27. The Slave #2
Gabriella knows beautiful females have it bad enough in Scelus’s region of Luxuria, the place where the air literally breathes lust.
But males that looked like Az, or worse, Silver…
I sit up on the bed, pulling the dark sheet with me and holding it tightly to my chest, covering my naked breasts. “You didn’t always have this power then?”
“It’s a long story.”
“Well, I don’t know if I want to keep my scars or not yet,” I shrug, my shoulders feeling more naked than ever. “We have time.”
If he really doesn’t want to talk about it, I won’t push him any further.
But then he finally meets my eyes, takes a few steps back and sits down in the chair next to the window.
He shakes his head. “They didn’t show up for a long time, for years.
Not until the week I escaped. As I say, it’s a long story, but my mother, she was owned by the noble family too.
She worked as a maid to the daughter of Luxuria’s High Demon, Lilu.
His eldest and most spoiled, succubus daughter, Lady Selmora. ”
“I’ve heard of her,” I say. Nothing good, only evil where that succubus is concerned.
He runs a hand through his dark hair. “When Selmora discovered my mother’s secret, me, down in the servants quarters, she claimed she knew immediately that I would grow to be the most prized and desirable slave in her collection.”
I sign a cross over my head and chest with my hand. “By the angels, Silver…”
He shakes his head, like it’s been a long time since he told it and he’s determined to get the rest of the story out now.
“I was only a boy at the time, and my mother was pregnant again. She was desperate to get out of her life of slavery, and so when Selmora offered her a deal, one that meant my mother could leave the castle with my father and unborn sibling forever, her deed and debt of slavery to her noble family abolished, it was hard to refuse. All Selmora wanted in return was me.”
I gasp. “Your mother took the deal?”
I think of my own parents.
My mother would never. Only death could separate us.
My father… our relationship has always been different to what I had with my mother. More transactional, I realize now. I do what he wants and in return I get to eat and sleep comfortably.
But to sell your own child to a succubus…
Silver’s jaw tightens. “The markings made me ugly in Selmora’s eyes,” he says. “Which was the only mercy I ever got while I was hers.”
Ugly?
I stare at him, stunned.
If this is Silver after pain, after survival, after being broken and reforged… I can’t even imagine what he must have been like before. The thought makes something ache deep in my chest.
“You aren’t ugly,” I blurt before I can stop myself.
His mouth curves, faint and humorless. “Neither are you, Scar. Or your scars.” He clears his throat and stands.
His moment of being vulnerable is gone and the Overlord is back.
“Liar,” I call him out. “I know they are repulsive. You said it yourself. Heavens, my own father told me as much.”
Silver crosses the room and joins me on the bed, one arm dipping beneath the covers and snaking around my back.
“Then your father is an asshole and doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”
Soft fingertips gently trace each of the scars as if he’s committed them to memory and I arch my back.
Something flickers across his face. Surprise, maybe. Or something more dangerous.
“I was being an asshole too. For that I’m sorry, Scar. But these are part of you, proof you are a survivor, and even when I teach you to fly again and you have wings here once more, these scars will only look all the more beautiful.”
I swallow. I don’t know what to say. He’s so close, his hand still gently caressing my back.
His words are so kind, so sweet, like nothing I expected to come from him. Like nothing I’ve ever experienced when it comes to my back and the scars my wings left behind.
Even Elias had been grossed out by them. I’d given my virginity to him and yet he’d avoided so much as looking at my back, certainly never touching the scarring like Silver is now.
“Nothing about you is ugly,” he says firmly, like he doesn’t think I’m convinced yet and he can’t stand the thought of it.
The certainty in his voice steals my breath.
“Not your scars,” he continues. “Not your pain. Not what was taken from you. They don’t diminish you. They mark you as someone who endured and survived and fucking thrives.”
His hand settles warm and steady between my shoulder blades.
“They tell the world you survived something that should have broken you.”
I swallow hard.
In that moment, the answer becomes clear.
“Don’t remove them,” I say quietly.
His hand stills, but his mouth curls up at the edges. “Are you sure?”
I nod. “They’re mine. And… I think I want to remember that I survived. That I lived. That I still live. No matter the target they put on my back.”
Something softens in his expression before a smile breaks out across his otherwise harsh face.
“Good,” he murmurs.
I want to melt into his touch, into his warmth, into him.
I want to explore the stirring deep in my core that’s triggered every time he touches me.
By the angels, every time he looks at me or curses with that hard F that makes butterflies dance in my stomach.
Instead, I pull away from him, and his hand drops instantly.
He looks startled, like he doesn’t know how or why he ended up so close to me in the first place.
“I’m sorry,” he says.
I shake my head. “Don’t be. No one’s ever said anything that nice to me before,” I admit.
“Tragic as that is, Little Nephilim, I’m selfish enough to like being the first.”
I don’t know how to answer that, so I don’t.
“How did you get here?” I ask instead. “To the island, I mean. How did you escape Lady Selmora?”
He scoffs, getting to his feet. “It’s actually thanks to Eurya.
The sister who was once wingless like you but now soars in the sky again.
Had she never lost them, I’d probably still be there.
” He looks over his shoulder and holds my eyes.
“A long story for another time.” Turning his head again, he keeps his back to me. “Now, get dressed, Scar.”
“Thanks for healing me,” I say, shrugging the nightshirt on and feeling oddly disappointed that I likely won’t get to hear the rest of his story.
A tale as fascinating as it is tragic and hard to hear.
“And for giving me a choice when it came to magicking away the scarring. Or however you were going to do it.”
“You're welcome. Though, I was never planning on doing it really. I just wanted to hear it from you.”
“Why?”
He shrugs. “The name Scar suits you too much.”
I feel my cheeks flush.
He laughs, turning to face me. I move toward the door, but he takes my wrist in his hand and shakes his head. “You might be healed, but we aren't done yet. Follow me out to the roof, it’s time to see you fly, Little Nephilim.”