28. A Deep Dark Pool #4
“Right,” he sneers, stopping before the boulder. Gathering up the extra length of leather cord over his shoulder, he hops atop the ten-foot boulder with continued ease. “Because your kind is so trustworthy,” he calls down.
I don’t see him for a few moments as he loops the leather around the vast stone, effectively imprisoning me to the rock. He lands lightly before me on his feet. Hands on his hips, he looks down at me. “We might have decided to keep you alive—”
“You had no part in that decision,” I bite out.
I can’t help myself. I’m not about to let him take credit for Tage’s decrees.
He’s not in charge, and I won’t allow him to pretend that he is, that he’s the alpha of this pride.
I avoided challenging him before, but what did that get me?
A late-night visit loaded with threats? And currently I’m bound to a rock.
Perhaps it’s time to show him I’m not so easily cowed.
Anger flushes his face. “Rest assured, I will have a part in all future decisions when it comes to you.” He squats before me.
“You think he likes you?” His gaze skims me with obvious disgust. My face burns.
“Oh, I see you around him, the way you behave like a bitch in heat . . . your pathetic attempt to entice him. You think your charms can win him over?” The way he emphasizes the word, he clearly thinks I lack said charms, and I remember that to him I’m not only the enemy . . . I am meat.
“Don’t fool yourself, human. Tage might like to fly to Penterra to wet his cock now and then, but you’re less than nothing with your weak little body and freakish eyes.
You’re merely something different. And your brand of different is not anything he wants or needs.
Once the novelty of you wears off, he will see your ugliness like I do. ”
Mortification flashes through me. Is my fascination with Tage so very transparent?
I shake my head. “I don’t want—”
His hand lashes out and seizes my face, his strong fingers digging into my cheeks, grinding the tender flesh into the edges of my teeth.
“You lie about as well as you fill out Danhy’s clothes.
” His coal-bright eyes glint blue, flickering over my body and then back to my face.
“You are not one of us. You never will be. You want him.” His nostrils flare like he’s catching scent of something foul.
“I can smell it on you, like a bitch in rut.”
His grip is too crushing on my face for me to speak.
He continues. “He smells it on you, too. We all do.” My face goes hot under his great paw of a hand.
“He might take you up on what you’re so eagerly offering, but don’t be flattered.
If you haven’t noticed, variety isn’t exactly in abundance here.
He might deem you better than his hand on a lonely night, but you’re just a vessel, a place to stick his cock.
Temporary. It doesn’t mean anything. Do not think yourself special.
” He shoves my face away with ruthless force.
My hands catch myself before my face collides with the ground, grit and loose stone abrading my palms. “You mustn’t be valuable to him either,” I spit out, looking up at him through the veil of my hair, my temper sparking. “He left you here. He took Viggo and Danhy with him. He chose them.”
“He chose me to remain here because I’m strong. Because he trusts me to guard you and Arvos . . . to protect and secure our home.”
I nod as though that makes sense to me, and then I counter, “I think . . . you might even be less special than I am,” I taunt, casting caution to the wind in my loathing of him, knowing, intrinsically, that comparing Cyphus to me would be the greatest insult.
“I wonder . . . who might Tage value more?”
“You think I’m threatened by you?” He laughs, but there is no humor in the sound. His blue-black eyes froth like a storm. I’ve got him thinking . . . doubting himself.
“I know you’re threatened,” I say with far more bravado than I feel, unable to stop goading him.
“He doesn’t listen to you. I’m just an outside observer, but as far as the hierarchy of the pride goes, you’re about .
. . here . . .” I hold up my hand, starting it high, at eye-level, and then dropping it down below my hip.
Splotches of red mottle his face and his eyes flash, the pupils thinning to vertical slits, a reminder of his dragon, and a reminder that I am very, very foolish to provoke him.
“Ohh.” He smiles viciously with a slow side-to-side motion of his head, and I know pain is in my future. Retribution at his hands. Pulling back his thick, tree-trunk leg, he kicks me. Once, twice.
Crack.
I cry out and curl into a ball, bringing my knees to my chest in an attempt to shield myself. Air crashes from my lips as I breathe through the pain, fighting back the sudden surge of bile. I peer up at him through a blur of tears.
He looms over me, his mouth a thin, cruel crescent in his face. “Anything else to say?”
I shake my head, words beyond me. It’s work enough to breathe through the throbbing in my ribs.
It’s enough to simply survive until Tage returns . . . hopefully soon. Before it’s too late.