Chapter 20
Raiya was alone. She stared at the cellar door, her heart racing.
She could do this.
She pulled on the door. It was heavier than she expected, and it didn’t budge. Planting her feet, she heaved, and it opened with a creak. The stairs down into the earth were dimly lit by mage light coming from somewhere farther down. She stepped down, her feet quiet, both hands on her baton.
She had never thought of a cellar as a place that required decorating, but the earthen corridor was lined with alcoves containing skulls, candles, eerie violet mage lights, and statuettes of the goddess of death herself, who was always depicted with a veil covering her face. Raiya had to give the cultists credit for committing to the theme.
At the bottom of the stairs, the cellar fanned out before her. It was a sprawling space filled not with food storage but with more altars and statues—places for worship or rituals. She passed a long slab that she at first thought was dark wood, but then realized was actually pale stone stained by massive amounts of blood. The walls were lined with neat rows of suspiciously ornate jars. It wasn’t a cellar after all. It was a crypt.
A distant voice came from somewhere on the other side of the room. Raiya clutched her baton even tighter, though her fingers were already aching and sweat slicked her palms. She crept toward the voice. As she rounded the corner, the other half of the room came into view, and she sucked in a breath.
Azreth knelt on the floor, sagging and bent over. There was no magical barrier holding him, but his body was wrapped in chains. Before him were two cultists, one holding a sword and the other wielding only her hands. The woman waved her hands slowly in the air, gathering magic for a spell. Raiya watched as lightning crackled through the air and then bolted into Azreth. He barely reacted. His body stiffened and convulsed for a moment, but he didn’t seem conscious enough to feel much pain.
“Wake up!” the woman snapped at Azreth. He didn’t respond. His head was drooping, his eyes on the ground. “Pitiful, useless creature,” the woman spat, then motioned to the other cultist. The man brought his sword up and pressed it lengthwise beneath Azreth’s chin, where—though the metal looked cold—it sizzled against his skin like a brand. Iron.
Raiya broke into a run. She raised her baton above her head and brought it down on the male cultist with a furious roar. The man stumbled, bleeding heavily from the head, then dropped to the ground. Raiya spun toward the mage, who was staring at them in shock. The woman quickly whispered words to a spell, but Raiya was faster. An enchantment didn’t need words or weaving—it only needed her will.
A bolt of energy burst from the baton and hit the cultist in the chest, sending her flying backward. She slammed into the wall, then went still.
Raiya turned to Azreth, who was swaying, not looking up. She shoved the baton through her belt and took his big face in her hands, forcing him to look up at her. “Azreth?” she said, her voice hoarse. The flesh on his throat was dark and raw—a magical burn from the sword. Beneath the iron chains wrapped around his torso and arm, his skin was peeling and covered in welts.
“Azreth?” she said urgently, needing to know that he was still alive. What would this much iron do to him? What if it was too much for him to heal? What if it had poisoned him beyond repair?
His eyes flickered. His lungs seemed to flutter in his chest, his breathing hitching. “Raiya,” he murmured.
She squeezed his cheeks. “It’s okay. I’m here. You’re safe.”
She had half expected that he would be suddenly invigorated now that he saw he was saved. She had pictured him standing up and shrugging off the chains. But he didn’t.
When she began pulling at the chains, she realized they were merely wrapped around him—there was no lock. The iron weakened him so much that none was needed. Raiya began unwinding them as quickly as she could, but she struggled under their weight. Azreth jerked in pain occasionally when the metal dug into him, but mostly he remained still, even as the iron seared his skin.
“Azreth, please stay awake,” Raiya begged as she worked. Chain clanked to the floor as she successfully unwrapped a short length of it. “Stay with me. Can you hear me?”
He said nothing.
She heard shouting above them. The door to the cellar creaked, and footsteps pounded on the stairs. She gave up trying to unwind the chains and just grabbed Azreth’s arm. Thrusting her hand into her pocket, she curled her fingers around the enchanted stone, feeling the etched runes. She channeled her will into it, activating the spell.
A group of cultists came around the corner. Raiya urged the spell to work quickly as the cultists ran toward her. She felt the enchantment coming to life, the magic taking hold of her and then crawling along her arm to where she clutched Azreth. One of the cultists raised his hand. A stream of fire burst from his fingertips. Raiya watched the flame as it shot toward her face. And then, just as the fire was about to reach her, it faded away. Or rather, she and Azreth faded.
The world spun around them and then turned into a messy, gray limbo laced with flashes of color, images of other places that went by too quickly to make out. Raiya’s stomach did flips, and she got the distinct sensation of moving very quickly, though she was standing perfectly still.
They collapsed to the ground in a heap, Raiya on top of Azreth. Her head spun. It was too dark to see much, but they were outside. Grass tickled her palms.
The enchantment had worked. They’d been transported outside of the temple, outside the city, far from anyone who would harm them.
She let out a shaky breath. “Azreth?”
He exhaled softly.
She cursed, pulling the unwieldy chains off him. It took longer than she would have liked. When she pulled away the last of them, she threw them as far away as she could—which wasn’t far, given how heavy they were.
Azreth would need magic to heal himself. Raiya climbed up to straddle him, thinking to… to what? Thinking about sex while he was in his current state made her feel ill, but what else could she do? Would he die if she didn’t find a way to force-feed him?
She gave a frustrated sob. “I’m sorry. We should have left when you wanted to. I let this happen. I’m so sorry.” She reached for his hand, one of the only parts of his body she was certain wasn’t hurt by the iron. “Please tell me what to do. Tell me how to help you.”
His fingers slowly closed around her hand.
“Azreth?”
His eyes glowed very faintly, barely there. He was looking up at her. Slowly, his arm circled around her waist and pulled her against him until her head rested against his pectorals, his soft breath puffing against the top of her head.
She lay still as his breathing grew deeper, sharper. His palm moved up her back to the base of her neck, holding her close as his nose pressed against her head. He opened his mouth, breathing her in greedily.
Like magic, his entire body slowly began to move. He was regaining energy. And the more he woke up, the hungrier and more desperate he seemed to become. He sat up, tipping her forward. Before she could find her footing, he’d tipped her fully onto her back on the ground. He moved over her, one knee on either side of her, and seized her throat.
“Azreth?” she gasped. He didn’t answer, and she wondered if it was because he wasn’t there. As she tried to pry his hand off, he bent low, pinning her with his body as his mouth went to the crook of her neck. She saw the gleam of fangs.
Pain exploded in her shoulder. She screamed.
She shoved against his chest, which only made him hold on tighter. Four bright points of pain appeared in her neck and shoulder where his teeth had pierced her skin.
For a terrifying moment, she thought he had really, truly lost his mind and was going to tear into her the way she’d seen him tear into Eunaios. But he only held her there, like a dog with a toy. He made a low growl in his throat, and Raiya stayed very still, held in place by those four anchor points.
Another hand appeared at her wrist, and then another at her ankle to restrain her further. He moved his real hand up to her jaw, tipping her head sideways to expose more of her neck. His teeth slowly withdrew from her skin, and a tremor went through her when she felt blood spill from the wounds. And then she felt the soft, slick lick of Azreth’s tongue lapping at the blood, his mouth closed over her.
Raiya closed her eyes and shivered. Something that felt a lot like pleasure went through her.
Azreth paused, as if listening. And then he continued. His tongue swept across her shoulder in a gruesome kiss as he drank her blood. Out of the corner of her eye, Raiya spotted flares of white magic glowing across his body, where the iron had burned him. Healing magic.
More hands appeared. They moved down her chest, over the dip of her waist and the curve of her thighs, squeezing and feeling and grabbing and bruising her like he couldn’t get enough, like he wanted to be utterly overwhelmed by her. It reminded her very much of the first time Nirlan had fed her to him, when he’d been out of his mind with hunger.
“Azreth, say something,” she said.
His mouth pulled away from her shoulder to hover over her throat, and then her chest. He breathed so heavily against her that she could feel the heat from his mouth through her clothes.
“I want you,” he said, his voice impossibly two-toned and reverberating with an alien resonance. Every part of her body was alight, aware of him, fearing him, desiring him. His eyes were like suns as he looked down at her. She was breathless with awe.
The disembodied hands hiked her robe over her hips. All at once, they lifted her up and turned her over, dumping her onto her hands and knees and pulling her trousers off to bare her to him. She struggled to catch her balance on her forearms as the hands took hold of her ankles, calves, and thighs, then lifted her knees off the ground again, positioning her to his liking. More hands clasped her wrists and throat as if to be sure she stayed where he liked, beneath him.
He grasped her waist tightly and pulled her against him, pressing his hard cock against her. It was thick and weighty between her thighs—an impossible, alarming size, and she nearly asked him to stop. She was almost certain that a mere mortal couldn’t take him, but she needed to know what would happen if she tried.
There was no more preparation. She felt the tip of him against her entrance, and then he pushed inside. A sharp pain followed, and she cried out in surprise. His hips met the back of her thighs as he bottomed out, stretching her beyond what she could take.
“Az—”she choked, her hands grasping at the dirt. The hands on her waist and ankles lifted her, spreading her legs wider, and he slid in even deeper. She gave a moan of mingled pain and desire.
He bent over her, reaching around to palm her sex, and she felt the familiar tingle of a spell being cast on her. Heat spread from his hand, penetrating deep into her flesh, and she was surprised to feel herself slowly opening beneath his touch. Her channel softened around him, growing hot and slick, pliable and eager, and suddenly she found it not so difficult to accommodate his body. Still a jaw-dropping stretch, but no longer breaking her.
It was all she could do to hold herself together as he gripped her waist and ground his hips against her. He withdrew and slowly thrust into her again, and it felt like he was filling her entire body. It took the breath from her lungs—there was no room for it—and she couldn’t think, could only feel. The world narrowed to that point of union between their bodies and to the hypnotic sensation blooming therein.
Her climax was so explosive that she might have blacked out for a moment. As her body clenched around his cock, she felt him grow even larger inside her, pulsing as he came with her. He thrust deep, holding himself at her farthest depth.
Raiya’s head pounded, her senses overwhelmed. The air was saturated with their desire, just as it had been saturated with Azreth’s anger before. She already wanted more of him.
Azreth’s arm looped around her waist, holding her against him. He panted, nuzzling her neck, and she smiled, reaching back to comb a hand against his scalp.
“You came back for me,” he said.
“Of course I did.”
He set her down slowly in the grass, turning her onto her back. She tipped her head up to try to check his injuries, but it was too dark to see them. He was kneeling over her, his eyes bright. He seemed to have calmed somewhat.
His hand brushed her shoulder where he’d bitten her. She stiffened as his fingers passed over one of the wounds. Light poured from his palm, and the pain began to dissipate as he healed her.
“Thank you,” she said quietly. She touched her shoulder. It no longer hurt, and the punctures had healed, but blood still dampened the collar of her robe. Azreth’s expression tightened.
“I lost myself. I did not mean to hurt you.” He bowed his head until it touched the ground. “I beg your forgiveness.”
“Forgiveness?”
“I have broken the terms of our agreement. Strike me,” he said, glancing toward the chains on the ground nearby. “And I will lie still while you pay the hurt back.”
She scoffed. “I don’t want to hurt you. I will never hurt you.”
“I cannot say the same.”
“I don’t believe you.” She sat up on her knees, pulled him up to face her, then pressed her lips to his.
He froze. Raiya savored the unexpected softness of his lips. They were hot, not too dry or too damp, not resisting but not particularly inviting. He waited passively while she kissed him, and she had to wonder if he’d ever been kissed before. Maybe it was not done in the hells.