Isaac is unconscious, his body overheating. I leave my pitcher on the counter, pocket an inhaler and then I take the knife. The little one he left me on the first day I woke up in this Hell. It was a gift. I want to thank him for it. I slip it into my pocket and step outside, veering right. Five steps into the swells of snow and my leg is aching. I am shivering and my nose is running. I glance back at the kitchen window, afraid Isaac will wake up and call for me. What if his heart stops while I’m gone? I push away these thoughts and focus on my pain. Pain will carry me through; pain will help me focus.
All I can see is his back; the silhouette of him against the white, white snow. A black coat hugging narrow shoulders and hanging down to the backs of his knees. He’s facing the cliff as I walk toward him. If he’s close enough maybe I can push him off and watch him crack on the bottom. I search for the direction he came from: a car, another person, a break in the fence where he could have slipped through. Nothing. My legs want to stop when I’m a few feet away. This is a heavy thing—meeting your captor. I am afraid. I am afraid the fuse in my bone will snap apart as I struggle to push through the last few yards of snow. I take my last step and I am beside him. I don’t look. My own hood is pulled up around my face so that I can’t see left or right unless I turn my head. It’s snowing into the hole in front of us. The flakes are heavy and dense. They fall quickly. The knife is out of my pocket, the blade pointed toward the body to my left.
“Why?” I ask.
Snow fills my eyes and mouth and nose until I feel like I’m going to choke on it.
There is no answer so I turn to face my captor, ready to stick the blade in his throat.
Her throat.
I drop the blade and stumble backwards. I almost fall except she reaches out and catches me.
I scream and thrash out of her hands.
“Don’t touch me!”
My leg. Oh God—my leg. It hurts.
“Don’t touch me,” I say again. Calmer this time.
I start to cry. I feel like a little kid, so uncertain, so lost. I want to sit down and process this.
“Doctor,” I say. “What is this?”
Saphira Elgin turns back to the cliff. It looks like a big bowl filling up with flour.
“You don’t remember?” She sounds disappointed. I sound like I can’t breathe. I pull the inhaler from my pocket, eyeing her red lips. I don’t remember her being so tall, but maybe I’ve become more bent from the weight of this.
“Why would you do this, Saphira?” I’m shaking violently and I’m light headed.
Dr. Elgin shakes her head. “I can’t tell you what you already know.”
I don’t understand. She’s obviously crazy.
“You can save him. Send him back to his wife and baby,” she says.
I’m quiet. I can’t feel my toes.
“How?”
“Say the word. It’s your choice. But you have to stay.”
I feel an ache in my chest. Saphira sees the look on my face. Grins. I recall the dragon in her, the way her looks seem to regard my soul.
“Can you do it? It brings you pain to part with him.”
“Shut up! Shut up!” I cover my ears with my hands.I feel everything on my skin. I’m boiling over. I want to attack her, and sob and scream, and die all at once.
“You’re sick,” I hiss. I raise the hand with the knife, and she makes no move to stop me or step away. I drop my arm to my side. Save Isaac and die here.
“Yes. If that’s my only choice, yes. Take him. He’s sick and we don’t have any more medicine.” I grab her arm. I need her to take him with her. “Now! Get him to a hospital.”
Where did she come from? Maybe if I can overpower her I can get to her car. Get help. But even as I think this, I know I am too weak, and I know she did not come alone.
She watches my struggle with interest. I’m so cold. I have so many things to ask: the box, my mother … the Why? Why? Why? But I am too cold to speak.
“Why?” I ask again.
She laughs. Her breath blows snow away from her mouth. I watch the flakes shoot horizontally and then continue their dance to the ground.
“Senna,” she says. “You are in love with Isaac.”
I don’t know it until the words are out of her mouth. Then I know it, and it feels like someone has sucker punched me.
I’m in love with Isaac.
I’m in love with Isaac.
I’m in love with Isaac.
What happened to Nick? I try to pull up my feelings for Nick. The feelings that imprisoned me for a decade, chaining me to a rotting corpse of a relationship. All I did for years was punish myself for not being what he needed. For failing the person I loved the most. But out in the freezing cold, with the blizzard swirling around me, and my kidnapper’s liquid eyes probing my face, I can’t remember the last time I thought of Nick. Isaac happened to Nick. But when? How? Why didn’t I know it was happening? How could my heart switch allegiances without me knowing?
Doctor—no, I won’t call her a doctor after what she’s done—Saphira looks smug.
I’m so cold I can’t be anything but cold. I can’t even muster anger.
I rest my hand on the outside of my pocket where my inhaler is. I don’t want to have to use it again.
“Take him,” I say again. “Please. He’s very sick. Take him now.” My voice is frantic. The wind is picking up. When I turn my head I can’t see the house anymore. I’ll do anything she says, so long as she saves Isaac.
She takes a syringe out of her pocket and hands it to me.
“Go say goodbye to him. Then use this.”
I take the syringe and nod, though I don’t think she can see me through the snow.
“What if I put this in your neck right now?”
I can feel her grinning.
“Then we’d all die. Are you ready for that?”
I’m not. I want Isaac to live because he deserves it. I wish he could tell me what to do. I was wrong about the zookeeper. I didn’t expect this. I profiled my kidnapper, but I never hung the face of Saphira Elgin on him. She changes everything; because of her knowledge of me, she has the ability to outplay me.
I clutch the syringe. I can’t see the house, but I know the direction it’s in. So I walk. I walk until I see the logs. Then I walk running my frozen hands along the logs until I reach the door. I swing it open and collapse on the bottom stair, shivering. It’s warmer in here, but not warm enough. I climb the stairs. Isaac is in his room where I left him. I add a log to his dwindling fire and crawl into the bed with him. He’s burning up; his skin is the heat I crave so badly. I press my lips against his temple. There is a lot of grey there now. We match.