Page 10 of Claimed In Darkness

10

ZEPHIRAN

S he thinks she’s ready.

She isn’t.

It’s in the way her fingers move, in the way her breath falters, barely perceptible but there. A weakness she doesn’t even recognize in herself yet.

But I will show her.

She will know exactly what it means to survive.

The underground pit reeks of blood and sweat and something sour—fear. The walls are damp, torches flickering, throwing long, jagged shadows against the stone. The stench of spilled life clogs the air, thick and intoxicating.

This is where I bring her. Where I will teach her what it means to be mine.

She stands beside me, wrapped in the red silk I forced her into, the fabric now rumpled, barely holding onto her curves, as if the dress itself knows it doesn’t belong on her.

Her chin is high, her spine straight, but I feel the anger rolling off her in waves.

Good.

She needs to be angry.

I want her desperate as I am about to destroy and rebuilt her in a way she won’t see coming.

“Why are we here?” she asks, voice hoarse, wary.

I turn to her, trailing a single finger down her arm, moving in circles. She shivers, goosebumps appearing on her skin.

“To prove yourself,” I murmur.

She scoffs. “Prove what? That I can play your perfect little pet? I think we established that already.”

I smile softly. “Not quite.”

I nod toward the cage at the center of the pit. The metal bars gleam under the torchlight, coated in old rust and aged blood. The floor inside is nothing but dirt and grime and the bones of men who lost.

The crowd chants, restless, eager.

I keep my voice low, calm, deadly.

“You are going to kill someone for me tonight.”

She freezes as if she’s a block of ice and every part of her goes rigid.

I can feel her pulse thrashing in her throat like she wants to curl them into fists.

She doesn’t turn to me.

She looks at the cage.

At the man inside it.

A human.

A slave.

Battered, scarred, and wide-eyed with fear.

Her chest rises. Falls. Slow. Shallow.

“No,” she says.

“Yes,” I whisper in her ears, willing her to glance at me.

Her head snaps toward me, her expression dangerous, vicious. “I won’t kill for you.”

I grip her jaw, tilting her face up to me.

I press my thumb against her lips, smearing a drop of wine she missed from earlier.

“Then you’ll die instead,” I declare softly but with a voice that brooks no argument.

She breathes faster.

I see the war inside her.

The righteousness. The stubbornness.

The terrified, aching truth.

She’s going to fight to survive. And she knows I’m not lying.

She looks back at the man in the cage.

He’s thin. Weak. Terrified.

He won’t stand a chance against her.

I brush a strand of hair from her face, leaning in, my lips a breath away from her skin.

“Make a choice, little fox,” I murmur.

Her body shudders.

Not from my touch.

From the inevitability.

She clenches her jaw. “You’re a demon from the depths of the glacies.”

I chuckle, dragging my fingers down her spine, feeling the way her breath hitches.

“I never said I wasn’t. I may be a dark elf, but I’m as demonic as they come.”

I step back, nodding toward the cage. “Now. Go inside.”

She hesitates.

I arch a brow.

With stiff, deliberate steps, she moves toward the iron gate.

The crowd erupts.

They want blood.

She is about to give it to them.

The fight starts, and she’s magnificent.

But she doesn’t know what she’s done yet.

Not as she stands there in the middle of the bloodstained pit, her chest rising and falling in sharp, shuddering gasps. Not as the dagger slips from her fingers, landing with a soft, sickening thud in the dirt beside the body.

She hasn’t realized the implications of the kill, her body running survival mode.

She will when it sinks into her bones. When the ghost of the man she just killed crawls into her ribs and makes a home there.

She will when she understands that she’s just taken a life—and she will never be able to give it back.

The crowd erupts, their cheers rolling through the cavernous pit like the roar of a starving beast.

Nairarooted on the spot.

She just stares at the man she cut down. The blood spreading slowly, slowly into the dirt beneath his slackened body.

For a second, I wonder if she’s going to drop. If she’s going to collapse beneath it.

But—she breathes.

Deep, steady.

And when she lifts her head, her dark, furious gaze meets mine. There it is.

That hatred.

That realization.

She knows exactly what she’s done.

And she’s very aware as to who made her do it.

The mark I burned into her skin is still fresh, just barely hidden beneath the thin silk I forced her to wear. I wonder if it aches now, the same way I imagine her heart must be shattering.

I hope it does.

I want her to remember every second of this.

I want her to know that she belongs to me now—not just in body, but in soul.

She steps toward me, her movements precise, deliberate.

Her hands are still stained red, but she doesn’t wipe them clean.

Good. She shouldn’t.

I lean back against the stone railing as she reaches me, tilting my head in amusement. “You look different,” I murmur.

She stops inches from me, so close, too close.

I smell the blood on her, the sweat, the lingering stench of fear, rage, and something crumbling.

But her voice is steady. “I hope you die on your own spit.”

I cackle, throwing my head back in laughter.

I reach out—slow, deliberate, because I know she won’t move away.

She lets me touch her.

I drag my thumb over her cheek, down to her mouth, smearing the drying blood against her lips.

She doesn’t flinch.

She just keeps staring at me, her eyes raging an inferno that threatens to demolish me.

I lean in, my breath brushing against her mouth.

“See?” I murmur. “You were always mine.”

Her lips part—but not in submission.

No, she’s taunting me. Challenging me.

And hell, if that doesn’t make my blood run hotter.

Her fingers curl into fists, her nails biting into her palms. I feel it, the need to strike me, to hurt me, to ruin me.

But she doesn’t.

Instead, she tilts her chin up and smiles.

Like she’s already plotting how she’s going to destroy me.

Good. It will make my life more interesting.

I release her, stepping back, watching the way her chest rises and falls, too fast, too sharp.

“We’re done here.”

She doesn’t move at first. Doesn’t blink.

After a long, seething moment, she finally turns away, stepping past me without another word.

She is not the same woman who walked into this pit. She never will be again.

I made sure of that.

I watch her disappear into the crowd, my pulse steady, even.

I exhale a slow breath.

And I smirk. Perfect.