Page 16 of Sweet Venom Of Time (Blade of Shadows #6)

Low. Dark. Possessive.

“You’ll learn your place,” he murmured, his fingers tightening around my wrist, his grip a promise of torment to come.

“You’ll serve your purpose, and in time…”

A pause. A leer. A cruel smirk slithered across his lips.

“You’ll come to enjoy it.”

The words coiled around my spine like a vice, bile rising in my throat.

I wanted to scream. To run.

To erase the feel of his touch.

But I sat. Trapped. Frozen.

And Lord Winston smiled.

“Don’t bother resisting,” he sneered, leaning in closer. “You’re mine now. There’s no escape from that.”

A knock at the door fractured the moment, shattering the silence.

The butler entered—his expression carefully schooled into indifference, but not before I caught the brief flicker of something else. Alarm.

“You are needed at once in the east wing, my lord,” he announced, his voice cutting through the thick air like a scalpel.

Lord Winston’s grip lingered for a heartbeat too long before he released me, his bony fingers trailing across my wrist like the legs of a spider retreating to its web.

“I don’t want you to leave,” he said, his displeasure barely concealed beneath the strained civility in his voice. His milky eyes locked onto mine, the unspoken command clear. “Look around. Make yourself at home.”

Then, turning to the butler with a conspiratorial tilt, he added, “Mr. Pemberton, please show Lady Alexander around. Make her feel… comfortable. In the areas of the house deemed suitable.”

Their gazes met.

A silent conversation. A shadowed understanding that curdled the air between them.

“Very well, my lord,” Mr. Pemberton said, bowing slightly. His voice was measured, his posture obedient.

But his eyes?—

His eyes never met mine.

I tightened my grip on the handle of my teacup, feeling its delicate edge dig into my palm—a small reminder that beneath the opulence, this place was nothing more than a gilded prison. And I, its unwilling captive, shrouded in the suffocating weight of what was to come.

An oppressive sense of impending doom clung to the air, thick and unshakable, draping over me like a funeral shroud within the decaying grandeur of Lord Winston’s estate. My gaze flicked to Mary. In her eyes, I found my horror reflected.

“We’ll look around, then leave,” she murmured behind Mr. Pemberton’s broad back, her voice barely more than a breath. “We don’t want to anger Lord Winston.”

“His home is a nightmare,” I whispered, each word raw and tight in my throat. “Gloomy. Musty. Death lingers in the walls.” I glanced at the faded tapestries, the crumbling edges of what had once been luxury. The air itself felt thick with the weight of unseen specters.

“It feels like ghosts are everywhere,” Mary agreed, unease threading through her words.

“Let’s talk a walk in the gardens. Surely, it is better than the house,” I suggested, pulling Mary with me to the terrace. I needed to escape.

And then—his voice, still ringing in my ears. Lord Winston’s coarse, dreadful words. Words I couldn’t bring myself to repeat.

I shut my eyes, drawing in a breath, feeling the sun on my skin, and for a fleeting moment, I thought of Lord Hassan.

His warmth. His vibrance. A stark contrast to this tomb of a house.

When I married, I longed for love, passion, and desire—a younger man who would set my soul alight—someone like Lord Hassan.

A wistful sigh slipped from my lips before I could stop it.

“Lady Alexander. Miss Mary.”

Mr. Pemberton’s voice cut through my thoughts, his tone brooking no argument.

“I must ask you, Miss Mary, to accompany me inside. His lordship insists.”

Mary stiffened beside me. “Surely, I cannot leave Lady Alexander alone,” she protested, her voice firm despite the worry creasing her brow.

“Lord Winston’s orders are quite clear,” Mr. Pemberton said, his expression as impassive as the stone statues standing sentinel over the withering gardens.

Mary cast me a troubled look, hesitation flickering in her eyes before resignation settled over her features. She leaned in, her breath warm against my ear as she whispered, “I’ll be back in five minutes. I promise.”

And with that reluctant assurance, she turned and followed Mr. Pemberton, vanishing into the dim maw of the house.

Left alone in the thorny embrace of the neglected gardens, I inhaled the heavy air, thick with decay, laced with the scent of rot and wilted blooms. Once vibrant, the roses drooped under the weight of neglect, their petals falling like silent eulogies to a long-forgotten past.

With each step through the overgrown garden, prickly brambles snagged at my skirts as if trying to ensnare me, to tether me to this place of slow, creeping ruin. The gnarled branches stretched toward me, skeletal fingers grasping at the empty air, their brittle thorns whispering of misery.

And then?—

A sound.

A scream.

Not the distant echo of wind through broken windows, nor the rustle of leaves, but something raw. Agonized. Human.

The cries sliced through the quiet, sudden and precise, shattering the hush settling over the garden. My pulse lurched, a cold sweat gathering at the nape of my neck. The wretched wails did not fade. They did not cease.

Drawn by a force I could not name, I stepped forward, my feet moving before my mind could protest.

Tucked away beyond the overgrown hedges was a small, dilapidated outbuilding, its crumbling walls barely holding themselves upright. The door hung ajar, revealing only darkness beyond its splintered frame—but I knew he was in there, waiting.

A foul stench seeped from within—iron, sweat, fear. It coiled through the damp night air, thick and suffocating, clinging to my lungs with every shallow breath.

I should have turned away.

I should have fled.

Instead, I edged closer, the screams pulling me in, my fear eclipsed by something far more dangerous.

Morbid curiosity.

Peering through the grimy window, my gaze fell upon a macabre scene that would haunt even the most ghastly of nightmares.

There was Lord Winston, towering over a naked man whose body bore the evidence of merciless brutality.

His skin was mottled with bruises and lacerations, each one a testament to the cruelty he had endured.

Lord Winston’s smile was like a grotesque gargoyle, full of malice and sadistic pleasure.

In his hand, he held a knife, its blade catching the dim light as he carved cruel lines into the man’s face.

A wicked grin spread across his mouth as he spat out the words.

“You’re nothing but a filthy Timeborne,” he hissed with venomous delight, his eyes blazing.

“Every second I wait hones the edge of what’s coming. I will break you—slowly, methodically. And when you finally beg for mercy… it still won’t come. Because there’s a special kind of pleasure in watching someone realize how much agony they can survive—only to learn it’s still not enough.”

The helpless man’s eyes fluttered closed, his body limp from the agony he had endured. Something shifted in Lord Winston then—something feral and monstrous. I could feel it rather than see it, a pulse of depravity in the air that made my stomach turn.

I looked away.

I couldn’t watch.

But the sounds—the sounds would haunt me forever.

A low, guttural growl. The rustle of fabric.

The sickening rhythm of violence. My breath caught in my throat, and the world tilted around me—the trees blurring, branches swaying like they too wanted to look away.

The air felt too thin, the earth unsteady beneath my feet.

I wanted to scream, to run, to rip the moment from time itself and bury it where it could never reach me again.

A soft rustle stirred from the shadows.

A young maid stepped out from behind a crumbling partition, where the broken remains of old shelves slouched against the wall, emerging slowly, her eyes wild and glassy, her grin split too wide, too wrong. It was the smile of someone who had long since abandoned their soul.

“Oh, my lord,” she whispered, her voice thick with something sick, something corrupted. Her gaze dropped to his blood-smeared hands, and a tremble rippled through her body. “Seeing you like this… it drives me mad.”

She moved toward him like someone hypnotized.

“Fuck me,” she begged.

A sound clawed its way from my throat, strangled and hoarse. I couldn’t stop shaking.

Lord Winston’s face twisted into a mask of wickedness—hunger without conscience, lust without humanity. He seized her, pulling her against him with violent fervor.

And then, before the broken body on the floor, they consumed each other—two beasts lost in their shared madness.

I staggered back, bile clawing up my throat, the world tilting violently around me.

How could such evil exist?

How could I be bound to it?

The air thickened, pressing in from all sides, suffocating. The trees seemed to shudder, their gnarled limbs arching inward as if the very earth recoiled from the sickness festering inside.

And in that moment, a single, brutal truth seared through me—I could not, would not, shackle myself to this monster.

But panic held me in its iron grip, rooting me to the spot. A petrified statue. A prisoner of my horror. My gaze remained locked on the macabre tableau beyond the grimy glass as if my body refused to believe what my mind already knew.

Lord Winston’s twisted, satisfied grin burned itself into my memory, branding him as something beyond villainy—something unholy.

I didn’t wait. I turned and ran.

Branches clawed at my sleeves as I fled through the overgrown path, heart pounding like a war drum in my chest. Only when the shadows of the outbuilding were safely behind me did I stop, gasping for breath.

“Lady Elizabeth, what’s wrong?”

Mary’s voice broke through the haze—crisp, urgent, anchoring. She hurried toward me, jarring against the horror I just witnessed.

“You’re as pale as a ghost!”

She skidded to a stop as she appeared before me, her eyes wide with concern. My lips parted, but my voice barely made it past my throat.

“We have to leave. Now.”

It was little more than a whisper, no louder than the squeak of a mouse.

But my hands—shaking, desperate—found hers, gripping with a force that betrayed the storm raging inside me.

I pulled her with me, stumbling, nearly tripping over the uneven ground as we fled toward the carriage. My pulse roared in my ears, my breath ragged, my body fighting to expel the images seared into my mind.

Bless her. Mary asked what had happened, her voice trembling with concern. She pleaded for answers, but the words wouldn’t come.

Some horrors could not be spoken of.

Some nightmares refused to be named.

The ride back was a fever dream.

The countryside blurred into meaningless streaks of green and gold beyond the carriage window, the world spinning past as if it wanted to rid itself of what I had seen. But the horror clung to me. Burrowed into me.

No matter how tightly I shut my eyes, the images returned—Lord Winston’s grotesque smile imprinted deep into my mind like a wound that would never heal.

The glint of his blade. The sick, eager moans.

The dying man’s ragged breaths were swallowed by the depravity taking place beside him. Gods above. The woman. That woman.

What were they?

What kind of wretched souls found pleasure in such perversion?

The carriage lurched to a stop, but I did not wait for the footman.

I flung the door open, stumbling onto the gravel.

My legs carried me before I could think, my breath coming quick and ragged as I ran.

Away. Away. Away. But there was no outrunning the filth in my mind, no tearing free from the memory sinking its claws into me, dragging me back into that dim, suffocating room.

When I reached my chambers, my hands shook violently, so I could barely latch the door behind me.

The walls closed in, smothering—but at least they were mine. At least here, in this gilded cage, I could pretend I was safe.

But my body betrayed me. Tremors racked my limbs, my pulse an erratic drumbeat against my ribs. I pressed my hands to my cheeks, ice-cold with terror, desperate to ground myself, to find something real beyond the nightmare clawing at my thoughts.

“I can’t marry him. I can’t. I can’t.”

The words spilled from my lips, a fragile, useless mantra—a whispered plea against the crushing weight of certainty.

I had no choice.

Not unless?—

A name flickered in my mind, a lifeline in the darkness.

Lord Hassan.

Where Winston was filth and decay, Hassan was something else entirely—something I needed to believe in.

He had offered me refuge—a sanctuary in his townhouse.

But could I trust him?

Or was I only grasping at cobwebs, weaving a foolish dream of escape in a world where men—no matter their charm or promises—only ever took what they wanted?