Wicked Abyss

by Kresley Cole

  Earlier, the idea of his mate bearing another's young--and possibly dying again--had made Sian lose his mind. But she wasn't pregnant, and she now wore a healing ring. No disaster loomed. So why couldn't he force himself to leave her? "Had you a male?" Say no. . . .

  A female this lovely must have. Maybe a lover who'd been helping her through the transition? At the thought, Sian almost rammed his horns into the wall again.

  "I have a fiance."

  I'll gut that fuck. "A fey, no doubt." She didn't deny it. "I absolve you of your agreement with him. In this world, you have no one."

  "Why do you care if I'm engaged? And why would you suddenly ask me if I was pregnant?"

  "You died in childbirth in your last life."

  She glanced away sharply--from the shock of what he'd told her, or was there more?

  "I will not let anything get in the way of my revenge, not even your death. Which is why I imbued the ring with a healing spell." His life force depleted to defend hers. Welcome to the world of matehood.

  "I thought the option of killing me was on the table. If my torture ceased to amuse."

  "I've concluded you will be endlessly entertaining."

  "Why do you keep . . . trying things with me?" Her cheeks reddened. Could she be a virgin? Then her fiance was an idiot. "Don't you have a really old female in your life, one even a relic like you can be with?"

  Another jab about age? He'd never thought that might be a detractor. Immortals grew stronger with longevity. But they could also grow mentally unstable. "I have twelve females. My harem of concubines keeps me very satisfied," he lied--not about the number, but about the satisfaction.

  Had Sian ever been even remotely satisfied since she'd ruined him with that one perfect kiss?

  In any case, he'd never been with any of those concubines, had inherited them along with the crown.

  Calliope bit out, "Then go dally with your harem."

  "I like variety. And a challenge."

  "You think I'd ever sleep with you? Now you're just being ridiculous. The only place I'd ever sleep with you is in your dreams." She shook her head, and her silken hair danced over her shoulders.

  Her scent muddled his thoughts. He inhaled it like a drowning man's next taste of air. Not helping my erection.

  Damn it, he'd done what'd he come to do; he should leave now. Yet his feet felt rooted to the spot. He wished he had other pressing kingdom concerns to distract him.

  Absolute power didn't corrupt absolutely; it bored absolutely.

  Seducing her would keep me occupied. He stifled the idea. She was right: he was just being ridiculous.

  She said, "If you'd told me the ring was for healing, I probably wouldn't have resisted you."

  "Perhaps in your realm, a king explains his wishes to lowly prisoners; not in this one."

  She cast him a measured glance, as if trying to predict what he'd do next.

  Good luck. He didn't even know. He felt the need to be around others, yet Uthyr had taken his advice and flown off. The rest of Sian's family--the Morior--weren't available.

  For now, Orion the Undoing, leader of their alliance, slept in a godlike hibernation, building strength for the Accession. Rune honey-mooned with Josephine. Blace, the oldest vampire, investigated Josephine's mysterious vampire father.

  Darach Lyka and their alliance's witch, Allixta, remained in Tenebrous, the Morior's moving realm, but Sian wouldn't return there yet. Minutes in Tenebrous could equal hours or even days elsewhere, and he didn't want to let Calliope out of his sight for that long.

  She crossed her arms over her chest. "Even lowly prisoners usually know why they're being punished. So what will it be tonight?" she demanded, eyes flashing. "Maybe you'd like to chase me around and lick my torso some more?"

  Admittedly, not his finest moment--but he couldn't seem to think anymore! "Take care, little firebrand; the next part of you I lick will not be your torso."

  She gasped, her ears flattening.

  Sian's gaze clocked the movement. Rune hated the fey so much that he despised pointed ears, even his own. He'd avoided bedding any females with that feature. So had Sian--but now he was right back to being fascinated by his mate's delicate ears. He wanted to discover how sensitive they were.

  Hadn't she trembled when he'd exhaled against one tip? Could she be seduced? For whatever reason, she had responded to him.

  If Uthyr had nearly tupped a ghouless in his transition, Calliope might turn to Sian.

  Get this idea out of your head, demon. Even if seduction were a sound idea--which it wasn't, at all--a demon with his strength couldn't take a fragile female like her until she'd turned immortal. "When do the women in your line reach immortality?"

  "I'm way overdue. If this ring makes me heal, how will I know if I've turned?"

  "Every month I will remove it and test you," he said.

  Her lips thinned. "Every month."

  Was the duration of her imprisonment just sinking in? "Why didn't you confess your age and weakness in the beginning, then beg for mercy from your tasks?" Even with her two lives added together, she was only in her forties. "I might have been moved to grant it."

  "Beg for mercy?!" She charged forward, breasts bouncing--again, not helping his erection--to stand in front of him. "I would rather bite out my tongue and bleed to death than beg."

  Her talk of dying checked his arousal. "You're quick to choose death."

  "You're quick to threaten me! And since you won't tell me what my 'crime' was, why shouldn't I believe you've set me up? Maybe you get off torturing young females so much that your deluded brain makes up excuses to justify your twisted needs!"

  She continued to make him into the villain. Yes, she was young, but he had been as well, a mere sixteen years old. Yes, he'd been harsh with her, but no permanent harm had been done--unlike his own mutilation. "You are either very stupid or crazed to continue challenging one like me." Evidence mounted that she was simply maddened.

  And that she was no spy.

  Between Sian and Calliope, only one of them was considering seduction.

  If he could somehow get her in bed with him, he'd rut her till he'd slaked his need, then discard her, cutting her from his life completely. He'd leave her to rot in this tower.

  The only drawback to his plan? He didn't know how to seduce. For most of Sian's life, his only difficulty with finding a partner had been getting rid of her amorous friends, since he never slept with more than one at a time.

  Hands balled into fists, she said, "All I keep hearing about is my supposed former life, when I supposedly wronged you. You're a demon who lives in hell and a Morior on top of that; something tells me you're not the most trustworthy male!"

  "Since when have the Morior been known as untrustworthy?"

  "Since they decided to invade our universe and conquer everyone in Gaia."

  "Someone needs to rule you because you are all doing a bloody bad job of ruling yourselves." Especially under Nix's guidance. Why didn't they realize she was leading them to an apocalypse?

  "I've hated and feared all of the Morior since I was a girl. Now that I've met you, I see I was right to."

  "Hated and feared? Then you know nothing of my alliance."

  "I know the one thing that counts."

  He grated, "And what's that?"

  She held his gaze. "You're all monsters."

  SEVENTEEN

  Day seven in hell.

  As warm water ran over her underwear-clad body, Lila rolled her head on her neck. She'd just taken the edge off with a quick orgasm--her first since arriving here--while trying to avoid thoughts of Abyssian.

  But the ring was a constant reminder.

  She glared at it. "Fucker." Healing wasn't unwelcome--all of her bruises, burns, and abrasions had mended--but she had no idea what other spells the ring might carry.

  Plus it felt like a mark of possession, a tiny slave collar.

  Despite her healing, she was fading overall. Her head ached, her muscles we
re stiff from sleeping on the floor, and she still hadn't eaten. Nor had she figured out an escape. Which meant she didn't know enough.

  She raised her face and rinsed her mouth. Perhaps she shouldn't antagonize the demon king--a source of information--if he returned?

  She exited the makeshift shower, wringing her hair out, and almost stepped on an encroaching runner of fire vine. Before long, she would be hemmed in at the center of the tower.

  Yesterday she'd used the edge of a food tray to sever a branch, and four more had taken its place, like a hydra's head.

  How to defeat it? As she pondered solutions, she scratched another slash on the wall to mark her captivity.

  Two spiders poked out from holes to watch her.

  They no longer terrified her, thanks to her immersion therapy. She'd named that pair Chip and Dale and fed them jellyfish-soup-creature-thingies.

  None of the others would approach her, still pissy because of her venom harvesting.

  How different life here was from her life in Sylvan Castle when she had strolled out to her private garden and coaxed fawns to eat lilies from her hand. She must be missing her home badly; she'd dreamed of a deer last night.

  In her reverie, she'd been sprinting circles in the tower when a fawn came bounding into the courtyard, its tiny hooves clickety-clacking on the stone floor.

  Bits of grass had dotted its muzzle, the young fawn still a clumsy forager. Lila had gazed around, mystified by how it'd gotten into a tower with no doors. And what would a woodland creature be doing in hell?

  She'd breathlessly eased closer to it, inching out a hand. . . . Just as she'd been about to pet its head, it'd disappeared.

  Was her subconscious trying to tell her about a possible exit from this place?

  Focus, Lila. Fire vine. She began to pace. The threat of the vine was like a puzzle devised to test her. How to conquer a poisonous vine that spread nonstop but couldn't be cut?

  Maybe she could build a stone barricade out of the remaining relics. A bulwark of raunchy statues. Lovely.

  The ancient inscriptions on the walls were just as dirty as those statues. She'd read some, everything from She seized his horns, guiding his mouth to her nether lips, demanding the wonder of his tongue to In a frenzy of possessiveness, he rubbed his aching horns all over her breasts, marking her with his scent to Licking the pierced head, she sucked him greedily, awaiting the heat of his promised seed.

  Judging by the bulk of them she'd read, demons were obsessed with horns, claws, piercings, and--

  A loud splashing sound carried from the lava river below.

  She meandered around vines to the edge of the terrace. At least the ash had started to settle outside. She hadn't coughed a single time today, and the foreboding feeling of this place had lifted somewhat.

  She gazed over the railing. Blinked.

  A dragon--multiple times bigger than any she'd ever seen--was swimming in the lava. Metallic blue-gold scales covered its gargantuan body, and two rows of black horns protruded from its head.

  Must be Uthyr, one of the Morior. If he was visiting, would the baneblood archer show up here too?

  She rubbed her hand over her chest. After her dream of the fawn, she'd had yet another nightmare about the fey-slayer.

  The dragon took a mouthful of lava and spurted it up like a fountain.

  Dragons. Swimming in lava. Of course.

  This demonic world was foreign to her, but by all the gods, she would figure out how to survive here until she could escape.

  She would adapt. She always did. When she'd been cast into the mortal realm with only a bag of clothes and a Book of Lore, Lila had been as good as doomed.

  Until she'd figured it the fuck out.

  She'd learned to live without luxuries and order and servants. Without knowing where her next meal would come from. Without any promise of safety.

  Fearing human detection, she'd learned to accept her loneliness and pour her energies into educating herself.

  At fifteen, she'd finagled a way to buy the one tool she'd coveted: an ID. After that, she'd set about exploiting weaknesses in the mortals' financial and social structure to pay for her education.

  Just as Lila had promised Saetth, she flourished with every hardship she survived, like the fire vine that grew with each cut--

  Her eyes went wide. That's it! Suddenly she knew how to defeat the vine.

  She laughed at the solution, stamping her feet. By not defeating it at all. . . .

  EIGHTEEN

  Sian's spies had returned with their first cursory report on Calliope, leaving him with more questions than answers.

  In the ten days since her capture, his curiosity about his mate burned ever hotter. His gaze fell on the hand mirror. Want to see her.

  He considered his addiction to watching her a major failing. Over the last few nights, he hadn't slept, just gazed at her even when she slumbered.

  Once she drifted off, nothing could wake her. And she had an active dreamlife, her expressive face evincing emotion after emotion, her limbs and ears twitching.

  Was she dreaming about her past life? Would she ever admit if she were?

  He succumbed to the need, snatching up the mirror and summoning the scene in the tower. He raised his brows at the sight.

  She was talking to two spiders that seemed to be following her around the central courtyard. Fascinating. Was she no longer afraid of them?

  She crossed to one of the walls and reached toward a fire vine. Then she . . . pressed her palm against it!

  Why would she burn herself? To trick him in some way! To get sympathy?

  She gritted her teeth against the pain. Then she did it to her other hand. To the backs of her wrists as well.

  His instincts screamed to protect her. Even from herself.

  She paused, eyes watering, then repeated the process. When tears spilled down her cheeks, he tensed to trace there and demand answers--

  Realization struck him, and he stilled.

  "Immunity." She was building up her tolerance to the vine, so she could escape down the side of the tower. Torn between the need to kiss his ingenious mate and the urge to throttle her, he muttered, "You clever girl."

  He found himself almost pulling for her. Yet a wave of his hand imbued her ring with a confinement spell. As long as she wore it, she could never leave the castle.

  She burned her forearm in vain. "Motherfucker fuckity fuck!"

  His brows rose. Definitely not the language of a princess.

  Calliope had gotten inside a Morior hold; a spy would not be this desperate to get out of one.

  Damn this thread of hope. Even if she proved true in this life, she hadn't in her last. He could never trust her. The day he'd lost his horns he'd lost forever any hope of a future with her. A traitorous voice whispered, You grew new horns.

  Unsettled, he traced to the River Styx to find Uthyr basking in lava again, backstroking with his wings. His golden eyes were heavy-lidded. --There is nothing like Pandemonian lava. Demon, if you could bottle this . . . -- He sucked in a mouthful and spurted it into the air. --How is Calliope?--

  Sian paced the stony riverbank. He kicked a black lava rock--cold and crumbling like his heart--into the river, watching it melt. "She's doggedly trying to escape. And scratching slashes on the wall for each day of imprisonment."

  --Not typical spy behavior.--

  "My thoughts as well." He couldn't hold in what he'd seen her do. "She was purposely making contact with the fire vine, burning herself to build immunity." His tone held a note of pride.

  --So she can climb out of the tower! Your mate's a cunning female. And you thought her stupid.-- Uthyr lifted his scaled brow. --I wonder how else you've misjudged her.--

  So did Sian. "My own spies have returned from their first foray into her background. Apparently the Magic Kingdom is a gathering place for mortals. Calliope worked there for years as a face character, whatever that is."

  The contents of her apartment were sparse and gave
scant insight into her personality--aside from the books stacked against every wall from floor to ceiling. The subjects ranged from introductory Japanese to Sumerian artifacts.

  If she liked reading, then Graven's Tower of Learning would leave her agog. Pity she'll never see it. "She was abducted from her place of employment by the Sorceri bounty hunters."

  The hunters he still owed. Though Sian disliked having a debt hanging over him, he wasn't looking forward to a bout of hell manipulation.

  He'd have to put himself into a trance, envisioning the changes he would make to the lands--but he'd actually be forcing his own consciousness to expand.

  Such an undertaking would deplete his life force in a way it hadn't been in ages.

  If Calliope could enliven his mind and combat his stupefying boredom, she might be worth that price.

  --No wonder your mate is so indignant. She likely had a life she was enjoying. A career. Maybe even a lover. It seems Nix is playing with you both.--

  Sian gnashed his fangs. "My mate had a . . . fiance."

  Uthyr cringed. --That's less than encouraging. What of her family?--

  "I believe she has none. No blood ties were uncovered on Earth."

  --I pity young Calliope. Cooping up a fleet-footed fey is beyond cruel.--

  Her species loved to run. Did she miss it? What would she give for a bout of freedom?

  --And imagine how confused she must be. She's starving, imprisoned, and friendless in a strange new dimension. If you won't bring her food she can tolerate, I'll toss some game in there. Maybe keep her company. You could conjure a chess set for us.--

  Sian scowled.

  --She is bold, but that doesn't mean she won't be afraid at times.--

  Sian's mate. Afraid.

  Damn Uthyr for plucking that instinct string!

  Over his endless lifetime, Sian had pondered one question more than any other: What if she returns . . . different?

  Already she seemed to be.

  --She's affecting you, demon. Your rages are much less severe.--

  Mates were thought to center each other, bringing clarity and steadiness. Was she neutralizing his uncontrollable aggression?

  --You won't even attempt to seduce her?--

  Sian shook his head.

  --Why not?--

  "Because it will end in failure."

  --What would you lose by trying? This strikes me as abysmal, Abyssian.--

  "Damn it, dragon, I don't know how. Before my transformation, my seduction arsenal consisted of one tried-and-true move: a crook of my finger. I beckoned, and females fought over me." Everyone except his mate. "I never needed anything more. Yet you think someone like me could tempt an exquisite fey?"