15. Lazarus
The first thing I feel is the cold. It doesn’t just seep into my skin, it gnaws, a hungry, patient thing that chews through flesh and marrow until my bones feel like brittle glass. My head pounds with a sick, rolling rhythm, each pulse a fresh wave of nausea that blurs the edges of my vision.
I try to move but my limbs are dead weight, stuffed with lead and static.
My wrists are bound above my head, the rope biting so deep that every twitch sends a bright flare of pain up my arms. My ankles are tethered too, spread wide, the vulnerability so absolute it feels like my skin has been peeled away, leaving every nerve raw and screaming.
Panic surges but it’s distant, smothered under the thick, chemical blanket the drug has wrapped around my mind.
I can’t even feel fear properly, and I think that might be the worst part.
I blink, forcing my eyes to focus through the haze. Rough brick walls weep with dampness and a single bulb hangs from the ceiling, its light a sickly yellow that makes everything look dead. The air is thick with mildew and something sharper, metallic; blood, rust, or both.
I know where I am, where they are keeping me. I’m in the dungeons, where we keep prisoners.
It’s a cage. That’s where I am. My cage.
The word lodges in my chest like a splinter of ice.
I hear her before I see her. The soft click of heels on stone, the whisper of fabric.
My stomach knots, acid clawing up my throat.
Ines. She steps into the light, her silhouette framed by the huge one-way window behind her.
In the glass I see my own reflection staring back, pale, dishevelled, trussed like a slaughtered animal.
The image is so pitiful, so stripped of everything I thought I was, that for a moment I can’t breathe.
She smiles, a slow, curving thing that doesn’t reach her eyes.
“Good afternoon, Lazarus,” she purrs, her voice a silken knife. “You’ve been asleep for a few hours. How do you like your new room?”
I snarl, the sound tearing out of me raw and broken, and I yank at the ropes that don’t give. “Go to hell.”
She tuts, shaking her head with theatrical disappointment. “Such hostility, and after all the trouble we went through to make you comfortable.” The word ’comfortable’ drips with mockery, and I feel it like a slap.
Ines steps closer, heels echoing like a countdown.
Her dress is black, clinging to her like a second skin, and she moves with the liquid grace of something that has never felt fear.
She looks like exactly what she is now; a predator, sleek and patient, and the sight of her fills me with a dread so profound it’s almost religious.
“Until you learn your place,” she continues, her voice dropping to a low, sultry murmur, “you’ll remain here. I’m going to train you to be the perfect pet.”
I laugh, but it comes out jagged and wrong, more a sob than defiance. “You’re delusional if you think I’ll ever be that.”
Her smile widens and she climbs onto the bed, straddling my hips.
Her weight presses down and I feel the heat of her through the thin fabric, a sickening warmth that makes my skin crawl.
My stomach heaves, but there’s something else too; a flicker of response, a treacherous tightening low in my gut. Shame floods me, hot and corrosive.
It’s the drugs I tell myself, the words a desperate mantra. It’s just the drugs, but the lie tastes like ash.
“You can deny it all you want,” she murmurs, leaning down until her lips brush my ear, her breath a ghost of warmth. “But I know you want me as much as Konstantine does. Just admit it and give in.”
I grit my teeth so hard my jaw screams. “You’re a witch. A fucking evil, conniving witch.”
She laughs, low and throaty, and the sound curls around my spine like smoke. “I’ll be whatever you want, Laz, if it turns you on.”
Her hands slide down my chest, nails dragging just hard enough to leave faint, stinging lines. I buck, trying to throw her off, but my body is sluggish and weak.
She laughs again, eyes gleaming with a joy that has nothing to do with pleasure and everything to do with power. “Feisty. I do like that.”
She shifts, and I feel her fingers wrap around me. A sound tears from my throat, half curse, half wounded animal as my body betrays me utterly, hardening under her touch. The arousal is a sickness, a poison spreading through my veins, and I hate it with every fibre of my being.
I hate her,
I hate myself.
I hate the way my hips jerk, the way my breath stutters, the way my mind screams no while my flesh gives in so fucking easily.
She grins, eyes locking with mine, and there’s nothing human in them. “See? You can’t hide it from me.”
I growl, the sound thick with despair. “I hope you fucking choke on it and die.”
She laughs, deep, throaty, delighted and then she lowers her head, taking me into her mouth.
The wet heat is an assault, her tongue a torment.
She swirls and teases, and every flicker of sensation is a fresh betrayal.
My hips thrust upward, a desperate in involuntary plea, forcing myself deeper, trying to hurt her, to silence her, to make it stop.
She gags, a wet, choking sound but she doesn’t pull away.
Instead she laughs around me, the vibrations shuddering through my core, and I feel something inside me crack.
“You’re just like your brother,” she murmurs, pulling off just enough to speak, her lips swollen and glistening. “So big and demanding but don’t worry, Laz. I know exactly how to take a big cock. I’ve spent years learning with his.”
Her words are a blade, and she twists it slowly. Konstantine. The brother she’s already hollowed out. Grief, guilt and rage collide in my chest, a storm with no outlet.
I hate her. I hate her more than I’ve ever hated anyone.
But the hatred is a cage too, because it changes nothing.
My body doesn’t care. It responds to her touch, her mouth, the relentless rhythm of her hand.
I try to fight it, to hold back, to find some scrap of control but the drug has stripped everything away.
My strength, my will, my ability to refuse.
I am nothing but sensation and shame, a thing being used.
She deepthroats me again, her throat tightening, and a groan escapes my lips, raw and broken. It sounds like grief. She laughs, muffled and triumphant, and pulls off, her hand replacing her mouth, stroking with expert cruelty.
“There you go,” she purrs, her voice a velvet garrotte. “Let it out.”
I try to resist, to cling to the last shred of myself, but it’s no use.
The orgasm is ripped from me in a violent, humiliating surrender.
I come with a strangled cry that feels like a death rattle, my hips jerking, my body emptying itself into her hand.
The pleasure is a razor’s edge, cutting deep, leaving me hollowed out and bleeding.
She grins, eyes gleaming with a triumph that makes me feel less than nothing.
“Good boy,” she murmurs, wiping her hand on the sheets with casual disdain. “You’ve earned a treat.”
She climbs off the bed, smoothing her dress as though she’s just finished a business call.
I glare at her, chest heaving, body trembling with a rage so vast it threatens to swallow me whole.
But beneath the rage is something worse; a cold, creeping despair, the knowledge that a part of me has been carved out and replaced with her fingerprints.
“You’re a monster,” I growl, and my voice cracks on the word.
She smiles, cold and calculating, and for a moment I see the abyss behind her eyes. “And you’re my pet. Don’t worry, Laz, you’ll learn to love your crate. Just like a dog does.”
She turns to leave, heels clicking a slow, deliberate rhythm. I watch her go, my chest burning with hatred, humiliation, and a grief so heavy it feels like drowning. As she reaches the door, she pauses, glancing back over her shoulder.
“I’ll be back soon for another go,” she purrs, the promise dripping with malice.
The door slams shut, and the sound echoes in the silence like a final nail in a coffin. I stare at the ceiling, my chest heaving, my mind a shattered mirror reflecting only fragments of who I used to be.
I’ll kill her. I’ll kill them both.
But the thought is hollow, a ghost of defiance. I’m trapped, trussed up like a sacrifice, and there’s no escape. Even now, I can feel her touch lingering on my skin, her laughter coiled in my ears, her triumph a brand seared into my soul.
The cold creeps back in, and I let it.