into her jaw.
Dazed, Annis swiped at where Tanith had just been, and her nails found nothing but air. She felt something tighten around her ankle, and looked up.
“What’re you doing?” she asked dully.
Tanith had tied the thick rope to Annis’s leg, and for the first time Annis realised that the other end of the rope trailed out of the cave. Tanith gave the rope a little tug, then stood up and stepped back.
“It’s morning,” Tanith said. “See outside? That’s sunlight, that is.”
Annis shook her head to clear it. “So?”
“So,” Tanith continued, “there’s a farmer out there on a tractor, and the other end of this rope is tied to that tractor, and his instructions are, when he feels a tug on this rope, he is to start driving, very slowly, away.”
Annis frowned. The rope was beginning to tighten. After a moment, it was taut, and Annis felt herself begin to move towards the cave mouth.
“You’ll turn to stone,” Tanith said, “for all eternity. You don’t want that, do you?”
Annis, her odd-coloured eyes wide, sat up and slashed at the thick rope with her nails.
“You’ve gone a bit blunt, I’m afraid,” Tanith said. “Striking my sword was bad enough, but that cave wall? That’s what did it.”
Annis squealed as she was slowly dragged towards the sunlight. She slashed again and again at the rope.
“There’s no way you’re going to cut through that in time,” Tanith said. She took a pair of wrist irons from her coat, and tossed them on the ground. “Put those on.”
“Never!” Annis screamed.
“OK.”
Annis attacked the rope with renewed vigour. She cut through one strand. By the looks of it, only another two hundred to go. She twisted around.
“Scrannel! Scrannel wake up!” Scrannel didn’t move. He snored gently.
Annis glared at Tanith. “You can’t do this! You can’t!”
“You eat people,” Tanith said. “I pretty much can, unless you put those shackles on and let me take you in.”
The sunlight was mere inches away.
“Fine!” Annis screeched. Tanith kicked the shackles over to her and Annis clicked them on around her wrists, the chain dangling. Immediately she felt her powers fade. Her skin began to lose its blue tint, and her teeth and nails shortened and her jaw relocated.
“I hate you,” Annis said.
Tanith nodded. “A lot of people in shackles do.”
“If I ever get out …”
“You’ll come after me? Tear me apart? Cut off my head? I’ve heard it all before, Annis. It doesn’t impress me.”
“If I ever get out of prison,” Annis said, ignoring her, “I’ll find you and eat you.”
Tanith smiled. “Well, OK then. Haven’t heard that one in a while.” She took hold of Annis’s arm and pulled her to her feet. “I’ve got a sack outside,” she said. “I’m afraid you’ll have to wear it until I get you to the van, just to keep the sunlight off. Hope you understand.”
Annis perked up. “Is it a nice sack?”
“It’s pretty stylish, as sacks go.”
On their way out, they passed Scrannel, who was snoring peacefully in the dirt. Annis gave him an affectionate kick, and he mumbled something and went back to snoring.
“Boyfriend?” Tanith asked.
“Pet,” Annis answered.
Tanith nodded. “All the best ones are.”
Her knees scraped over rough stones and rubble and bled through her jeans. The cold shackles dug into her wrists. Her struggles echoed down through the concrete corridor, as wide as the school running track. The sunlight was too far behind to throw shadows. The darkness was too close in front.
The man holding her arm let go, and keys jangled as he went to the cell door. He slid open a hatch before he unlocked it, to check on the beast. She felt the other man tense, and for a moment his attention was away from her. She twisted from his grip. The light was too far away, so she ran into the darkness. Laughter followed her.
She ran fast. Her tennis shoes splashed in dark pools of stagnant water, and the uneven ground threatened to cut short her escape. She kept her shackled arms up, like a boxer, to protect her head should she run into a wall or a low-hanging pipe. Her eyes were adjusting to the world of shadows, and she couldn’t risk a backwards glance.
There was a break in the solid mass to her left, and she veered into a branching corridor. The cold registered on her bare arms, but she didn’t feel it. She wouldn’t feel anything until the adrenaline faded.
Their voices came, calling for her. Cell doors, iron and old, blurred by on either side. There were people in some of those cells. She could hear them, reacting to the mocking calls of the men. In other cells, there were beasts. They snarled and snapped and hurled themselves against the iron, excited and bloodthirsty, adding to the cacophony.
Concrete steps led upwards to a faint yellow light. Valkyrie left the darkness and took the steps three at a time. The staircase spiralled and the light grew stronger. Another corridor, long and thin, the sunlight streaming through the narrow windows on one side. At the end of the corridor, a wooden door. She ran past the narrow windows and through them saw a small stadium, basic stone seating curving round a lowered arena.
Where the hell had they taken her?
The wooden door opened before she got to it. The man with the keys smiled. Oddly, for someone so dirty and brutal, he had a nice smile. Behind her, the other man was blocking her retreat.
“You’d better be coming along now, girl,” the man with the keys said.
Valkyrie went to a window, turned sideways, and squeezed the upper half of her body through. There was an open space of flat concrete twelve metres below, just before the seating started. She managed to get her hips through, but a hand grabbed her leg as she fell. She swung into the wall and did her best to loosen the grip. The man with the keys could barely get his head through the window. His fingers were tight on her ankle.
“Go down and catch her,” he said to his friend.
Coins fell from Valkyrie’s pocket as she dug into her jeans with her shackled hands, searching for something to break his hold. Something sharp. She unbuckled her belt and pulled it free, held the buckle in her palm with the prong sticking up through her index and middle fingers, and closed her fist. She curled her body upwards, stabbing the prong repeatedly into the back of his hand. It was a crude dagger, and limited. He cursed and yelled and gritted his teeth, but didn’t let go.
The muscles in her abdomen were burning. She had to break his hold now. She wouldn’t get another chance.
Valkyrie released his forearm and grabbed his hand, doing her best to prise a finger loose. She could raise his fingertip off her leg, but