--=-Chapter 59: Escape With Who?--=-

"A deal?" I asked, sounding maybe half as skeptical as I was. "From what I can tell, everyone who knows about my Shadow wants it, and Hands, at least, really doesn't want you to get a hold of it. I'm not sure you can offer anything more valuable than escape."

Sori snorted. "Escape to what? Escape from what? Escape with Who? Who would even go with you? You realize that, since you got trapped in here, nobody has died permanently? Nobody's grandpa, nobody's accident-prone cousin. Cancer and disease are gone; everyone's body has been made whole-"

It was my turn to snort. "How many have been made into crows or chased by embodiments of traumas they can't escape? How many are trapped in endless, inescapable death-cycles like Larry and Steve? How many, like Jon, have family they care about on the outside? Humans will look for advantage in any situation, and some may choose not to leave, but even they would still want that freedom to choose."

Nia had curled in on herself as Sori had given her hope and then shredded it with confusion. She was crouched, head between her knees, crying softly. If she weren't still clinging to the doorknob as a lifeline, I suspected she'd be in the fetal position.

"Sam, Sam, Sam," Sori said, somehow managing to give me a pitying look— despite being an unchanging metallic eye. "You can't save them. Not most of them. They don't want you to. Many of them specifically won't want you to save them. Haven't you learned that yet?"

The sound of wind blowing through the leaf-sails, and waves breaking against the hull, created a lapping susurrus as I gave the eye a baleful look. He was pissing me off, and I could feel the muscles in my cheeks twitching, trying to peel back my lips to show my teeth in annoyance and anger. Apparently, whatever I looked like, not all my canine instincts were gone in this place.

I hadn't had much success using emotional illusion on Sori before, but I'd had some practice since then. He'd probably notice when I used it, but as he had pointed out previously, knowing it was manipulation didn't stop it from working—on humans anyway.

I considered how Sori seemed to view me. He'd accused me of breaking the trash collectors; he'd spoken about me getting in the way. The moment we'd met, Sori had dropped a glamour on me to manipulate me. I was a bug in the system he was trying to fix; the pea under his mattress he needed gone.

He also seemed to need my willing assistance. I was a problem he was trying to fix, but also the source of the solution he needed.

I allowed myself a sigh and crouched down, resting my arms on my knees but not taking my eyes off Sori.

I decided I'd try for resigned capitulation. Sori hadn't believed me when I'd lied before, but he'd hopefully be less resilient when I included a matching glamour. "You think I don't know it won't be hard? You think I haven't been paying attention?" I asked, the frustration coming easily.

I glanced over my shoulder. Nia had let go of the door handle at some point, and her face was smudged where she'd wiped away tears. She was also crouched and still leaned against the door. Her eyes wandered around the ship, only flicking back to me when she noticed me looking. I gave her a wink, trying to provide some discreet comfort, but judging by her expression, it didn't work.

"Not just hard, Sam. Impossible. You'd be lucky to get one in three of the people in Forest Lake to follow you, and that's if you had all the time in the world and no enemies trying to steal the Shadow for themselves."

I let my shoulders slump. "I can't just do nothing. You said you wanted to make a deal." I unleashed the glamour I'd been building and cast it at the eye. "Give me a show of good faith, and send Nia back." I focused on appearing defeated, on giving Sori a false sense of victory, of domination.

A tendril of light connected us, but Sori gave it no mind.

"I could probably do that," Sori said with a bob in the air. "Then again, that doesn't seem like a very good incentive. How about instead—"

Nia began to hyperventilate. I looked back over my shoulder. Her eyes were wide, and rather than wandering, they darted around the ship as though looking for escape. I saw her gaze linger on the rail. For a second, I was sure she was about to leap over the side.

"No!" I shouted, standing up. This place was a mystery to me, but that ocean had always felt dangerous. My shout made her jump in fright, and her eyes locked onto the cellar doors.

One moment, the doors were closed; the next, they stood open.

The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

Sori can change things here, I realized.

It shouldn't have been a surprise. I'd seen him control the clouds and plasma last time he was here. Opening a door was hardly more difficult, except perhaps for the suddenness of it.

Nia bolted, racing down into the basement/cargo hold. For a second, I didn't understand why she'd suddenly gotten so scared. Then I realized, I wasn't the only one using a glamour. I'd assumed Sori would use it on me— or was even trying to, but wasn't empathetic enough to understand my distrust of him was growing.

I didn't understand why Sori wanted Nia down there, but then I remembered my last visit to this ship. Nia wasn't necessarily the only stowaway on my ship. I'd seen someone else here the last time I'd opened the cellar door. They'd been entirely shadowed and sent me falling into the Plasma waves of the ocean below.

It seemed like a safe bet that it had been Nia's mom. Somehow, my Shadow had let her access this place.

The demented look Kay had given Nia before trying to slash her with a blade flashed through my head. Nia looked like an ordinary child here, but I wasn't sure Kay was lucid enough to notice. Especially if she ran into Nia in the dark. Kay had tried to kill me here, and I should have just looked like some guy.

"Dammit!" I snarled as I stood and hurried over to the still pitch-black cellar.

Behind me, Sori giggled like a girl at a sleepover at one in the morning, like he was trying to be quiet but found it all too funny.

It was as dark down there as I'd remembered, and I again looked around for a flashlight or lantern. This time, I wasn't spooked and distracted. Hanging on the wall was an ancient-looking flashlight with a plug on one end for recharging. It was an identical copy to one that had hung on the stairwell to my grandma's basement.

"Nia?" I called as I flicked on the flashlight and stepped carefully onto the wooden steps. My feet ground sand into the wood with each step. The chill air of the basement felt like walking into a freezer. The musty smell had me breathing shallowly, and yet each breath sounded loud in the stillness of the dark.

"Sam," Sori whispered from directly behind me, making me jump and almost slipping down the last few steps.

"Dammit Sori!" I spat, "Why the fuck are you doing this? She'd a kid, and you seem to be taking delight in tormenting her."

"Uh, Sam, I'm delighting in tormenting you. Isn't that what friends do? Just a little light ribbing between pals."

"Jesus Christ." I sighed. The eye was insane. It wasn't new information. His very identity had been all over the place since I'd met him. Even so, I hadn't wanted to believe he was dangerous, or at least not malevolent.

"Oh my god, Sam. Relax. The girl is fine. You wanted me to show her the exit, so I did. Is it my fault if you stupid apes are so easy to manipulate with fear?" Sori said, sounding exasperated. "You give her too little credit anyway. Sure, she's scared, but she wouldn't have become Titania if she wasn't able to overcome that fear."

The stairs opened up onto a basement that was dim but not black. There were port holes that let the glow of the plasma in. The light wasn't bright, and rather than illuminate anything, the port holes mostly just created more shadows and silhouettes.

"Nia?" I called again. It took effort to speak above a whisper. This place was too creepy. The basement wasn't large; there were just two rooms.

The stairs led down into a storage space with a doorway leading toward the front of the ship. The second room had more portholes, and one of the walls had a long workbench that looked worn and well-used, but there were no tools or supplies out to suggest what it was used for.

Nia wasn't there either.

"What exit?" I finally asked Sori, who seemed content to let me waste my time looking around.

"Oh, right, I forgot you can't see it all. Go back to that other room, I'll show you."

Skeptical, I walked back into the first room. There was an orange glow coming through the doorway that I couldn't explain. When I got close, I lowered my flashlight. There was another doorway, one that hadn't been there before. It looked like it should have exited through the back of the ship. Instead, there was a path, a hallway that gave off an orange light. Nia was no more than two steps into that path but utterly still. Even her hair trailed unmoving behind her.

"Now," Sori said, "maybe you're finally ready to listen."

--=-

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