Chapter 82 The Chains of Suffering
THE CHAINS OF SUFFERING
LUELLA
She staggered onto grass damp with summer’s dew.
Low voices spoke all around her, and she slowly turned her head, gaining her bearings, disoriented and ill from being dragged through the shadowed portal.
A company of Umbra stood around a flat meadow, flowers trampled beneath boots and the hooves of huffing horses.
The metal fittings of the saddles clinked as the Tenebrae stalked close to a nearby horse, large and dappled with a grey and black coat, and took the reins.
The hair around the horse’s legs was long and perfectly kept.
The horse stomped its front hoof, air releasing from its snout as large brown eyes met Luella’s.
Her toes sank into the spots of grass, and she was forced to take a step forward, with the shadows still keeping her on a short leash, tethered to their master. She gritted her jaw, feeling wound up and tight, poised to snap. But if she snapped, what would she do? Kill them all… or just herself?
The air was heavy and foreboding among the Umbra.
Everywhere Luella looked, she saw shadowed eyes and smirks, lingering looks that swept over the white cape held tightly around her shoulders, the right side bunched strangely around her one remaining wing.
She was suddenly glad for the cape, for it kept her wounds concealed from these hungry, depraved eyes.
She didn’t want them to see. They had seen enough of her suffering.
The rest would be hers to bear. And bear it, she would, until the chains of suffering grew to be so stifling and heavy that she would have no choice but to cast them off in rage and let everyone around her find themselves at the mercy of her making.
"Come, conquered Princess. We ride for the Lunar Temples in the Lunaria Mountains. We will be there before dawn." The Tenebrae’s white cape fluttered in a gentle evening breeze, which made the flowers that stretched beyond ripple like waves.
Luella stared at the litany of purple petals, interspersed with delicate yellow and deep blue, as she said, "If I do not agree?"
His response was just as simple. "Then I will force you. You have no autonomy here. I have shown you, time and time again, the length I will go to claim you, to break you down, just so I can build you up into a being befitting my needs."
The shadows curled around her chin, forcing her head straight until she met his eyes. Every breath made her back ache.
"Your needs?" she questioned softly.
He tugged on the chains, making the horse nicker. She wanted to wrap them around his neck and squeeze. Her fingers flexed at her side, and she relished the twinge of pain as they spasmed.
"Every damned creature in creation bending a knee to me."
Luella released a held breath, then stepped toward the horse. She walked carefully, not wanting to crush the flowers underfoot, but it was no use—they were so plentiful, she couldn’t maneuver them. They were crushed anyway, no matter how hard she tried to preserve their peaceful beauty.
She pressed her palm to the horse’s flank and uttered a silent apology to the creature used by such a merciless master.
The Tenebrae stepped back, a cruel grin on his lips. He waved a hand to the saddle.
Right. He wouldn’t help her, then.
She could manage.
Luella hooked her hand around the pommel, grip too weak, as she tried to lift her right foot and fit it in the stirrup. She failed halfway. It was far too high for her to reach on a good day—let alone now, with her battered body.
After many bouts of trying, she rested her head on the leather of the saddle and exhaled roughly, squeezing her eyes shut.
If only—
If only what?
What could she do if she had her magic back?
She wouldn’t force the horse to bend to her will, not like he would.
So what could she do?
She felt the crushed petals and trampled stems beneath her feet and wished desperately for the flowers to stretch and grow, if only to help her, or a gentle breeze to stir more fervently, to lift her up and carry her on.
The Tenebrae was silent at her back, waiting.
Luella didn’t turn to look at him. "I cannot."
Even through her cape, she felt a sudden frigidness grow nearer as he covered her back with his front.
"See, all you have to do is ask, and I will do it." He laughed. "Never anything that means something to you, though. Can’t have you getting ideas in that heirus mind of yours. I own you now. Your whims will become mine."
Shadows curled around her and lifted her until she found herself plopped into the saddle, staring down at him.
His head brushed her chest from the horse’s height.
He placed a hand on her thigh, and she tried to ignore the sick roiling in her gut at the feel—or the way the cape parted down the middle, showing off her bared thighs, from how her legs were forced to part as she sat astride the horse.
A voice called out, making him turn his head.
An Umbra approached. A female, Luella realized. She hadn’t seen many female Umbra. Most of the females she had seen had been forced into pleasure or slavery.
Her hair was white, eyes a shadowed blue, and shoulders straight and proud beneath silver armor.
She bowed her head, a braid slipping over her shoulder and knocking against the chestplate of her knightly garb.
"Master, we need you to look over the route to ensure its efficacy for the swiftest journey possible. "
The Tenebrae’s hand dropped from Luella’s thigh, and the horse shifted beneath her as he stepped back.
"Do not leave." The shadows tightened around Luella, keeping her still.
"And do keep your mouth shut, or I will follow through on my threat to sew your lips together.
Maybe then you will realize my threats are not as empty as you think them to be. "
Luella certainly didn’t think his threats were empty—her wing was testament to that—but she dipped her chin in acknowledgment regardless, watching as he disappeared into the throng of Umbra.
She was not alone, far from it. The Umbra were close; though, they didn’t venture near the horse upon which she sat.
Until one did.
A male led his horse closer, dressed in a suit of arms similar to the female who had stolen the Tenebrae away. He, too, had white hair, curling around his pointed ears. His shadowed eyes fell to her as he gave a strange half-smile, nothing kind about it.
"The Princess has truly fallen from grace.
I still think my master has been too soft on you.
What could persuade you to take off that shitty excuse for a cover-up?
" He eyed her cape. "I want to see your wings up close and personal.
I was there when he cut it away. I think of your screams often.
" He reached down, knuckles brushing over the front of his armor, drifting until they touched the space between his legs, where the suit was more flexible, the dark material of his breeches showing.
There was a bulge there, and he pressed his palm to it.
Whenever Luella thought every horror had been forced upon her, that she couldn’t possibly be more ridiculed and degraded, she was proven wrong.
"There was so much blood. I just wish you had screamed more. Strangely quiet, considering the pain you must’ve felt."
She didn’t speak, didn’t want him to hear the sound of her voice.
"No riposte? Did my master take your tongue, as well?"
Luella just… stared at him, committing his features to memory.
Her mind was addled, overcome by her slipping sanity.
Her eyes flicked over his nose, slightly hooked; his jaw, a little too sharp; his strong brow and deep-set eyes.
And she swore to remember his face, because she wouldn’t dare ask for his name.
She didn’t know what the Umbra saw in her eyes, on her face, but whatever it was, it made the male take a step back, turning sharply as he led his horse far away from her.
She was only dimly aware of another piece of the puzzle slotting into place in her mind’s eye: the Umbra weren’t under the Tenebrae’s full control.
She had seen fragments of evidence, scattered here and there. But the Tenebrae had told her not to speak to anyone, yet an Umbra had approached her. If he truly wanted to forbid it, he could have commanded it—yet he hadn’t. Their thoughts were not coalesced; there was no gestalt intellect.
It seemed even gods were not all-powerful.
She smiled, then jolted as she felt a whisper of awareness at her back. Feeling stretched thin, she slowly turned her head, only to see red eyes peering at her.
Bastian was perched on the rump of the horse, legs kicking out as his flowing dark breeches rippled in an imaginary breeze. His silken black hair was tousled, rings in his ears sparkling. Fangs flashed as he traced the tip of his tongue over the front of his teeth.
"Luella," Bastian sighed, fingers settling on the back of the saddle as his nose drifted over her hair. She saw it, but didn’t feel it.
However, her mind worked to fill in the blanks, imagining the rustle of her hair from his breath.
"You look so delectable, perched upon this steed like some sacrifice poised to be sent off into the mountains.
I wonder what awaiting monsters will greet you… "
"You’re not real," she whispered. And though her voice was a whisper, it still drew the attention of nearby Umbra. Their shadowed eyes were curious as they watched her—her head slightly turned, lips barely moving, shoulders tense, and cape bunched around her like her own fragile suit of arms.
Bastian sighed, and she swore she felt it against her back, the sound loud in the air. "When will you learn? I am as real as you believe me to be. Just think, one day you will go so mad you won’t question it anymore."
"Are you from him—the Tenebrae?" Luella could barely get the words out. She’d wondered, every time an apparition came to her, were they still being sent by the Tenebrae?
Or had her mind latched onto any sense of familiarity she could find, conjuring the images of her Vincire for some sense of comfort?
She didn’t know. Couldn’t begin to understand the way a mind worked, teetering on the cusp between sanity and insanity.
Bastian smiled, and his fangs left little dips in his plush bottom lip. "What do you think?"
A clang of metal drew her attention away from him, toward the Umbra, where the Tenebrae stalked through the crowd, eyes already upon her, brow furrowing as he spied her open lips, as if she were just in the middle of speaking to—
Luella turned back around and found the space empty. Bastian was gone.
Hands landed on her thighs. She jumped.
"Who were you talking to?" the Tenebrae demanded, black hair fluttering in the wind.
She was suddenly reminded that at one time she’d first mistaken him for Bastian.
It was evident now, the dark hair, the pale skin, but that was where the similarities ended.
Even a vampire, Bastian was warm and—and kind.
To her, at least. The god who wore the flesh of Caliban was not.
He’d turned Caliban’s warmth into a frigid pit of nothingness.
"N-no one," she managed, voice a meek whisper of air.
He did not seem convinced, but he placed his foot in the stirrup and hoisted himself atop the horse, settling close at her back. The saddle shifted and groaned, and her hands scrambled for a grip on the pommel, fingers twisting painfully.
His chest pressed into the line of her back, and she whimpered as it forced agony into her being.
His hand firmly cupped the base of her throat, digging into the collar, until her head tipped back, baring her vulnerable neck to the watching crowd of Umbra.
She jolted as he boomed into the crowd:
"My Umbra, we ride to the Lunar Temples, where I will wed the conquered Princess, Luella Eritrais of Luna."
The crowd cheered, watching with glee the position she was forced into.
Reins snapped, horses huffed, and hooves beat a trodden path against the flowers as the procession began to ride on.
The Tenebrae lingered back, lips cold against her ear, teeth dragging over the tip of it, as he whispered, "This will not be a pleasant ride. If you behave, after we are wed, I will give you a much more pleasant one."
"I don’t know what you mean…"
But Luella’s voice was drowned out by the sharp call ripped from his throat, as he snapped the reins and the horse was driven forward.
The first pounding fall of the hooves against the flower field, and she immediately knew what he’d meant.
Her entire body jolted against him, her back scraping against his chest, forced further back in the saddle, until she was nestled close against him. She shivered from the cold leaking from his flesh, even through their capes.
Pain stole her, and she gasped, head falling forward until her hair obscured her vision. She stared at the trampled flowers that passed by in a blur until she knew nothing else.
She dreamed of voices whispering to her.
Give in. Just give in. It will all be so much easier.
The voices turned to screams. And the screams turned to chaos.
Air whipped around her. Then, the air turned to blood, droplets falling from nothing. That, too, shifted to fire, crackling and burning against her skin as a trail of headless bodies chased after her.