Page 130 of The Souls Harvest
He glances at me from over his shoulder, bringing two fingers to his lips and turning an invisible key at the corner of his mouth before theatrically tossing it away.
“Fantastic,” I grumble, picking up my pace, surpassing him by a few steps, but before I can get any closer to the decrepit building, he nudges me away, waving his hands in my face.
“This is ridiculous. Speak, you weird Horigean, before I pluckyour soul from your body,” I command, puffing light purple breath in his face.
He releases a loud sigh, hands on his hips, scrunching his lips. “You don’t look like the type of person surrounded by friends, but for some reason July thinks we should listen to you…Interesting.”
His words strike something inside me I don’t even want to contemplate. Dealing with betrayal from my own people is one thing. Arguing with a simple Horigean, so openly rude, is something I can only discuss after a shower, food and my beauty sleep.
Despite him still staring at me, immobile, the skeleton of rust and stones at his back starts creaking and hissing.
“Follow me, but don’t touch me. I don’t want amoleculeof my soul to end up in your hands.”
His voice sounds like that of a child mimicking an adult.
“You know I’m a Harvester, right? You know whatIcould do to you?”
But as I rant after him, louder with every word, he takes a step back and disappears in thin air, leaving me agape.
“Just keep walking, Harvester. The fences won’t be down for long. Your choice. Follow me and live to keep listing the bad things you could do to me, or…” His disembodied voice fades away. “Stay there, friendless, hurt and smelling awful!”
“Take them off me!” I frantically pat every inch of my body, shaking my head upside down as hundreds of invisible little legs crawl over me and under my clothes.
“Those are not creepy crawlies, you squeamish Harvester. Only millions of highly trained, thinking particles of electricity.” Mack chortles, standing crossed-arms in the centre of a vast hall with three doors. “After a while, you’ll get used to it. It’s actuallypleasantif you learn to enjoy it. It makes you feel alive.”
His tone is relaxed, despite our earlier altercation.
“What is this sorcery?” I pant, brushing my hair off my face.
“Says the one who threatened to suck my soul a moment ago. No magic, Harvester, just genius.”
He’s mocking me. He’s irritating me. So much so that I briefly forgot why I had even come here in the first place.
In the dim light of the atrium, warming up the naked walls and the simple terracotta floor, Mack no longer resembles the young, annoying boy I met outside. He owns the space, as he marches from one door to the other, making sure they’re all locked.
When he gets to the third one, at the end of a short corridor dividing the hall into two hemispheres, the doorpurrs?under his touch and slides open. “This way, Harvest—”
“Lucretia, for fuck’s sake. My name is Lucretia. Stop calling me that.”
He cuts a smirk from over his shoulder. “Oh, don’t worry. I know your name.”
“Mack, stop teasing her and come down now.”
A female voice I don’t recognise resounds from a hidden speaker above us.
“Boring soul,” he mumbles, taking the stairs behind the door and slowly descending, disappearing from my view.
I hurry after him as much as my sore feet allow me. The staircase is well lit and, to my great relief, has only ten or twelve steps before it ends in another door, which Mack holds ajar, waiting for me at the bottom of the stairs. A slice of light flows from under it, disturbed by someone moving behind it.
“After you, Lucretia.”
I hold Mack’s mocking stare until the imposing female voice speaks again. “We don’t have the whole day.”
Mack pushes the door completely open, and my eyes widen.
Galen and July are standing with their backs against a flashing, beeping control panel. Next to Galen, a stranger, is another woman who shares Mack’s colours and annoying smirk.
“Finally,” she exhales, “Mack, restrain her.”
