The Three Most Wanted by Corinna Turner

Author:Corinna Turner [Turner, Corinna]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: UnSeen Books
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Ipse tantum est petra mea et salus mea,

Praesidium meum: non movebor.

The Lord is my stronghold and my deliverer,

my protector: I will stand unmoved.

I clung to the tune and the remembered words, allowed them to tow me to the surface, where I found… Jon. Of course. Jon rocking me gently, his hands rubbing my hair and back as he hummed that lifeline.

Breathing shallowly, I clung to the psalmody, let it fill my mind and drive the terror away.

Lord, please don’t let them try to break me. Please don’t let them try. The prayer came at last. Let them just give me the injection. I might be able to hold out that long…

“What if they break me, Jon?” I whispered in Latin, regaining the use of my voice.

He hummed a few more bars, still rocking me slowly, slowly.

“All you have to do is your best,” he murmured. “Just do your best, and the Lord’s mercy will take care of the rest. But they probably won’t try again and if they do, I don’t think they will.”

“How d’you know!”

“Think it through, Margo.” His lips brushed the top of my head and he must’ve felt my breathing speed up, because he started humming again.

I grabbed the sound once more, clung to it. Think it through? How would that help? Because I could see it, all too clearly, back on that gurney, with those swine tempting and threatening, could hear those awful words squeaking from my cowardly throat. I shuddered and burrowed against Jon.

They’d still dismantle me in the normal way for the Sedition charge, of course. But not before they’d paraded me in front of the press, had me say it again and again… I choked, my head flying up. “I will not say it in front of the press! I will not.”

Jon was right. I wouldn’t say it to the press. So how many times could I get myself on and off the gurney, like that? I must hold silent: simply no point doing anything else.

I rested my head against Jon’s shoulder, breathing as though I’d just run a race, and looked through the cab and out the windscreen. Forest. From the way we bounced and jounced, we were still on the drive.

“Wish you hadn’t come out, Jon.”

“What, you’d rather I was still in the house! I beg to differ.”

“You know what I mean. I wish you were free like Bane.”

“Never mind me. I wish you were free like Bane. Or instead of. And I can say that as his friend because I’m absolutely certain he’d agree.”

“It was meant to be me who was free,” I whispered. “François asked me to go out to the woodshed. But Bane went instead.” Jon should know, however briefly, that François hadn’t meant me to die like this.

“Oh. Poor Bane. François’s dead, isn’t he. And his sons.” It wasn’t a question. He’d followed what was going on just fine.

“Yes,” I murmured anyway. “Requiescant in pace.”

“Requiescant in pace,” sighed Jon. “Stupid thing to do, though.”

Never a good idea. He’d been right, of course.

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