Chapter 38 #5
"Hours," Riven confirmed, moving to stand beside me, his golden eyes burning with anticipation.
His voice was almost cheerful, which made it somehow more terrifying.
He cracked his knuckles, the sound loud in the stone room.
"Did you think this would be quick? Did you think we'd just kill you and be done with it?
" He laughed, a low, dangerous sound that echoed off the stone walls.
"You bought our mate like she was cattle.
You were going to use her, breed her, sell her offspring to the highest bidder.
And you've done the same thing to dozens of others—hundreds, maybe.
All those lives destroyed, all those families torn apart, all that suffering.
.." He leaned in close, his scarred face inches from Marcus's terrified eyes, close enough that his breath ghosted across the merchant's tear-streaked cheek.
"You're going to feel every bit of it. Every ounce of pain you've ever caused is going to be repaid tonight. "
"The omegas you bought," Vale said softly, circling around to Marcus's other side, his beautiful face serene and terrible.
His voice was musical even in human form, and somehow that made his words more chilling.
"Did you ever wonder what happened to them?
Did you ever think about the fear they felt, chained in your cages, waiting to be sold?
Did you ever hear them crying at night and feel even a moment of guilt? "
"I—I—" Marcus's teeth were chattering so hard he could barely speak, his whole body convulsing with terror. "I was just—it was just business—I didn't—"
"Just business." Thane's gentle voice had gone hard as iron, his amber eyes burning with uncharacteristic fury.
He stepped forward, and even he—the softest of us, the healer, the nurturer—looked at Marcus with nothing but cold disgust. His gentle features had transformed into something fierce and unforgiving.
"You reduced human beings to business transactions.
You bought and sold people like they were bolts of cloth.
And now you want us to believe you didn't understand what you were doing? "
"You knew," Lily's voice cut through the room, quiet but absolute.
She stepped into Marcus's line of sight, and I saw him flinch, saw the terror in his eyes multiply at the sight of her.
She moved with the predatory grace of someone who had learned to hunt, her eyes cold and ancient in her young face.
"You knew exactly what you were doing. You just didn't care, because you were making money.
Because the people you were hurting didn't matter to you. "
She moved closer, close enough to touch, and Marcus pressed himself back against the wall as if he could somehow escape through the stone. His chains rattled with his trembling.
"When my father signed that contract," Lily continued, her voice soft and conversational, almost pleasant, which made it somehow more terrifying, "I was standing right there.
I watched him take your gold. I watched him shake your hand.
I watched you look at me—look through me, really, like I wasn't even a person.
Like I was just another item on your inventory list." Her hand came up to rest against his cheek, almost gentle, and Marcus whimpered at the touch, tears streaming fresh down his face.
"I've had nightmares about that moment. About the look in your eyes when you realized you'd gotten a good deal. About the way you smiled."
She stepped back, and her hand fell away from his face. Her expression hardened into something cold and final.
"Tonight, I'm going to watch you die. And I'm going to smile too." She turned to us—to Riven and Vale and me—and nodded once, her dark eyes steady and certain.
"Make it slow," she said, her voice carrying the weight of absolute command. "Make it hurt. Make sure he feels every second."
Riven started with his fingers.
One by one, he broke them—not quickly, not cleanly, but slowly, methodically, letting each bone snap with a wet crack that echoed through the chamber.
He held each finger between his own, applying pressure gradually, letting Marcus feel the building agony before the bone finally gave way.
Marcus screamed, his voice going hoarse and ragged, his body convulsing against the chains that held him in place.
"That's for every omega you chained in your cages," Riven said, his voice calm, almost meditative, as he moved to the next finger. His golden eyes never left Marcus's face, drinking in every expression of agony. "Every person you treated like property. Every life you destroyed for profit."
When he finished with the fingers, he moved to the hands, crushing the small bones one by one, taking his time, savoring each cry of agony.
The sounds of snapping bone mixed with Marcus's screams in a terrible symphony.
I watched Marcus's face contort with pain, watched the tears stream down his cheeks, watched the snot bubble from his nose as he sobbed and begged and pleaded for mercy that would never come.
Vale took over next.
His approach was different—more precise, more surgical.
He had a knife, taken from one of the fallen guards, and he used it with terrible expertise, cutting thin lines across Marcus's chest and arms and legs.
Not deep enough to kill, not even deep enough to cause serious damage.
Just deep enough to hurt. Just deep enough to bleed.
His silver eyes were focused, intent, an artist at work.
"This is for every moment of fear," Vale murmured, his voice soft as silk, his silver eyes fixed on his work with concentration.
The knife moved with delicate precision, opening red lines across pale skin.
"Every night an omega spent in your cages, wondering what would happen to them.
Every time they heard your footsteps and felt their hearts stop with terror.
" Another cut, another scream, another thin ribbon of blood running down Marcus's trembling body.
"Every tear they shed, every prayer they whispered, every hope that died inside them. "
The blood ran down Marcus's body in thin rivulets, pooling on the floor beneath his feet in a spreading crimson puddle.
He'd stopped trying to beg, stopped trying to speak at all.
The only sounds he made now were raw, animal screams that seemed to tear themselves from his throat without any conscious thought.
When Vale stepped back, his knife dripping red, I moved forward.
"Look at me," I commanded, and something in my voice made Marcus's eyes snap open, made his head lift despite the agony consuming him.
My voice carried the weight of centuries, the absolute authority of a pack leader.
"I want you to understand something. I want you to truly comprehend it, in whatever remains of your mind. "
I leaned in close, close enough that my breath ghosted across his blood-streaked face, close enough to see every burst blood vessel in his eyes, every tear track cutting through the grime on his cheeks.
"You are going to die tonight," I said quietly, my voice soft but absolute.
"That is certain. There is nothing you can say, nothing you can offer, nothing you can do that will change that.
But before you die, I want you to know why.
I want you to understand, with perfect clarity, exactly what brought you to this moment. "
I straightened, looking down at the broken creature hanging from the chains, at the ruin we had made of him.
"You saw an omega girl and you saw profit. You looked at a person—a living, breathing, feeling person—and you saw nothing but gold. You bought her from her own parents, and you were going to sell her to the highest bidder, and you never once thought of her as anything more than merchandise."
My claws extended—even in human form, I could manage that much—and I drew them slowly down his chest, opening four parallel wounds that welled with dark blood. Marcus screamed again, the sound raw and broken.
"But she wasn't merchandise. She was ours. Our mate. Our pack. Our everything." My voice dropped to a whisper, cold and absolute. "You tried to take her from us. For that, Marcus, there is no punishment severe enough."
I stepped back, letting Thane move forward.
Gentle Thane, who healed instead of harmed, who soothed instead of struck. But tonight, his gentle hands held no comfort. His amber eyes burned with cold fire, and his gentle features had hardened into something unrecognizable.
"I'm going to keep you alive," Thane said quietly, his voice flat and merciless in a way I'd never heard from him. "Every time you get close to dying, I'm going to pull you back. I'm going to make sure you feel every moment of what's coming. Every second of pain."
Marcus's eyes went wide with fresh horror as he understood. Not just torture, but prolonged torture. No escape into unconsciousness, no relief of death. His mouth worked soundlessly, trying to form words that wouldn't come.
"No," he finally managed, his voice a broken rasp. "No, please, just kill me. Please, just end it—"
"You can endure more than you think," Riven said, moving forward again, his claws fully extended, gleaming in the lamplight. His scarred face was split in a terrible smile. "You will. For as long as we decide."
What followed was beyond anything Marcus could have imagined.
Riven worked on him with claws and fists, breaking bones and tearing flesh, while Thane hovered nearby, using his gift to keep Marcus alive, conscious, present for every moment.
Vale continued his precise cuts, opening new wounds whenever the old ones threatened to close, keeping the blood flowing, the pain fresh.