“You killed them because he left you? You should have run or done something else. No wonder we are here, locked up in this cage like animals. He is going to kill us!” Clara cried as her body began rocking with silent sobs.
“It isn’t that easy, Clara,” Laura chided. “There is a lot more to this story that you don’t know, nor will you be told.”
“He is going to kill us!” she repeated on a hiss.
“No, he is going to kill me. Maybe I deserve it, maybe I don’t. Either way, his blood brought me back to life, and he is the one who can take it from me. He knows that, which is why you are here as collateral and to keep me from bringing them all down as I did their hive in London. You are here to guarantee I behave, which I will. I will do whatever is asked of me to procure your freedom.”
“He could kill you, you know that, right? He hates you, and no matter what you once shared, he is after one thing and one thing alone. Revenge,” Laura warned.
“I agree with your friend, Avery,” Conner laughed wickedly as he stepped from the shadows and stared at me like I was a stranger instead of the lover he’d once cherished above everything else. “Stand up and turn around, orphan. If you whisper a single spell, sweet Clara here will stand in your place for your first night of punishment while you watch.”
I did as he’d asked me to and, standing on shaking legs, I turned around and stared at a crack in the prison floor. I could smell the musk from the mold, taste the death that lingered from the last unfortunate soul who displeased the King of the Inland Northwest. These mountains belonged to him now, his territory when he’d come to the Americas. His hands bit into my arms as he clasped them behind my back, locking them into metal cuffs. He pushed me aside as he closed the cell, even as I moved towards Laura’s outstretched hand.
“You guys will be okay,” I promised through the thickening in my throat.
“But you won’t,” Laura sobbed as she watched me, swiftly moving to stop me from leaving as if she could pull me back into the cage with them. The moment Conner stepped closer to me, she stopped.
“No, she won’t,” Conner agreed softly while a dark smile spread over his lips. “She is accused of murder, and will stand trial for her crimes.”
I shivered at the hatred that burned in his tone as he locked the cell, the noise filling the room until he stood behind me. His hands slowly wrapped around me and pulled me against him. The heat of his body filled the chill of my bones as he laughed huskily against my ear.
“Did you miss me while I celebrated your capture, little witch?” he asked.
“That answer is still no. Remember, I never did miss you when you were away. Can we get on with this?” I asked.
“I remember the last time I fucked those pretty lips of yours. I do believe it was right before I left and you slaughtered my entire fucking family, wasn’t it?” he purred against my ear, licking it, which sent a shiver racing through me. His fingertips drifted down my arms, sending an electrical hum of his immense power into my core. He turned me around, rubbing his knuckles over my cheek as he studied me. Those piercing, bluish-purple eyes bored right into my soul. Conner reached up, pushing away a strand of midnight hair from my face. His hair was the color of the sand on the beaches when the water drifted over them, cleaning it. His arms were covered in intricate tattoos, some of which I’d given him myself through magic to keep him safe from magic, as well as enemies who had sought to end his life prematurely.
“I remember,” I uttered hoarsely as desire swept through me. “I also remember you calling me your sweet little plaything, and telling me how I betrayed my people. You told me to run because only death would ever welcome me into its embrace after what we had done together. I would have run, but your father wouldn’t allow me to leave, and you knew it. You gave me to them, Conner. If I am their murderer, you handed them to me to slaughter. After all, you brought me back from the dead and said that I was one of you from that point on. So what does that make you?”
“Your personal hell, Avery,” he growled angrily as his jaw clenched. “You won’t die here, but you also won’t ever leave here either. You see, I know how much us feeding bothered you, so what better punishment than to keep you as my blood whore?”
“Why would you want that?” I asked.
“So that I can fuck you whenever I feel like it, and finally taste that sweet blood of yours that I denied myself so long ago. I never did get to taste what I earned. First things first, though, you get to face the others who want your blood as bad as I do.” He held out his arm, indicating the dark stairway that led up into the main floors. “Ladies first, or do you prefer Killer of Kings these days? I never did figure out if you took the proper title after everything you’ve done to us, Avery.”
“I prefer Cheveron witch; it makes even other witches uncomfortable when I am in their presence. Speaking of witches, they will come to take me, either to request my death or my release. The covens will never allow me to live long enough to be your whore. That would give their enemies too much power, and not even being King will sway them.”
“Mmm, I took that into consideration. I have an entire school full of students from the strongest bloodlines alive as bargaining chips. I think mommies and daddies might argue they want their children back more than one ancient, murderous bitch.” I was shoved roughly towards the staircase that led up into the darkened interior of the stone mansion. I tripped on the way up, and instead of preventing my head from crashing against the concrete stairs, he let me fall. Conner could have stopped it easily, but he’d chosen to let me endure the pain. This gentle creature had turned into a monster, and I wasn’t sure anything I did or said would change my fate, but if I could change Clara’s and Laura’s fates, I’d do whatever it took to manage it. There was also the fact that he may have been right: if he held the students, I may not have help coming for us. They meant more than the power that burned through my veins, and I wouldn’t fault them for choosing their children over us.
I stayed there for a moment, fighting past the pain as something hot and wet ran down my temple. I could feel Conner behind me, staring at my ass, which was pointed upwards as I fought the nausea and pain that hit me. I realized I was stuck, ass-up and at his mercy.
“Ask me for help, waif,” he demanded.
“I’m in no hurry to move from here,” I muttered as I felt his palm skimming my ass before it slipped between my legs. I fought the moan that rose from deep in my chest as he rubbed his fingers through my core.
“Get the fuck up, you stink,” he hissed as he helped me up. I swallowed down the urge to feel bad about stinking, which was insane since he’d thrown me into the cell so he could celebrate my capture. It was his fault I stunk in the first place.
“Would you like to watch me bathe, Conner?” I asked in a sultry voice that pulled a growl from him. He pushed me against the wall with his forearm against my throat as he stared into my eyes with naked hunger.
“I’ll watch you do more than that tonight before the sun rises, Avery. I have planned this for centuries and have relished the thought of destroying you every fucking night since I returned to discover my father’s corpse. You think you can escape me, but I’m buried so fucking deep into the fabric of your being that you can never do so. Your sweet cunt is already weeping at the thought of me destroying it, and I have hardly even touched you. There’s also the fact that I’m hungry, and you’re looking like my dinner date. I can’t wait for you to meet my feeder. I chose her because of you. She endures the pain I wished to give to you, and now that I have you, you will scream for me, orphan. Would you like that? To be fucked like you’re nothing to me, like a dirty little cunt that lives to please me? Welcome to hell, imp,” he laughed as he pushed me from the darkness into the light of the hall.
Chapter 3
I was shoved to my knees as he took his place on the throne. My clothes were filthy, my hair ratted from the days of en
dless worrying over Clara and Laura’s fates as we were forced to sit in a cell without food or water. His punishment of me I could see, but then he didn’t care if I suffered. Clara and Laura, on the other hand, were both innocent. Clara was something pure and light and didn’t belong in the darkness where we resided.
The crowd cheered for their King; his prowess of hunting down his prey in broad daylight would be the shit of legends, and even I may have cheered him on if I hadn’t been the one caught. I bowed my head, a subtle suggestion of submission, which he noted with a raised brow.
Unlike most of the vampires here, Conner had been born to parents who had royal blood humming through their veins. He was from one of the original lines of born vampires to remain ruling today. Creatures flocked to him in masses since he was one of the strongest vampires in the world. It explained his full hive after I’d destroyed the last one.
“I give you Avery Ilsa Cheveron, the orphan I spared from the Black Death and brought into my home as one of us. My lover, my witch, and my father’s murderer,” Conner announced as he stared at my bowed head. “How does the hive wish to proceed?” he asked.
“Traitor’s death for what she did to our family,” Addison’s sultry voice filled the room.
“Agreed, traitor’s death,” another demanded.
“I say you let us all fuck her and feed on her,” Royal snapped as he knelt beside me, tilting my chin up to stare into his amber eyes. “I’ve always wondered what that golden pussy must taste and feel like to have snagged our prince so fully. Or was it magic you used to make my brother blind against your poisonous flesh, slut?”
“What’s the matter, Royal? Jealous because I denied you every time you tried to fuck me behind Conner’s back?” I asked without lifting my eyes, which was exactly how he landed a blow against the side of my head with his inhuman speed, sending me to the floor and my ears rang as pain rocked through my head.
“I don’t believe I said she could be abused, yet, brother,” Conner said softly, as if he was reprimanding a child who had asked for his dessert before dinner.
I didn’t get up, nor could I with my hands bound behind my back. I stayed there, listening to the heartbeat that raced through my eardrums. Rough hands picked me up and placed me back on my knees at Conner’s feet. I refused to meet his stare, even as he asked the room what they thought should be done, and they agreed with his younger brothers and sister, the only family he had left.
“The entire room thinks you should face a traitor’s death, little witch,” he announced with cold, emotionless eyes that watched me for any sign of weakness. “How do you plead to murdering an entire hive and a King?”
“Plead? I plead nothing. Did I murder your family? Yes,” I said, and the room erupted in angry shouts for blood, my eyes lifted to his, holding his angry stare.
“You admit to murdering the King?”
“I boiled him like dirty laundry soaked with the plague, Conner.”
His hands tightened on the arms of his throne as he watched me. The muscle in his jaw ticked with his rage as he fought for control over the anger pushing through him with the need to impart violence on me. His chest heaved, his fangs slipping from his gums, and his eyes turned black, soulless.
“So you admit to murdering an entire hive and its King,” he growled.
“I do,” I agreed.
“You deserve the traitor’s death or worse,” he uttered thickly.
“No, I do not. I never agreed to serve your King. I agreed to be yours, never your whore, never the one you fed on, and never your witch. You placed me within your father’s keep, abandoning me to him. I served you and you alone by choice, and in order to deserve a traitor’s death, one must first be loyal. I was only loyal to you.”
Addison snorted and rose from her chair beside her brother’s, swaggering over to me with her war braids on full display as she knelt in front of me. “You belonged to us, you were saved by us. That makes you ours.”
“No, your brother saved me, and then he freed me. He did so by denouncing his claim to me. He didn’t ask, nor did he instruct me that I would become a whore to his father. I never gave you a vow of service, did I, Conner?” I asked pointedly, with unwavering accusation in my eyes.
“I saved your life from the plague, waif,” he snapped.
“I never offered you a vow of service, did I, Conner?” I repeated as the memories of being previously subjected to a traitor’s death over and over replayed in my mind, from being forced to watch it happening from Conner’s lap long ago. “Did you ever ask me to serve you or your father with my loyalty or my solemn vow?”
“No, but then you are alive because of my blood,” he growled.
“Under the covenant, I am only to be held to the laws of a race and their punishment if I gave a vow of loyalty. My vow to you was to honor and love you. I did both until you told me how unworthy I was of the Prince of the Undead and walked away from me and what I had given you freely. So, if you want my blood, kill me, but I will not stand guilty of treachery when I gave no vow to break.”
“You should have left this fucking bitch in the trash to die like the rest of the peasants.” Addison’s hand twisted in my hair and she lifted me, slamming my face down against her knee as she hissed and brought me back up to my feet, turning to face me. “If we can’t kill her outright, I want to fight her.”
“My hands are tied behind my back, Addison,” I muttered through the pain of my face as my nose dripped blood onto the floor in front of me. “What’s the matter, afraid of a fair fight? Or still pissy I took away your daddy, little girl?” I taunted and watched as her fist flew at my face, knocking me back, but not down. I righted myself as blow after blow sent me back until she punched me in the stomach, knocking the wind out of me.
Dropping to my knees, I stayed there a moment before I got back up and watched her eyes turn crimson as she eyed the blood that dripped from my face. She moved faster than my mind or eyes could track her. I was thrown to the ground, and her hot breath skimmed my throat before someone threw her back and stood in front of me.
“No one feeds from her but me, Addison. Not unless I say or permit otherwise. She never promised or offered her loyalty, not even with me pulling her useless body from the garbage, or saving her pathetic life so that she could betray me. She will not face the traitor’s death—however,” he paused as the room erupted into chaos as I stared up at him. “She will never leave here alive. She will remain as my whore and my feeder until I tire of her and end her life myself.”
I coughed, turning to spit up blood as everyone cheered him on like he just announced he was going to take on the world and they were happy about it.
“And when the witches come, what then, Conner?” Mayhem asked, his deep, sultry voice echoing over the cheers and silencing the room. He wouldn’t meet my stare, and we both knew why, and yet he was one of the only vampires here who knew the full details of what had happened to me. He chose to protect himself, which kept my secrets from the others.
“Then I inform them that we have over sixty witchlings that were in her care being held at their school, and if they want their children back, she stays to face her charges and full punishment,” Conner said nonchalantly as he shrugged.
“And if they demand you release her still? She’s the most powerful witch that I know of, and one of the oldest and purest bloodlines. They’re not going to settle with her being under your thumb, brother,” Addison added, her eyes still crimson as she stared at me.
“Then we will go to war against them, no hive would argue it. She will pay for her crimes one way or another. She isn’t leaving here, even if it means war against the witches.” Conner stared down at me, his smirk firmly in place as he knelt beside me and pushed the hair away from the blood that was stuck to my face, his finger tracing the curvature of my cheek. “Are you ready to serve me, whore?”
“Free Clara
and Laura, or give them water. Clara’s young, she won’t last if you continue to ignore her needs, and then all the leverage you hold over me is gone. So unless you want to fuck an unmoving corpse, tend to their needs first.”
“She was fed and watered the moment you were removed from their cell. You, on the other hand, can fucking beg to be fed and if you’re a good girl for me and earn it, I may give it to you.”
“You do know that I crave death more than I do sustenance, don’t you? Oh, I guess we’ve been apart awhile. I don’t beg to live anymore, because I wish for death. I crave the peace it will offer my soul. I miss my mother and my coven. So, go ahead, threaten me with what I crave most and see what it gets you,” I uttered and he shook his head as his eyes darkened with my words.
“If you wanted death, you wouldn’t have drunk the blood I sent you. Tell me, did you touch that pretty cunt when you drank it as you used to? Or did you drink it and wish I was with you to destroy that pretty flesh?”
“I was inside a school full of innocent students. Do you think I’m selfish enough to allow the plague to be let loose on innocent lives? I’m fully aware of what happens when I don’t drink your blood; how do you think there have been outbreaks of the plague before? So no, I didn’t think of you at all, ever.”
“Clara and the other bitch stay here to ensure you behave. Until I free them or end your life, you’re all at my mercy. If you don’t play nice and do what you are told, I’ll give that sweet young one to Mayhem to play with, and we all know how sick and deviant he is with an untrained cunt, now don’t we?”
“I already agreed to play a good whore for you,” I whispered as I struggled to get up, only to fail. I exhaled as I stared up at the vaulted ceiling. “Let’s play, Conner. First, you may want to wash me, as I fucking stink.”
“You do, and I can’t decide if I want to lick you clean and taste your sweet blood or strangle you. So get the fuck up and move. I find myself impatient to hurt you,” he chuckled as I once again tried to get up and failed, groaning as more blood leaked from the gash on my forehead and nose. “You’re weak,” he growled and grabbed my hair, ripping me off the floor as the crowd cheered.
Immortal Hexes Page 3
