Chapter 6
Sage
“S he looks like him,” Empress Avena said, her voice a soft whisper as her fingertips passed over my face, mapping the architecture of my bones. “It’s the nose.”
I couldn’t feel any of it.
“What do you plan to do with her . . . after?” Victor rasped, his words rattling from deep within his chest. He was bent over my vessel, a chisel in one hand and a small hammer in the other. He tapped it along my skin, working on the tattered flesh and gaping wound in my chest, caused from . . .
I searched for an answer but found none.
“I suppose that depends on her memories. If she succeeded at her task, then I will reward her. However, if she failed, I will have her soul crushed, once and for all,” the empress said as she brushed a strand of hair behind my ear.
“You delude yourself with false hope,” Victor said as he turned toward a tray, his ichor-covered fingers passing over top of the different tools.
“I do not need to look at her memories to know how things must have played out with Nockrythiam, all factors considered.” Selecting a chisel with a smaller point, he went back to work. Tap. Tap. Tap .
The empress looked up at Victor, her eyes full of fire, her features twisting in anger.
She hissed, “I do not delude myself at all. I set all the pieces perfectly. I was the one who infiltrated the minds of the Spinners, whispering to them that a new king was coming. I was the one who had Nockrythiam dethroned, handing his two favorite realms over to the New Gods we created. And then I sent her . I placed Aurelius’s heart in her chest, knowing the organ would sway her every thought.
I pitted her and Nockrythiam against one another.
I did everything right to ensure that she would succeed at her task.
That she would kill Nockrythiam and send his soul back to me. ”
“You do not need to remind me. I was there through it all. But have you forgotten, Avena? Despite all of the things you did to ensure success, she still had a child with him,” Victor countered.
Something tugged at the inside of my vessel, the slightest feeling. Like the tick of a finger. But it was gone as fast as it came.
“That doesn’t mean anything.” The empress glanced down at me. “He could have easily forced her. Nockrythiam was a ruthless beast after all.”
“Oh, I doubt that,” Victor disagreed, looking up from his work. His tongue pressed into the corner of his mouth, rubbing against it. “She probably couldn’t keep her legs closed.”
The empress’s nostrils flared, but she said nothing. “How much longer?”
“She’s done,” Victor answered as he tossed his tools onto his tray.
“Good,” the empress stated. Bolts of lightning burst from the corners of her eyes, streaking outwards, sparking then vanishing. She plunged her hand into my chest, her fingers rooting around, searching for something.
From inside my frozen vessel, there came a sound—a scraping of metal on metal. Like coins grinding against one another inside a cloth purse.
She pulled her hand from my chest and flattened her palm, studying the strange bits of broken, silver shards. She raised them to her mouth, her eyes glowing even brighter. Her lips pressed together, and she blew on them—the swirls of air visible.
The shattered remnants began to glow. Then, they began to move.
They rose from her palm, swirling and twirling, dancing with one another as they began to line themselves up.
It was like watching a circular jigsaw puzzle put itself back together, the strange pieces trying to fit in this spot then that, until finally, they sealed together, creating a perfectly round, silver ball.
The empress shifted her glowing, sparking, electric eyes to mine, and then she shoved her hand back into my lifeless body .
At first, I felt nothing.
And then, I felt everything .
A drum began to beat inside me, growing louder and stronger, forcing ichor to pass through my shattered veins, healing them with each strike.
My lungs, once tattered and torn but now healed, instinctually looked for oxygen, but there was none to be found.
Desperation clutched at me. I felt like a drowning person on the verge of losing consciousness.
Panicking, I tried to breathe in, but instead of air, it felt like I filled my lungs with water.
It was heavy, so heavy, and it dragged me under until blackness swept over me.
Was this the end?
A bloodcurdling scream tore its way out of me, and my eyelids sprung open. I jerked upright and began to vomit over the side of the altar. The retching did not cease as my body expelled a briny, watery substance.
A cool hand slid over my heated skin, rubbing my back in gentle movements. “That’s it. Let it all out,” the empress spoke softly, her voice melodic.
A string of saliva dribbled down my chin, stretching at the command of gravity’s pull, until it snapped and dripped into the clear vomit below.
When the violent clenching of my stomach began to subside, I rolled over, my body shaking and dappled with beads of sweat.
Panting, I looked up into the eyes of the empress.
“Now, shall we see if you completed your task?” she asked, her voice calm and serene, like the glass top of a lake, untouched by wind. She pinched at something in the middle of my forehead, pulling a strange material from my body, like a layer of organza that had been tightly wrapped around me.
Memories stampeded into my thoughts, shoving me backwards, back to him .
Polished floors emerged beneath me, glistening with bits of broken chandelier. The underlayers of my decadent gown sounded against one another as we swayed back and forth to the enchanting, dark melody—a symphony of death.
I looked up into the eyes of my soul’s other half. My mate. My love.
My safe haven.
Amazing, isn’t it? he mused, the heat of his breath caressing the shell of my ear. How responsive you are to my touch. He spun me away from him, our hands disconnecting. A cavernous mouth, forged of shadows and obsidian, stretched wide and swallowed him whole.
“Von!” I cried out, reaching for him as he disappeared along with the rest of the ballroom.
I’m right here, he spoke from behind me.
His voice calmed my frantic heart.
Walls and floors, forged from black glass, stretched before me. I turned to him, tears brimming in the corners of my eyes. He held my gaze, surveying my tears before his attention drifted to my hand, his beautiful face fracturing with concern.
I looked down, finding a thin linen tenderly wrapped around my finger.
Goddess, please, I can scent your ichor. It is a fresh wound. Let me see it , he said, his voice almost . . . pleading. He held out a tattooed hand, and I almost went to put mine in his, but I stopped.
“Von, this is a memory,” I said, looking around us, trying to find a way out. The obsidian walls began to breathe, pulsing in and out, in and out. Then, they started to move. My eyes stretched wide—they were closing in on us!
Panicked, I turned to Von. “We need to get out of here.”
It needs to be set, he said, his attention locked on my broken finger.
I promise to be as gentle as I possibly can.
Carefully, he grasped the end of my crooked finger.
When his lips came crashing down on mine, my world was enraptured in his dark flames.
My finger made a loud noise as the bone was snapped back into place.
That sound repeated, growing louder and louder as it began to shift from a clicking into—
The headboard tapped against the wall in slow, rhythmic movements as I lay beneath my mate, my legs wrapped around him, our bodies connected as he drove into me with delicious, long, sensual strokes.
With each one, he etched his name into my bones, carving himself into me with heartbreaking gentleness.
Tonight, he had taken his time with me, his lips leaving no part of my body untouched.
Tonight, he had worshipped me, treating me as if I were a sacred temple.
And tonight? Tonight, I wanted all of him.
Are you sure? Von asked, forest-green eyes locked with mine. His wild black mane tumbled over his broad, inky shoulders, spilling around me. A slender braid, the one that had my feather tied into the end, swayed with each rhythmic thrust.
“I am. I want this,” I reassured him, my hands grazing down the length of his powerful, masculine arms, the muscles taut as I melted beneath him. My body was soft and pliable, molding to his hardness.
A smile, brighter than I had ever seen before, crested on his full, beautiful lips.
I want this as well, he pledged softly, his hand drifting between my breasts, lowering down my torso to the flat of my stomach.
His large hand spanned over my abdomen. You are going to make such an incredible mother.
It’s a shame you won’t ever become one , snarled a heavily accented voice—
Nicholas.
The bed dissolved beneath me, and I began to fall.
Sage! Von yelled in desperation as he reached for me and I for him.
A hand, forged from bone-breaking strength, clamped around my wrist, pulling it down, pulling me onto another bed, but this one was not wrapped in black silk.
No, it was made of lies and deceit and pain—so much pain.
Aurelius’s body shoved against mine as he drilled his fingers into my jaw, forcing it to open.
Leaning forward, he filled my mouth with his ichor, and then he clamped his hand over my lips, making me swallow the taste of him down.
Welcome back , Aurelia , he said as his forceful knees wedged my compliant legs apart. He pressed himself into me, stealing everything I thought I knew about myself in one painful thrust. Without permission. Without consent.
Tears welled in my eyes.
Make it stop. Make it stop.
“Make it fucking stop!” a voice screamed. My voice.
Something hard pressed into my hand—
A blade.
The Blade of Moram.
It was enough. It would free me from him. From this.
I turned it on him—on me. I would sacrifice it all to make this stop.
Please do not leave me again, Little Goddess, Von yelled from somewhere in the distance. His voice was a powerful tidal wave, breaching my shores and flooding me with emotion.
“Von,” I cried out as the blade dissolved from my hand.
Aurelius’s body split in two, falling to the sides like two pieces of cloth. A scream tore out of me as Nicholas emerged in the middle, his hand shooting out for me.
Von’s not coming to save you this time, Nicholas sneered as he grabbed my wrist and tossed me over his shoulder.
“Nicholas, wait,” I pleaded as he walked us out of the bedroom and into a courtyard, toward a tree with crisp, snow-white leaves.
The hairs on the back of my neck raised.
I could feel myself being pulled toward it.
“No!” I sobbed.
It couldn’t end like this .
I never got the chance to tell Von about our—
“And so, I have my answer,” the empress snarled through clenched teeth, her voice unceremoniously dragging me back to the present.
I was lying on a cold, hard slab of stone, in a strange room, filled with horrifying tools and eerie objects.
The empress looked down at me, her voice filled with disappointment. “You have failed at your task, child, which means you are no longer of use to me. Your soul will be destroyed among the sands, your existence erased forevermore.”
Child . The word slammed into me.
I looked down at my torso, at the hardened plains of my stomach, my trembling fingers snaking their way across my empty abdomen.
Empty.
My heart fractured, the hairline crack snaking its way through the middle. Then, it shattered. Into thousands of tiny, tiny, tiny pieces. So small, even time itself could not make them fit like they had before.
I was forever changed. Forever broken .
A deep, low-pitched sound grew from the back of my throat, growing and growing until it turned into a screaming sob. I collapsed onto my side, wrapping my arms around my naked frame as I curled into myself.
Voices blurred over top of me, the sounds fading in and out, warring with the ringing in my ears, warring with my mangled mental state as I sobbed for the loss of our child. Any concern for my own safety was forgotten as I fell into the depths of this cold and bitter truth.
Von and I had been so close to having the family we dreamed of. We had been so close, and Nicholas had robbed us of it. Of our child. Of our future. Of everything .
Another scream tore out of me, my cheeks scalding hot against my river of tears.
Hands grabbed hold of me, forcing me onto my back.
I didn’t fight them. Why would I?
What did I have left to fight for?
I felt a prick of pain in my arm, and I turned my head to the side.
Through bloodshot eyes, I saw a blurry figure standing beside me. In their hand was a strange cylindrical glass device with a sewing needle pressed into the end. The sewing needle was stuck in my arm. Their thumb pushed on the end and whatever liquid was inside the glass began to disappear.
Slowly, warmth began to spread over my body, like a comforting blanket slowly being pulled over top of me. It chased away the pain, the torture. And filled me with a sense of . . . peace.
Willfully, I handed myself over.