A Demon's Drink {Book Three-Kat}

Chapter 41

--- Jonathan’s POV---

Someone had tied me to one of the sturdier chairs in the hat shop shortly after I woke up. Ra’s stood over me the entire time with a grim smile on his face. Occasionally he spoke into a headset and glanced at the monitors behind me. Jervis muttered to himself a lot and never left his spot at a keyboard. I glanced around, unable to see the majority of the room due to the lack of outside light. The windows were boarded up and the door had a plank of wood set firmly in place across the middle, right above the door handle.

The Demon hadn’t spoken a word to me in the last hour of my consciousness, but I took that as a blessing. There was a man in the room that would occasionally mutter curse words under his breath whenever Jervis would start to ramble about time and teas. I didn’t know his voice and that unsettled me. The rope around my wrists bit into my skin if I did the smallest amount of flexing so I kept all of my movements to a minimum.

“I have to admit,” Ra’s finally spoke. “I cannot fathom why you would do something so incredibly stupid, Doctor.”

I spoke slowly, holding eye contact. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” That was when he struck me across my left cheek.

“You continue to meddle with things you have no business in,” Ra’s sneered at me.

“This is ridiculous,” I frowned. “What in the world do you think you’re doing to her mind? Nothing that you are doing will leave her unaffected.” Ra’s laughed at that, slowly walking to the monitors to my left. He stood behind Jervis and watched as the screen transitioned between different scenes of a deserted Central Park.

“Really, Jonathan? What I am doing is nothing different from what you yourself have done.” I jerked toward him at that and it did nothing but make him smile. “Where you tormented her mind and body, I am strengthening her. Kat will thank me for what I am doing to her.”

He whispered a few instructions to Jervis, who looked nervously at the monitors but nodded nonetheless, before turning to a side room and departing. Ra’s reached for the doorknob and right before he shut himself in the room he spoke words that would haunt me for months.

“I could never have done this to Kat if you yourself had not first poisoned her. For that, dear Doctor, I thank you.”

I sat there for a moment, letting his words stand in the air. If you yourself had not first poisoned her…

“Scarecrow?” Jervis glanced back nervously. “Scarecrow?”

“Shut up,” the other man growled behind me.

“What is the Scarecrow doing here? There is no Dorothy here. There is no more Dorothy. Why is the Scarecrow here?”

“I swear to God,” the man growled. “Shut up and do your damned job Tetch.”

“Be quiet peasant!” Jervis yelled at the man and glared wherever he was standing behind me.