Chapter 34
Chapter Thirty-Four
Thea
The arms that circled my waist were like a vice as they pulled me tightly against a firm chest. I hissed my frustration, throwing all my weight into kicking and stomping, but those arms only tightened further, squeezing against my rib cage until it felt like I couldn’t breathe.
Nessira burst from the woods only moments after me, taking in the scene in an instant before immediately moving to sprint towards me. My name was a desperate cry from her lips as her hands sparked into burning plumes of orange flame.
I struggled to keep my breathing steady as I glanced wildly around us, taking in the five men that seemed to surround us from all angles.
“No!” I wailed, just as the man to her left threw out his fist.
His blow connected with Nessira’s jaw with such merciless force that her body went flying to the ground. All the air in my lungs seemed to escape in a single shuddered gasp as I watched her crash down.
The only sound she made was a whimper before she attempted to push back to her feet.
“Take care of the beasts,” the man holding me ordered. Numbly, I recognized the voice as George’s as he leaned his head down to mine, “You are going to make me a fortune, little lady.”
I craned my neck as far away as I could. His breath was uncomfortably hot against my cheek, reeking of something rotten, as he laughed at Nessira struggling to find her balance. She pushed up, only to fall again.
“What about this one?” his companion demanded, staring down at Nessira with a predatory hunger. Without warning, he snapped down, grabbing her hair and pulling her up to her knees. She cried out, magic flooding instantly to her fingertips again as she clawed against his hold.
The fire caught on his shirtsleeve, and he released her instantly, desperately patting out the flames while stringing together an arrangement of expletives that made my stomach turn. Nessira rushed to her feet again, still awkwardly off balance from the blow to her head.
“Run!” I told her.
George throttled me, nearly lifting my feet off the ground as he did. “Shut up!”
Still, I implored her with my eyes to flee, to get out of here while she still had the chance.
They wanted me alive in order to claim their prize at the castle.
They wouldn't hurt me, at least not badly.
If Nessira escaped now, she could still go to Eagirton.
She could find Clay and the others and bring help.
But Nessira’s eyes nervously flickered to the men flanking her before she swallowed, squared her feet, and locked her attention on George.
“Let her go!” she demanded, sparks lighting near her fingertips.
I felt his chest rise and fall behind me as he released a taunting laugh.
She lifted her hands in front of her.
And it felt as if the ground fell out from under me as the men moved all at once.
George yanked me further back away from her as my feet skid in the dirt.
Wildly, I thrashed within his grasp, my nails digging deeply into his forearms as the two men on either side of Nessira lurched towards her.
She twisted to her left, fire snaking down her arm and flying towards the thin, sandy-haired man who ran at her.
All the while, the taller man with a rounded belly and crooked nose stepped casually behind her and wrapped his arm around her throat, cutting off any air supply.
“Nessira!” I cried, heart pounding in an unnatural rhythm within my chest.
“We don’t get any coins for turning you over,” the man spat down at her, pulling so tightly that her features turned purple.
I screamed—wordless, unintelligible sounds—pulling as hard as I could against the arms around my belly to get to her.
George only tightened his grip on me further, his voice falling over me like an inky mist. “Just kill her. We only need the blonde.”
The order sounded distorted to my ears, as if I had heard it through a tunnel.
Across the distance that separated us, Nessira and I locked eyes. Her jaw dropped open in a picture of pure, unimaginable terror.
No!
I couldn’t lose her. I couldn’t lose another friend.
“Don’t touch her!” I howled, not even recognizing my voice.
The man holding Nessira watched me with a slimy smile.
“Or what?” George mocked over my shoulder. “How are you going to stop us?”
His friend laughed, pressing his chapped lips against the crown of Nessira’s head. “We can do whatever we want, and there’s not a damn thing you can do about it.”
If it were possible for time to slow, I felt it happen then.
Nessira held my gaze, both of us desperately struggling against the men who held us. Tiny bits of flame sparked at the tips of her fingers but quickly extinguished. She’d exhausted everything she had trying to save me, and she gave a heart-wrenching whimper as she realized that.
Terror and rage poured through me, making my heartbeat a steady drum that bled away any other sound.
I screamed.
I cried.
I kicked.
I scratched.
I fought for my power. I practically ripped myself apart from the inside out as I searched for it—for any small piece of it.
What kind of Goddess was I if I couldn’t save anyone I loved?
Nessira watched me through it all, the fear on her face melting away. Her body slackened, her eyes sparkled with acceptance.
“Run,” she breathed. “So you can save the realm.”
“No.” Shaking my head from side to side, I refused to accept this.
It was far easier to rage against myself than to find the peace that she had somehow reached. My useless magic had abandoned me once more. It had come to the surface so briefly when I pushed away Caldrius only to flee from my grasp once more when I needed it.
And I loathed it for doing that.
I loathed myself for not being able to find it because I was so tired of being so fucking powerless.
“Just let her go! I’m the one he wants! Let her go!” The words slurred together, muddied by my tears.
George’s skin tore under my nails, blood seeping over my fingers, as I desperately tried to break free of his grasp. He hissed at me, but didn’t release me.
In the end, none of my screams or pleas worked.
None of it stopped that man from wrapping his meaty fingers around Nessira’s chin and pulling.
I didn’t even hear the moment her neck snapped. My own unending bloodcurdling screams drowned out the sound.
And that agony consumed me.
Two days. In just two days' time I had lost two of the only people I could trust. Two friends. Dimitri and Nessira had both died right before my eyes and I'd been helpless to stop either of those atrocities.
So, I screamed. That was all I could do.
“Oh, would you shut up!”
The ground flew towards me, far too fast for me to catch myself, as George threw me down. Before I knew it, his boot was soaring through the air, slamming into my gut. The impact was shocking, locking my body so tightly that I could neither breathe in nor release the air that was trapped inside me.
And then it happened again.
Fingers folded themselves into my hair, tearing at my scalp as they ripped me up.
It was all too much. The sun was so bright it stung my eyes. The movement was so fast it left me nauseous. The physical pain was so consuming that I couldn’t move.
The emotional agony was so sharp that I couldn’t think.
Another friend. I’d lost another friend.
And it was my fault all over again.
Nessira. Dimitri. Lorelai.
Maybe I truly was nothing more than the daughter of Death, cursed to drag anyone who cared for me into the Underworld.
“You’re going to behave now, aren’t you?” George demanded, his face filling my blurred vision.
He was an ugly man. His features were proportional enough—a round chin, rosy cheeks, and tangled brown hair—but his soul shone through his eyes.
I could see the evilness that lingered in the depths inside him, and I knew that if I was, indeed, a curse on this land, then I wanted him to be another person who would suffer me.
I spat in his face.
I had enough sense to close my eyes before his fist connected with my cheek, but my ears still rang out as the world rocked underneath me. Tears fell instantly, their salty flow merging with the blood that dripped from my lip.
Once wasn’t enough, though. Once was never enough for men like these.
Once, I had thought that the Dragon was the worst villain in this world, but I’d been wrong.
Him. Hyrax. George.
They were all the same deep down. They were all insecure creatures that needed to cause another soul pain to feel important about themselves.
He didn’t even want to hurt me, not really. He didn’t know me. I was just a tool for him to feel powerful.
It was a bit ironic. I had gone from being the most powerful person in the Mortal Realm, to making others feel powerful by degrading me.
It didn’t hurt as badly when he hit me a second time.
When he hit me for the third and final time, I hardly even felt it at all.
The brutality of it went on and on. My ribs snapped. My lip split again. My left eye swelled shut. I was nothing more than a vessel for him to release his anger upon.
George gripped my face in his hand, forcing me to meet his eyes.
“You’ll behave now.”
Not a question. Not even an order. Just a simple observation of a fact that we both knew was true.
There wasn’t any strength left in me to fight when he lifted me from the ground and threw me over his shoulder. Even if I had wanted to keep fighting, my limbs wouldn’t move. All I could do was exist in the pain that had taken over my every sensation.
“You’ll die for this,” I murmured through swollen lips.
He laughed.
But as he began joking with the other men, musing on what he’d spend his money on, I took comfort in that promise.
When George returned me to Hyrax, and the God saw me covered in bruises and broken inside, Hyrax would kill him instantly.
Or Caldrius would.
And if, by some miracle, they didn’t, then the day would come when my powers returned and I would personally make him suffer for what he’d done to Nessira.
Either way, he would die, and I was going to be the reason why.
Two thunderclaps pounded in the sky as if the realm itself sealed that vow.
“Did you kill all the monsters in the woods?” George asked someone I couldn’t see.
“Most,” a voice answered. “The rest won’t come into the village for a while since they have that girl’s body to feast on.”