Where did my balls go? And how did I find them again?
“Z’s going to want to train you herself when she wakes up,” Dair said,
absolute certainty that our girl would open her eyes again ringing in his
voice. I wanted to have that same conviction, but every time I stared at her, I
saw the way those mages in the brothel died right before my eyes. The blood
that had poured from their mouths, ears, eyes, and noses. The pain twisting
up their features, their haughtiness transforming into agony. The way they
screamed just before death claimed them in a cruel, unrelenting vise.
And the fear that had flashed in their eyes just before they fell to the
ground.
They’d known they were going to die, could feel it in their bones, and I
wondered if that was how Z felt every damn day since Zack poisoned her.
If my mate died, I’d follow her into death, consequences be damned. All
of the kingdoms could fall into ruin for the number of shits I had to give.
“Z’s going to want to train all of us,” Bash retorted with a self-
deprecating twist of his lips. “Can you picture that? Us as fighters?”
“Well, now I’m picturing it.” I smiled too, envisioning my mage brother
in badass leathers and sunglasses as he twirled a blade around his fingers. It
was almost too comical to picture. Bash was a lazy son of a bitch and had
never found the motivation to train like I did when we were younger. He
preferred to spend his days in his room having orgies than in the training
yard.
Bash narrowed his green eyes at me. “Why do you look so amused?”
I worked to keep my expression placid. “No reason.”
“You don’t think I can fight, do you?” He cocked an eyebrow at me,
though I swore I saw amusement in his dark green gaze.
“I think…” I gave him a wry smirk. “I think that if you and Killian got
into a fight, Killian would kick your ass.”
The incubus’s head snapped up from where he was staring down at Z.
“W-wh-what?” he stuttered, surprise lacing his tone.
Dair smirked and folded his arms over his chest. “I agree. Bash is too…”
He trailed off as he contemplated what word he wanted to use.
“Wimpy,” Jax finished absently, though he didn’t peel his attention away
from the window.
Bash’s eyes flared with indignation. “I am not.” His power cackled and
fizzled, green currents erupting on his skin and congregating in his palms.
“Just a teeny bit wimpy.” I placed my forefinger and thumb together as
rage distorted his face. My shadows moved me out of the way just in time to
stop his assault, and he ended up running face-first into the wall. Cursing,
Bash swiveled in my direction, his hair standing on end with the force of his
power.
“If I’m so wimpy, why don’t you stop hiding and face me like a man?” he
questioned dangerously, and I stealthily used the shadows to materialize
directly behind him.
“Like this?” I breathed in his ear, and he spun towards me with another
curse.
“You’re such an—”
“It’s time.” Paco removed his hands from where they rested on Z’s
shoulders and turned to face us, his expression uncharacteristically grave.
“T-time?” Killian asked, brushing Z’s sweat soaked hair behind her ears.
Paco nodded and stood from his crouch, moving towards his collection of
freshly brewed potions beside his bed. He grabbed two bottles—one of them
a verdant green and the other a sparkly purple.
“What the fuck do you mean?” I demanded, pulling the shadows tighter
around my body and using them to propel me protectively in front of Z.
Paco didn’t even spare my silhouette a glance as he kneeled beside my
mate once more with the two potions in his hands.
“Time to administer more poison,” he answered simply, unscrewing the
green bottle.
“What? No!” I knew this was the plan, I knew we’d talked about it, but
all I could see were those mages falling to the ground, a perpetual state of
grief and agony twisting up their features. They deserved it for the sick and
vile things they did, but Z didn’t. Not my sweet mate. Not my little dove.
Turning desperately towards Bash, hoping he would back me, I held his gaze
and pleaded, “Bash, no! You can’t allow him to do this.”
Bash gritted his teeth together so tightly, I was surprised he didn’t crack a
tooth. “We don’t have a choice, Ry. You know Z has to die from the poison
in order for the cure to work.”
“You saw what happened to those mages at the brothel.” I was practically
pleading at this point, more than willing to fall to my knees if that was what it
took to save my little dove from this fate. If I could’ve experienced her pain
for her, I would in a heartbeat. But what I couldn’t endure was watching her
suffer.
“She needs to return to the capital by…” Bash turned towards the clock
on the wall, surprise darkening his features when he discovered it was already
one in the morning. “She needs to return to the capital by tonight. We don’t
have time to wait.”
My shadows twisted and writhed, hissed and snapped. They felt like live
wires about to whip around and electrocute anyone who came too close. They
were sentient and dangerous, their sole purpose to protect our oblivious,
sleeping mate in the center of the shed.
I lost control of my rage, the full brunt of it pouring out of me in a wave.
“No! I can’t allow you to do this.” Darkness closed in on us from all
sides, pushing off the walls like a slow-moving, sticky tar. It crawled across
the floor, devouring everything it came into contact with, as panic invaded
my lungs.
I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t see, couldn’t think.
The anger and fear… They ran through my blood like magma. I was the
reaper of death, and anyone who touched me would fall dead at my feet.
“Ryland, calm the fuck down!” Dair demanded as my shadows crawled
forward like pitch-black molten lava.
“Ryland!” Killian sounded terrified, but I couldn’t stop. Wouldn’t stop.
My shadows had a mind of their own.
The muscles in my shoulders were so tense, they physically spasmed, the
full reality of what I was doing wreaking havoc on my insides.
Protect Z.
Worry about the consequences later.
Something sharp stabbed into my neck, and my shadows instantly
retreated inside of me. I turned my eyes to Bash, who stared back at me
without a flicker of remorse. Betrayal reverberated through me.
“I’m sorry, brother,” he whispered as my body tilted to the side.
I was unconscious before I even hit the ground.
TWENTY-ONE
Z
I was back inside the strange stone palace, once more in an ostentatious
green gown that cascaded around my ankles. I brushed impatiently at
one of the blonde curls cascading down my shoulder, forcing the unruly
strand behind my ear.
Everything was exactly as I remembered it, down to the shattered window
that I’d fallen out of. The only difference was the notable absence of Aaliyah.
Where was that bitch hiding?
I spun in a circle, nearly tripping over the trim of my dress, and glared
daggers at the fucked-up paintings on the wall. One displayed a woman in a
brown dress, her face obscured by a burlap sack. Her hands were tied behind
her back, and in the distance, I swore I could see malevolent shadows
standing on a hill, watching the woman. I had no idea what the painting was
trying to depict, except for a general sense of fuckery, but unease still skirted
down my spine. It almost reminded me of a person shuffling their sock-clad
feet across carpeting and then reaching out a finger to zap me.
The painting beside it showed a second woman, this one in a drab gray
dress, leaning beneath a guillotine. Directly beside her was a bucket full of
decaying heads, their eyes vacant and their mouths open in a scream I
couldn’t hear. Unlike the first painting, this one displayed the woman’s face
clearly—the horror and fear emanating from her eyes, the twist of her
features as she awaited death, and the spark of defiance in her cunning
smirk. The same number of men that stood on the hill in the first painting
surrounded the woman now, though their faces were devoid of any features,
as if someone had taken sandpaper and scrubbed off their eyes, nose, lips,
and ears.
“Z,” a soft, breathy voice whispered from behind me. I spun, heart
racing, to see Mali standing before me.
My entire body froze as if I’d been jolted by electricity. I could barely
breathe through the tightening in my throat.
Mali.
My best friend who…
Who betrayed me.
She looked well. Better than she had when I last saw her, fleeing from the
scene of Diego’s murder with tears in her eyes. Over the course of the
Damning, she’d discovered she was mates to one of the competitors, a
sociopath who hadn’t hesitated to kill everyone in his pathway, including
innocents. Mali had inadvertently led me to a trap, believing that Zack would
make a deal with me.
A bunch of horse shit.
Because of her naïveté, Diego had died, stabbed by the man she claimed
to love. I sent her away without a second thought and hadn’t heard or seen
from her since.
Until now.
Her brown hair was perfectly coiffed, framing a face that appeared fuller
than I remembered it being. Her dewy eyes were glossy with unshed tears,
and her hands trembled where they plucked at the skirt of her vibrant red
dress. I noticed blood on the corner of her mouth, almost as if she’d just
recently partaken in a feeding.
What the fuck was she doing here? With Aaliyah?
The familiar sense of betrayal rushed over me like a swooping, ice-cold
tidal wave. It seeped through my skin and embedded itself in my bones and
bloodstream.
I knew I had no right to feel this way. I’d sent her away, after all. I
couldn’t stand to be around her, knowing that Diego’s blood rested on her
hands.
But to know she went crawling to my enemy?
I wanted her to suffer.
“Z.” Mali’s lower lip began to tremble as she took a hesitant step
towards me. I automatically countered it with a backwards one of my own,
wishing desperately I had some sort of weapon to defend myself if she chose
to attack. Hurt flashed in her eyes at my retreat, but instead of commenting
on it, she asked, “What are you doing here?”
“Obviously your bitch of a master brought me here,” I snapped, trying to
remember what had happened just before that. My memories were hazy,
shifting constantly like someone was repeatedly running their hand through a
pool of water, causing them to distort. The last thing I remembered was the
brothel…
True fear flashed in Mali’s gaze as she took a few more steps closer. I
found that I couldn’t back up any more. My body was already flush against
the far wall, and there were no windows in this particular area. I would
prefer jumping into the sea below than facing my traitorous best friend.
“Z, there’s so much I need to tell you while you’re here, and I don’t have
a lot of time,” Mali began urgently, her eyes flicking in all directions.
“Leave me alone, Mali,” I hissed, but she ignored my acerbic tone and
gripped my wrists, her vampire strength rendering me immobile. I could pull
away and risk breaking a few bones, or I could hear what she had to say.
The former option sounded pretty appealing right about now…
“The kings have been here to visit Aaliyah,” Mali told me, and I froze,
finally giving her my complete attention. “They want her to help them live
forever.”
“So it’s true,” I breathed, stunned. “They’re trying to become immortal.”
“Aaliyah made a deal with them,” Mali confirmed, once more glancing in
all directions, as if she expected the redhead to be hiding behind the couch.
“I don’t know the details of it yet, but I know that the second the kings
complete their part, Aaliyah will make them immortal. They won’t die of
natural causes, and no man-made weapon will be capable of killing them.”
“Fuck.” We had known about this, of course, but hearing it confirmed
had goosebumps rippling across my skin. “What else can you tell me?”
“A lot.” Mali’s eyes turned sharper, shrewd almost, as a wicked grin
seemingly satisfied that I wasn’t going to run away, and continued with her
report. I didn’t know if I could trust her, but at this point, I didn’t have a lot
of fucking options. Mali, Atta, Axel… I had the distinct impression that one of
them was going to betray us, but I had no idea which one. “Aaliyah talks a
lot about the prophecy.”
“The one about the princes becoming more powerful than their fathers?
And either ending or saving the world?” I questioned, and she nodded.
“She also mentioned…” She hesitated, biting on her lower lip, and I
nodded to encourage her to continue. Swallowing, she tried again. “Aaliyah
also mentioned that the princes weren’t born. I have no idea what she meant
by that, but…”
Icy fear infiltrated my heart as if someone had injected frost into it
directly. My mind replayed Tavvy’s final words before Dair killed him.
“If the rumors are true, you and those men you call your brothers
magically appeared. Out of thin air.”
From what I’d gathered, Dair hadn’t told any of the others what Tavvy
said. And I knew I hadn’t either. I dismissed Tavvy’s words as the ramblings
of a crazed, dying man, but if what Mali said was true…
I needed to tell my mates.
“What else?” I asked urgently.
“The basement.” Mali pointed towards a long hallway decorated in metal
knights standing at attention. They held swords, javelins, and daggers
directly over their hearts.
“What about the basement?”
“It’s where Aaliyah raises her monsters.” She lowered her voice to a
whisper. “It’s where she has her portal to Hell.”
“What—” Before I could continue my li
ne of inquiry, Mali’s face twisted
in surprise and shock a second before she was thrown across the room. I
screamed her name, rushing towards her, but she continued to fly backwards
down a long hallway until a door slammed shut, hiding her from sight.
“Mali!”
“What a traitorous little swine.” Aaliyah’s face twisted into a look of
utter disgust as she stomped towards me, her red, revealing dress trailing
behind her. The skirt was long, almost resembling a wedding train, but it had
two slits up either side, revealing more leg than I ever wanted to see on that
she-bitch. Her neckline dipped almost completely to her bellybutton, and her
shiny red hair was perfectly straight, giving her a severe, harsh look.
“What the fuck did you do to her?” I hissed out, and I swore something
akin to jealousy flashed in her brilliant green gaze.
“You care about that vampire, don’t you? After everything she’s done?”
She trailed her fingers over the top of the couch as my gaze followed her with
the intensity of a hawk. She didn’t wait for me to answer, not that I would’ve
given her one, before continuing, “Why do you hate me, sister of mine?”
“I’m not your sister,” I scoffed, and once more, that white-hot jealousy I
noted earlier entered her gaze.
“You don’t have to love me now, Z, but just know that everything I’m
doing, everything I have done, has been for you.” Her voice crawled over my
skin like an invasion of skittering insects.
“I never asked you to do anything for me,” I snapped, balling my hands
into fists. “I don’t want your help.”
“But big sisters don’t always listen,” she retorted, finally removing her
hand from the back of the couch to study her red painted nails, the exact
same shade of her dress and lips. “They do what’s best for their family.”
“I don’t understand what you mean,” I growled out. “I have memories of
my mom and dad, and I never saw you in any of them. I think I would
remember your ugly mug.”
Rage flashed in her eyes for a brief moment before it immediately
simmered away, replaced by amusement. She threw her head back and
laughed haughtily, the noise grating on my sensitive nerves.
“Is this what sisters do? Banter?” She cocked her head to the side
curiously. “But no matter. To answer your question, of course you wouldn’t