The Merciless II (15 page)

I
feel the ropes first. Their rough texture against my skin. The slick of sweat between my wrists, and the thick knots. I'm curled on my side, and the ropes bind my hands behind me, pinching my shoulders together and jerking my arms back at uncomfortable angles. I groan, and pain blisters through my chin and jawbone.

“Are you awake?” Jude asks. I open my eyes. Candlelight moves across the blackened walls like a predator, hiding blurry shapes in the darkness. I watch the shapes for a moment, dazed, trying to remember what they are. Where I am.

“Jude?” I croak.

“You passed out. Do you remember?” His voice is sweet, like he's telling me I fell asleep while watching a movie. But that's not what happened. I fight against the pain pounding at my skull, trying to remember.

I see Jude standing over me, a strange look on his face. He pulls his hand back, and then—I close my eyes against the memory. A tear drops down my cheek and rolls over my mouth, leaving a film of salt on my lips.

“I had to run out to grab some supplies, but I won't leave you again. Promise.” Jude hauls something off the floor with a grunt. At first, I see a backpack. The same black backpack Alexis had with her that weekend in the abandoned house. But then he drops it on the pew and it transforms into a green army duffel bag smeared with dirt and ashes.

“I'm going to help you, Sofia. You won't have to do this alone.”

“What's that?” I ask, my voice cracking. The bag is big and lumpy. I stare at the shapes beneath the green fabric, my mind turning them into tools. Duct tape. A butcher knife.

A nail gun.

Jude crouches beside me. “Don't worry about that yet.”

“You . . . you
hit
me.” I still can't believe the words. Jude brings his hand to my chin. His touch sends shivers through my skin.

“Sofia, I didn't hit
you
. I would never hit you. I hit the demon inside of you.” Jude's voice is barely a whisper. “I'm doing it because I love you,” he says. “You know that, right? This is for us. I'm going to get that evil thing out of you.”

A sob rises in my throat. “Jude,” I whisper, leaning into his hand. This has to be a mistake. Jude wouldn't hurt me. “Don't do this. Untie me.”

Something flicks to life inside of Jude's eyes and, for a moment, I see a shadow of the boy I thought I loved. The creases around his mouth soften. The tension leaves his shoulders. “Think about it, Sofia,” he says. “You said yourself that you've been asking the Lord for salvation, but He hasn't answered. Remember?”

I think of all the times I've knelt on the floor in this chapel, my hands clenched together, trying to reach God. My voice cracks. “I remember.”

“I'm here to give it to you. We can't wait for God to make you clean.
We
have to do it. Like this. Together.”

I think of all the terrible things that have happened this year—things I've caused, even if I didn't mean to. I see candlelight reflected in Leena's dazed eyes. I see the horror on Karen's face when I tightened my fingers around her wrist and dragged her onto the tracks.

There
is
something evil inside of me. But Jude thinks I can be redeemed.

“Is it going to hurt?” I ask. Jude smiles, almost sadly.

“I'd never hurt you, Sofia,” he says. He unzips the bag, and stares down at what's inside. He swipes a hand over his forehead and wipes the sweat on the back of his jeans.

He pulls something out of the bag and places it on the pew beside him. It looks like a set of handcuffs, except they're not normal—the cuffs themselves are vises attached to a thin metal lever. I picture how they work in my head. Someone twists the lever and the vises slowly crush the bones in your wrists.

The fear I'd been fighting hits me in a wave. I try to breathe, but my throat closes up and the oxygen leaves my head, making me dizzy. I start to cry.

Jude's at my side again in an instant. “Shh, Sofia, it's okay. Those aren't for you.” He pushes the hair back from my forehead, his hand cool against my skin. “Father Marcus collects tools like this for
his
exorcisms. But I'm not going to use any of it on you, okay?”

Tears cloud my eyes. Jude's holding something, but my eyes are too blurry and I can't see it. I blink, trying to focus on his hands.

It's a Bible. Just a normal black Bible.

He presses his hand against the cover. “I'm going to pray for you,” he says. “That's it. Is that okay?”

I nod. “Okay.”

Jude flips the Bible open and clears his throat.

“
Credo in Deum Patrem omnipotentem
,” The words flow from his tongue. I remember what it was like to watch him perform, his velvety voice filling every inch of the auditorium.

“Creatorem caeli et terrae. Et in Iesum Christum, Filium eius unicum, Dominum nostrum, qui conceptus est de Spiritu Sancto, natus ex Maria Virgine, passus sub Pontio Pilato . . .”

My breathing steadies. I need to forget about the handcuffs and whatever else Jude might have in that bag. Prayer and Bibles are okay. And I wanted this—I begged the Lord to save me from myself. Maybe this is His way of answering my prayer.

Be careful what you wish for
. Leena's words make a lump form in my throat. It's like she knew.

Jude paces the length of the chapel while he reads, his footsteps crunching over broken glass and ashes. I study the swirls of soot staining the walls, losing track of time. The ropes that bind my hands behind my back are too tight. The arm I'm lying on falls asleep and a dull headache pounds at the back of my head. Pins and needles prickle down the length of my arm, and spread through my hips. I stare into the shadowy corners of the chapel until the darkness seems to pulse. A cockroach darts across the floor, antennae twitching, and disappears into a pile of rubble.

Jude's Latin blends together until I can't tell where one word ends and another begins. Darkness crowds in from the corners of my eyes, and the floor seems to tilt and sway. My eyes droop.

Something wet hits my cheek—my eyes fly open, and I reel backward, wrenching at the ropes binding my arms.

Jude kneels in front of me, holding a tiny glass bottle. “Holy water,” he explains. He smiles sheepishly. “Sorry. I didn't mean to surprise you.”

I blink, shaking the water from my eyelashes. “Are we done?” I whisper.

Jude stands and slides the bottle of holy water into his jeans pocket. “Soon, my love,” he says. He walks to the pew and leans over the duffel bag. “But I have to follow protocol. It's the only way to drive out the demons. Prayer and holy water are just the first step.”

A shiver shoots up my spine. “First step?” I ask. “What does that mean? What's next?”

The muscles in the back of Jude's neck tighten.

“What are you going to do next?” A tremor has crept into my voice. I sound unhinged—hysterical. “
Tell me
.”

Jude turns, a leather whip curled around his fingers. It's the whip Father Marcus used on him that morning in the chapel. The leather is frayed and stained red with blood—Jude's blood.

Panic claws at my throat. “I don't want to do this anymore.” I yank at the ropes binding my arms, fear making my movements jerky. I picture the whip slicing through my dress, biting into my skin. Bile rises in my throat. The bruise where Jude hit me suddenly feels like nothing. A bump. “Let me go.”

“I've been through it, too, Sofia,” Jude says. But he doesn't look at me, and his hands tremble. “I know you're scared, but you don't have to be. I'm going to be right here the entire time. I love you.”

His words prick into me like thorns. “This isn't love,” I say. I swallow, trying to stay strong. “Jude, please. You have to let me go.”

“That's the demon talking.” Jude holds up his fist, and the leather creaks beneath his tightening fingers. “And
this
is how we overcome demons.”

Jude loosens his hand and the whip unfurls. The leather tip brushes against the floor, making tiny patterns in the layers of ash. Jude slips a hand beneath one arm and hauls me to my knees. I inhale, and my breath shudders down my throat like a sob. I wonder if I could pull my hands loose if I caught him off guard, if I jerked my body away fast enough. I twist, trying to jerk my wrists out of his sweaty grip. But Jude holds tight.

“Take it easy,” he says, kissing the top of my head. “I don't want you to fall. You could hurt yourself.”

“Don't do this,” I say again. But Jude doesn't respond. Fear rises in my chest, making my hands and legs stiff. I can't feel my toes or my fingers, can't feel anything other than my own rapidly beating heart. “Jude, stop,” I beg. “Think about this. You love me, remember? You don't want to hurt me.”

Jude circles me, stopping when he's directly behind my back. A sob bubbles up my throat.

“Jude,
plea
—”

The whip cracks against the arcs of my bare feet. Pain zips up my legs. I gasp and bite down on my tongue. Blood fills my mouth and trickles out around my lips.

“Stop,” I say, squeezing my eyes shut. “Please stop.”

The whip slaps into my back without warning, ripping through the thin velvet of my dress. The leather tears into my skin like some wild animal's fangs. Vomit spills onto my tongue.

I double over, heaving and coughing. Something thick and brown spews from my mouth and splatters across the dirty chapel floor. It's swirled with red.
Blood,
I think. I cringe, imagining Jude's whip cutting deep under my skin, leaving welts inside my body. I feel the vomit rising in my throat and I try to choke it back down.

I arch forward, pulling against the ropes binding my hands. I retch until my stomach feels raw, and a veil of sweat clings to my forehead. I stare at the brown-and-red
puke, my eyes blurry and bloodshot. I swallow, tasting mint.

It's not blood,
I realize, panting.
It's peppermint
.

Jude kneels beside me and takes my face in his hands. “It's working, Sofia. See? Your body is rejecting the demon. You're fighting it off.”

I release a choked whimper. My eyes feel wet, but I don't remember when I started crying.
It's not a demon,
I want to tell him. It's the peppermint cookies I made for my grandmother. This isn't working.

Every muscle in my body aches. Every inch of my flesh burns. I want to tell Jude that we've failed, that I can't be redeemed. But maybe he'll finish sooner if he thinks this is working. And then he'll let me go.

Jude whips me again. And again. My back screams, and pain like fire shoots through my feet. My head lolls forward. For a long moment, I can't tell if my eyes are open or closed.

And then all I see is black.

I
open my eyes. It's either been hours or minutes since I passed out, but I'm not sure which. Pain zigzags up my spine. Blood and sweat pool between my cheek and the floor.

“Water.” I swallow, and taste the sharp mint and acid bite of vomit on my tongue. I blink my eyes open, and the chapel shifts and moves around me. The walls keep switching places.

I can't see Jude from my angle on the floor. Hope blossoms in my chest and, for a second, I think he's left. He's given up on my soul and abandoned me to die.

Then the shadows move and Jude steps out of the
darkness. Flecks of blood glisten along the line of his jaw and sweat clings to his hair. He digs through the duffel bag and produces a plastic water bottle. He kneels in front of me and carefully lifts my head. I whimper. The blood on my cheek has grown sticky, and my skin stings as he unpeels my face from the floor.

“Easy,” he says, tilting the bottle toward my mouth. The water is so cold it makes me shiver, but I suck it down, feverish with thirst. “There you go,” he murmurs, stroking my hair. I close my eyes and drink. The layer of vomit leaves my tongue. The room stops spinning.

Too soon Jude pulls the bottle from my lips. “Feel better?” he asks. I open my mouth to answer and a sob escapes instead. The muscles in my face spasm. I can't get my mouth to work.

“
Cold
,” I choke out. I press my lips together to stop their trembling. The cold stabs into my skin and my bones. I feel it like a dull ache in my muscles. Goose bumps crawl over my arms and legs.

Jude frowns and presses the back of his hand to my forehead. “You feel a little warm, actually.”

“Something's wrong,” I whisper. My throat feels dry again, despite all the water I just drank. I can't stop shivering. Chills jolt through me, making me twitch. “Jude . . . please. I think I have a fever.”

“No, this is just your body rejecting the Devil,” he
says, moving his hand to my cheek. His skin feels hot against my face. It practically burns. “It's a good thing, Sofia. It means we're making progress.”

“I think I need to go to the hospital.”

“You don't know what you're saying.”

“This isn't working.” I curl into a fetal position, bringing my knees to my chest. “You have to let me go.”

“That's the Devil talking,” he says. The heavy cross looms over him, its wood charred and blackened.

“This is almost over.” Jude reaches forward and brushes the hair off my forehead, his fingers skimming my face. “And then we can be together.”

I stare into the shadows, trying to separate Jude's eyes from the darkness. I don't know what to believe anymore. Jude said he'd never hurt me, but then he whipped me until I passed out.

“Don't touch me,” I say, my voice low and angry. Jude pulls his hand away.

“I love you, Sofia,” he says. “But you're evil.”

He's not going to let me go,
I realize. He doesn't care that I'm sick and hurt. It doesn't matter what he says. You don't do this to someone you love.

“You don't love me,” I whimper. “You're
a liar
. Don't you
ever
touch me again.”

I spit in Jude's face. He reels backward, saliva running down his cheek. His hand comes down hard and fast
against my cheek, and my head snaps against the floor. The pain is like slamming into a wall. I release a choked gasp, lights dancing before my eyes.

“Dammit!” Jude stands and takes two quick steps away from me. I can barely see him through the fog covering my eyes. The room gets hazy.

“I shouldn't have lost my temper.” Jude's voice draws me out of the fog. I open my eyes, then squeeze them shut again. The whole world is light and pain. I moan, wishing for unconsciousness. Every muscle in my body aches. Every inch of my flesh burns.

“Sofia? Did you hear me? I said I'm sorry. I know it's not you saying those things. It's the demon. I shouldn't listen.”

I feel Jude's hand on my cheek, and a tear slips down my face. “The Devil inside of you is strong,” he says. “We need to be stronger.”

Jude pulls his sweater over his head and tosses it to the chapel floor. His bare skin gleams gold in the near darkness, muscles rippling across his chest and stomach. Pain twists through me. I just ran my hands over his warm body. I kissed his lips.

Jude leans over the duffel bag. Moonlight streams in through a broken window, and catches one of the scars twisting over his shoulder. The gnarled tissue glints, almost silver. I stare at it, and a sound like a scream
fills my head. Jude didn't get those scars from a single morning of being whipped by Father Marcus. Scars like that could've only come from being whipped over and over again. I imagine the scars that will soon snake up my own back. I'll be marked, just like Jude.

“I was hoping we wouldn't have to use any of this,” Jude mutters, sorting through the bag. I hear the metal clink of chains against something heavy and solid. I think of the handcuffs he dug out of that bag a few hours ago.

Father Marcus collects tools like this for his exorcisms
.

I thought I'd reached my capacity for fear, but then I think of those cuffs clamped around my wrists, digging into my skin, crushing my bones. My insides feel loose all of a sudden. If I wasn't so dehydrated, I'd probably piss myself.

“Jude,” I breathe, my voice shaking. “Please, I'll be good, I promise.”

“That's the demon talking again. You don't know how hard this is for me, Sofia. You look like you, and you sound like you, but you're possessed by something terrible. I need to find a way to keep it quiet while I do my work.” Jude kneels in front of me, holding a pear-shaped device attached to what looks like a long metal screw. “I'm afraid this is going to hurt,” he says.

I arch away, but Jude clamps a hand against the side
of my face, pressing me against the floor. He forces my mouth open, and shoves the pear inside. I try to scream, but then Jude turns the screw, and the pear opens in my mouth like a flower. Metal blades crush my tongue and dig into the roof of my mouth. Their edges split my gums, and stretch the sides of my lips. Tears form in the corners of my eyes.

“We can't take the pear out of your mouth until you're ready to praise the name of the Lord,” Jude says.

He grabs me by the shoulder and hauls me to my knees. I gather my breath and try to scream. Blades cut into my gums, and blood oozes down the back of my throat. I inhale—coughing on blood—and try again. The pear muffles my voice, making it impossible.

“You're only making it worse, Sofia,” Jude says. He tips my body over his shoulder and stands, lifting me as easily as if I were a bag of flour.

Oh God. I picture Jude hauling me outside and dumping me, covering me with dirt, the horrible metal pear making it impossible for me to scream as I'm buried alive. Fear drops through me like a stone. I try to speak, but the pear keeps me from moving my tongue. Blood leaks from the corners of my mouth.

“Don't try to talk,” Jude warns, carrying me across the chapel. “You'll hurt yourself.”

I twist my rope-bound arms, wondering how difficult
it would be to pull my wrists free. The rough fibers chafe my skin like sandpaper. I tug—hard—on my wrists, and the ropes binding me roll down to my knuckles.

“Stop squirming,” Jude mutters. “I'm going to drop you.”

I tug again. The rope scoots down my fingers a little farther.

Jude stops in front of the huge wooden cross. He adjusts my body and his shoulder digs into my gut, making it hard to breathe. I twist my hands, and my thumb slips free. I close my eyes and pull—ignoring the pain blistering through my hand, and the blood leaking from my skin. With a sudden jolt, I pull one hand loose of the bindings.

“Hey—” Jude starts. I grab for his face and claw into the fleshiest part of his cheek. He screams and jerks, but I just dig my fingernails deeper into his skin. I feel blood pooling below my fingers and seeping into the cracks around my nails. Jude grabs my wrist, and yanks my hand back, losing his grip on my body. I pitch backward.

Jude releases an angry, animalistic yell. He shoves me into the wooden base of the cross to keep me from falling to the ground. I squirm, but he leans against me, pinning my wrist beneath his shoulder. He's taller than I am. I stretch out my toes to try and touch the floor, but I'm too high up. Jude grabs my other hand and presses it to one of the cross's short arms. I release a choked, desperate cry.

“Hold still,” he whispers, grunting. He takes the rope still dangling from my wrist, and twists it around the cross, tying my arm in place. I scream and kick, but Jude doesn't seem to notice my struggles. He pulls my other arm straight and holds it in place against the cross. His broad hand is like a vise against my wrist. I grit my teeth against the cold metal pear, and try to push him away. But he's too damn strong. He leans down and pulls at the ropes binding my ankles with his free hand.

“Almost there,” he mutters, tugging the knot free. My legs dangle below me, untied.

I kick at him, but he dodges to the side, easily. He uses the length of rope that had been binding my ankles to tie my other arm to the cross. When he finishes, he steps back, admiring his handiwork.

My head falls forward, sobs shaking my shoulders. Pain arcs up my back, holding me upright. I pull at my arms, and ropes dig into my wrists. I lift my head.

He's tied me to the cross in a perverse imitation of Christ's crucifixion. My arms stretch out to either side of my body, my wrists tightly knotted to the splintery wood. I'm dragged down by own weight, my body pulling at the bindings until my arms feel as if they're going to rip from their sockets. It takes all my strength to hold my head upright. I try, again, to scream, but the metal pear steals my voice.