Chapter 33 #2
“You’re okay,” she said, forcing him to focus on her. The crimson shine of her pupils glowed hypnotically. “You slipped back here and fell. You were alone and scared and ran back inside. That’s all.”
“I-I fell. I’m clumsy like that.” The man smiled as she released him.
He stumbled and ran past me, still holding his throat.
I adjusted the flat cap on my head but didn’t have a chance to congratulate her before her lips slammed against mine.
It was a forceful yet chaste kiss. I grunted as her arms squeezed me tight.
She did not yet realize how strong she was.
“I did it!” she exclaimed, her smile bright.
It took me a moment to even remember what she was talking about. She did that to me every fucking time, sneaking past barriers no one else had ever breached.
“Yes. You did.” I felt myself smile, and shock flowed into me. When was the last time I’d smiled? Certainly long before I’d been sealed away in the pit. “Now you will be able to feed without leaving bodies in your wake.”
She nodded and glanced behind me, tracking the fleeing man.
“I like the way it makes me feel,” she whispered.
“Feeding?” I asked, my hands resting on her hips.
“Yes, I thought I’d hate it, but if I can control it,” a small tremor went through her, “it’s exciting.”
I tipped her chin up. “You will need more practice. You have to be careful not to overindulge. Where I am from, a single Ig’Morruthen could destroy an entire city if they became lost in blood lust.”
“Lust?” she practically purred, running her hands over my chest. “Yes, I feel that, too. Is that normal?”
“Very.”
“I guess I need more practice then.”
Her eyes burned ruby red. She pushed up on tiptoe, her hand cupping the back of my head as she lifted her lips to mine.
I wrapped my arms around her, one hand tangling in her long hair.
My mouth took hers, my fingers fisting in her curls, holding her in the kiss.
I slipped into the inbetween, taking her while I could.
I knew I couldn’t keep her, but damn the old gods, I would try.
We made it back to the small stronghold on the newly formed island. We walked into the crumbling building we had been calling home. She flipped a coin, the smell of blood overriding the scent of metal. She smiled up at me and tossed it to me.
“What’s this?”
She shrugged. “A souvenir. For tonight. Something we can remember it by.”
“Why?”
She shook her head. “Where I am from, gifts for those you care about mean something. You helped me and keep helping me. So thanks.”
I curled my fingers tightly around the coin. A flicker of some emotion brushed against me, and the beast inside me hummed. An emotion I no longer recognized stirred to life, soothing something long broken in me.
I reached out and brushed my fingers along the silken curve of her cheek. “Okay.”
She pressed a kiss to my palm, her eyes warm. “I am going to go wash up.” She disappeared into the small bathroom. I opened my fingers and stared at the coin.
I felt the darkness near me tear.
“What are you doing?” Alistair glanced at my hands.
“What do you mean?”
“You smell like her.”
“That’s because I fucked her in an alley. Why would I not?”
“You know what I mean.”
The stench of death filled the room as Tobias appeared at my side. “You’re infatuated with her,” he sneered.
“She is a beautiful girl, yes.”
Tobias scoffed. “She is not yours.”
Rage erupted in my gut, and I slipped the coin into my pocket. “I made her. She’s mine.”
“That is not how this works. You cannot keep her. That’s not the plan. It never was. You changed her. It’s different. How much longer are you going to parade around like this? As if being stuck here isn’t important to opening the realms and going home?” Tobias snapped.
Reality slammed its way back in, and my rage eased. Alistair folded his arms but said nothing.
“I know that,” I growled, fighting not to sound defensive.
“If they find out you’d rather have your hands up her skirt than find that damn book, you’ll wish you thought with a different head.”
I felt my eyes blaze. I grabbed Tobias by the front of his shirt and lifted him, my face inches from his.
“What makes you think you have any dominion over me? I am your king. Just because you have a crown means nothing to me. The only reason either of you are here is because of me. You have a job because of me, a reason because of me. You’d still be holed up in the Pit if it wasn’t for me. Do not forget who and what I am.”
Like the rest of the Kings of Yejedin, Tobias hated being outranked, but it was a truth he would accept.
“We haven’t,” Tobias said, his tone an octave lower as he dampened his temper. “But you seem to have.”
I placed him back on his feet, running my hands over the crumpled fabric of his shirt before patting his shoulders hard enough to shake him.
“He’s right,” Alistair pushed. “She’s here for a purpose.
We all know it. You made an Ig’Morruthen, so use it.
Break her, starve her of affection, and train her to kill like the old ways.
That’s the whole fucking point. Not to make her a love-sick fucking mutt.
Use her. Make her a weapon so we can kill him and go the fuck home. ”
I glared at them until they both looked away and left.
Slipping my hand into my pocket, I withdrew the coin, staring into the shadows of the darkened room.
They had spoken the truth. It was the simplest truth.
I was getting distracted for the first time since arriving in this cursed realm.
I knew my purpose, knew what I was supposed to do.
They were waiting for me, counting on me to get the realms opened. What was I doing?
This woman woke a part of me I never knew existed with her smile.
A spark ignited in my chest at the first touch, the first caress, the first glance.
My hands fisted, blood dripping onto the floor as my claws dug into my palms. Tobias, while out of line, was right.
She was not mine. I could not keep her. She had a purpose here, and I was fucking it up.
I opened my hand, watching the puncture wounds quickly heal. The blood-soaked coin stared back at me. I was what he made me, and I needed to remind them all of it.
The following weeks turned into months. Those evolved into years of bitter hate, cruelty, and distance. The smiles faded, the laughter died, and Novas grew. It all shifted, but it was that one night that everything changed. It was only then that it truly ended.
“You know, I remember the night I broke her. When it all changed,” I said, still tapping the coin on the table.
The tall figure looming in the doorway waited for me to continue.
“I remember hearing her footsteps and her voice calling my name. She wanted to talk as she always did about something she cared so much about. Even with her bloodlust, she was this iridescent shining girl. Full of life. And I needed to break it. So I did. I called her in, and I remember her walking into the room and stopping. The look on her face is something I will never forget. I had someone between my legs, my hand gripping her hair as she pleasured me. The color drained from Dianna’s face, but it was more than that.
Something bright and precious in her died.
At the time, I thought it was for the best. We both needed a stark reminder of the world we lived in and how we could trust no one but ourselves. ”
The coin tapped on the edge of the table.
She turned and ran. I pushed the female away and flowed from the bed, not bothering to fasten my pants before going after her. I grabbed her arm and spun her toward me. Tears turned her eyes liquid and stained her cheeks. A final straw, perhaps.
“Where do you think you’re going?”
“How could you!” She tried to jerk away but to no avail.
“I think it’s time we set some ground rules, don’t you? This isn’t a getaway for you. I’m not your boyfriend or whatever you’ve concocted in your head.”
“Let go of me,” she growled from between clenched teeth. “I’m leaving.”
“No, you’re not. You know the rules. You work for me, remember?”
“Work for you? Kaden. Why are you saying this?”
“Because I made you, and I think you’ve forgotten your place.”
“My place?” She shook her head, tears streaming down her cheeks as her face crumpled. “I thought…”
“You thought wrong. You are nothing but a weapon to me. That’s all you have ever been, and if you want to keep that precious sister of yours breathing, you do what I say when I say. Is that clear?”
Pain flashed through her eyes, her chest heaving.
“And you just fuck whoever you want and treat me like trash? Absolutely not.”
I gripped her jaw. “You belong to me, but in no way do I belong to you. Is that clear?”
She was silent, so I squeezed harder. “Is that clear?”
“Crystal.” She nodded, her body stiff and unyielding.
I released her, pushing her away with more force than I should have, but I had to.
I had to put distance between us in more ways than one.
She rubbed her hand over her bruised jaw as if trying to wipe away my touch.
She glanced at me once more, then turned and walked away.
The world came screaming back, pulling me from the memory.
“Everything was different after that night—no more gifts of coins, soft smiles, or laughter. The halls of that cavern grew as cold as the rocks that formed it. She was a weapon then, my weapon. And the rest is simply history.” I spun the coin on the table and watched it.
“The King agreed to let me keep her, which changes everything. I will make her love me again, erase what I’ve done.
It will be easier once Samkiel is permanently out of the way. I’ll make sure of it.”
I stood, placed the coin back into my pocket, and strode around the long obsidian desk.
“We just need to meddle a little more with that spell for it to work. Don’t you agree, Azrael?”
The long-feared Celestial of Death stared blankly ahead, his arms behind his back. I patted his shoulder as I strode out of the room.