking it's one of the guards with their batons that feel like lightning. But it's two of them breaking up another fight on the other side of the cafeteria.

"Please. I-I'll give you half my food every other day if you share."

She pinches the bridge of her nose, then hands me back my empty plate. "Deal, but you don't tell anyone shit about where you learned this or I will rip out your tongue."

I nod.

"Only way you can get there is if you know someone who takes you with them. Otherwise, you will end up killed."

She turns and marches away.

Well, that sucks!