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Back Cardinal Black Save as PDF
Chapters (44)
  1. Title Page
  2. One: Into the Storm
  3. One
  4. Two
  5. Three
  6. Four
  7. Five
  8. Six
  9. Seven
  10. Two: London Calling
  11. Eight
  12. Nine
  13. Ten
  14. Eleven
  15. Twelve
  16. Thirteen
  17. Fourteen
  18. Fifteen
  19. Three: The Malignant Seven
  20. Sixteen
  21. Seventeen
  22. Eighteen
  23. Nineteen
  24. Twenty
  25. Twenty-One
  26. Twenty-Two
  27. Twenty-Three
  28. Four: Squirrels and Cats
  29. Twenty-Four
  30. Twenty-Five
  31. Twenty-Six
  32. Twenty-Seven
  33. Twenty-Eight
  34. Twenty-Nine
  35. Thirty
  36. Thirty-One
  37. Thirty-Two
  38. Five: Revelation
  39. Thirty-Three
  40. Thirty-Four
  41. Thirty-Five
  42. Thirty-Six
  43. Thirty-Seven
  44. About the Author

“Well done,” said Lash. He motioned for the musicians to stop and at the final note he led the applause. RakeHell Lizzie remained on her knees, obviously winded by her efforts. “Dear?” he asked. “Are you able to dance with two more?”

She breathed in and out a few times, and then she answered, “One.”

“Good enough,” Lash agreed. Again he stroked his beard as he regarded the false Prussians. “All right,” he said, coming to a decision. “Let us prepare Mr. Corbett.”

Twenty

Twenty

Matthew regained consciousness as his arms were being stretched above him and secured by the wrist manacles. The pit spun about him, his eyes were unfocused and his brain dazed by the blow that had been given to him on the back of the head, but even so he realized the three men—whether the Owl’s security men or Lash’s attendants, what did it matter?—had not yet trapped his ankles in the irons, and so he fought.

It was a losing proposition. One of the men hit him in the ribcage with the same short wooden club that had previously clouted his head, the pain blew the air from Matthew’s lungs and the next blow from a fist to the side of his jaw rocked his head and sent him once more into a haze. He felt the irons clamp around his ankles. His spine was stretched by the tension of the chains above, and so his naked body was bowed slightly forward as had been the other two men who were torn apart this night.

“Wait a moment until he recovers.” It was Lash’s voice, seemingly speaking from a great distance. “We want him fresh.” That brought a spate of sadistic laughter from the assembled killers, and in his state of disrepair Matthew thought he had reached the position of being a low-hanging apple on a tree, ready to be turned into pulp.

He had been taken from the gallery by the three men—Owl’s or Lash’s, whomever—and marched down a set of stone steps, then across the bloody pit where RakeHell Lizzie sat on her haunches watching him, her taut nude body gleaming with gore and the sweat of her exertions.