Regan examined the tools for a long moment before eventually choosing the stick. It was long and smaller in diameter than a pencil. It was by far the most innocent-looking object she’d removed from her little bag of tricks, but Dorothy still felt a shiver shoot up her spine.

“Do you know what a bastinado is?” Regan held the stick up to the light, and a line of silver appeared along its edge. “It has been used in some of the most ancient forms of torture. You merely remove a person’s shoes and socks and whip the bastinado against their bare feet.”

Regan demonstrated by cracking the small stick against her own, gloved palm. It made a sound like a whip as it hit the leather.

“So simple,” she continued, grinning behind her slim mask. “And yet so effective. In fact, the first documented use of a bastinado in Europe dates back to the year 1537. In China, it’s been used since 960.”

Dorothy swallowed. One look at that stick and she could practically feel the wood biting into the soft flesh on the bottoms of her feet. She imagined how her skin might rip, how the blood might trickle down between her toes.

She licked her lips to stop them from trembling. “I told you that I don’t know anything. Whipping that thing against my feet won’t change that.”

Regan glanced to where Eliza and Donovan were standing and nodded, once. Some deep, animal instinct inside of Dorothy kicked to life. She no longer cared about looking frightened, she shot off the bed and took a slow step backward, toward the door—

The others were too fast. Eliza’s hands clamped down on her shoulders, holding her in place.

Dorothy jerked beneath her grip. “Let go of me!”

But then Donovan was on her, his hands tightening around her wrists. His palms were sweating, Dorothy noted. That sweat, more than anything else, told her how real this was. Even Donovan was scared, and he wasn’t the one about to be tortured.

She inhaled, her breath shuddering down her throat like a sob. She’d never been tortured before. She didn’t think she would be good at it.

She thought she could pull her hands loose if she caught Donovan off guard, if she jerked her body away fast enough. But then she’d still have to get past Eliza and Regan and Mac. It was no use.

“Take off her shoes,” Regan said, still examining the stick, as though looking for flaws.

Dorothy was forced onto the bed, her boots roughly removed. She shivered when the cool air touched her bare skin, but at least she was able to hold it together enough not to beg or cry. She wouldn’t give these people the satisfaction.