Page 30 of The Interdimensional Lord's Earthly Delight
Chapter 8
Light. So much light, all the light, it burned him. It scorched away everything he was, everything he’d ever known, and left him with nothing, only…
Dark.
And unending, falling void.
Any hope he might’ve had that he’d find an end to the dark was extinguished. In his first life, he’d been a reckless warlord. In his second life, he’d been a heartless criminal. And now in this thirdchance, he’d hurt the very first person he’d touched.
Why did he keep doing these terrible things? Better he kept falling through the void with no end.
But then he woke up.
The cold, hard slab beneath him was colder and harder with every breath. Modern Thorkons might eschew the death penalty, but they apparently had no particular care for the comfort of their condemned.
With a wretched groan,he rolled to his side and sat up. He made use of the nutrition and hygiene utilities—neither particularly inspired—and walked the few paces of his confinement. What would the day bring?
With each step of his pacing, memories nipped at his heels. When he’d first come to himself under the eye of the black hole, Lishelle had been there. Touching her after he’d been nothingness incarnate for solong had been irresistible. Also, he was the God of Beloveds. How could henottouch her?
But he was also the selfish, insatiable Tynan. And the cruel Blackworm. In confused flashes like dreams, he imagined the tired, angry, disgusted glares of the hundred Thorkon girls he’d put to task. And the panicked struggles of the Black Hole Brides who’d lost their lives to Blackworm. All of those facesseemed to crescendo with Lishelle’s devastated expression at discovering whose body he walked in. He wrapped his arms around himself, digging his fingers into his biceps, as if he could rip the skin away, reveal what was underneath…
He should not have bothered with the food packet. If he didn’t eat, maybe he would scatter again into the particles from which he’d coalesced.
That would be oneway of escaping his cell.
Of escaping the hell of remembering who and what he’d been.
The goddesses hadn’t been interested in his redemption; they’d sought his punishment. Discovering that the link between lovers transcended even the dominion of the Lightlands had been his one chance to make amends, by sharing the blessing of beloveds with those still living.
Now he couldn’t even do that, lockedaway from the wedding, hated and feared.
“I would never have believed you’d be so stupid.”
Since the words were basically an echo of the voice in his own head, it took Tynan a moment to realize the sneer had come from outside his cell.
He waited before he pivoted to face the newcomer. Since everyone seemed determined to sneak up on him.
The Thorkon male was dressed in a higher end style, buteven through the distance of the barrier, Tynan saw the quality of the fabric was clearly subpar. Not an estate employee, but not a noble guest.
He tilted his head at the unfamiliar male. “Do you know me well enough to say?”
Despite his attempt at humor, the newcomer advanced with a stilted, angry step that implied the barrier was the only thing stopping him from coming all the way into Tynan’sface. “I know you killed my twin. And then had the arrogance to come back hereagain.”
Tynan studied the other male’s face, but… Nothing. The young warlord he’d been had fought numerous duels to the death, but any siblings of those victims would be long dead themselves, the dust of antiquity. And Blackworm had chosen his female victims from the Earther Intergalactic Dating Agency.
His blankexpression seemed to only enrage his visitor.
“My sister, Adria,” the male hissed, “whom you chose as your consort, against her will.”
Tynan closed his eyes. Another wounded innocent the goddesses were punishing him for? Had she looked like this one, flaxen haired, with eyes like the green spears of yili leaves? He couldn’t summon the memory. “I’m sorry,” he murmured.
A distant thump on thebarrier made him look up.
“I thought I lost you,” the male crooned, menace in his voice. “First to the penitentiary and then to the black hole. I spent the last of my sister’s meager savings to come to spit into the singularity at you, but here you are. If I hadn’t seen you at the bar…” He shook his head sharply, the short plait of his hair lashing. “The gods said to me, ‘Radek, you will haveyour revenge,’ and now they have finally smiled on me.”
Actually, it was the goddesses, smirking at Tynan, but he didn’t suppose the grief-stricken young male would appreciate the difference. And he wasn’t even going to try to explain that he wasn’t—entirely—Blackworm anymore.
“I’m sorry,” he said again, “for what happened to your sister. And that you cannot have your vengeance since”—he gesturedat the wall between them—“I’m currently suffering someone else’s vengeance.” The goddesses’, the duke’s, Lishelle’s…