31. 

That fiery red hair, the mossy green eyes—staring at Valerie was always like staring at an older version of Flo. But time has not been kind to her. Crows feet carve the sides of her sunken in eyes, and the roots of her unkempt hair have turned grey. In a way, I'm glad. It's easier to look at her when she isn't a carbon copy of Flo.

Valerie doesn't seem at all surprised to see me. She doesn't even shout for help. She pulls me close, her breath warm in my face, and whispers, "Did you think we wouldn't find you?"

A shudder crawls down my spine as she pulls back, looks me right in the eye. She blocks the glow from the lantern on the wall, her ominous shadow cast across the ground. I can't stop myself from thinking about Flo. Did her parents ever find her body or did it rot in the earth? Did they know that she sacrificed herself to save me? Do they even care?

"You knew I was here." It's a statement. Aaliyah's desperate pleas, Valerie's lack of surprise. Have they known I was here the whole time? Did they let me break into the prisons?

She's dropped one of my wrists, I look down at her arm and notice the two dotted lines at her vein—puncture wounds, from an injection—the serum. She's immortal. If I'm fast, I could try to break free, reach for the dagger in my boot and give myself a few seconds. But Valerie must see it in my eyes, because the second I move she's shoving me against the wall, one hand grasping both my wrists and the other around my throat. She's so much bigger, stronger, my struggles barely cause her to budge.

"Thinking about escape?" she asks, voice cold. "You wouldn't even get three feet."

I swallow against her grip. "Maybe I'm not the same Milena you remember."

She tightens her grip on my throat. "You're a foolish little girl. You always have been."

I know that isn't true, maybe it was once, but the girl she knew died the same night as Darius. I've changed, grown stronger. And yet, no matter how much I change, seeing people close to my past somehow pulls parts of myself back—the parts I don't want to be anymore. Weak. Fragile. Afraid. Still, I don't break eye contact. I can't prove her right.

Her grip only tightens. My throat tightens, head lightening. And even though I know there must be some kind of plan behind all this, for a brief moment, as I look into her eyes, I see murder. My vision starts to dot black and my hearing distorts. My struggles weaken with each passing second as my airway is cut off. One second, she's glaring into my eyes, the next she's slumped on the floor, a knife in her back.

I fall to my knees, reaching to grab at my throat as I gasp for air and press myself against the wall. Elias stands above Valerie, his breath uneven as he stares at me and then back at her.

"We have to go." My voice is hoarse and it hurts to speak. "S-she's had the serum, she'll wake up soon—"

"Milena, look." I shove to my feet, stumbling slightly. Elias grips my wrists to steady me, guiding my gaze to Valerie's body on the floor. "She's not going to wake up."

He's lodged the shadow right into her back, positioned so it will go straight through her ribcage to her heart. My breath quivers as I look back to Elias, almost expecting her to move. She doesn't. "It works. Malik was... he was right."

Elias doesn't let me go, holding me close to his chest with my wrists. "Are you okay?"

"You shouldn't have used it, not yet. If the hollowers get it and destroy it you could—"

"Milena." I blink at him. "Are you okay?" I nod, mouth dry. My head doesn't feel so clouded anymore, and though my neck aches from Valerie's grip, I'm okay. "Then we should get out of here. It won't be long before someone finds her body."

He releases me and reaches over to pull the shadow from her body. I half expect her to gasp, wake up and snatch at my ankles. But her body remains lifeless.

Elias leads us down the hall, back to the room we broke in from. My mind races as we trek down the hall, significantly faster than when we came. My eyes draw to the shadow in Elias' left hand. Red stains the blade, dripping along the carpet as we move. The emerald in the handle glints beneath the low-light in the hall. It works. Malik was so confident, and I wanted to believe in him, but it was impossible to shove all doubt away. But now, the seed of hope inside of my chest flourishes because it works. Valerie was immortal and now she's dead. The immortal hollowers are not immortal anymore. Cynthia isn't immortal anymore.

I grab Elias' arm as we enter the room. "Cynthia's back. I heard them talking. She came back early and—"

"I know, I heard the guards talking. They kept on mentioning some event in the morning."

I nod, slightly breathless as we move over to the window. "Harrison mentioned it too, and—"

"You saw Harrison?"

"And Bastian and Aaliyah. Harrison was in the training room, the others in the prison cells. He said it's where they took those who were being difficult."

"And?"

I swallow. What little hope I'd felt fizzles as I picture them in my mind, broken on the floor of the prison cells. "They're not in good shape."

Elias' eyes darken, and for a moment I think he's going to storm down the stairs and murder them himself. But he turns back to the window silently, merely a silhouette against the moonlight streaming in. There's nothing we can do for them, not right now. Our only shot it taking the hollowers down from the inside—starting with Cynthia.

Elias climbs down first so he can catch me if I fall. My journey down is much less graceful than his. I can't tell which vines will snap and which ones will hold like Elias can, but I manage to make my way to the ground without a slip. I stare at the sky. It's still dark, dawn will be in merely a few hours, but Cynthia's already back and planning something. It can't be anything good.

~

Eric, Malik and Cassia are waiting in the same spot we left them. Hopeful and relieved gazes turn to us as we emerge from the darkness. Cassia storms over, eyes brushing over each of us, as if inspecting for injuries. I tilt forward so that my hair hangs over my neck, covering whatever marks Valerie left.

"What happened?" she demands. "Did you find Aaliyah? Where are they? Are they okay?"

"One at a time, Cassia." Eric glides over, expression serious as he regards us. "What can you tell us?"

Elias looks to me and nods. I swallow, flicking my eyes to Malik. He's watching me intently, a wrinkle forming between his brows. We all have people we love in there, but I have nothing to tell Malik about his soldiers. I wouldn't even recognise them if I saw them.

I tell them what I told Elias, about the training centre, the prisons. I don't tell them that Bastian was unconscious, that he looked dead, nor do I tell them they're all being hollowed. I don't have to, from the looks on their faces, they already know.

"And my soldiers?" Malik asks, on edge.

"I'm sorry I-I didn't see them." He purses his lips, looks to the ground. "But the shadow works."

"You used it?" Malik sounds baffled, staring at Elias.

"A hollower was strangling Milena, I did what I had to do."

Malik looks at me. "She tried to kill you?"

I nod. "But Elias killed her. An immortal hollower, with the shadow. It worked." Nobody says anything as the news sinks in, but I don't look away from Eric. Somehow, there's still that look in his eye—the doubt. Eric won't believe it until he sees it for himself.

"This is huge," Cassia murmurs, eyes wide as she gazes at Elias. "We can use this."

"How?" Eric says. "We know where the villagers are, but how do we get them out?"

"Aaliyah said something strange, almost like she was trying to warn me," I say. "She was horrified to see me there, but before I could talk to her more the guards started to come down."

"Warn you about what?" Eric asks.

Elias and I exchange glances. "Cynthia has been planning something for the morning, all the guards have been talking about it."

"She said—"

Cassia's voice dies in her throat, overtaken by another voice, a louder one, someone echoing through the trees towards us. We all freeze, recognising the voice as we exchange glances.

"Was that—"

"Cynthia," Elias breathes.

It sounds again, somehow surrounding us like a call. Elias creeps forward, to the treeline where we can still see the castle edge but they can't see us. And there she is. She holds a shell of some sort, speaking into it. Her voice echoes like a bird call. 4 words. They send chills down my spine.

"I know you're there." None of us move, frozen in the trees. There's no way she could see us, and yet, she knows. Did she just assume from finding Valerie's body? Or has she known the whole time? "Show yourselves, or we'll have to force your hand."

Nobody moves. Cynthia waves a hand, a sinister grin on her face. Behind her, two guards push through the castle doors, a body slumped in their arms. The others recognise her before I do, Cassia slamming a hand over her mouth.

Aaliyah.

She's alive, but barely. Her head hangs, only held up by the hollowers grasping her, and her eyes are dazed. She looks worse than she did when I last saw her, and that's saying something.

"Show yourselves."

Still, nobody moves. Nobody but Cynthia. There's no screaming, no begging, no resistance from Aliyah as Cynthia walks up to her, takes her knife out. Cassia shoots up, but before she can do anything, Cynthia plunges her machete into Aaliyah's stomach and, when the hollowers drop her, she crumbles to the ground. 

~

HELLO I AM A PUBLISHED AUTHOR! It's Creatures of the Night release day. Can't believe I'm finally saying that. If you live in North America, you can now go to your local book store and actually buy my book! How surreal! 

DISCUSSION:

1. Were you a doubter like Eric, or did you think the shadow would work the whole time?

2.  If you were in this situation, what would you do? Give yourself over to save a friend?

3. What do you think might happen next?