Page 3 of Blood King, Part I (Crowns #4)

Chapter two

Cyrus had just finished tightening the leather straps of his treads as his chamber door swung open. Pyro stepped inside. Disgust rippled through Cyrus. He hated this man—this man who owned him, who mistook that ownership to mean he controlled him. And perhaps he did.

For now.

“You just sit there in the presence of your master?” Pyro snarled.

Heat coursed through Cyrus’s veins, and he clenched his fists. Master. Cyrus had no master, but slowly, he stood.

“And if you pull another stunt like the one you did yesterday, you won’t be able to sit at all,” Pyro added.

Cyrus knew what Pyro was referring to. He’d put himself in harm’s way for a lesser-ranked fighter.

As lead of House Pyro, he was expected to protect Pyro’s assets, including himself, and make the necessary sacrifices to keep House Pyro on top.

Sometimes that meant accepting the loss of a lesser fighter.

But Cyrus would never abandon Kieve, or any of the other fighters for that matter.

If Cyrus did have any reservations about putting his own life at risk, it wouldn’t be for Pyro’s reasons.

It would be because Cyrus was the only one who might be able to kill Pyro one day.

No. Not might . Would , he corrected himself. He would kill Pyro one day.

Pyro wasn’t a usual lord. He wasn’t fattened by gluttony—his indulgences were of a different nature.

He was a large man, larger than Cyrus, well muscled and highly skilled in leisure sport wrestling.

Cyrus could kill him, but not easily, not with his bare hands, and certainly not while guards trailed the lord everywhere he went.

But one day there would be an opportunity, and Cyrus needed to ensure he'd be able to take it.

The malicious lord eyed him and scowled. He stepped closer, running his gaze down Cyrus’s injuries, then he reached out and poked at the swollen flesh around the gashes across his chest. “You haven’t seen the healer.”

A sharp pain shot through Cyrus with each prod, but he didn’t let himself show it. The lord liked inflicting pain. Cyrus wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. “Manus and Kieve needed him more,” he said.

“Manus and Kieve aren’t gold-tier fighters!” Pyro snapped. He grabbed Cyrus by the throat, just under his jaw, and clutched him tightly. Pyro’s anger was cruel and abusive. Few withstood it unscathed.

Cyrus tensed with his own fury against Pyro’s hold, cracking open the wounds on his chest. The broken gashes wept fresh trails of blood down his skin.

Cyrus prayed to the gods—the gods that had forsaken him—that Pyro wouldn’t touch it.

He hated this man’s mind, and he couldn’t control his curse enough to stay out of it.

Pyro loosened his hold, only slightly, and ran his hand down the base of Cyrus’s throat. “You’re the most valuable man I have.” He paused, and his eyes dropped to Cyrus’s stomach.

Every fiber of Cyrus’s body tightened. The trail of blood from his chest now reached his navel, and he knew the lord’s bloodlust wouldn’t let him ignore it.

Pyro brought his eyes back up, locking his gaze with Cyrus’s as the corners of his mouth drew up. Then he dropped his free hand to Cyrus’s stomach and swiped his thumb up the trail of blood.

Cyrus blinked slowly as another wave of disgust rippled through him. Fuck the gods. All of them.

Pyro brought his thumb to his mouth and drew it between his lips. Cyrus felt it—the moment his blood touched the lord’s tongue. He felt the link in his mind, and it sickened him more than Pyro’s physical hold.

These were the times that Cyrus silently vowed, over and over, that he would kill this man.

He’d kill him.

He’d kill him.

He’d kill him.

It was his mantra. His only solace.

Pyro’s smile grew as he savored Cyrus’s blood. He didn’t know about the curse, the affliction that trapped Cyrus in a chaos from which he couldn’t break free. Pyro could never know—the lord lived to torment, and Cyrus was tormented enough.

Cyrus forced himself still as the lord stepped around behind him. Pyro’s hand stayed on his neck. His grip tightened, pulling Cyrus back against him. Cyrus could feel the hard length of male arousal. Bile rose in his throat.

Pyro chuckled into his ear. “If you won’t take care of yourself, you’ll make me do it.” He ran his free hand down Cyrus’s stomach to his groin and gripped him roughly. “And you won’t like it when I do it.”

Cyrus trembled with rage, but he could only stand there, his eyes burning into the guards at his door, who refused to meet his gaze.

The lord snorted. “Or maybe you will like it.”

Every muscle of Cyrus’s body coiled with fight, and Pyro chuckled again. With a final rough squeeze, he released him and stepped toward the door. “Get to the healer,” he snarled over his shoulder. “Now.” And then he was gone.

It took a few moments for Cyrus’s death-lust to pass enough for him to move. One guard still held the door open but didn’t dare press Cyrus to move quicker, and didn’t dare look at him. It was a wise decision.

Finally, Cyrus stepped out of his chamber, reluctantly doing as he was bid.

It wasn’t that he didn’t think he needed healing, but he’d wanted to give Teron more time.

He was an old man, and healing took energy.

While scrapes and gashes didn’t take much, injuries like the ones Manus and Kieve had would have taken every ounce of power the old man could muster.

Had Cyrus gone the evening prior, Teron wouldn’t have had the strength to heal him too.

He hoped the old man had recovered somewhat.

Trying to collect himself, Cyrus breathed in the morning air.

It helped that the guard didn’t follow. Only gold-tier fighters were free to move around the villa unsupervised.

Pyro believed in incentives to motivate his fighters to rise through the ranks.

It wasn’t the wisest idea to allow those most capable of killing the freedom to roam.

But Cyrus certainly wouldn’t object. It would be to his advantage. One day.

The healer’s workroom wasn’t a far walk.

Teron was Rael’s best-kept secret—speaking about him outside the villa was punishable by death.

He was the world’s only known healer. Pyro had procured him for King Orrid but asked that he remain at the villa to heal his fighters and simply travel to the palace when needed.

Orrid, certain Teron would choose the palace, had given the old healer the choice.

Cyrus had always wondered why Teron had chosen the villa.

It certainly gave Pyro a premier advantage against the other fighting houses.

Cyrus reached the workroom, which was plain and simple, like Teron himself.

Despite having access to every instrument, every physic, and every herb, the old healer kept only a few things, all meticulously stored in cabinets along the wall.

Two large slab worktables filled the center of the room, where Cyrus and Everan had laid Manus and Kieve the night before.

In the corner was a small side table and chair, which was exactly where Teron now sat eating a bowl of dumplings in broth. He moved to rise when he saw Cyrus.

“No, no,” Cyrus told him. “Sit. Finish first.”

The old man relaxed and took another spoonful of broth. “I thought you’d come last night,” he said after he swallowed.

“I knew you had your hands full,” Cyrus replied as Teron took another bite. “And it’s not that bad.”

The old man eyed Cyrus’s chest, and he tilted his head. “It looks bad.”

“Do you need more time?” A night might not have been enough.

Teron picked up his bowl and drained it, then shook his head as he set it back on the table. “Come.” He stood and moved to one of the slab worktables.

Cyrus knew the process, and he stepped to it, sitting down and lying back.

He didn’t close his eyes as he normally did.

He didn’t dare. He feared where he’d find himself—in Pyro’s mind—and the thought haunted him.

The lord had done more than touch his blood, he’d consumed it, and Cyrus would have to guard his mind longer than usual. There’d be no sleep tonight.

Teron drew close, leaning over him, inspecting the wounds across his chest and then his arm.

He pressed the swollen flesh around the crusted tears of skin.

It was painful, but Cyrus didn’t move. The healer spread his fingers wide across the gash on his arm; it was less severe and would be the easier of the two.

Cyrus tried to settle himself, tried to relax.

The process wasn’t painful, but he hated it.

He’d rather suffer the injury itself. Of all the minds, Teron’s was the hardest to endure—all the things the old man had seen, all the things he’d healed.

What had been done to men in bloodsport, what had been done to men under Pyro, were things that haunted Teron’s mind.

And when he touched Cyrus’s blood, they haunted Cyrus too.

Warmth pulsed over his arm, soothing the sting. Teron’s touch took away the pain, at least the pain of the flesh. Nothing could heal the soul.

As the healer worked, so did Cyrus, struggling against the pull of Teron’s mind.

But he couldn’t help the glimpses of the memories that coursed through him: Manus lying on the table, splinters of the javelin still in his thigh, and Kieve, writhing with a strip of leather between his teeth as his leg was reset.

Broken bones were some of the worst injuries, needing to be aligned before Teron was able to start the healing.

There were limits, of course. Shattered bones couldn’t be healed at all; Teron could only dull the pain.

The warmth lifted, and Cyrus didn’t have to look at his arm to know the wound was gone, as if it had never existed. Teron moved to the gashes on his chest and spread his hands across them. The warmth returned.