The Dawn of Dae (Dae Portals Book 1) (20 page)

Sometimes I hated being right.

Sulfur burned my nose, warning me of trouble long before the scuff of shoes on the pavement behind me confirmed my fears. Arthur had reeked of sulfur, and after going through the hassle of kidnapping me and locking me in a warehouse, I had every reason to believe he wasn’t going to let me get away without a fight.

While Arthur was the most likely to seek me out, there were hundreds of disappointed dae within the fringe who had good reason to hate me.

Without a real weapon, with my legs trembling beneath me and the rest of me aching and sore, I wouldn’t provide much sport for whoever was following me. I had three choices, and they didn’t appeal to me. I could try to run. In my current state, I’d last a couple of blocks before I collapsed, assuming my pursuer wasn’t faster than me. I could turn and prepare for a fight, hoping a display of aggression would trick a dae long enough to drive it away.

As my last option, I could stop and wait.

I rejected the idea immediately; standing around and doing nothing was no better than giving up. A face-to-face confrontation didn’t appeal, which left me with the choice of running. I kept my stride even as I kept walking, squinting in my effort to see farther ahead. Hundreds of dead-end alleys littered the fringe, and without knowing the streets, one wrong turn would leave me cornered.

Still, running was a better option than turning to fight. If I had to fight, I would, but I needed an advantage if I made such a move. I kept my stride steady, but shifted my weight more to my toes so when I committed to running, I could sprint. Whoever was stalking me was trying to be quiet about it, which could prove useful.

If they didn’t want to make a scene, I could use that against them.

Once upon a time, the fringe had been one of the older parts of Baltimore, much like the Inner Harbor. While the cobblestones were long-since gone, taken by the elite to build up their part of the city, the narrow streets lined with crumbling townhouses and stores remained. I waited until I reached an intersection, pivoted, and made a run for it.

My choice of street was promising; while still narrow, it boasted actual sidewalks. I kept to the asphalt, sprinting on my toes. A man cursed behind me, heralding the thud of his footsteps as he pursued me.

At the rate of his approach, I wouldn’t make it a block before he caught up with me. While I had long legs for a woman, and had several inches on most, I still wasn’t fast enough. I blamed my fatigue and injuries; my breath burned in my throat and lungs, my ribs ached, and I kept pulling my stride thanks to the stabbing pain of the cuts stretching across my side.

Running wasn’t working, which left me with fighting, since there was no way in hell I was going to let my pursuer capture me without making him work for it. I sacrificed speed, eyed the uneven brick walls in the dim moonlight, and chose an empty flower box jutting beneath a shuttered window. It looked sturdy enough, although I didn’t care if it broke, so long as it held long enough for me to switch directions.

I jumped, kicked out my feet, and twisted around. My pursuer had gotten closer than I thought. Arthur skidded to a halt, and launching myself from the sill, I hurtled towards him. He choked back a cry.

I slapped my hands to his shoulders, shoving down with all of my strength so I could propel myself over his head. Clearing him, I tucked my head and shoulders so I’d roll and be able to get to my feet.

It almost worked. His fingers closed over my right ankle, and that was all the warning I had before he jerked me towards him.

Humans shouldn’t have had the strength necessary to grab someone and fling them over their head and slam them to the street. I spat a single curse at him before I hit the ground hard and everything went black.

Chapter Thirteen

Arthur’s knee jammed into the small of my back, grinding against my spine. I couldn’t have been out for long; the way he shifted his weight on me and clutched a handful of my hair told me he hadn’t secured a strong enough hold on me for his liking.

Whether seconds or minutes, it didn’t matter. My body refused to obey me, and instead of struggling, I remained limp. I considered opening my eyes, but I decided playing dead served me better.

Maybe if he thought I was unconscious, he’d lower his guard. If he did, I had some hope of freeing myself. I had gotten so close, only to be caught again. I really, really wanted to howl out my anguish, humiliation, and frustration.

Arthur lifted my head by my hair. “Lassie?”

The concern in the dae’s voice helped keep me calm and still. If he had wanted to kill me, he would have burned me to a crisp. While I had hundreds of reasons to worry, so long as I lived, I could regroup and make another move.

Moving would be the difficult part, though. I wiggled my toes in my shoes, and lightning zapped from my neck all the way down my spine. My relief at being able to move was crushed under the agony the movement cost me. I wasn’t paralyzed, which meant the dae probably hadn’t broken my neck slamming me to the ground.

Arthur shifted his hold on me and touched my throat. Sure enough, his hand burned worse than his fire. I thrashed, opened my mouth to scream, and choked. I sucked in a breath as a pained wheeze, and instead of struggling like I needed to, my hands and feet jerked in a convulsion.

“Shit,” Arthur hissed before tossing me over his shoulder like I weighed nothing. Securing a hold on the back of my legs, he shifted me to his satisfaction, leaving my cheek to rest against his back while my unresponsive arms swayed with his every movement.

I cracked open an eye, but like in the warehouse, my vision blurred too much for me to make out any useful details or landmarks. I wanted to curse, but it took all of my concentration and effort to breathe.

Shaking someone’s hand was painful enough. I had never had someone touch my neck before, and it felt like a burning rope constricted my throat. My lungs burned with the need for air, and I panicked when I couldn’t draw a deep breath.

It wouldn’t matter what Arthur wanted with me if I suffocated. I had never believed, not for a moment, that someone touching my neck could cause such a reaction. The harder it became to fill my lungs, the more I shook. My toes went cold first, and the shivering chill spread up my legs. It took longer for the sensation to strike my fingertips.

Breathing out of my mouth didn’t help; no matter how hard I tried, my lungs refused to fill, and it grew more difficult to suck in air. Lethargy seeped into me and my lips tingled.
 

In the end, all I could do was struggle to breathe, and I feared my efforts wouldn’t be enough.

At some point, I fainted, although the exact memory of when it happened eluded me. I was conscious on the streets of Baltimore one moment, and the next I was lying on my side on another concrete floor, wrapped in a blanket.

The blanket was a problem. No, the lack of clothing under the blanket was the actual problem. As I realized I was naked, my body reported every single injury I had picked up since the Dawn of Dae and added interest. I still wheezed, but it wasn’t quite so hard to fill my lungs. I shivered, clenching my eyes closed as I tried to breathe my way through the pain.

The burns ached, the cuts added a more vicious, stabbing pain to the mix, and my throat throbbed in time with my heart. To make everything even worse, I itched. I had no idea what Arthur had done with me while I’d been unconscious, but I’d pay him back for it one way or another.

I wiggled in the confines of the blanket, freed my hand, and tentatively touched my ribs. My memory of cutting myself escaping the warehouse was confirmed by the presence of bandages covering my stomach. While my hands weren’t bandaged, I recognized the greasy texture of ointment. It wouldn’t help with the allergic reaction, but maybe I wouldn’t end up a scarred mess from the burns on top of my normal rashes.

The evidence of care boded well for my long-term survivability, although I was disconcerted by the fact someone had pawed all over me while I was unconscious. At least I was confident I hadn’t been raped.

If checking for my pulse was enough to make it difficult to breathe, sex was out of the question. I’d die. I shuddered, wondering how close I’d come to my expiration date.

I never wanted to experience what it was like to suffocate ever again.

It took several minutes and a lot of squinting, but I finally forced my eyes to focus. I wasn’t in a warehouse; the space wasn’t large enough despite the concrete floor. The white-painted walls were water stained and patched with gray and black mold; the stench of the bay burned my nose. I grunted, rolling onto my back.

Instead of a ceiling, the underlying structure of the floor above me greeted me. Pipes and a tangle of electrical wires paralleled wooden support beams reinforced with metal rods and brackets. The whole thing sagged in the middle, and the plywood overhead was rotted in more than a few places.

I was in a basement in the fringe, somewhere near the water. Most folks in the fringe with basement space shared it with other families. Was it a shop instead of a home? Somewhere behind me, water dripped. I braced myself for the pain and rolled over, getting my arms beneath me so I could lurch upright.

I had to clench my teeth together so I wouldn’t scream, but a groan slipped out.

“Ouch,” I croaked, and my voice was so hoarse I was limited to a breathy whisper. “Well, shit.”

It was a good thing I hadn’t intended on using screaming as part of any escape plan; the rotting plywood overhead would be sufficient to prevent anyone from hearing me. I wrapped the blanket around my shoulders. It was too thin and worn to keep me warm in the chilly basement. Either the place was always cool, or the temperature had dropped outside; my teeth chattered.

I squirmed on the concrete, turning in a full circle to take in my surroundings. A death trap disguised as a stairwell took up one corner of the room; someone had gone through a few of the steps over the years, leaving gaps in the eroding, wooden frame.

Decayed chunks of wood and rusted nails marked where boards had once been. Only an insane person would try to ascend or descend without shoes—preferably steel-lined ones. If I wanted to make it out without a hole in the bottom of my foot, I’d need to be very careful and test every step.

I sighed, having no doubts the staircase was why Arthur had relieved me of my shoes. Had taking the rest of my clothes really been necessary? At least he hadn’t gotten a good show; I had acquired too many scars over the years to be beautiful.

Lily was Kenneth’s pretty bitch, groomed for his pleasure. I was the work dog, the one best out in the fields herding his clients. I knew it, she knew it, and Kenneth knew it. I growled and winced at the pain in my throat.
 

At least Kenneth was familiar territory. I knew exactly what he wanted from me. Arthur was an unknown, and my ignorance of the dae’s motives drove me to the brink of insanity. I was tempted to try to get to my feet without help, but decided against the idea. My body still shook, and while I was able to get to my feet, I had to lean against the wall to stay upright.

The effort left me panting, and despite the chilly basement, I sweated under the blanket. I alternated between freezing and baking, and I wondered how far I’d get if I somehow managed to climb the stairs.

Not far. I clenched my hands into fists. It was better I couldn’t. Arthur and I had some unfinished business to settle, and it involved my lack of clothes, my gym bag, and Colby.

All I could do was hope my rather odd yet lovable roommate had survived the inferno. If it hadn’t, I’d show Arthur I was a bitch with a big bite one way or another. My gaze fell on the staircase, and I smiled at the thought of beating the dae to death. A board with some rusty nails would make a good enough weapon.

Maybe I was naked, but I wasn’t helpless.