Talons⛥Kaz Brekker

⛥𝔑𝔦𝔫𝔢⛥

I layed on my belly, arms extended in front of me, wriggling like a worm through the dark. Despite the fact that I'd been as good as starving myself, the vent was still a tight fit. I couldn't see where I was going; I just kept moving forward, pulling myself along by my fingertips.

I'd woken sometime after the fight on Vellgeluk, with no sense of how long I'd been unconscious and no idea where I was. I remembered plummeting from a great height as one of Van Eck's Squallers dropped me, only to be snatched up by another-arms like steel bands around me, the air buffeting my face, gray sky all around, and then pain exploding over my skull.

The next thing I knew I was awake, head pounding, in the dark. My hands and ankles were bound, and I could feel a blindfold tight across my face. For a moment, I was twelve, playing blindfold tag with my siblings on father's ship. I forced myself to breathe. Wherever I was, I felt no ship's sway, heard no creak of sails. No one tugging at my arm to playfully torment my blindness. No joyful laughter. The ground was solid beneath me.

Where would Van Eck have brought me? I could be in a warehouse, someone's home. I might not even be in Kerch anymore. It didn't matter. I was Ambrosia Dawn, and I would not quiver like a rabbit in a snare. Wherever I am, I just have to get out.

I'd managed to nudge my blindfold down by scraping my face against the wall. The room was pitch-black, and all I could hear in the silence was my own rapid breathing as panic seized me again. I'd leashed it by controlling my breath, in through the nose, out through the mouth, letting my mind turn to prayer as my siblings gathered around me.

I imagined them checking the ropes at my wrists, rubbing life into my hands. I did not tell myself I wasn't afraid. Long ago, after a fight I'd gotten myself into for sticking up for my youngest sister Rose, my father had explained that only fools were fearless. We meet fear , he'd said. We greet the unexpected visitor and listen to what he has to tell us. When fear arrives, something is about to happen.

I intended to make something happen. I'd ignored the ache in my head and forced myself to inch around the room, estimating its dimensions. Then I'd used the wall to push to my feet and felt along it, shuffling and hopping, searching for any doors or windows. When I'd heard footsteps approaching, I'd dropped to the ground, but I hadn't had time to get my blindfold back in place.

From then on, the guards tied it tighter. But that didn't matter, because I'd found the vent. All I needed then was a way out of my ropes.

The only thorough look I got at the room where I was being held was during meals, when they brought in a lantern. I'd hear keys turning in a series of locks, the door swinging open, the sound of the tray being placed on the table. A moment later, the blindfold would be gently lifted from my face-Bajan was never rough or abrupt. It wasn't in his nature. In fact, I suspected it was beyond the capabilities of his manicured musician's hands.

There was never any cutlery on the tray, of course. Van Eck was wise enough not to trust me with so much as a spoon, but I had taken advantage of each unblindfolded moment to study every inch of the barren room, seeking clues that might help me to assess my location and plan my escape.

There wasn't much to go on-a concrete floormarked by nothing but the pile of blankets I'd been given to burrow into at night, walls lined with empty shelves, the table and chair where I took my meals. There were no windows, and the only hint that they might still be near Ketterdam was the damp trace of salt in the air.

Bajan would untie my wrists, then bind them again in front of me so that I could eat-though once I'd discovered the vent, I'd only picked at my food, eating enough to keep up my strength and nothing more. Still, when Bajan and the guards had brought my tray tonight, my stomach had growled audibly at the smell of soft sausages and porridge.