32. The chain didn't tighten

The guards at our bedroom door had been removed, but Lias (who really did look like a fox, not the head of the bodyguards, but a sneaky fox) grinned and put the bracelets on us. As long as we were inside the mansion, the sensors on them were dormant, but as soon as we stepped outside the gates, they turned red and a siren blared from the guard tower, alerting the neighbourhood to the fugitives.

“It feels like being in prison,” I said with a sigh, admiring my new jewellery. A choker around my neck, a bracelet on my wrist, and at this rate I thought I'd have my own special set of jewels.

“Why ‘like’?” Lias smiled, making sure ‘the cuffs’ were secure. “You are in prison, Miss Siri. In Imperial times, this mansion was a place of detention for noble prisoners, but then Mr Gisborne bought the building and made it his home.”

“Yes,” Grant confirmed, “I heard they used to carry out executions in the room where the dining room is now.”

“And why am I not surprised?” to hide a smirk, I raised my eyes to the ceiling, where there was a picture of clouds and two doves.

“You can leave. You're free to go,” the head of the guards opened the office door and let us through.

His words sounded like a mockery. Grant and I grinned bitterly and walked out into the corridor.

“What do we do next?” I asked out of curiosity.

“Do what you want, but I'm going to sleep,” Circul yawned, infecting me with his sleepy mood.

We'd been recovering from the Labyrinths of Oblivion all day. We slept, raided the kitchen while I fought off Barg, who liked my slippers, read books for a few hours, watched a film with Gisborne and listened to his commentary, and slept again. But we had to find a new bed or sofa every time we went to sleep.

And when it was time to go to bed, we had just woken up. Our daily regime had gone to belief in humanity, snow dinosaurs and talking penguins, things that don't exist and are long extinct.

“Where are we?” I looked around, trying to remember where we'd chosen to sleep this time.

“It's the guest bedroom in the right wing of the house,” Grant murmured, wrinkling his nose sleepily. “You know, Siri, I've had enough of your foibles.”

“What can I do?” I grumbled reluctantly, pulling the elastic band out of my tangled hair.

“Shall I take you to a counsellor?” Grant came up with the idea.

“It doesn't work. Even sleeping pills haven't helped.”

The guy immediately hung his head: “Shit.”

I took a pillow from the bed. I loved it, soft but bouncy, just the way I like it.

“What are you doing here?” Kai asked.

We bumped into him as we were leaving the bedroom.

Asanor's curiosity had to be satisfied, otherwise he would not have left us. Grant described to his cousin the inconveniences he'd had to endure all this time, which made me both ashamed and angry with him.

After listening to Circul’s outpourings, Kai leaned back thoughtfully in his chair, folded his fingers together and said slowly: “Perhaps I can help.”

The president's son looked at his cousin as if he were a saviour and an idol.

“No, not again...” I even jumped up from the sofa and moved closer to the exit, even though I knew I wouldn't get far.

“Siri, you see this chain here, don't you?” Grant defiantly lifted the chain and tested the links a few times for strength. “I'll strangle you with it if you don't agree.”

“If you kill me, you die too,” I replied, backing away from him.

“At least in a coffin you won't have to worry about finding a place to sleep every time,” he said threateningly as he stepped towards me.

I was quickly caught, and no matter how much I struggled and scratched, they sat me in a chair and wrapped a chain around me several times, along with the padded backrest.

“Siri, open your eyes,” Kai asked with a smile in his voice.

I shook my head. Magic hypnosis was the last thing I wanted to experience with my poor, battered mind.

“If you don't open your eyes now, I'm going to tickle you to death!” Circul barked in my ear.

Well, I mean, it's worth a risk to try, isn't it?

“Okay,” I lifted my eyelids and looked at the guys from under my lashes, “do whatever you want. It might actually help.”

Asanor leaned over me, grabbed my chin and said softly, reassuringly: “Siri, you have beautiful eyes...”

I didn't listen any more, melting into his pure and tender gaze.

And I can tell you that that night and all the nights that followed, when Kai ordered me to switch off my consciousness, I slept dreamlessly.

‘Are you all right?’ Asanor asked me mentally.

‘Yes. I even think I might be able to sleep this time...’

‘I'm giving you confidence. I hope that's what happens...’ he smiled reassuringly.

‘Thank you...’

‘You're welcome, Siri.’

‘Kai, can I ask you a question?’

The guy raised his eyebrows, but nodded.

‘It was you in the Hole, wasn't it? Why weren't you punished? Did you escape?’

Asanor frowned, but replied, ‘You are mistaken. I was with the bodyguards the whole night...’

‘But I saw you…’

But Kai had already looked away, so he didn't hear my last statement.

“You finished?” Circul, who had been watching us from a distance, walked over to his cousin.

Asanor nodded as he moved away from my chair, and Grant immediately took advantage of that to untie me and take me by the arm.

“Let's go, I want to sleep,” said he.

“Again?!”

“I used too much magic in Oblivion, it needs to recover,” Circul Jr. rambled on, almost making excuses.

I sighed and squinted at my companion. What had I done in my previous life to be punished so much in this one?

Grant was playing on Kai's phone because the president had taken all the tech out of our room. He especially made sure that all of his son's phones were removed from his belongings. Of course, I knew that parents sometimes restrict their children in some things, but to categorically deny them the Internet – that seemed pretty monstrous and inhumane to me.

I decided to brush and braid my hair while the lights were on, so I wouldn't wake up in the morning with a crow's nest on my head.

I changed into my pyjamas in the bathroom, threw my clothes in the hamper and went to the dresser to get my hairbrush, but my collar rebelled. My necklace of death shrank slightly and flashed with multicoloured light.

The bomb beeped, but the chain didn't tighten.

Until that moment I didn't understand the meaning of this thing. I didn't realise until one day the steps were nineteen instead of twenty.

We were just slowly being killed.