Chapter 43 Devora
Devora
The knock at my door nearly made me jump out of my skin.
Everything made me skittish lately. For good reason. I was living one hour to the next in this creepy mansion of doom, worried I was either going to be arrested one second or ambushed the next.
I could still see those young men and women fighting in that ring from last night, could still smell their blood and hear the roar of the crowd. I could still feel Scarven’s hands winding their way up my back, his lips pressed to mine and his hot breath in my ear.
I wanted to burn the memories away. I wanted to wipe every touch from my skin.
“Ready, Selena?” Scarven’s rich voice called out.
In another life, it would’ve been the kind of voice I was drawn to.
Deep, authoritarian, smooth like honey. But in this life, it made me shudder.
It made me miss a different voice. One just as deep, but with an arrogant playfulness, a roughness around the edges I wanted to fall into.
“Coming.” I hastily tucked the enchanted parchment under my pillow and laced up my boots.
When I opened the door, I found Scarven waiting for me in black slacks and a crisp button-down shirt.
His freshly trimmed beard was shaved close to his jawline, and those dark eyes sparkled back at me with a hint of desire and malice all in one.
“Are we going somewhere tonight?” I asked.
He raised an eyebrow. “I was under the impression you wanted to see more of my passion projects, as I call them.”
That term made me sick. But I pasted on a smile and took his outstretched arm. “I didn’t think it would be so soon.”
“You gave me a very compelling reason not to wait.” He covered my hand with his as we walked. It felt like a clamp. Something holding me down, something to claim me as his.
He guided me down the corridors of the guest wing, always staying half a step ahead, subtly pulling me along.
We walked through the main entrance hall, down several more corridors, and up even more sets of stairs.
Just when I was beginning to think he was taking me in circles, the stairs emptied onto a new landing.
We stood before a wide hallway, with a huge tapestry of a lion staring me straight in the face.
By the look of the gold-plated doors and crown moldings, the lush rug running down the length of the corridor, and the two lion-masked guards at the top of the stairs, I would bet anything this was Scarven’s personal wing.
My stomach immediately clenched. Why was he bringing me to his bedchambers? This couldn’t possibly be where he kept his “tests.” I tried to stop my heart from hammering in my chest, even though I knew he could hear it from a mile away.
“Relax, love,” he said. “I want to show you something.”
He strode straight to the tapestry of the lion at the end of the hall. I followed hesitantly, my trepidation growing with every step.
He stood, staring at the image with his head cocked in a feline way. Then he took a small blade from his pocket, swiped it along his palm, and pressed his bloody hand to the lion’s maw.
I blinked. What just happened?
Before I could ask, the lion’s mouth started to grow.
Shaking my head, I rubbed my eyes to clear away the vision. But when I looked again, its mouth had only gotten wider. It stretched and elongated, and I felt my face contort with both disgust and intrigue at the disfigured lion. Within seconds, the opening was wide enough to fit a person.
Scarven held out an arm. “After you. Be careful—the first time traveling by portal is quite a shock.”
“A what?” I looked at him, then back at the lion’s mouth. “I’m supposed to walk through that?”
He chuckled. “It won’t hurt you. It’s a magical entrance to my underground labs and office. Can’t have just anyone waltzing in, now can I?”
I furrowed my brow and looked at the cut on his hand, which was already fading to a faint pink mark. His blood must be what opened this “portal.” Why else would he have to cut himself?
That certainly complicated things for coming back. I doubted Scarven went around giving others his blood for fun.
He was waiting for me to enter, so I straightened my shoulders and stepped into the darkness of the lion’s mouth.
It was like walking under a waterfall of ice. My breath caught in my throat, my skin so cold, I could barely move. I gasped at the sensation as the portal swallowed me whole, then spat me out onto a rough stone surface. Scarven gracefully appeared at my side, completely unfazed.
“Welcome to the Hollow,” he said.
I swallowed hard, trying to hide my shock. The Hollow. Not only was there an entrance at the stables, but inside the mansion too—through his private quarters.
We were in some sort of lab. Gray-and-cream marbled stone surrounded us on all sides, with bookshelves and cabinets along every inch of wall space, save for two doors. A large table sat in the center of the room, where a man in a white coat hunched over a notebook and three thin glass vials.
The man straightened at our arrival, and a shiver went down my spine when his eyes met mine.
From this distance, they looked pure white, with a small black pupil in the middle.
The area around them was rimmed in smudged kohl, making the rest of his fair skin look even more pallid.
A mane of black hair billowed around his face and past his chin. He appeared to be in his forties.
“Lord Scarven,” he said, his voice quiet and measured. “I see you’ve brought a guest.” His stare never left mine, his features blank as he tilted his head and peered at me. I quickly looked away.
“Malek, this is Miss Selena Nyte, a member of the Mysthelm contingency. Selena, meet Malek Mortep, my lead Alchemist and trusted advisor.” Scarven nodded to the Alchemist.
Sure, because why wouldn’t the creepy mansion of doom also have a creepy mad Alchemist?
“It’s nice to meet you.” I inclined my head to Malek.
He simply hummed. “I’m sure we’ll be seeing more of each other, Miss Nyte.”
Over my dead body.
On second thought, that probably wasn’t too far from the realm of possibility.
“Let’s leave Malek to his work,” Scarven said, taking my arm. “He’s developing a special serum for me now. But that’s not what I wanted to show you.” He turned us to the door on our left, fished a key out of his pocket, and inserted it into the padlock.
Behind the door was another large room, more of an office than a lab. A pine desk was situated against the back wall, with a leather wingback chair pushed into it. Other than that, a bookshelf, and a locked cabinet, the only items in the room were what hung from the walls.
I had to blink to take it all in, tamping down a look of horror.
There were drawings. Dozens and dozens of drawings, diagrams, and charts. Some mere sketches—dark, jagged lines of charcoal—and some were in full color, bright and glaring.
All were of his experiments.
A man with his chest cut open and a glowing green heart suspended in the middle.
Flayed skin with runes drawn on the surface.
A diagram of a body strapped to a table with what looked suspiciously like shadows being ripped from the skin by hooks.
A floating head with the eyes sewn shut.
Men, women, and children with burn marks and lacerations spread across their bodies.
Drawing after drawing after drawing, all depicting his prisoners. I wanted to vomit. But I could feel him gazing at me, studying me like one of his test subjects. Weighing the results. If I gave any undesirable response, my chance to find out more would be gone.
“You’ve been busy, my lord,” I said, refusing to meet his eyes.
“Power takes knowledge, and knowledge takes time. I’ve always been interested in how our bodies and magic work.
” He brandished an arm toward the diagrams and charts with pride.
“For the past three centuries since the Fates gave us our power, we’ve been limited, confined to the magic of our respective provinces.
Nobody has ever bothered to seek beyond these boundaries.
But who decides what power we possess? The Fates?
Our own blood?” He laughed. “Nobody tells me what magic I can and cannot wield. Not anymore.”
I raised an eyebrow at him. “One might think you consider yourself a Fate.”
“Not a Fate. Simply a man who knows how to get what he wants.”
I took a step closer to the nearest wall. “I never even knew something like this was possible.” I forced awe into my tone. “You and your Alchemist can do all of this?”
He nodded. “I’m not too proud to admit that Alchemy may be the most powerful of all.
But it’s also the most underused. They use their abilities to what, make tea?
Light fires? Mix their little potions? They have no idea.
” He shook his head. “We have created entirely new powers with Alchemy. Gone to the edge of mankind and back again, reshaping what it means to be a Veridian. If you can find just the right combination, pair it with just the right spell, be willing to go just a little further than magic permits, then you can do whatever you want. Be whoever you want.”
A chill swept down my spine as I took in his words, then squinted to read the inscriptions below some of the images.
A teenage boy with symbols carved into each of his limbs—fire, water, a mountain, and wings. The expression on his face was frozen in agony. Beneath it read:
Ten drops of Alchemist blood mixed with fatesprig, dandelion, bay leaf, and blue vervain, injected into a Strider subject. Results of elemental magic test: chaotic, unstable.
There was another, a girl no older than ten, with red veins and pale skin that glowed like the sun was bursting inside of her. The note read:
Ten drops of Lightbender blood infused with vireroot, injected into the bone. Results of latent light magic test: bones now fragile and emitting internal Lightbender magic. Active.
Then one with three subjects, two male and one female, standing hand to hand. The note beneath said:
Linked using bonding spell and injected with three vials of Alchemist blood and crushed ashgrave. Results of coupling test: magical signatures have been forcibly paired. Physical symptoms are duplicated across all test subjects.
On and on it went. Dozens of tests, if not hundreds, all on display like some sort of morbid art gallery.
It was sick. Twisted. The results of a corrupt, cruel mind that would stop at nothing to gain power.
To gain control. That was what this was—Scarven wanted to control this magic, to be a deity among men.
And he took joy in it. He reveled in the pain of these people, torturing them and then watching them either die in his lab or in his fighting ring like animals.
I imagined Nox and Everett as one of the images on these walls, and I had to clench my hands at my sides. They had been through this. They had worn these chains and suffered in these cells.
I struggled to clear my mind and focus on what I could take away from this to help.
There was one piece of long parchment on the wall that caught my eye, with rows and rows of drawings of various herbs.
Some I’d heard of, like amaranth and thistle.
At the bottom was fatesprig—I recognized the four green leaves with their sharp tips.
There were a couple of others next to it that I’d never seen before.
“I don’t know some of these names,” I said, running a finger along the word “fatesprig” on one of the drawings, then “ashgrave” on the one next to it. “Are they flowers or something?”
“Or something,” Scarven said. He came up next to me, his chest brushing my side. He fingered the edge of the fatesprig sketch. “I’m surprised you don’t recognize this one.”
My heart beat a little faster, paranoia seeping through me. “Why should I?”
“Because it’s found in your kingdom.”
I blinked. Right. “I’ve hardly left the North Territory of Mysthelm, to be honest. Where does it grow?”
“The island. We learned of its existence only a handful of years ago. It reacts with Veridian blood in a way no other element has before. Just as these do,” he added, pointing to the two herbs next to the fatesprig. One was marked ashgrave, and one said vireroot.
“Are these from Mysthelm too?” I asked.
There was that chuckle again. It sounded more and more condescending every time. “Did you think the Veridian Empire and Mysthelm were the only two lands out there for us to draw inspiration from?”
I whirled to face him. I didn’t even have to act surprised this time. “I—I don’t know. I’ve heard people allude to there being more out there, but not many have explored the rest of the world.”
There were whispers of places beyond ours.
Uninhabited islands, continents ruled by less sophisticated groups, lost kingdoms outside our realm.
But there had hardly been any proof. No records, no communication.
For as long as our history could remember, the focus had been on the Veridian Empire and Mysthelm.
Was he saying he’d been to these places? That some of his herbs came from there?
His fingers slid from the drawing to my hand. “I didn’t think you came here for a geography lesson, Miss Nyte,” he murmured, leaning closer.
I closed my eyes and swallowed the lump in my throat. His lips moved down my neck, and I clenched my hand in a fist so tight, I thought I drew blood.
Blood.
An idea hit me. A stupid, reckless idea.
My specialty.
“Can’t blame a girl for trying,” I said as I wound my arms around his neck and pulled his lips to mine.
When his hands fell to my waist, I slid my tongue along his lips and nipped the bottom one—quick and light, just testing the waters. He responded by seizing the back of my neck, threading his fingers through my hair. I balled my fist in the top of his shirt right as I bit down on his lip again.
Hard.
A copper tang met my tongue.
I gasped and pulled away, wiping my lips with the back of my hand. “I’m so sorry, my lord,” I said, feigning embarrassment.
“No need to apologize,” he said, already leaning in again. “It’s just a little blood.”
As his lips met mine once more, a scream rang through the hall, coming from the other side of the door.
“What was that?” I asked sharply.
He glanced at the door with a scowl. “Nothing Malek and I can’t deal with.” Straightening his shirt, he let out a sigh. “Come, I suppose we better get you back to the main house.”
He swiftly led me back into the portal to his private quarters. He instructed one of his guards to see me to my room, but before he left, he yanked me closer.
His lips found my ear as he said, his voice low and heavy, “This isn’t finished, Selena.”
A promise. A warning.
It didn’t matter. I got what I needed.
When he vanished back to the Hollow, I looked down at the small streak of red on the back of my hand and smiled.