Wregen #3
“Apologies, my liege.” I don’t say anything else because she couldn’t give a shit about my reasons. None are good enough to disobey her. If she wants to punish me, she will. I stopped offering excuses ages ago.
She watches me for a long time, and I thank my fucking stars that she needs me alive. She tired of my bullshit within the first century, but she’ll lose too much if she kills me. It’s part of the reason I’ve had more freedom than most in this accursed place.
It doesn’t mean she can’t make my existence even more of a soul-eating misery if I piss her off badly enough.
Finally, she returns her gaze to the flames. “It’s too cold in here,” she murmurs. “Fix the gods-damned fire.”
Every fucking time. Her room is an inferno but never hot enough for this realm’s queen.
One of her peons appears, as if he melted from the walls to stand before us, and launches himself toward the flames.
“Apologies, mistress,” he mutters as he uses an enormous fan to drive it into a conflagration, the blaze of a thousand trees shoved into this little space.
“Enough,” she bleats after a moment, her lips welding together in a thin line while she watches him slither away.
Finally, she turns to me. “You’re not as obedient as I require.
You’re very close to losing my trust. So I’ll tell you first what will happen if you fail me in the task I’m going to give you. ”
“I will not fail you, mistress.” The promise comes out before I think about offering it, a response ingrained in my soul.
“No, you will not.” The warning in these words echoes around us, deep and malicious.
“How may I serve you?”
“Did you not listen to me?” she demands, her dull eyes boring into my soul. “You will hear the punishment first.”
I dip my chin, waiting again for her to release me. A long fucking time. Finally, she clicks her tongue and I lift my head to watch her.
“You belong to me,” she reminds me as she spins her head again to stare into the fire. “I’ve allowed you privacy for too long, letting you keep your emotions to yourself. If you fail me again, you’ll have earned my oversight.”
Fuck. Me. I’ve pushed my luck too far this time.
The one balm in this place—the only reprieve I’ve had from the perpetual misery Hel demands—is the isolation she’s allowed me.
It’s the only reason I was able to find some smidgen of gratification in Finaan’s presence.
I can’t fathom the bleak existence remaining for me if my mistress takes that away.
“You came to me,” she adds, “begged me to control your beast. Have I given you all you asked?”
“Wrath is bound because of you,” I agree, “and my soul is yours as long as you have use for it. My gratitude to you is undying.”
Wrath—the name I gave my beast when I first felt his presence as a lad barely able to wipe my own ass—is the reason I’m here. He’s a monstrosity, seeping into every orifice, scratching and ripping as he goes. His pulse pounds in my ears, reminding me that as noxious as I am, he’s ten times worse.
He’s been trapped since I chose to swear fealty to Hel, the exchange I made with Helheim’s mistress to save me from his endless hunger.
Hel gave me the strength I needed to control Wrath, and I used my powers to imprison elves and dragons who’d pissed off one of the few allies she has in the other worlds.
The elves joined us in Helheim, and Hel combined her powers and mine to trap the dragons in a distant cave.
And then I gave myself to Hel and her realm. The final resting place of those unlucky bastards who aren’t worthy of joining óeinn in Valhalla, or Freyja in Folkvangr. The eternal punishment humans dread.
“Our connection is eternal and unbreakable,” Hel continues, yanking my attention back to her. “I’ll always find you, wherever you might try to hide. If you fail or defy me, my father and brother will bring you back to me.”
The chaos god Loki and his detestable spawn, Jormungandr. The other gods trapped Hel in this world, forcing her to call on her family when she needs something from another world.
Her father looks as human as me, but his children take different forms. Hel’s brother, Jormungandr, is a serpent larger than any beast who ever swam through the oceans or walked across their fields.
He’s carried me more than once to another land in my mistress’ service.
She turns to look at me with narrowed eyes and lips lifted in a ghoulish grin.
Perfect teeth appear on the right, a sharp contrast to the foul, decomposed stubs on the left.
“I don’t often subject you to the true torment the pit offers.
But those are lessons one never forgets.
You know what it does to all who suffer that fate at my command. ”
“It is very effective, my liege,” I respond, struggling to keep the dread from my voice. “But I’ve nearly died twice during that penalty, threatening your hold on those I’ve helped you trap.”
“Oh, you’ll survive,” she declares. “I’ll reclaim the emotions, the sensations I’ve let you keep to yourself, so I know when your body is ready to fail.
And then I’ll resurrect you, restoring this physical form,” she adds with a dismissive wave of her arm, “as often as I must to leave you suspended there. You’ll know nothing except fire for as long as I choose.
And as you know, I don’t forgive easily.
” Her words are cold, devoid of emotion, but I don’t need to feel the avarice to recognize it.
Fuck me, indeed. My gut twists as my thoughts drag up memories of moments I’ve spent over the pit, my skin bubbling as flames eat me alive—little reminders Hel’s given me over the years that I belong to her.
When I gave myself to Hel, she entwined our lives, drawing part of my soul into hers. It’s how she helped me bind Wrath, but more importantly, it gave her control. Those parts of my soul will always be connected to her, and she can use that link to find me whenever she chooses.
It’s why I never tried to leave, except on her errands, although others have managed to escape. I know this realm well enough to find a route to Midgard or one of the other worlds, but I won’t. Any “freedom” would be short-lived and not worth the price I’d pay.
“My father learned that the elves are in Vanaheim. They’re in the southern part of that world, called Vanatia. They’re building new lives there,” she snarls, “forgetting they belong to me. I am etched in their souls, as I am in yours. They won’t survive long in another place.”
Now my mistress turns to watch me, eyes flickering with the shadows of the inferno blazing next to us.
“Your return to Helheim won’t be easy. When Ragnarok shook the worlds, it skewed the paths between them.
The fates have not yet fixed the chaos they created when they meddled in the war between gods and jotnar, and the lesser gods still rage at my dread father, Loki.
But I have faith in you. You’ll go and bring my elves back to me. ”
I still my expression, careful not to let her see the flames of anticipation, of fucking hope, that light within me. She’s sending me to Vanaheim. I’ll see the sky again.
I’ll see Finaan again. An image of her bounces into my thoughts—bronze skin, even after centuries without the sun, hair as dark as a starless night, and eyes as rich and vibrant as the woods that surrounded my house as a child.
My mind’s eye trails down her body and my cock starts to throb again as I draw up images of tits the perfect size for fucking—swallowing even my enormous cock when I thrust in their embrace—generous hips that sway with her strides, and an ass that jiggles when she walks, begging to be spanked.
I can’t let Hel know how badly I need this. What it would mean to me. To Wrath. In a voice as flat and empty as my soul, I question her as much as she would ever allow. “And if they do not yet recognize their need for you?”
“You think they can survive without me?” she spits out, decorating the floor between us with the glistening drops. “That their hearts aren’t already fracturing for all they’ve lost?”
“I do not know what beings as strong, as resilient, as those elves might endure for the lives they think they want.” My voice is low because I’m walking a thin fucking line.
Hel tolerates more from me than any others in her world, but I’ve been punished severely for challenges much less direct than this one.
She must want them back desperately, though. A scowl flits across her face for a moment, the edges of her lips dropping before her expression returns to the nothingness that usually marks it. When she responds, her words leave no doubt about what I must do, and what I’ll suffer if I fail.
“I don’t care whether they choose to come or you bring them back to me, where they belong. But every last one of them will return to Hel. If you fail—if I can’t punish them for their subversion—I will punish you. You’ll suffer every moment of pain I plan for them. All of them.”
Fuck me.