Chapter 59: The Mummy in the Dirt

The darkest stretch of Hookup Forest was notorious for burying dangerous secrets. The towering trees grew so close together here that their thick canopies blocked out the moonlight, plunging the forest floor into near-absolute darkness.

Under the cover of those shadows, a patch of dirt looked freshly disturbed. The soil had been messily, unnaturally scattered with dead leaves in a hasty attempt to cover it up.

If anyone had possessed the courage...or the sheer stupidity to wander this deep into the woods and look closely at that specific patch of earth, they would have seen a tiny, bruising nose peaking out from beneath the dirt. The small nostrils flared weakly with every ragged, shallow breath.

But no one was looking at the ground.

Right next to the makeshift grave, the trunk of a tree trembled just slightly.

"Put it in," a melodic, breathless voice purred into the dark.

Jasper Silver was bent over, his hands pressed flat against the bark. The Fish beastman was naked, the cool night air biting at his pale skin, his flowing blue hair framing his flushed face. He sounded like a siren ushering a sailor to his watery death.

Behind him, positioning himself to enter from behind, was a feline beastman. He was also naked, his chest heaving. His golden eyes were hazy with lust, and a fluffy, striped tail swished back and forth in the air in anticipation.

The feline beastman surged forward, burying his face into Jasper’s shoulder.

"Jasper," the beastman groaned loudly, his voice thick with pleasure as he finally sank inside the Fish noble.

Jasper let out a high, breathy moan. The thudding against the tree began, the force of it shaking the dead leaves loose from the branches above. With every eager thrust, Jasper’s diamond and pearl necklaces rattled and clinked loudly against the bark.

The quiet, ominous night of the forest was shattered.

Deep beneath the dirt, the sounds caused the mummy in the dirt to stir.

Blair’s consciousness returned at a glacial pace. The first thing she registered was the taste of dirt coating her tongue.

She tried to open her eyes, but her eyelids felt like they had been glued shut. A dull, throbbing pain pulsed relentlessly at her temples, but the true agony lay in her limbs. She felt like all the gravity in the world had localized on top of her, pinning her flat against the earth.

Am I dead? her sluggish brain supplied. Where am I? What happened?

She drew a complete blank.

A high-pitched ringing echoed in her ears, creating a bubble of isolation that made her deaf to the moans not too far above her head.

Blair focused all her energy on her right hand. She twitched her index finger. It scraped against her side.

Slowly, fighting through the lethargy, she managed to move her hand upward. She dragged her fingers along her thigh. The movement displaced a layer of loose dirt that cascaded down her leg.

Her nerve endings flared to life in a rush. She felt the cold, damp grit of the dirt against her skin. Whatever she was wearing felt incredibly thin and tight, clinging to her like a second skin. It took her a second to realize she could feel her own nakedness right beneath it.

Blair forced her heavy eyelids open, but the darkness remained.

Gritting her teeth against the pain, she planted her hands in the dirt and shoved upward.

Clumps of soil fell away from her shoulders and chest as she broke the surface of the shallow grave. She managed to force herself into a sitting position, but the sudden movement sent a spike of pain shooting straight up her spine.

Blair gasped, inhaling sharply through her nose. The pain was so intense black spots danced across her vision. She felt like she might actually pass out again. She tried to open her mouth, but she couldn’t.

Trembling, Blair raised a hand to her face. Her fingers brushed against rough, tight fabric. Her entire head was tightly wrapped, leaving only small, narrow slits for her eyes and a tiny opening around her nose.

As her eyes finally began to adjust to the dim light of the forest, Blair pulled her hands away from her face and looked down at them.

Her hands and arms were encased in white bandages.

She brought her wrapped wrists closer to her face. The fabric smelled overwhelmingly of a sweet, rose perfume. But beneath the cloying scent, Blair could see the dark, rust-colored stains of dried blood seeping through the white material.

Panic flooded her veins.

She squeezed her eyes shut, desperately trying to retrace her steps. Think, Blair. Think. The last memory she had was being in the armory. The professor filling in for Professor Feron had gotten blackout drunk on vodka and she left for a bathroom break to slip out.

She remembered trying to decide whether she should go to Daemus’s hockey game, or if she should search for Professor Feron.

Clearly, she must have chosen the latter.

Blair rubbed at her ringing ears. Daemus is going to be so mad at me. She had blown off the hockey game she was contractually obligated to attend. She would’ve been late since she didn’t know about it earlier, but she would at least have been there.

Pushing the worry aside, Blair planted her bandaged hands in the dirt and forced herself to stand.

Her legs shook. Every muscle in her body screamed in protest, making her feel as though she had been trampled by a stampede of rhinos and somehow survived. Her back, specifically, felt like it was on fire.

She looked down at herself. She was wrapped from head to toe in dirty, bloodstained, rose-scented bandages.

She looked like...a mummy?

She concluded that she must have been captured by beastmen in the woods, tortured for reasons unknown, and then wrapped in bandages and buried alive for fun.

If that was the case, Blair was genuinely glad that the trauma had induced amnesia. She really didn’t want to remember being tortured.

Suddenly, a warm, thick line of moisture seeped from both her ears, trickling down her neck.

Blair pressed her fingers to the fabric. When she pulled them away, the bandages were stained with fresh, bright red blood.

But the ringing had finally stopped.

Sound rushed back into her world.

But it wasn’t the sound of the wind or the creepy sounds of nature at night.

Crunch. Tear. Slurp.

It was the unmistakable sound of eating.

A shudder traveled straight down Blair’s spine, freezing the blood in her veins. She stood still, her breath catching in her throat.

Blair was terrified of what she might see, but still, she slowly turned around.