Chapter 16 #2
"Perhaps," Thalos returned, letting a predator's smirk gleam at the corner of his mouth, "I merely enjoy Nyxarion's suffering." Grip growing tight around the base of her neck. "Or maybe," he murmured, gesturing at the bottomless abyss yawning below them, "I just enjoy the flavor of your fear."
Breath hitching, Kore's eyes flicked up to meet those that were glacial.
Thalos' fingers curled at her nape, teeth gleaming. Wrenching her head back, only to let his head dip. Tracing the edge of her jaw, inhaling a breath at her throat.
"Ah," he hummed. "There it is. That delightful little shiver.
" His teeth traced her pulse—the opposite side Nyxarion had marked.
"Delicious. Scream if you like," Thalos murmured, and his tongue darted out to taste her gills.
"Cry. Beg. There's no one left who might hear you.
So let's not pretend you understand what I want, hmm? "
Swallowing her gasp, Kore's eyes went wide. The words were a mirror of her own grim realization.
That she was alone.
Utterly.
Her throat worked around a swallow, flexing against his lips. And then, "I think you're curious," she whispered, because it wasn't time to submit. Body drifting against his. "That you want to know what it's like. Why Nyxarion is willing to bleed in the sun just to keep me in the Deep."
A smile curled against her gills, then. Wicked, when he said, "But not this time, hmm?"
Because Nyxarion had abandoned her.
Given her to Thalos.
Forfeited his right to her body.
"He…" she blinked. Realization blooming without the fog of confusion swamping her brain. "He spared me the suffering," she said, and felt something in her chest hitch. "Because he knew you wouldn't."
Cruel laughter rippled through her gills.
"Tell me," he murmured, "does it feel like he spared you?
" Claws scoring her scalp, he dragged her head back.
"No, Kore. He spared himself. Forfeited the humiliation of baking in the sun, knowing he'd lose anyway.
" Thumb tracing her pulse, notched in the hollow of her throat, Thalos grinned.
"Are you so innocent that you can't see the difference between mercy and strategy? "
"Are you so arrogant to think both can't exist in the same place?
" she returned. And then she pressed him.
Reckless, pupils blown wide as the danger pulsed beneath her skin and his grip on her throat teased the edge of her gills.
"I think it terrifies you," she murmured.
"Think you can't stop thinking about the lightning.
The way I shocked you. Because when you look at me… you don't just see a womb, do you?"
"My, aren’t we an observant little beast, hmm?" he thrummed, vibrating low in his chest. A purr that made the water dance in her chest. Deep in her lungs.
Still swimming, at that impossible pace.
There was still time. To save herself. To convince him.
Hands braced against rigid muscle, Kore nodded. "If you kill me now," she murmured, fingers tracing opalescent scales, "you'll never know if there might have been… more."
Something shifted in his frigid glare. Growing bunched and tight at the edge of his jaw. A tension that flexed in a tiny betrayal of his interest.
Voice dropping to a whisper, Kore said, "All that potential… all those secrets lurking in my blood… left to rot in the abyss."
His spines flared.
Barely a flick before the flinch was mastered. Tucked away too late.
"Intriguing," he murmured, frigid glare tracing her face. "Or it would be," he said, "if you could control it."
Head tilting, Kore looked up at him with a frown.
"It was a reflex," Thalos hummed in a voice that was almost…
soft. Tender. "An accident." Thumb tracing the bow of her lip, he shrugged.
"You cannot summon it, else you would have done it the moment I won the Chain of Breath.
Defended yourself. Defied me. Used it to punish Nyxarion for abandoning you to my whims."
For a moment, Kore could only stare. Lips parted. Breath ragged. And then, "You're right," she admitted. "I'm desperate. Trying to convince you to think like a king and not a lowborn executioner.”
Grip growing cruel where it was anchored at her nape, Thalos wrenched her head back and made her look. "You wish to be a weapon?" he asked, and laughed, a sound utterly devoid of warmth. "Tell me, sweet Siren. What use is a weapon I cannot wield?"
Pulse beating in her gills, she said, "Let me show you," before she could second-guess herself.
Going still, Thalos' fins flared. Catching the current. Slowing to a stop. Drifting as he watched her with frigid, unblinking eyes. And then, "Show me what?"
"Why Nyxarion would bleed in the sun. Why he’d risk a war his people don't want." She swallowed, her throat working against his grip. "Why he'd defy every one of your precious laws, just to reclaim me for the Deep."
Chips of frigid ice narrowed on a glare. "You think me curious of the breeding habits of trench filth?"
"Yes," she said. Simply. Honest. "You've brought me here. Where no one might witness what you choose to do with your victory. One taste," she whispered. "One chance. Let me prove that I'm more than a womb, more than power you can't control."
Spines flaring, the current tousling their hair with gentle fingers, Thalos bristled.
But he remained.
And then he grinned. "Oh, sweet monster," he purred. "You have no idea what you've just given me."