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Chapter Fourteen

ELIAS

W ith a flick of deft fingers, Magnus removed a blade from his robes.

Fear squeezed Elias’ throat at the sight of the syphen. But there was nothing he could do as Magnus strode across the tent toward where Elias was bound hand and foot to the X.

While he’d been given periods of respite after feeding on Magnus where he could collapse on the tent’s carpeted floor, every day brought him back to this torture device.

The sorcerer’s eyes flicked up to his, as sharp as the edge of the blade he held.

“My erox found where your enchantress was,” Magnus said. “She took refuge in the Twilight Court within the estate of one of the princes.”

Elias’ heart drummed in his chest.

Had they taken Arabella captive? If so, where were they keeping her? Was she within the encampment even now?

“But she and her friends left before we could intercept them,” Magnus continued, a fire alighting in his eyes.

Before Elias could even breathe a sigh of relief, a band of air wrapped around his throat. His vision swirled, and the tent went in and out of focus. Pulling at his restraints on instinct, he tried to break free. His wrists quickly became raw, and he felt the trickle of blood down his forearms.

“Nothing to say, my prodigal son?” Magnus said as he pressed the tip of the syphen to Elias’ bare chest. A single drop of blood trickled from where the blade broke his skin.

Elias gasped, unable to even get a wisp of air.

“What was that?” Magnus pressed the blade further into his chest.

Half an inch.

One inch.

Pain sliced through the panic consuming his senses, desperate for air. The syphen was one of the things that could kill him. If the blade even nicked his heart, he would cease to exist.

As Magnus pressed it in with agonizing slowness, it felt like Elias’ skin was being seared by a metal pulled from flames. Unable to heal around the syphen, blood poured from the wound.

Just as Elias was about to pass out from a lack of oxygen, Magnus released the pressure around his neck—the band of air dissipating. A pitiful croaking sound escaped his lips as Elias sucked in one breath after another.

Suddenly, Elias realized one of his ankles was free. Had he broken free in his desperation to breathe? His hands were still bound, as was his other ankle. But if he wasn’t fully bound to the X, he could use his magic.

“Touch your power,” Magnus said as something sharp sliced into Elias’ mind.

The syphen’s will , he realized.

Unbidden, Elias reached for the essence swirling at his core, knowing if he used too much of it, he’d succumb to the demon within.

Heat flared behind his eyes as the room came into focus.

Every time he wielded essence, his eyes burned and turned a bright blue.

He focused that energy before his chest, allowing the essence to form into an orb of the same blue hue as his eyes.

It grew larger between him and Magnus, but the sorcerer didn’t pull back, didn’t step away.

Instead, he watched, transfixed as Elias’ power blossomed between them.

“Hold,” Magnus said, not releasing the syphen’s hilt where it remained in Elias’ chest.

Instantly, Elias stopped, and the orb of power hovered between them.

In his years of being tortured beneath the mountain, he’d become all too familiar with Magnus’ manipulation with the syphen.

He’d retreated far into himself, locking the shreds of himself far away where Magnus couldn’t reach.

But as he tried to protect what remained of him now, he felt himself slipping—as if shards of himself were falling through.

Into Magnus’ waiting hand.

Minutes passed as Elias held on to his power, sweat trickling down his face.

All the muscles in his body strained, fighting to cling to the magic. It felt like he held a boulder thrice his size atop his shoulders. He was so weak that even this display of magic depleted his strength swiftly.

A pulling sensation came from his chest.

For a moment, he thought it was the mating bond, thought Arabella had gotten closer to him somehow. When he’d prevented Magnus from going after her, the bond disappeared hours later. Or nearly so. The tugging sensation had faded, and he could no longer sense her emotions or nearness.

He wondered if she’d escaped with Breckett through the gateway to the fae realm.

Even though he longed to feel her, he felt relief that she was far from here.

Far from Magnus.

The pulling sensation in his chest now was unlike the mating bond.

It was a deep part of him. A place he’d never journeyed. It was the well of energy at the center of his core—the very fabric that wove his being together. All that made him an erox.

My magic, he realized.

“There you are,” Magnus purred. “The core of an erox’s magic is in different places in each male’s body. And it would appear yours is in your…”

Disbelief and then fury crossed Magnus’ features as he shook his head, taking a step back. Though he never released the syphen.

“No,” Magnus hissed. Then a laugh bubbled up his throat and tore through the silence in the tent. “Of course, my most sentimental erox stores his magic in the one place I can’t access with the syphen.”

Without warning, Magnus pulled the syphen free.

The sound Elias made was something between a croak and a cry. Blood flowed from the wound in long lines down his body, which started to stitch back together but didn’t close. And it wouldn’t. Not without more essence.

He’d nearly depleted all of it as he clung to the orb of magic, which he still held in front of his chest.

“Release your magic,” Magnus said.

Elias did as he bid.

Instantly, the essence fizzled out, and the heat behind his eyes disappeared.

He quickly breathed the orb’s essence back into him.

In place of the heat that once burned behind his eyes was a dark, searing pressure.

He felt his pupils dilate, growing wider as hunger filled him.

Fangs pricked his lips, and he tasted the metallic tang of blood.

Magnus flicked a wrist, and Elias’ ankle was cuffed again.

Elias tried to form words, but the hunger was consuming him slowly, making it impossible to form individual thoughts.

“The source of your magic, my prodigal son,” Magnus said as he studied Elias’ blood on the blade. “Is in your heart. At present, I can’t reach it—not with the syphen anyway. Can’t have you dying just yet. There’s much we need to do. Much, indeed.”

In a flash, Magnus was before him, slicing him open from collarbone to his stomach.

Elias screamed as agony crashed over him. It felt like he was being peeled open. No, he was being peeled open. Glancing down, he watched as the sorcerer pulled his skin back and punched his hand into Elias’ chest.

His pupils widened further as fingers touched his heart, bands of magic wrapping around it.

Soon, conscious thought faded from him, and all he knew was agony—and hunger .

Fangs out, Elias snapped at the male but couldn’t reach him. Not bound as he was. But soon, even the hunger wasn’t enough to keep him awake. He fell beneath a wave of agony, slipping into unconsciousness.

His dreams were short and filled of scarlet eyes and crows flying on bloodied wings.

When he woke, a woman was before him, and a hunger unlike anything he’d ever known burned through him. It felt like he’d stepped into flames even as they burned him from within.

Several erox held the woman by her wrists and neck.

Tears slipped down her cheeks as his gaze fixed on the essence swirling in her chest.

He called it to him, hunger driving him.

The female stopped fighting as she fell under his power, taking a step forward and then another.

Their lips crashed together, and she cried out as she came again and again.

He didn’t pause between feedings like he might have with other prey.

No. He was too lost to the hunger and the need to feed.

Again and again, he pulled essence into his mouth—ignoring her screams of pleasure tinged with pain—until his body was full to the brim.

All at once, his hunger was sated, and his flesh knit back together.

Thoughts returned to him, and he watched with horror as the female slipped to the ground.

Dead.

There was a tsking sound, and Elias looked up to see Flynn with a smug look on his face. “Drained her dry. I’ve never seen an erox kill someone so fast.”

Guilt swelled in Elias' chest, and he gagged, nearly retching.

I killed her. She’s dead because of me.

Flynn and the other erox turned toward the tent’s exit, not bothering to remove the woman’s body.

Elias’ wordless screams filled the tent as he raged against his bonds.