Christa’s Obsession (Obsessions #3)

Chapter One

Wanda

“You’re going to the city again? Why?” The words ran through Wanda’s mind, the worry for her brother, it breathed within her. And for good reason, it seemed. The conversations with Silas, her brother, gave her a strange sense of foreboding. Those senses never steered Wanda wrong. She always listened to them despite the fact she often couldn’t explain them if asked. Not that Silas asked, or would have listened to reason if she could tell him why she was concerned something bad was going to happen.

Silas believed in the good of people, and no one took her seriously.

She flounced off towards the river's edge, the evening breeze making her curls bounce around her cheeks.

Her green eyes glowed in the dying sun. It bathed her in an ethereal halo, surrounding her with its warmth. Her fingers ran over the blooms as she passed, offering what little she had left within her to the plants.

Dryads were supposedly solitary creatures, only bonding their spirit to a tree. Yet Wanda had never wanted to lose her connection with Silas. Their parents were long gone. Wanda alone had followed Silas to the forest where he had set down his roots, needing to keep her own rooted bond with him.

There she had come across an orchard. It sat on the far edges of the forest that Silas resided in, dying through neglect. The four peach trees, left to fend for themselves, called to Wanda’s soul. Silas had already bonded with his oak, so his powers for healing could not be given to another tree, not in the way they needed to survive.

Wanda was unique because she had the ability to bond with all four trees without diminishing her gift. They would surely have perished if not for her willingness to share her magic.

By following Silas, she had expanded her family, something she secretly craved. Although she understood that no matter how hard she tried to cling to Silas, as with all dryads, he was destined for something else.

She loved Silas very much, but Wanda, the younger sibling, didn’t crave anything beyond the forest. Maybe a burger or two, whereas Silas wanted to head into the city and sing for those who, to Wanda’s mind, didn’t appreciate the pureness of his heart. She witnessed the destruction and carelessness of those who came into the forest. They left behind their garbage and trampled over the plants with no thought to the life they were hurting.

Dougal, Silas, and Wanda helped maintain the balance of life in the forest and to Wanda, there was no greater gift. So no, Wanda didn’t want to leave the forest, her orchard, despite what Silas said about those he sang for.

So here she was, fretting and terrified of all the changes that were happening in her small part of the world. Silas was a blissful one, the equivalent of a shifter’s fated mate, to a demon, of all things. How this was possible, Wanda couldn’t fathom.

Weren’t demons evil creatures?

Destroyers of good?

Dougal, the troll of the forest, who was the font of all knowledge on such things as humans, shifters and all other beings, would have the answer, and all she had to do was ask. Only Wanda didn’t know how to ask. To express her fear when Silas himself seemed—content— excited by this situation.

“You got somethin’ on your mind, Wanda?” Dougal walked patiently at her side. As usual, he picked up her unease. The troll was perceptive.

She hesitated, then gave in, looking at Dougal as he walked quietly beside her like he had done a thousand times before. The troll wore a coat of many pockets. It never ceased to surprise her what he could find within it. “You’re right, I do.”

She sighed, knowing that talking to Silas about her worries wouldn’t help when he saw things so differently to her. Her lips parted, then she stilled, listening out.

Head tilting, her curls tumbled around one shoulder at the voices that carried on the air. She didn’t stop to think and took off, sensing where the interlopers were. “Someone’s in my orchard.”

The idiots were tramping around her trees.

“Slow down,” Dougal called out after her.

“My trees need me,” she called back, quickening her pace.

It wasn’t the first time humans had come to take from the full branches of fruit. Wanda was happy to share, she just preferred they asked first. Her trees did not like anyone else touching them. They could get a little testy about such things.

“You there, what are you doing?” she called out when in sight of the two tall strangers, one of whom was running his fingers down the bark of the smallest peach tree in a way that left Wanda feeling violated. Her tree shook its branches, trying to slap the hand away.

Stop them.

Her trees’ demand had her running when the big brute didn’t seem to notice he was getting whipped by branches.

The need to get them away overrode all common sense. “Stop that right now. They don’t like to be touched by strangers. I don’t go poking around your home touching your things, do I?”

They turned as one. An enormous wall of muscled chests, or so it seemed when they blocked the light, towering over her.

Eyes as dark as coal matched sneers that made everything inside Wanda scream for her to run. Their presence was unholy, yet the need to protect her family kept her right where she was. Chin poking out, she did her best to hide her fear.

The sense she was in serious trouble came too late when they grabbed hold of her arms, jerking her clear off the ground like she weighed nothing at all. She juddered violently at the feeling of their hands touching her skin. The dread she had felt earlier deepened. It attached itself to her heart, squeezing it in a painful, vice-like grip.

Oh, to the forest goddesses!

She struggled to shake off the touch that sucked on the pureness of her soul.

“Great. The asshole got a dryad. That wasn’t difficult.” One of the men—demons grunted.

Wanda could sense the darkness surrounding his soul and her confusion at his words came with a slither of hope when she heard Dougal shout to let her go.

Violent shudders ran through Wanda, her stomach heaving and her eyes slamming shut as she felt herself leave the forest. The tight snap of the band severing her from her trees cleaved her heart in two. The pain left her gasping for air.

“Get off me, you idiots,” she gasped, hoping someone might hear and come to her rescue. “Put me down, this instant.” She kicked out her bare foot, and it was like kicking a tree. All it did was make her bare toes throb.

A hand smacked her cheek, the impact so brutal it made her head snap back. White spots danced in front of her wavering vision and blood trickled out of the corner of her mouth from where her teeth bit her lip. The throb of her toes didn’t compete with the pain coming from her cheekbone, which she was positive that ham fisted ass had broken.

“Shut the fuck up,” growled the one who hit her. They shook her violently, making her flap about like a shift on the breeze. A nauseating scent coming from them overshadowed the sweet smell of the peaches that lingered on her skin.

It was then that the air shimmered and more demons appeared. All of them naked, they came closer, sniffing and pawing at her. “Let’s hope Rainer says we can play with her.”

A demon licked down her cheek to where her lip was bleeding and groaned, sending terror through her soul.

Each breath dragged in the scent of blood, along with what she knew was death, degradation, and sulfur. The darkness surrounding her broke with the cast of red lights, basking the room in a creepy glow.

Wanda whimpered, trying her best to stifle the need to cry out. Here she would know no pity. Beyond the walls, in other rooms, inhuman sounds sent panic through her.

Flung down onto a chair that creaked and rocked at the force, the breath left Wanda’s body. The room filled with yet more demons, larger, and scarier. Their cocks were hard, and they pushed closer to her face, arms, and chest. She shrank back, but to no avail.

Each touch painted her soul in misery. Wanda was flooded by a sense that her life would end in this room. She could only pray it was a quick death. A death that Silas would thankfully not feel, being in another realm.

“She’s pretty enough, I suppose,” a huge, naked, red demon said, coming closer with ropes in his hand. His cock was enormous and engorged, brushing against her skin. “I bet I could make you look better, though, riding my cock. That would give you some color in those pale cheeks of yours.” The menace in his voice stopped her blood pumping around her body.

Wanda had no time to consider how to reply before a scream tore from her throat as a large fist plowed into her unmarked cheek. The bone beneath shattered. She lost her vision when the pain hit her brain, and she slumped off the wooden seat. She was quickly dragged back into it as the demons used the rope to tie her to the chair.

Demon laughter rolled over her, much the same as the icky feel of the place, plucking at her sensitive skin, looking for ways inside.

More came into the room, Wanda’s vision flickering with lights as she tried not to let them feed off her pain and fear.

Tied to the chair, she much preferred the hitting rather than the turns they took, pawing at her, touching, taunting, and torturing her.

Endless pain sucked her to a husk. It came not only from their bodies, but from the separation from her trees. She had never left them since they had become a family. The broken connection left them exposed and her dying.

They would feel her pain, she could sense it.

She willed her death as her swollen eyelids drifted shut, and she sank into a pit of despair.