Chapter 7: The Raven (2)
Through the back-and-forth, Duan Po's smile remained rock-steady. He took another sip of his drink, seemingly reminded of an unpleasant memory. His dark eyes surveyed the room, growing a little dangerous.
Elyse drifted toward him involuntarily, two steps.
"Commander Duan, Miss Elyse is very frightened."
Li Yufu affected surprise, tilting his chin up — and poured fuel on the fire, casually pulling Elyse back.
The girl seemed genuinely angry now, but still didn't dare lash out at anyone. She could only bite her lip, on the verge of tears.
Li Yufu smiled and enjoyed the sight of her sulking.
Like teasing a cat.
After being provoked repeatedly, Duan Po suddenly went calm. He glanced at Elyse, then even offered a reassuring smile: "It's all right. Don't cry."
He raised an eyebrow at Li Yufu, set down his glass, and with leisurely composure drew out a Montecristo. He held it to his nose and inhaled; a server quickly stepped up to light it.
He gestured for Li Yufu to have one too, and peeled off a US dollar bill for the tip.
But Li Yufu declined — he never smoked anyone else's cigarettes.
Duan Po didn't insist. He reflected with amusement: won't take another man's cigarette, but loves to take another man's woman.
How cheap.
"Say it, Boss Yu. What exactly do you want?"
He looked down, patient, seemingly savoring the cigar's aroma.
Li Yufu maintained his smiling-tiger guise, impossible to read: "Duan Po, why don't you give me this girl?"
Elyse struggled violently — her first clear, unambiguous protest.
"No! I won't go!"
Duan Po didn't even look up. He barked coldly: "Shut up."
The girl went still, stunned and blinking, tears shimmering but refusing to fall.
"Boss Yu, it seems you're here to pick a fight with me today."
Li Yufu neither confirmed nor denied. He stroked Elyse's head, felt her trembling, and casually draped an arm around her shoulders.
"That's not entirely fair, Duan Po. Didn't you pick a fight with me first?"
He smiled. "You killed my capable man. You owe me at least one replacement."
Duan Po fell silent, seemingly in the wrong.
Li Yufu pressed his advantage: "I think this child would do nicely. You killed my man and got her heart — I'm very unhappy about that."
Duan Po took a drag and exhaled. "This one is not on the table."
The smiling tiger gave a grunt, ignoring the refusal entirely, his manner one of determined acquisition.
Duan Po sneered: "What's mine stays mine — I don't like people picking through my things, either."
He suddenly flicked away his cigar, produced a silver Italian Beretta from God-knows-where, and aimed the black muzzle directly at Elyse's head.
Li Yufu blinked, startled. His hand released her.
Elyse dropped to her knees, dazed. Her red dress and shimmering pearls pooled around her on the floor — a beautiful, desolate ruin.
The gun remained trained on her.
Duan Po raised an eyebrow. On his refined face appeared a blade-sharp smile. His voice was extraordinarily gentle, extraordinarily seductive:
"Elyse — would you die for me?"
Silence.
Elyse slowly lifted her head. Her tears still hadn't fallen. Her eyes even seemed to be laughing, deeper and deeper.
The same madness as Duan Po's. The same willingness to stake everything.
She said: "I would."
Click — the sound of a round chambering. Duan Po pulled the trigger.
3.
Bang!
The ballroom erupted into chaos. Screaming guests scattered in every direction.
Elyse rose like a sleepwalker. Her eyes blazed — twin fire-meteors, incandescent with the heat and force to burn down the world.
She looked at Duan Po, but Duan Po averted his gaze.
The bullet had gone upward, piercing the vaulted ceiling — at the last instant, Li Yufu had shoved Duan Po's arm aside.
"You're insane!"
He wrested the gun from Duan Po's hand and threw it on the floor.
Duan Po turned his face away.
"She's yours."
He strode for the exit. His cold voice fell behind: "But she's worth ten catties of gold. Deliver her to my estate tonight — or I'll kill her again."
Elyse swayed.
"Duan Po…"
She called.
The warlord either didn't hear, or didn't bother to respond. He exited Alem Palace in long strides, slipped into his heavily guarded motorcade, and roared into the darkening night.
"You liar."
Even though he was gone, she murmured the rest.
Li Yufu caught the girl as she lost consciousness, sighing — half relief, half concern.
He looked down at her face. Even unconscious, she looked in anguish, tears leaking endlessly from beneath her lashes.
Would you die for me?
When she said she would — it was truly moving.
Li Yufu thought: In these terrible times, for Duan Po to still earn that kind of sacrificial loyalty from a young woman — what an extravagant thing.
He'd lost this round to Duan Po, in truth.
He wanted that kind of loyalty too.
…
Elyse woke in total darkness.
She screamed and pitched off the bed. Her head struck something — but it was soft.
Blackness so absolute, so airtight, she couldn't catch her breath.
Elyse clutched herself and closed her eyes.
After a moment, she felt her way up, then found the wall and stood. The walls were padded thick with soft material. She walked seven steps along one wall — it ended. She turned and walked along the second wall — ten steps, and it ended too.
She quickly established that the room contained nothing but a bed. The walls were soft, the floor was soft, every edge of the bed was soft.
She sat down on the floor beside the bed.
Holding her head.
The silence was crushing. No sound at all — only her own heartbeat, her own breathing.
In the infinite silence and darkness, both amplified, endlessly replayed.
Thump, thump-thump, thump-thump-thump, thump-thump-thump-thump…
Inhale, inhale-inhale, inhale-inhale-inhale, inhale-inhale-inhale-inhale…
Soon she couldn't even breathe properly. Paying too much attention to breathing trapped her in breathing — she gasped in chaotic, hiccupping rhythms, taking in more air than she let out, curling into a fetal position on the floor, writhing in agony.
The floor was like the maw of some giant mollusk, swallowing her, pulling her down, down, down.
Strangled by absolute, impenetrable dark.
She fainted.
She didn't know how long later, she woke again in the dark.
Still nothing — no sound, no light, no time, no anything.
Convinced she was being compressed into a bloody smear by the viscous darkness, Elyse screamed.
She screamed until she tasted blood in her throat and could produce no sound at all.
She headbutted the wall, struck the floor — but everything was padded. She couldn't even hurt herself.
She fell onto the bed and began biting herself, scraping with her fingernails.
When her hands were covered in wounds, pain — her old friend — finally gave her a fragment of peace. She sucked the blood from her injuries and drifted off.
The next time she woke, she was disoriented.
Having entirely lost the concept of time, shattered by complete chaos and sensory deprivation — as if a passenger in a car at high speed suddenly thrown into an eternal vacuum, her internal organs unable to adapt to the abrupt cessation — her head split open, her stomach heaved and convulsed as she vomited.
She retched until her stomach knotted, but nothing came up. Her insides were completely empty — as if, before being locked in here, she'd been pumped and flushed, scoured from top to bottom.
This was hell.
Elyse laughed in a raw, broken voice.
She must already be dead, to have fallen into this particular hell.
She must be.
Outside.
In a room lined with surveillance monitors, a night-vision feed showed Elyse curled at the foot of the bed, motionless.
A technician reported to Li Yufu: "The subject for the psychological stripping experiment has been in the Black Room for twenty-four hours. Currently unconscious — vital signs are stable."
Li Yufu rose and walked toward the Black Room, three stories underground.
In the darkness, the door opened — then sealed shut again.
Wearing night-vision goggles, Li Yufu located Elyse precisely from under the bed. She was twisted into a knot, seemingly in the grip of nightmares, drenched in cold sweat.
Handled, manipulated, she gasped and startled awake.
Unable to see who it was, she was terrified anew — she couldn't even scream, only scrambled to escape, hands and feet flailing. But the man pinned her effortlessly.
"Don't be afraid. It's me."
He said in a low voice.
Elyse's panicked expression was fully visible in his night-vision eyes.
Her pupils were blown enormous — like a blind, panicked little creature.
"Why." She barely managed to speak, faint and raw. "Why are you doing this."
No answer.
The man sat on the soft floor, keeping her firmly contained, one hand continuously stroking her hair — comforting her like a child, over and over.
"Don't be afraid. It's all right. I'm here. I'll stay with you. I'll always stay with you."
4.
"Let me out…"
"Please, let me out!"