Page 54 of Golden Queen (Idrigard #1)

They hauled me down the hall toward Markus' chambers—to the necromancer standing in the doorway.

I struggled, helpless and angry, as the guard held me firmly. I screamed, cursed them, but I barely knew what I was saying as we reached the old man.

"Take her below," he said.

I spat at him, realizing only when bright spots of blood hit his face that I must have bitten my tongue.

The necromancer's cane shot out, amber head striking me in the chest, forcing the air from my lungs.

"That is enough, Aelia! You will stop struggling!" he said angrily. "Give me her hand," he told the guard. "And hold her face away so she cannot spit on me again."

They did as commanded, one guard forced my hand out in front of me while the other held my face to the side.

I felt a sharp cut across my palm, and then another. I didn't think they were very deep, but when I felt a hand clasp mine, fiery pain bloomed in my skin, sending shockwaves of agony up my arm.

A familiar, acrid scent filled the air, sticking to the back of my throat. I held my breath, whether by choice or something the man had done to prevent me from breathing, I couldn't tell. I felt strange, disconnected.

I sagged in the guard's arms, and then my hand was released. I could suddenly breathe. I desperately sucked air into my ravaged lungs again.

"Now then, Aelia. You will not struggle," the necromancer said in a deep, resonant voice that made the insides of my ears vibrate and itch. "You will not scream. You will walk behind the guards and be a good girl."

I felt my feet hit the ground, but I could not move to fight them. I willed myself to strike, to run, to do anything, but I could not. I was enthralled. I had no will of my own.

Helpless rage coursed through me as the guards turned to lead me away down the hall. My feet began to move on their own. One of my slippers was gone. I heard the intermittent slap of one bare foot on the tiles as I walked, like a good girl, down the hall.

I woke up on the floor of a dark chamber, my head sore and raw.

The last memory I had was of standing in the chamber after the necromancer commanded me to stay on my feet until he returned.

"Perhaps you will manage to learn a bit of patience while you wait, Aelia."

I wanted to snarl at him, wanted to lash out, but all I could do was stare. I could not even lift the tongue that felt so thick and heavy in my mouth—or swallow the bile that gathered in the back of my throat.

I remembered the shame of my own urine coursing down my legs at some point, stinging skin scraped raw from the scuffle with the guards, and then only endless, helpless, rage.

But when I woke, my body was mine again, heavy and aching, but mine.

I scrambled up on feet grown numb from the cold and looked around the room. It was bare, save for a set of thick iron manacles hanging from the ceiling by a rusty chain.

I shuddered at the thought that if I did not get out, they might hang me from that chain by my wrists.

I went to the only source of light—a door with a barred window.

I realized I must be in the old, disused dungeon under the castle.

I looked out the window to see an empty, shadowed corridor, but when I tried the latch, it was locked. The sound of my attempt echoed harshly through the silence.

A man appeared on the other side of the door. "Shadows save us," he muttered and disappeared.

I tried the door again, wrenching against the wood as hard as I could. When that got me nowhere, I tried the bars, jerking the door back and forth with all my strength. It stayed firmly shut.

Even if I hadn't been weak and sore, I would not have been strong enough to open the thick iron-banded door.

I turned and limped around the chamber, searching for anything I could do—anything I could use as a weapon—anything at all to help me out of that mess.

The room was empty. My feet found only the dank, filthy floor. My eyes found only bare stone and shadows.

Aegis appeared at the doorway several minutes later, and I heard the sound of a key being turned in the lock. I tensed.

When the door began to swing outward, I lunged, shoving past the startled necromancer. He stumbled back, trying to catch himself.

I slid to the left and ran.

"Stop!" Aegis shouted.

My body halted as though I met an invisible barrier, my bare feet cemented to the stones. My muscles did not so much as twitch. They simply stopped, frozen.

"Walk back into the chamber, and do not attempt to harm me or anyone!" Aegis' voice was cold and strange again. Somehow, the words were more than just words. I could sense the magic that laced them, and I was helpless against it.

Aegis circled me as I stood in the middle of the chamber again.

He eyed me speculatively. "You are more powerful than I gave you credit for.

" Again, he almost sounded proud. "But you must come to terms with your fate, dear child.

You are going nowhere. If you stop fighting, I can make this much more comfortable for you—nearly painless. "

He limped around, studying me.

When he stood behind me out of sight, he sighed melodramatically. "You really are quite lovely. It is a shame how much abuse you have allowed to happen to your body."

I didn't understand. Did he mean the injuries they had given me?

Aegis came around to stand in front of me again, and he leaned forward, inhaling deeply as though he was smelling me.

Revulsion coursed through me as I realized that was precisely what he was doing.

"I can smell him on you!" he hissed, face contorting with disgust.

My revulsion turned to anger—raw but calculating anger. I understood the meaning of his use of the word abuse.

Aegis straightened and took my chin in his hand. He had to look up at me. He was several inches shorter. "Did you let him spill his seed in you?" he asked, disgust heavy in his words. "Did you?" he demanded, squeezing my chin.

His hands shook as he waited for me to answer, as though I had any ability to speak.

He released my chin and breathed a resigned sigh.

His change in mood was startling. He was almost cheerful as he added, "It matters not.

If he left anything behind, we will scrape it out of you.

" He said it so matter-of-factly that it made me gag, the automatic reflex tempered by whatever spell held me so tightly bound that all I did was jerk my eyes.

I had never once considered the possibility of a child resulting from being with Io. But the knowledge of how utterly naive I had been to not even consider it paled in comparison to the ache in my chest at the thought that this man might harm that unimagined child.

"Do you have any idea what the King of Penjan would do to you—to us all—if he arrived to find his son's bride had been ruined by another man?"

He knew I couldn't answer, but he still waited as though I might. "He would rip you apart, starting at that broken little slit between your legs."

He huffed a vicious laugh. I wanted—-so badly wanted—to rip him apart, starting with what I knew would be a shriveled little sack of marbles between his legs.

But I could not. I was trapped, helpless, lost. The knowledge of that threatened to consume me.

Aegis turned back to me, smiling. "You are lucky that I have come along," he said in his gravelly, wet voice. "None but a High Actem would have the skills to repair that kind of damage. And none but me would have the nerve to do it."

He grew solemn as he reached up and ran a hand down my head, petting me like a dog.

"I do not want to see you turned out to the king's revenants, used up like an old dishrag.

I like you, you see. I have liked you since you were the barest slip of a girl, when I gave you your pretty golden bracelets. "

Shock ran through me at the revelation. Had Markus truly been conspiring with the Shadowlands since I was a child? How long had I been promised to Penjan?

"You probably do not often think of your bracelets, do you, child?" he asked with a secretive smile.

The hand that had been trailing down the side of my head slid down across my collarbone until it lay just over my heart. With fumbling, shaky fingers, he slid it lower, trailing over the outline of my breast.

"You were such a small, delicate thing then. Who knew you would grow to be so...pretty." The tip of his tongue darted out, almost like a snake scenting the air. He inhaled deeply again. "If I had known you would let yourself be ruined, I would have taken the opportunity myself."

Anger exploded in my chest, and something broke free.

My hand came up, the metal cuff of my bracelet striking his head with a dull crack. Pain radiated up my arm as he went careening off to the side, landing in a heap on the stones.

As I moved to reach for him, he screamed like a petulant child. "Stop! Don't move!"

My fucking body betrayed me again. I stopped, my muscles frozen. I could not move again.

I looked down at the disgusting creature, and I wanted to pull my very bones out of my skin and use them to beat him to death. I would gladly have used my last breath of air to end his pathetic existence.

But I could do nothing. I was once again helpless, enthralled, enslaved.

I watched as a group of necromancers, all missing their last two fingers, came into the cell to lift the old man from where he had fallen onto the stone floor.

Blood trickled down the side of his head, and he had a dazed look on his face. My wrist throbbed from what I was sure were broken bones.

"That was very stupid," Aegis said angrily, pressing his hand to his head and staring at his bloody fingers.

He turned to the door and nodded to someone. After a moment, a guard stepped into the chamber—one of my Royal Guardsmen. His long gold and white embroidered cloak was swept back from his broad shoulders.

"Hold her," Aegis said, his voice rising as though some strong emotion was driving him.