The Gold in the Dark

Chapter Twenty-One

He kept her close, the brown cloak about his shoulders hiding the knife at her back, and guided her with patient, nonchalant steps toward the alleyway. To anybody else in the square they'd look like an ordinary couple out for a stroll. Tia didn't dare turn her head to look back towards the shoe shop.

Alindy's words from so long ago pealed in her head.

He slashes the girls' bodies, and they're found with their clothes ripped away. It's horrid.

The alleyway loomed toward them, only fifteen steps away now. It was dark and forbidding as a monster's gaping maw, ready to swallow her whole. Time slowed, and the bustle in the square dulled to a muffled drone. With every step, all she could feel was her trembling, sweating hands swinging uselessly at her side against her skirt.

And then her hand found the pocket in her skirt, slipped inside, and grasped the knife handle within tight.

Another step proved he hadn't noticed. She let out a silent, furious curse that the leather sheath was on, holding fast to the blade. She slowly started to inch the blade out of the clinging sheath, praying he wouldn't realize what she was doing.

Seven steps away. The knife was only a third of the way out.

Six steps away. Clumsy from desperation, she pressed her palm against the knife edge and bit back a gasp of pain as it sliced into her hand. Warm blood dribbled down her fingers.

Five steps away. His fingers dug deeper into her shoulder. She tried to keep it still so it wouldn't betray her fingers scrabbling against the sheath.

Four steps away. His easy pace quickened. He was excited.

Three steps away. The sheath came away and dropped into the bottom of her pocket.

Two steps away. She eased the knife out and sent up a prayer.

She swung the knife downward, and a shock ran up her arm when blade met flesh. It sank into his thigh easily, gladly—but of course it would be a quality knife, she couldn't help thinking, for her mother would have made sure to buy a bog iron blade, no doubt straight from Dezel Smith himself.

"Bitch!" the man cried, and she heard a clatter on the ground. He'd dropped his knife, but, perhaps more from fury than his original murderous intentions, still held her fast against him. He pushed her one more limping step towards the alley...

And she found the handle of the knife again, the blade still stuck in his thigh, and twisted it. Hard.

His cry this time was animalistic, feral, and she wrenched herself away from that awful, looming alleyway. She heard the sound of fabric ripping, and then she was free, leaving him holding the shreds of her sleeve. Was he following her? She risked a backward glance.

He'd retreated into the relative darkness of the alleyway. The man stared after Tia as he backed further away, his face purple and distorted with fury. Some raw, primal emotion coursed through her, and she couldn't tear her eyes away from his, as if letting him out of her sight for one second would let him once more blend in with the people of Haplyr. She burned his face into her brain.

And then there were people all around, holding her up so she didn't fall on shaking legs, pressing cloth to her bloodied hand. The crowd jostled her this way and that, and she could see the man no more.

"Where is he?!" someone was screeching. "Did he get away?!" She realized distantly that the voice was her own. There were so many people everywhere, but she felt like she was floating above them all, somewhere far up in the clouds.

"They're going after him, sweetheart," an old woman beside her said. Tia retched at the pet name. It was what he'd called her.

"You're safe," another voice said. "You got free." But there was no safe, she knew, if the Firefly Hollow Killer eluded arrest.