Dante and Jemma were led to the center of the market, where three others were shackled and sitting in an iron cage in the hot sun. The prisoners' lips were cracked and their faces gaunt. One of them had his face lowered, and his shoulders shuddered and shook in silent sobs. Four armed guards stood about where they were chained, watching the prisoners with an intensity that would have crushed Dante's last hopes of escape if they weren't already shattered.
One guard unlocked the cage, and Dante and Jemma were unceremoniously thrown inside. The three prisoners already there remained unmoving as though they were already dead. The two who weren't sobbing stared blankly, their eyes unfocused.
The door of iron bars slammed shut after them, and Jemma scooted closer to Dante. "What's the plan?" she hissed into his ear.
Dante shrugged, indifferent, and didn't even flinch when Jemma smacked his arm.
The woman who had kept her sword at Dante's throat stood outside the cage and sheathed her weapon and stooped down to peer through the bars. She looked older than she sounded, with gray in her long hair and wrinkles in her forehead and around her eyes. "Looks like we're ready for the sacrifice," she told the guards as she straightened. "We'll throw them all in." When none of the guards moved to open the cage again, she snapped, "well?"
The four guards shifted uncomfortably.
"M'lady, we should wait until we have one more," one of them stuttered.
The woman scoffed. "Five has been plenty."
"But it wasn't long ago when we used four. And before that, we used three," another guard piped up.
"If we need a sixth, we'll shove one of you in after them," the woman snapped. "Take them out and get the portal taken care of already! We'll never get rid of the portal pox by hesitating!"
Jemma tugged at Dante's shirt while the woman and the guards continued to argue. "You can get us out of this cage, right? With your Chimera?"
Dante shook his head and raised his hands. "Not like this," he whispered back. He pulled at the restraints binding his hands together and covering them like metal mittens. The steel bent against his strength, and a flicker of hope caught in Dante's throat as he realized how strong he now was. Plus, the guards were distracted. This was his chance. But then he realized that there was no way to break the shackles without making enough noise to catch the guards' attention, who'd then run him through, and that flicker of hope was instantly extinguished once more.
Jemma's face fell as well, and Dante could see in it the same hopelessness that swirled darkly inside himself.
"Okay, so, there's no way we're getting out of this," Jemma muttered. "Well, how's this for plan B: we get shoved through the portal, get your chains off, and then go home unharmed?"
Dante pursed his lips. "That's…a plan," he said. In theory, it sounded straight forward and easy. But going through an unknown portal was incredibly dangerous and was one of the warnings drilled into everyone's heads as children. It was even worse thinking about going through a portal that these people were also calling a pox.
But in a situation like this, survival was most important. As long as they lived, they could figure out a new plan. It was just a matter of surviving whatever was on the other side of the portal.
The door to the cage flung open, and a guard yanked Dante out again before he could even start to consider his options, and he was hauled to his feet. The others were dragged out after, first Jemma and then the three strangers. Each guard took up the chains attached to one prisoner and led them through town. The woman personally took up Dante's, her sword pointed at Dante's back as less-than-gentle encouragement for him to walk.
They made their way through the crowd, which parted to allow them through. Dante and the woman took up the rear, and the onlookers seemed most terrified of the pair of them. It was hard to tell if the woman had a bad reputation, or if word of Dante and Jemma's portal-based arrivals had already spread.
The procession wound its way through the streets before finally stopping in front of a rippling patch of air that Dante instantly recognized as a portal. However, a quick glance around revealed that there was nothing visible – Chime, Chimera, or otherwise – that was sustaining it.
The locals were giving the area a wide berth. In fact, the road looked like it had been abandoned long before the prisoners had arrived.
The man first in line had been the one silently sobbing in the cage. His body was now unmoving and limp, the resignation of helplessness having taken its final hold. The guard holding his lead dragged him toward the portal, unlocked his chains, and shoved him through the portal.
The portal buckled as the man struck it, as though he had hit a heavy curtain, and then he was engulfed by the rippling currents and vanished.
The woman grunted. "Bring the next," she barked.
The guard holding Jemma started forward. Jemma looked over her shoulder, meeting Dante's gaze with a pleading look, one that was begging fate more than her friend.
Dante tried to ignore the knot rising in his throat, trying hard to swallow it back down. He told himself he'd see her on the other side and they'd be able to go home without issue. That was the plan. Everything would work out just fine.
The guard removed Jemma's shackles and shoved her at the portal. Jemma cried out in surprise, but her shout was cut off abruptly as she disappeared.
The world blurred as tears pricked at the corners of Dante's eyes. He blinked quickly to try to clear them as he reminded himself it was temporary. He'd see Jemma again on the other side. He was sure of it.
He was lying to himself. Panic gnawed at the pit of Dante's stomach, and his guts churned.
The chain lead attached to Dante's hands was yanked, and he stumbled forward, more out of surprise and lack of balance than from the guard overpowering him. Dante allowed himself to be led toward the portal, his mind in a numb haze. His hands encased in the metal were wet with sweat in spite of being ice cold.
A key scraped across his hand's prison, but then the woman barked out, "no, keep his on!"
The words snapped him out of his haze of mourning as he realized he needed to be ready to face whatever was on the other side of this portal, and he needed to be doubly ready because his hands were going to be useless until he could break free of his restraints.
Dante took a deep breath and did his best to mentally prepare himself. Dread thudded icily through his veins as countless scenarios raced through his mind, followed by possibilities of what he might do to counter each.
His chains clattered together as he shuffled closer to the portal, dread rising inside of him. And then, he was shoved through the portal.
Somehow, the transportation felt more similar to when Garrick had transported Dante to the Nascent than how Dante was used to traveling by Chimes. This wasn't a portal between adjacent worlds. He was going much further than that.
And nothing could have prepared Dante for what waited for him on the other side.