Chapter 16
“ D on’t stop.” His breath felt hot—too hot—burning as it fell across Garrik’s gouged chest.
He could not see anything. No cracks of light. No windows to show him if it was night or day. Not that it mattered, anyway. And judging by the smell, he had dangled, arms chained high, above his blood and vomit for over a week.
No water. No food. Infection was setting in. His peeling wrists were shackled, deep raw wounds carved into them, and bled long streaks of blood down his arms.
Even through the painful ringing in his ears, there , a soft voice spoke. Hallucinating the tender warmth of it at times, they were the only flutters of peace he felt in that rotting cell.
It kept him from completely breaking.
The voice spoke again. Gentle, loving ticks of the tongue. A melody that carried across the murky space. Echoed off one of the eight stone walls filled with unimaginable torturous weapons in the lowest parts of the castle.
By now, he knew by the trajectory of watery footsteps which method of torture he would suffer when they visited throughout the day. And … endless hours of the night.
But he could die peacefully listening to that voice.
And judging by his state, he had few hours remaining. Maybe less.
Listen.
Breathe.
Oftentimes, Garrik wondered if it was his mother speaking from the Stars Eternal. Giving him strength to simply exist for as long as she —the serpent—allowed his fractured heart to beat. Garrik recognized pieces from books his mother read to him as a faeling. Perhaps it was only his memory that recited the words and brought the voice. Likely fever-induced delusion. Only he was not always in this state when he heard her.
“Please.” He had not heard his voice in weeks—months, possibly. Did not recognize it through the painful cracks it made. “Don’t … leave.” He heaved in a short, imploring breath.
Breathe.
Metal hinges screeched, piercing his sensitive perception like freshly forged blades. Any sound these days was a massacre to his senses. Even his labored breaths were too loud, no matter how shallow they were. His traitorous body trembled against his best efforts.
Why did the torchlight cause him to tremble so uncontrollably? The warm glow was inevitably the first thing he saw when the thick wooden and iron-barred door opened.
Two guards adorned in flawlessly polished silver armor and purple cloaks descended the stone staircase, entering his home of horrors.
They were new. And new guards could be swayed to show him some mercy. He had done it before. But he needed to see their eyes. Needed to see if all color had been stolen to know if they enjoyed serving or if they had fallen prey to magic-washing before he risked another unjust beating.
Unjust beating …
They were all unjust beatings.
It made little difference, though. In the end, everyone laid their hands on him, no matter if they desired to or not.
And these guards made no stops against any of the walls, so he knew he would not remain in his cell tonight. It was the serpent’s turn to deliver new marks and cut open slow-healing wounds.
The serpent…
She made sure of that. Her powers of poisons administered through needles seeped into his High Fae blood, slowing the natural qualities of life and healing. Rendering his blood completely useless to his wounds. Keeping him in constant misery and torment, too weak, too broken, too worthless to fight.
Rattling metal sounds impaled his ears as chains released from the wall, clanging to the floor. Garrik slammed into the bloodied stones below, forcing his knees to scrape on the salt kernels used to split his skin and burn deep. His head splashed in the pool, severe enough to crack.
The cold from the stones seeped into his mangled body. Like ice on a bruise, its chill was gratefully welcomed, almost soothing in a way. One small comfort since being strung up for so long.
They could not have come at a better time. His exhausted, aching legs had been giving out underneath him. The skin of his feet was so severely burned that he had lost the determination to continue standing.
With a swift kick, the guard’s boot found its way to his shattered ribs.“Get up.”
Garrik choked on an excruciating cough, spitting beads of blood across the stones.
Ribs throbbing, arms with no strength to clutch them, his vision spotted. Impressive. Most new guards were terrified of him. Given the history of snapped necks when they foolishly dropped their awareness and underestimated his injuries, they usually kept a wide distance. He had mastered appearing weak to the eye while charging to strike.
Guess this one wanted to assert his dominance first thing. Smart but foolish.
“Walk or crawl, dog.”
How? There was no strength left in him. The burning fever he had suffered the last few days had turned his skin fiery as shivers wracked his battered body.
Another boot collided with his sweat-slicked face, slamming him backward onto the blood-puddled stones. The salt scraped along his back, burning into the fresh slashes made by Brennus’s whip that morning.
Garrik’s head turned cloudy. Breathe. Stay awake. You have to stay awake.
“If you wish him to walk … a boot to the face renders that difficult. Imbecile.”
Scales . All Garrik could see were the black scales of Malik’s coat as he squatted over him, crackling salt underneath his boots.
Malik fisted his hair and wrenched his head up to see Garrik’s unfocused green stare. “Pathetic,” he sneered, and that handhold on Garrik’s hair loosened, dropping his head onto the stone, splashing in the blood pool.
If they did not leave his head alone …
Where was the voice? Please, come back. Don’t leave me.
Malik stood and waved his hand lazily in the air like he could not be bothered with the order. “Drug him and drag him.”
The guard opened his mouth to protest, but night-blue flames engulfed his throat. Pleasing gasps for air escaped his lips.
A strained smile ghosted Garrik’s face.
Covered in flames, Malik’s hand clenched into a fist. Reptilian night-blue eyes engulfed by blue flames burned at the guard.“Not.Another.Word.” Voice as searing as fire, yet stunningly ancient in its tone.
Garrik gasped as he felt the sting of the needle inserted into his neck.
How he felt any sort of pinch was a mystery because sharp pangs of pain constantly surged through him. He tensed with small spasms, then relaxed as if all his muscles—what was left of them—had given in and left him utterly helpless.
Laying on the cold blood-covered stones, his heart dropped, ashamed he could not muster the physical strength to fight. No matter how tenacious his mind was, his body left him incapable.
“Drag him to her now ,” Malik ordered, still crouched over him. Then he said to Garrik, “This doesn’t need to continue. Give your father what he wants. You can be free, Garrik. Why do this to yourself?” He almost sounded like he cared.
Garrik knew better.
“ Never ,” Garrik choked out, throat raw from his screams hours before.
A burning reptilian sneer twisted Malik’s sharp face before a foreign tongue scraped along the walls of the dungeon. By some fleeting memory, Garrik understood the cursed words. By the Flames. Then the common tongue returned, “You’re a fucking fool.”
Garrik could not discern what they were saying.
His mind was so close to unconsciousness while his blistering infected feet scraped over the graystones permanently stained by his blood. Up, up, up a winding staircase from the depths of hell … up into Castle Galdheir, they dragged him.
The smells of his rotting cell faded behind them as …
Rain? Was that truly rain falling outside a square iron-barred window?
He certainly hoped for it. Malik was less prone to extensive torture sessions when it rained. However unlikely, he seemed to adopt a gentler mood, more patient between Garrik’s screams. Even ended his fiery attempts at persuasion early like he couldn’t get under the weeping sky fast enough.
If only she was the same …
They arrived at a blackened door fit for a monster. He had been there countless times before. Knew what waited for him inside.
Greeted by slithering darkness—Snakemares she called that magic—as they escaped the cracks around the stone frame, he watched them coil along the wood. A warning to anyone who dared to disturb the creature lurking behind the barrier.
Malik hesitated mere breaths before his clenched fist beat on the blackwood.
Each bang sent shards of pain through Garrik’s ears like freshly sharpened knives. Too loud, too much light. Everything was agonizing?—
“Open. The damn. Door.”Malik sounded pissed and spoke in stops like he addressed a simpleton. She would take offense to that. Garrik would suffer for it. Typical when anyone made Malik wait. He was not prone to patience and hoarded his precious time like a dragon hoarded gold.
Maybe they could tear each other apart when the door opened.
Malik viciously shouted her cursed name and pounded again.
A hiss seeped through the blackwood, and Garrik desperately used whatever strength he had left to keep from trembling. It had come to this—cowering at a lick of her voice.
“Enter.” A seductive melody. No wonder Magnelis made her his revered Washer. And there were rumors slithering around that Magnelis had her entertain in the royal bedchamber, too. Disgusting how his mother’s memory was tainted by the likes of this serpent. She would never be High Queen. Never.
The door swung open in slow motion, hinges groaning.
Inside, a horrifically haunting, beautiful bedchamber awaited, everything covered in a black that seemed void of all light. Wooden floorboards cracked with each step the further they pulled him inside. Curtains hung from the ceiling to the floor over sky-high windows that overlooked the mountain the castle was built into. Incredible crystal chandeliers hung from the ceiling.Tomes sat open atop a long table with eight chairs settled on a reike pelt between the bed and door. Bottles of liquids sat upon long shelves on the walls.
A black throne-like chair with deep red cushions sat near an obsidian fireplace jutting from the wall in front of …
Garrik’s heart quickened.
A blackwood and steel four-post bed with draped inked curtains.Under an onyx blanket, the plushness sewn with sparkling diamond buttons was drawn as if prepared for sleep, revealing pure white sheets.
Only they would not be sleeping …
Robed in black silk, her long black hair flowed loosely around plump breasts when she sauntered in from the balcony doors. With each step of her favorite silver-snaked heels, Garrik’s heart jerked.
He did not dare lift his eyes. Giving her the satisfaction would be painful enough. Besides, he would be staring into them soon anyway.
Why rush?
Ombré dagger-like black nails dug into Garrik’s cheeks, lifting his slumped head before it dropped to his chest. “I wanted him more conscious than this,” she hissed.“He could die at any moment, you fool. How am I to enjoy myself when he can’t even open his eyes?”
“Not. My. Problem,” Malik seethed. “Surely one of your poisons can remedy that.”He crossed his wrists behind him, pacing the dark floor in a measured stride. The night-blue of Malik’s eyes scanned shelves littered with jars, face twisting as the tip of his finger scratched a long line through dust.
Malik never cared for messes. Even his clothing was immaculately kempt, flawlessly preserved in perfection. This made the appointments with Garrik painfully drawn out. Taking great care to prevent Garrik’s blood from ruining his clothing, of course.
The serpent released another hiss. “Put him on my bed and get out. ” Full obsidian eyes that appeared almost crimson glared at the guards and Malik before dragging a razor-tipped finger across Garrik’s hollowed cheek. Scratching against the bones jutting from his taut skin. The touch was … almost sensual.
“Going soft …”Malik asked, lifting an amused eyebrow as he trailed the serpent’s name off his tongue.
She sliced Garrik’s chin with a nail, withdrawing to examine the blood smeared across it. Like a predator, she sucked it into her mouth, clearly savoring the iron taste.“You’d be wise to not insult me, Malik .” She pierced him with a lethal expression. “I am never soft,”she said and grabbed Garrik’s chin, examining his sunken face.“He’s going to bleed. Care to watch?” A Bloodlusted grin crossed her face as the guards threw Garrik on the white sheets.
“Not particularly,” Malik said flatly, face twisted in disgust. Unamused. “Though I’m certain you will wish otherwise.”
Their voices drifted away. Garrik focused on his few remaining breaths, hardly recognizing the clanging of chains threatening to split his head as cold iron clasped around his raw wrists.
Where was the voice? Please … I need you.
“Restraints won’t be necessary,” the female crooned.
Garrik knew what was coming as he heard glass sliding across wood.
She rolled the poison bottle between her fingertips on one of the blackwood shelves. Amused. Aroused. Sadistic inked eyes followed the dark emerald swirl in one of the bottles, its sickly shimmer glistened in the light.
Her neck twisted. The endless abyss in her eyes pierced Garrik with ravenous desire. “This will do tonight, pet.”
No. Please. Not that one.
“Do try not to have too much fun, my lady,” Malik grit out between his teeth.“Brennus returns come dawn. You know how he expects a visit with your whore at first light.”Wrists still held behind him, he sauntered around the bed, almost stopping when his eyes scanned Garrik, and a flicker of a candle exposed a hint of uncertainty in his eyes.
But Garrik knew what that meant—or at least thought so.
Malik meant she could not kill him. Not tonight.
Black silk fell to the floor. Disrobing in front of them with pleasing satisfaction, she traced her nails down her breast, stopping against her navel. Those ravenous eyes never once moved from Garrik on the bed.
“ Out !”Speaking to no one in particular, she waved through Snakemares forming in the air.
At the sound of the door latching, a fingernail traced up Garrik’s abdomen, not stopping until it reached his pale lips.
Stop touching me.
“This won’t do.”Perching on the bed beside his motionless body, she toyed with a lock of his dirty matted hair and twisted it taut to the point he believed it likely to rip from his scalp. “Look how worthless you are.”
His breaths were turning shallow—too shallow. Breathe. You need to stay awake.
Icy black fingers roughly clutched the back of his head. The smell hit him before the bottle touched his lips. The smell of crow-picked corpses left decaying in the middle of summer. But even with that, her touch was more repulsing than the smell.
Defiance was all he had left. He would not allow her to take him easily, so his mouth refused to open.
And that angered her even more.
Snakemares slithered from her hands and plunged into his skin to crawl through his veins. Needle-like pricks in his nerves and muscles involuntarily forced him to arch his back. Yet he still fought to keep his lips sealed.
“ Open now. ”The bottle rammed into his lips enough to bruise.
He would not be able to fight for long. Even through the immense agony coursing through his body, he knew what was to come if he obeyed.The poison made movement impossible but did nothing to dull his senses. And he had been in that bed more times than he was able to remember in the last thirty years to know he would remain under its effects for an unnerving length of time.
But he was too broken and weak to need it now. Which meant she planned on drawing this out, pumping healing serums through his body. Using enough to save his life … until she ultimately took it. Enough to restore him completely, then rip him apart one inch of flesh, muscle, and bone at a time.
“No?”She set the bottle down on the bedside tabletop with infuriated force. “I’m far too bored for this. Open your mouth or I’ll do it for you.”
Garrik’s excruciating breaths faded. The blood loss, toxins, infection, pain … he was almost gone.Going completely limp, his mouth relaxed, and she took the opportunity to wedge his mouth open with her fingernails. Drowning him with the bottle before jamming a needle into his neck.
The effects worked instantly.
First, the wave across his skin sent convulsive shudders from his head to his infected feet. Burning. Bubbling. Sealing all wounds and forming perfect skin. Then, not a finger twitched.
His mind sharpened. Alert. Hyper-focusing on everything around him. The breeze in a tree far up the mountain. Guards speaking ten stories high. A drip of water in his dungeon. His blood rushing through his veins.
It was all too much. A different form of torture.
Everything from his shoulders down froze solid, out of his control. He would rip out her throat if he could fight the poison. With renewed energy that could level a mountain, Garrik’s voice rumbled like thunder, “ Do not touch me. ”
A cruel, twisted smile. “There’s my pet. I do love when you think you can scare me.” She drew a finger down his chest, the nail carving a bubbling crimson line before she lapped it up. “I’m going to enjoy this.” And slowly unbuttoned his rags for clothing.
The voice … Please, don’t stop.
Thank Maker of the Skies for her voice. He would have given up so many times without her. Always wafting in on a phantom wind, stealing his attention, pulling him from whatever pain was inflicted on him. If he only focused on her—if he listened and breathed through it—for a moment, he was not at the hands of Malik or Brennus. He was not being torn to shreds by dagger nails while being humiliated on his back.
Please, don’t leave. I need you.
Sometimes he wondered if the voice heard him. Unlikely. They drugged him without fail, so his powers were null. They could never reach her—wherever she was. Still, he spoke to her like she was physically there. Often hallucinating a moving shadow in the far distance of his cell, imagining it was her. Wishing—hoping—the figure would come closer so he could glimpse what she looked like.
Garrik’s body trembled beneath the female.
No. Not his body. It had not been his for nearly three decades.
That icy touch, bitterly cold. He would never forget how freezing she was against him.
I need you. Please, keep talking. The green of his eyes narrowed on a vase full of dead pearlseas on the fireplace. The decay and rot a perfect match to how his soul felt. Those same flowers he stared at when the voice faded.
Besides the voice … flowers were his peace.
The poison’s effects wore off sometime after dusk, yet the damage to his body left him lifeless. His tormented mind could not decipher if his convulsing was from another unwanted release or from pain radiating through every inch of his freshly tortured flesh.
No other punishment humiliated him more than this. How his traitorous body responded to her—he did not want it. But the treatment was not always this severe. Sometimes she would simply fuck him while chained and not carve into him. Sometimes she would not administer the venoms. Other times, she dosed him into delusion and forced him to serve on his knees. Those moments when it was only pleasure and mind tricks, even against his will, he … regrettably … enjoyed it.
Pleasure was preferable to pain, no matter how vile that fact was. Especially after so many endless years.
What would his mother think? What would Thalon think? The kingdom?
Whore.
He needed—desperately—to vomit. But nothing would come up.Other than what she had forced down his throat, he had not eaten in … fourteen?Fifteen days?
Her beautiful body, drenched in his blood, slipped from the carnage of him and sank into the blood-soaked bed. The movement was unbearable, disturbing the deep gouges in his flesh.
Pressed against his side, one pale leg wrapped around his thigh and an arm pulled him into her. Cradling him like a mother soothing a child. Forcing him to cling to her as he trembled, as if she could bring him comfort after.
Another form of her torture.
“Disgusting,” she insulted. “No one will ever want you like this. Repulsing.” His scars, she meant. What she always said after stripping him and leaving him bloody and marked. Never forgetting to remind him how hideous his body looked now. “You’re lucky I can stomach you.”
Garrik believed it.
Not that he would ever escape, but … no one would want him. Not like this.
A nail scratched between them, tracing along his slow-moving chest.She never disturbed the skin there. Likely because one ill-calculated slip could pierce his heart too soon. And she would never end his suffering early. No. Never too early. Never without a great deal of pain that would inevitably have him begging for her to kill him.
He was her plaything. And toys were not enjoyable when they did not scream. So he would suffer, and suffer, until they deemed him truly worthless. Even then, if they did allow him to die, he was unsure he would ever find peace.
Slithers of Snakemares fell across his bony body as she traced designs in the blood. The open wounds of his inner thighs and abdomen still leaked slowly.
Garrik’s mind protested every touch, but his body could not form any amount of energy to push her away.
“Thank me for it,”she seductively whispered.
No.
“Thank me for it or I’ll rip out your heart.”A daggered nail dug deep into a wound, and an agonizing grunt escaped his lips.
She would do it anyway. The threat meant nothing.
But he could not risk another death. Risk his mental shield that magic itself graciously provided when he was unable to.
The nail pressed, threatening to pierce his heart.
“Th”—barely a hoarse whisper—“thank you.”
“Mmm,” she hummed.
Her serpentine smile parted and sucked his blood from her black fingers, her tongue darting out to lick every drop.
Pushing herself up on an elbow, the other hand brushed over his cheek. Icy fingers trailed across his quivering lips before she swung a leg over and straddled him. Leaning down to rub cold lips along his ear, she whispered,“Your father beckons me. I revel in his passion, but it’s your screams I long for. Don’t be jealous. I’ll return for you.”
Bile burned his throat.
Like the viper she was, she slithered off him and wandered to her silken robe pooled on the floor. Opening the blackwood bedchamber door, she ordered,“ Malik ! Drag him to his hole. See to it he’s returned in an hour. I want him bound for when I arrive.”
Leather boots thumped on the wooden floorboards toward him. His world began fading to blackness, but not before Malik’s night-blue eyes flickered with a heat of utter disgust.
“I’ll see you soon … my pet. Then you’ll remind me what that pretty mouth can do.”
The stars never seemed so beautiful as tonight. A calm blanketed over him, surveying their shimmering magnificence. Was he hallucinating or was he truly seeing them align into different forms?
A lion? They were myths. And as far as he remembered, not one had been sighted since Magnelis had declared himself High King.
And over there—a dragon. Baring its teeth to … another dragon?
A star shot across the sky, grabbing his wavering attention.
Starfire was so beautiful. The most beautiful thing in Elysian—besides the voice. The way its long white tail of flames gracefully danced behind the star as it left the realm. The sudden sapphire burst of light as it shredded through space and perhaps entered a new realm altogether. Perhaps it searched for something. Something lost. Wherever it ended up, he desperately wished he could go with it.
By her malicious order, Malik had discarded Garrik on the balcony when she was finished. His arms lay heavy on the graystones. From the shadows, quiet movements lurked inside the door. She watched him slowly drift away under the haunting glow of amethyst moonlight.
As a small reward, she had allowed him to fade outside tonight. He had provided exactly what she demanded; fucking her against a wall with Malik as an audience and restrained by Snakemares close to his heart.
If he screamed now from shame, would the stars see it as weakness? Would they take pity on him? Or condemn him?
As he looked up, pleading to forget, remembering who he once was … even the moon abandoned him behind darkened clouds. He used to love the night sky. It knew him well. Knew him before pieces of himself were ripped away and he became … something worthless.
And looking skyward tonight, looking at what she had reduced him to, at what he willingly did to her to save himself from pain …
He wanted to throw himself over the edge. Someday would.
As the emotional and physical pain seared through his body, Garrik’s green eyes drifted away into the comforting darkness.
But the darkness was odd tonight.
Usually so far away, dancing around the stars, tonight it cascaded from a whorling smoke-like cloud until it weaved to the balcony.
Garrik’s mind was hallucinating, surely. Because that cloud of darkness feathered across his body and dissolved into his flesh. Turning him ice cold.