“You people talk big, but you don’t have anything to back it up.”

“So you’ve always expressed.” He smiled then, an ill-tempered grimace, and in the strange, angled light, he resembled the evil emperor from Star Wars.

Uh-oh, Amy. This guy doesn’t want to help you.

“You gave us a challenge at your interview,” he went on. “And Diggers don’t take things lying down. You’re here to learn a lesson, Amy Haskel.” The door behind me flew open. “I got her, guys,” I heard him say as both of my arms were twisted behind my back, firmly, but not uncomfortably, and the first figure prodded me between my shoulder blades to make me march.

“Time for the Grand Tour.”

“This is assault,” I said. “I’m going to scream.”

“If anyone could hear you, which they can’t, do you think they’d react to it? A scream coming from the Rose & Grave tomb on Initiation Night?” A few of the figures surrounding me laughed.

Fear skittered down my spine and my skin began to crawl everywhere my captors were touching me. This had to be a joke, right? Part of the initiation game. But then again, I’d heard stories about Diggers and their run-ins with the law. Somehow, the power of Rose & Grave prevailed and the members wormed their way out of all charges. Some people said the society owned the police.

“Where’s Malcolm?” I asked, in a voice far more devoid of snark than I’d been using a few moments earlier. Malcolm Cabot was a governor’s son—he wouldn’t be party to anything too illegal, right? Unless you believed the legends that said the society owned the whole government as well.

“He’ll be around…eventually. Now shut up and enjoy the ride.”

With that, they shoved me forward into the waiting arms of another group, who spun me around, lifted me up, and deposited me not-so-gently onto a hard, flat surface.

“You’re destined for a pauper’s grave.”

For a moment, I thought they were letting me go. Boy, was I wrong—a point that became clear a few seconds later when they closed a lid in my face. I tried to move, but the walls closed tight around me on all sides. I could feel sanded wood a few inches from my shoulders, above my head, and most noticeably, right beyond my nose.

They’d put me in a coffin.

I pounded on the lid, but it was closed shut. “Let me out! Let me out, you sons of bitches!” I screamed, kicking my legs. They responded by turning me over. I tumbled around, hoping at once that the movement would knock a few screws loose and also that it was sturdy enough not to spill me out without warning.

“You don’t take us seriously enough, Neophyte Haskel,” said Darth Digger. His voice was muffled through the coffin, but I recognized it now. He was the jerk from my interview. The one who kept arguing with Malcolm about not letting me in the society.

“I promise you, I’ve learned my lesson!” I pounded the coffin lid for emphasis.

“You belittle us,” he went on, as if he didn’t hear. “You ridicule us. You challenge us. You call our Sacred Vestments costumes….”

“Well, you dress like extras at a D&D convention.”

They shook the coffin, which shut me up.

“Before this night is over, Neophyte, you will learn respect for your Elders.”

I bit my tongue to keep from pointing out that I didn’t count a few months as a generation gap. They’d been carrying me for what seemed like ages, but it was difficult to tell how much of the jostling was actual forward motion and how much was cleverly designed to seem that way. At last they set me down. I thought I could hear splashing sounds all around. Another bathroom?

I could hear my captor’s voice very clearly now, as if he’d leaned down to whisper directly into the coffin lid. “You are in our power now, and we hold your life in our hands. This is the pool room, Neophyte. If we wanted, we could drop you in. Do you think you’d escape from the coffin before you drowned?”

No. Something scraped against the bottom of the box—or perhaps it was the coffin itself, being shoved along the ground. I felt myself sliding forward, as if tipping, and then something wet splashed against my legs. Water, flowing through the seams in the coffin. Oh my God, they were doing it! They were submerging me in the pool!

“Stop! Stop, please!” I shrieked, kicking for all I was worth. The wooden walls of the coffin remained uncompromised.

Oh, God, I can’t swim. I can’t swim! Let me out, please, don’t let me drown!

Pure terror washed through my body as I practically broke my hands pounding on the lid. I heard a rush of water above my head, and it started seeping in at the top of the coffin, wetting my hair and my shirt. Any second now, they’d let go and I’d sink to the bottom. Helpless. How long would it take? The coffin’s seams didn’t appear very tight. “Please, please, take me out! I beg of you!”

My cry broke on the last words into a sob. At last, I felt them lift me up and the hysteria ebbed.

“Well, that was quick,” he commented dryly.

Hot tears ran down my face and mixed with the cold pool water. Now that the danger had passed, I felt nothing but anger at myself for having let them see me squirm. I vowed I’d have no reaction for the rest of this crazy ride, no matter what they did to me.

“Do you remember what you said to us at your interview, Neophyte?” my head captor asked. He was clearly the master of ceremonies here—everyone else was playing the part of muscle. My captors swung the coffin in earnest now, and the water inside sloshed around, drenching the legs of my metal-free pants.

“Speak!”

Not a chance. But when I didn’t they began shaking me up and down. “Okay, okay,” I capitulated. “Which part of my interview?”

“Your parting shot.”

I struggled to recall. I remembered giving them the finger, but that was about it. “Not really,” I said haltingly, wondering what else they could possibly have planned for me. Whatever it was, there was no way it could beat the pool.

“Then let us jog your memory,” he said as his cohorts jogged my container. “Knights!”

And then, in unison: “I don’t do drugs, I’ve never been arrested, and from what I hear, I’m not too shabby in bed. Not that any of you people will ever have the opportunity to discover that firsthand!” The cacophony of voices had a garish, military quality to it, and if possible, I was even more humiliated by their recitation than I had been when I’d first opened my big mouth in that interview room.

“Have you ever heard the story of the Diggers’ Whore, Neophyte?”

I shuddered at the way he addressed me.

“I take it by your silence that’s a ‘no.’ ”

Ugh, I could almost hear the bastard’s smug smile. “Either that or you’ve knocked me cold in here.”

“She doesn’t learn her lesson, does she, boys?” Someone, I assumed it was my Sith M.C., thumped loudly on the lid of the coffin. “Do we have to dump you in the water again?”

Oh, boy, was this jerk going to lose some parts of his anatomy when I finally got out of here.

“As I was saying, the Diggers’ Whore is a very special woman, given the sacred trust to Initiate the Knights of our Order into the Mysteries of Connubial Bliss.”

“Lovely,” I said, with extraordinarily minimal sarcasm. But this is what I thought: Initiate? Hardly—or at least, not in the last few decades. If a man like Malcolm Cabot was a virgin, then I was a nun.

As if he heard my unspoken musings, the M.C. went on. “Though most of the Knights are already familiar with such Earthly Pleasures”—

And Purple Prose.

—“there are few who leave Eli without having tasted of her Delights.” The coffin stopped moving, as if we’d reached our destination. “Have you heard such tales, Neophyte?”

No, not as such, but it didn’t sound off-base. A prostitute on call at the Rose & Grave tomb? A little gross, but in keeping with every other tall tale I’d ever heard about the society. “Sure, why not?”