Page 36

Chapter Seventeen

ELIAS

M agnus must have punctured his lungs because as the syphen plunged into his chest, Elias couldn’t draw a breath. Pain sliced through him as the sorcerer twisted the hilt.

“Nearly there,” Magnus hissed, his voice oddly strained—quite unlike his usual stoic demeanor.

Gritting his teeth, Elias tried to stifle the scream threatening to rip out of his throat. He didn’t want to give Magnus the satisfaction of knowing how deep the pain was—or how close he was to breaking.

Being tortured with a common blade or non-magical means was one thing.

It was agony, but it was bearable. It was simply flesh.

But to be stabbed over and over by the very blade used to create him…

It was akin to having his chest torn in two, his entire being ripped open—tearing apart everything he was until there was nearly nothing left.

Blood surged up his throat, and he coughed, choking.

Panic bled across his chest with icy fingers. For several moments, he couldn’t breathe. Gasping, he pulled against the restraints that bound him to the X. But all he could do was stand and bear everything that was being done to him.

Suddenly, his chest convulsed and air rushed into his lungs. Then blood spewed from his lips, and he spat scarlet onto Magnus’ once-rich rugs.

The pressure in his chest eased as Magnus released the hilt and stepped back. He tapped a bloodied finger against his chin.

Elias focused on taking one breath and then the next. But each was agony. The syphen remained in his chest—piercing one of his lungs. His body tried to heal itself, but the blade’s magic kept his body from mending anything it touched.

The sorcerer had changed as of late. He’d been muttering under his breath, but Elias hadn’t bothered to ask. He hardly possessed the energy to remain conscious anymore, let alone fight.

But this time, when Magnus strode around the tent, Elias caught on to one word of the sorcerer’s mutters— enchantress.

“What—” Elias began, but his punctured lung made it nearly impossible to breathe, let alone speak. He gasped, eventually managing two words. “What happened?”

A wicked smile alighted on Magnus’ face. “When you and I struck our bargain and I returned Arabella’s memories to her, I added a little bit of magic to be embedded in her mind alongside her memories.”

Elias frowned, shaking his head. What had Magnus done?

But more than that, why had he trusted Magnus would return her memories without some ulterior motive? He’d been so foolish. And that oversight could cost Arabella her freedom.

“That magic made her more… sympathetic to dark magic,” Magnus continued. “But most importantly, it allowed me to track her whereabouts.”

Shock had Elias’ mind spinning.

Magnus pressed his hands together. “But it would appear your enchantress is more capable than I thought. She managed to remove my magic.”

Meaning, Magnus could no longer track her.

Relief swelled in Elias’ chest. Before he could speak, blood bubbled up his throat once more, and he spewed it onto the ground.

Magnus sighed. “Perhaps it’s time for another offering. Can’t have you succumbing to your inner demon just yet.”

“No,” Elias snapped, the word tearing out of him. Shame bled into that single word—shame for what he’d done to that innocent woman.

I’ve already killed someone. I won’t do it again.

But if he was presented with another mortal, he didn’t think he could stop himself.

For the first time, he wondered if succumbing to the hunger was so bad.

He didn’t fear death—never had. But the idea of fading into the demon lurking beneath his skin, to lose his memories and be driven solely by the desire to feed…

That fate had once terrorized his waking dreams. But now?

He realized then that fear didn’t fill him at the thought as it once had.

A smile lifted the corner of Magnus’ lips. “Perhaps I’ve been going about this all wrong.”

In a flash, the sorcerer was before him—his lips hovering in front of Elias’. If Elias moved even the slightest, they would kiss. He kept his body still, knowing what would come next.

The sorcerer’s eyes glowed red, and desire churned in Elias’ gut. Then the air before the sorcerer shimmered like heat above cobblestone streets in the summer.

One moment, Magnus stood there in his immaculate robes, and the next, Arabella was before him.

Tears were in the corners of Elias’ eyes as he allowed himself to feel the agony in his chest alongside relief at the sight of her.

My mate. She’s here.

His eyes feasted on the sight of Arabella.

She was tall and lean, garbed in enchantress leathers as dark as the night itself.

Her long braid was over her shoulder, and her fair skin looked like it was kissed by starlight.

Even the teardrop gemstone on her forehead shimmered like it held the moon within it. But when he looked at her eyes…

They were wrong.

Instead of the brown irises he’d come to love, her eyes were a deep scarlet.

But in his current state, with a fiery hunger burning in his gut, it didn’t matter.

His cock hardened instantly. Painfully.

“Elias,” the female said as she pressed her body against his. As she did, he became very aware that he was naked and covered in both dried and fresh blood. And the syphen still stuck out of his chest.

Even still, his name on her lips had his body slackening. Blood slicked his chafed wrists as they pressed into the restraints.

A haze settled over his mind.

She reached a hand up to cup his cheek. “You don’t need to fight anymore, my love. Submit to me. Give in.”

His cock twitched, growing even harder.

Just being near her had his body screaming for release.

He yearned to thrust his hips forward, for any friction. One touch from her, and he’d come.

A tongue darted out from her mouth, glancing against his lower lip.

Body still slack in the restraints, he managed to tilt his chin up to her. Showing her that she could have him—all of him. He was hers for the taking.

“That’s it,” she purred, her breath smelling strongly of peppermint.

Then her lips were against his, pressing hard enough that he felt her teeth. Desire swirled inside him even stronger—so powerful it was painful. Then what little essence he had unlatched from deep within his chest, called to her on a soundless siren song.

That slip of energy was all that was left of the girl he’d killed.

A hand encircled Elias’ cock, squeezing.

He grunted in pain, and sudden clarity entered his thoughts.

This isn’t right.

Arabella’s touch could be hungry and laced with need, but it was never like this.

Her touches lingered on his skin, pulling him in as if she couldn’t get enough of him.

More than once she’d raked her nails along his back, but it was never with the intention of hurting him.

Anything their bodies shared was out of a desire to find the deepest parts of each other.

But this…

It was as though she was intent on consuming all that he was.

Reaching for the bond in his chest, he felt for his mate. He still couldn’t sense her emotions, but he knew from the lingering tightness that she wasn’t nearby.

She certainly didn’t stand before him.

Something inside him cracked at the knowledge that his mate was far out of his reach. But if he couldn’t see her, then neither could Magnus.

She was out of both of their reaches.

Slowly, Elias forced back the fog in his thoughts before meeting Magnus’ scarlet eyes.

Dark mischief twinkled in Arabella’s eyes, but the sorcerer didn’t change his form. Neither did he release Elias’ cock.

“No,” Elias breathed.

The idea of looking upon the face of his mate like this , with a touch that wasn’t hers, had something in him fracturing.

Please, let her touch be just mine.

He wanted to remember Arabella with her sincerity, gentleness, and fierceness. With sudden certainty, he understood why Magnus wore her face—he wanted to warp Elias’ memories of his mate. To remove the safe place his thoughts retreated to during the worst of the sorcerer’s administrations.

To tear him down brick by brick.

There was a flash of teeth as the female before him smiled.

Elias tried desperately to keep his body still. To keep himself from thrusting into Magnus’ hand even as desire alighted in his core.

But when her tongue plunged into his mouth, his body betrayed him.

He thrust once, twice, and then his seed spilled into the female’s hand.

As he came, his essence shimmered up his throat and flowed into his mouth.

The female’s eyes glowed a brighter scarlet as she pulled it into her.

The metallic tang of Elias’ blood mixed with her peppermint taste and the essence’s rich flavor as she fed.

Elias’ fangs pressed against his lower lip as Magnus pulled back, still wearing Arabella’s face. She brought her hand to her mouth, licking Elias’ pleasure clean from her fingers.

A growl ripped from somewhere deep in Elias’ being. He yearned to rip into Magnus’ throat and tear him into shreds even as nausea filled him at the sight.

Once his hand was clean, Magnus smiled and stepped forward until his body pressed against Elias’ skin. Until only Arabella’s leathers were between their bodies.

“You will never be free of me,” Magnus whispered into the space between them with Arabella’s voice, his breath warm on Elias’ cheeks.

“I see now that, even after feeding on me, even with your compliance, you resist me. You guard your heart from me. So, until you lower those shields around your heart and give me what I seek, I will wear her face, keep you teetering on the edge between desperation and despair.”

As Magnus’ eyes glowed red once more, Elias’ cock became rock hard.

“Please,” Elias managed between kisses as Magnus descended upon him.

Tongue plunging into his mouth, Magnus circled slowly before pulling back and running his teeth over Elias’ lower lip. “Give me what I want, and this stops.”

But Elias couldn’t open his heart—and magic—to Magnus.

Even if he knew how, it was the one place that he could lock away his truest self.

When Elias didn’t respond, Magnus said, “That’s what I thought.”

Then the sorcerer’s hands—Arabella’s hands—were on him again.

Elias pulled at his chains. The motion was violent and filled with every ounce of rage and desperation flowing through him. Blood poured down his wrists. Soon, his arms were slick with red.

But there was nothing he could do to stop the female before him as she fed from him. Each time, she kept him teetering on the edge of humanity, a breath away from succumbing to the demon under his skin.

As day after day passed like this, a haze formed over his mind as his thoughts and realities blurred together.

Each time, he was helpless against her touch and how she used his body. Even the pleasure became painful, and he found himself flinching away at the mere sight of her. The fear bled into his dreams. Soon, the one place of refuge he had from all of this was no longer safe.

Until slowly, the faintest fissure formed in his heart.