Chapter 30
EVER
Iput a hand to my cheek, feeling my skin. Then to my heart, feeling the beat. I blink. No tears. I swallow. No lump. How am I supposed to respond to a mother that regrets my existence?
A harsh breath leaves me, as if some tough part of me wanted to laugh. I nod slowly, accepting. “Me too. I wish you weren’t my mother.”
But I’ve come too far to run from reality. I belong here. I matter.
I want me.
Even if no one else does.
“Well.” Zandrite laughs dryly. “How ironic. It seems your death is the only thing that matters in your life. I might as well get on with it.”
I snap.
On with the riot. All the festering darkness I’ve held at bay boils to the surface. Rage explodes from my pores. Every violent thought, every death I found alluring, every scream of agony that struck chords of beauty—I embrace them.
I don’t feel my feet push off the ground. Or my hands slam into her chest. I’m hardly present when I climb on top of her tall body and reach for her throat.
Then everything jolts to life when my hands wrap around her neck. Her skin is warm and soft beneath my death grip. But I don’t hear the scream I expect at my touch. “You don’t feel it?” I stammer.
“I do,” she says with perfect control. “And I told you, pain is meaningless to me.”
Right. New plan. I wiggle my thumbs around in search of the right spot, watching for the moment I take her breath away. That finally spurs a reaction. She claws at my back, pulls my hair. Her hips thrash, trying to throw me off her.
I take her assault as if I know what I’m doing. But all I really know is that I can’t let go. I squeeze her throat, pinching high and low, left and right. How do people make this look so easy?
She scratches my face, draws blood from my arms, inflicts pain on anything within reach. I lift her neck and slam her head down. Again. And again. “Who am I?!” I scream.
She sputters and groans.
I bash her head once more when she tries to roll away. “Who the fuck am I?”
My thumbs slip into the perfect position. Her eyes bulge in shock, darting back and forth with a panic so real it’s exquisite. Her mouth opens in search of air.
“That’s right,” I croon, leaning closer. “I’m the daughter you wish you never had.”
Somewhere between mind and body, between heart and soul, magic shifts. The flow of energy rearranges inside me, swirling like my thoughts until it finds its place, its balance.
I’m oblivious to my surroundings, lost in my own darkness.
A surge of warmth consumes me as I watch her limbs give up their struggle, falling limp, a clump of my hair tangled in her fingers.
Her thighs twitch and jerk beneath me. But she’s still conscious, still holding on, the blackness of her gaze an unsettling threat.
Then rough hands grip my waist and pull. Zandrite.
“I’m not done!” I hold tight, clutching her neck, clinging to the cool hug of darkness.
So he goes for my hair. He rips me off her and hauls me away, leaving my mother gasping for air. “That’s enough, you savage little thing,” he says.
I reach for her, raking air, trying to hold onto that black emptiness that fills me so beautifully. But every sensation returns.
They all catch up with me—the stinging scratches.
The formation of bruises. And the burn in my scalp as Zandrite drags me through the cave by my hair.
Coen tips himself over and reaches toward me the best he can with his arms restrained, rope looped around his torso.
He’s just short of clutching my arm. Sola thrashes next to him, unable to help.
Zandrite continues down a dirt hallway. I try to scramble to my feet and take hold of his arms to reduce the pull on my hair, but he whips me to the side whenever I get close.
I’m sobbing by the time we reach the bottom of a long, spiral dirt ramp and enter a circular room.
He tosses me to the ground. The cold air is sharp and unforgiving, the earth beneath my body loose and moist, not packed and hard like everywhere else in the Underbroke.
I curl into myself and assess the space, my chance of survival.
Metal cages ring the room, each with creatures inside.
They’re tall and built like Vaile from head to toe, but wholly vicious with a curved horn on either side of their heads.
No hair or fur hides their mottled gray skin.
Clawed hands and feet scratch the metal floor below them.
They snort and grunt at our arrival, wedging their noses between the bars, more congested with every labored breath.
Two serrated fangs extend down their chins.
Not good. Not good at all.
Zandrite stands behind me. “Get up.”
I don’t know if I can. Everything hurts. The effects of maturing and linking with no release are worsening. Every pump of blood to and from my heart burns like acid. My ears buzz. My skin itches. My floating head might explode. And I’d welcome it. I cover my ears and hold in a scream.
Down on one knee, Zandrite puts his godly face near mine. His voice easily makes it past my hands. “I know you’re linking with him. That’s why he wanted you close.”
“I’m pretty sure I’m only dying,” I rasp, dropping my arms.
“Not yet, but soon.” He pets my hair, and I slap him away. “I almost want to spare you purely to see how it all plays out. I’m not as bad as you think, spawn of Malachite.”
What is he going on about? “You’re going to kill me. How is that not bad?”
He pushes my hair behind my ear and traces my jaw, twisted affection in his touch.
“You would do the same in my situation.” Would I?
I shy away, but his touch continues, his eyes squinting in thought.
“I do wish I could keep you for my collection of rare beings, but you’re my only means of escape from the Mortal Realm.
I’ve spent hundreds of thousands of years waiting to get revenge.
It’s time for me to go home. First, though, I have a gift for you. ”
How sentimental of him. “Keep it,” I sneer.
“Really? It’s the only piece of your father you’ll know before you die.”
His choice of words is disturbing, but I muster the strength to sit up. “What is it?”
It’s not the sneaky way he pulls it from his pocket that has me forgetting how to breathe, or how he holds it in his palm so casually.
It’s not even the stringy pink muscles coming off the back.
It’s the way my birthmark burns on my chest, straight through the layers of disbelief, the same way my necklace heats when Eli touches it.
Zandrite rolls an eyeball back and forth in his hand then plops it into mine. “The Eye of Malachite.”
It’s smooth and moist as if it just popped out of the socket, the blue-black iris gleaming. I scratch wildly at the depression between my ribs with my other hand. Where my birthmark is. The one shaped like an eye.
Panic is a joke. I’m so far past that.
I squeeze it, briefly wondering if an eyeball can burst. “Why do you have his eye, you sick freak?”
“Legend says, once Malachite looks upon you, death is only a blink away. So before I was banished, I carved it from his face to spite him.”
“Hundreds of thousands of years ago? It doesn’t look more than an hour old.”
“My body is just as old, and look how well-preserved I am.” He sits back proudly with a flex of his muscles then glances around the room at the sniffing creatures. “Speaking of preservation, your death can’t be too messy. I need every drop of essence from you. No blood, minimal bruising.”
Cold death infiltrates my thoughts, my body frozen with some sort of stoic terror.
Where’s the brightness when I need it—Milo’s smile and sweet soul?
Kaleida’s stories and passion? Kelter’s quiet presence?
Eli’s relentless claim to me between those panicked looks and studly smirks? How does everything go so wrong?
Zandrite lifts my drained body onto his lap and presses a kiss to my forehead, like a father might. “You were born from death. Do not fear it.”
My hands and face are clammy, my stomach fluttering with disgust, with defeat.
I’m running out of strength, of the rage that fuels me, and I’m so, so tired.
I wait for my life to flash before my eyes, dozens of homes and deaths, Kelt’s warm hands and Eli’s rough caress.
I wait for the crack of my neck, my last breath.
But he only holds me, a tear building momentum on his cheek.
“This is why I must pit the Half Links against each other, let them do the killing. The connection to life is too strong for me. I only take one when I have to.” He laughs softly, hugging me close to his chest. “Would you expect anything less from the god of love?”
And with that, he sets me down in the dirt and pushes back against the wall, kneeling as though he’s not a god at all, eyes drawn with regret. But they harden. Then tear away from me. “Dig,” he yells.
For a moment, I believe he wants me to dig my grave before he ends me, but it’s much worse.
He yanks a chain hanging above him. I watch with my mouth agape as it triggers twelve other chains to rise, lifting cage doors.
The creatures don’t hesitate. They bend their bodies and slide under the rising metal before the doors fully open. And head straight for me.
“Get back!” I squish my father’s eyeball in my fist and holler, not quite ready to have my limbs sheared off by their sharp claws.
They dive into a digging frenzy, tossing loose earth behind them.
Saliva flings from their mouths with each jerking motion.
Drops splatter on my arms, and my skin sizzles.
I scurry back and back, away from the shoveling creatures and the flying dirt… and into Zandrite.
Hysteria gets the better of me. “Please. Let me go.”
“You brought this on yourself.” He strokes my cheek from behind, then my neck, the hair on the back of his fingers tickling my skin.
“Letting the Centress take your memories to get your essence was your best option. She was the only Vaile in the realm with that gift, but you drained her of it. Now, your only choice is death.”
Not simply drained. I stole it. With no idea it would stay inside me, throwing off my balance and hurting Eli.
The pile of dirt surrounding the developing hole grows taller and wider. “Don’t worry,” he says, “Your essence won’t be wasted.”
I hold back the tears at his touch, reaching within for any way to stay alive. To see Eli again. To see Kelter. To escape. I come up empty except for hollow words that risk everything, masked in coyness. “I’m sure I could make it worth keeping me alive a while longer.”
“Is that so?” His hand continues down, passing between my breasts and landing on my lower belly—nothing fatherly about it anymore.
“It’s been a long time since I’ve benefitted from the urges that come with maturation.
It’s not the same as the ravenous Half Links, all mindless and physical.
But you, a demigod about to fully mature and link, you’re as open-hearted and turned on as they come.
You crave connection. You literally need to fuck to stay alive. ”
Still kneeling, he pulls my back tight against his chest, his arm holding me against him, his length pressing against my back. I bite my lip, suppressing every curse word I know from flying out of my mouth while forming a needy tone on my tongue. “Please. I won’t last much longer.”
His free hand yanks my head back so he can speak into my ear, puffing his nasty breath over the side of my face. “Who better than the god of love to save the god of death’s daughter with a long, sensuous fuck before she’s killed? It’s perfect.”
I stroke the hairs on his arm as I stow the eyeball away in my pocket—my bra seems a tad inappropriate. “At least I’ll die satisfied.”
He moans, dropping his arm from my belly to slide his hand between my legs, and I make my move.
I turn around and kneel in front of him.
He pants into my face. I hold my breath to keep from passing out and put a hand on his thigh.
And another. His leg hairs poke through the fabric and prick my palms. I glide one hand up and up and shift the other to the side, near a pocket.
He closes his eyes and rests his head on the wall.
My soul sours. But I have one chance. One damn chance. I lean into him. “Take it out. I want a god-sized cock inside me before I die.”
Instantly he fumbles with his pants, trying to free himself, oblivious to everything else.
I slip my hand in his side pocket, disguising the motion as a caress of his leg, and pull out my necklace by the chain.
His length now exposed and much too close to my face, he grabs the back of my neck and pulls down.
Toward his cock. And a frightful amount of hair.
Nope. I try once more to shove every bit of darkness and pain out toward my fingers as I grip his thigh tight.
I beg—not the gods or any other power I can’t understand, I beg myself—to take control, to choose, to fight to live another moment, another day.
What’s the point of having magic if I only succeed at hurting those I care about?
I carve out a reality where I’m strong and brave and decide my own fate, then I force myself to believe it, to believe in myself. And I see it. A grimace forms on his face. It twists into flawless agony. His body glows white as the pain consumes him.
Finally. “Not even to save my life, you old fuck. And my man would have his knife speared through your hairy golden god balls so fast you’d wish he’d stabbed you in the heart.”
He pulls away, spending only a moment in shock, gasping for breath, then lifts me into the air and chucks me into the freshly dug pit.