“Don’t do it,” I said calmly. “Please? Just don’t. Just let me go.”

A breathy laugh came from somewhere in the darkness behind me. “I really had you convinced, didn’t I?”

“Convinced?”

“That I loved you.” He looked over the top of the chair, his hands wrapping the back, rolling it downward. Butterflies bashed violently inside my stomach. All I could do was watch the rounded ceiling as I came to rest, my spine straight, my hair falling past the headrest, reaching for the ground, my hands pulled into position, stretched out beside my hips.

“So that’s what it was?” I asked in a nervous attempt to gauge where in the room he was standing. “It was a game—I was a game?”

“If you stopped to look at yourself for one minute, with all your scars, your high-maintenance girlie issues and your lack of anything intelligent to say, you’d have realised that.” His voice gave away his position behind me. “But, you’re really just too young and dumb to see past your own nose.”

As if a mask of heartache saturated my face, the corners of my closed lips arched downward and my teeth chattered inside my mouth.

No. I know it was real. His love—it was real. This is the lie—it has to be.

The darkness of the fire-lit room became an orange ocean as tears filled my eyes, pooled there like a lens, then rolled out over the sides of my face. I wanted to wipe them away, but was too afraid to even try moving an arm, not wanting any confirmation that I was trapped—that this was real, that Jason, the boy who saved me at Karnivale, could really be doing this to me.

“Stop crying,” Jason muttered impassively from somewhere behind.

“What are you doing back there?” I asked, my ragged sobs allowing only a small voice.

He took a deep breath through what sounded like his nose, and something heavy clunked on something tinny. “I’m getting things ready.”

Ready? I closed my eyes and rolled my head to the side, wishing I could scratch away the itch of salty tears. My nose, crinkled, trying to shake off the irritation, and as I opened my eyes, saw the tiny, open-mouthed skeleton of what looked like an infant.

“Is that real?” I asked, all tears, itches and fear stopping with my heart.

Jason appeared beside me and looked up too. “Yes, there’re no Halloween costumes around here. That, my dear,” he leaned closer, whispering in my ear, “was my brother’s handy work.”

David, holding a screaming baby in his arms—killing it? “I don’t believe you.”

“Believe what you want—doesn’t matter to me.”

I swallowed, looking away. He’s right. He’d have no reason to lie to me—not now, it’s not like I’d ever see David again.

While he ‘prepared’ things behind me, I searched for something in the room to open a conversation over; maybe make him relax, relate to me—help me. “Jason, what’s that metal cage—the thing shaped like legs?”

“That—” Jason pointed to it, “—is the Coffin. You’ve heard of it in your History studies.”

Damn. Playing dumb won’t work. “Ur, yeah, I remember now.” My mouth dried seeing one for real, though. I’d seen all sorts of medieval torture implements, but never the Coffin. Imagining people had actually died in there was sickening, but the History student in me was somewhat fascinated. “Was this place only used to torture vampires?”

“Yes.” He rested his elbow on the chair beside my hip and smiled, becoming the light, carefree boy from my dream. “Hey, d’you know what our favoured method of torture is here—still in practice today?”

“Humour me.”

He wandered over to an iron shelf on the wall opposite my feet and grabbed something. “This method was known as Toe Wedging. You see, we take this little guy—” he held up a small triangular block of wood, “—and place it under the toenail.”

I tensed, panic rising, making my toes flex as the splintery block parted a tiny bit of flesh from nail.

“Then, we take this hammer—” He held up the rusty old mallet. “And bang!”

I jumped involuntarily, snapping my eyes shut tight. But nothing happened.

“Relax, Ara. I’m not going to use this on you—unless you have something to confess?” he suggested.

I shook my head.

He wandered away again and came back with an oddly-shaped metal thing, almost like a really small hot-air balloon. “This is called the Pear of Anguish.”

Okay, pear, that’s a better comparison. “What do you do with that one?”

“Well, the torturer inserts this little baby into any number of orifices. The mouth for a liar, anus for a homosexual, and vagina for a whore or a woman who miscarries. Then, he’d wind this little key here—” He twisted the top of the thing and it opened out in four arms. “See?”

“And that’s it?”

“That’s it? What’d you mean that’s it? Do you know the extent of mutilation this, when opened completely, would cause?”

I thought about that for a second.

“Especially if the torturer decided to rip it out—” he thrust his hand backward quickly, “—while it was still open.”

I nodded. “Okay. Message clear.”

“Good, because you’ll be seeing this again.” He threw it on the shelf with a loud, echoing clunk.

“What do you mean?” I tried to sit up a little to look at him, but my dead-straight arms made it impossible to move higher than a stomach crunch. “Jason, tell me you’re not going to use that on me.”

“Of course not. But this is still one of Drake’s favourite toys. Especially with you, my dear, since you have the ability to heal.”

“Kill me!” I shook my wrists in the cuffs. “Just kill me, please, Jason. Don’t let him do that to me. Please don’t let him—”

“Shh, hush now.” He stroked my hair. “Don’t be afraid. Pain is not the worst you can suffer.”

“How is it not?”

“I’ve lived a long time, Ara,” he started, his eyes becoming distant. “I’ve seen men, vampires alike, rise above, even overcome agony to survive. Pain is only pain. But there are always things man himself cannot fathom—things that drive one to madness, making animals of good people, fuelled by instinct alone. All manner of survival will become acceptable to you soon, Ara, and in that, you would even give up the life of a child to survive it. We all do. It is, essentially, human nature.”