POV: Jack
I looked at Lily, my heart sinking. The stress of the kidnapping, the violence of the party—it had broken something in her. She was staring at an empty bed, talking to a ghost that wasn't there.
"Lily, listen to me," I said, grabbing her shoulders. "There is no girl. We have to move. I slipped past the guards, but they'll be checking the cells soon. If we don't leave now, Lukas will kill us both."
"But she's right here!" Lily insisted, her eyes wide with terror. "She's bleeding, Jack! She's been here for ten years—or ten days—I don't know!"
I didn't have time to argue. I grabbed her hand and pulled her toward the window. "I can't help someone I can't see, Lily! Please, trust me!"
We barely made it to the ledge when the door burst open. Lukas stood there, flanked by four armored guards. His face was twisted in a mask of pure, unadulterated hatred.
"I knew you couldn't stay away, Brother," Lukas sneered. "Always the hero. Always the favorite."
"Let her go, Lukas," I growled, stepping in front of Lily. "This is between us."
"Oh, it's very much between us," Lukas said, stepping into the room. He didn't look at the bed. He didn't see whatever Lily saw. He only saw the throne he was about to lose. "Guards! Seize him. And lock the Princess in the iron maiden downstairs. If she won't be my queen, she can be my monument."
The guards lunged. I fought with the desperation of a man with everything to lose, but there were too many. They slammed me against the wall, the back of my head hitting the obsidian with a sickening crack. As the world went gray, I saw Lukas grab Lily by the hair.
"Sleep well, Leo," Lukas whispered.
That night, they threw me back into a deeper, darker hole. But for Lily, the horror was only beginning. In the dead of night, as she sat huddled in the corner of her cell, Annabelle appeared once more. This time, she wasn't crying. She was holding a doll—a small, porcelain thing with its eyes gouged out.
"He's coming," the ghost whispered to Lily. "He did it to me. Now he will do it to you."