Like an answer to a prayer, a knock sounded at the door. At last.
The blonde Born, Natalie, stood outside his door with a dark, burly Revenant who kept close to her back. Her mate perhaps? By the glower on his face, he knew Guntram had thrown her to the ground.
“You ready?” she asked.
Since he’d slept in his clothes, he nodded. “Just let me get my gear,” he said, going to the corner where he’d propped the sword he’d selected and the knives he would strap to his belt and inside the top of his boot. A thin and supple steel garrote had already been threaded through a seam of the black cargo pants he’d been given. The handles appeared like toggle adornments at his belt and at the edge of one deep pocket.
He followed the couple down the corridor and through the open barracks, where his team stood in a single rank as he passed, hands fisted over their hearts. At the very end, he halted in front of Udo. “Stay vigilant,” he said softly.
Udo snorted. “Just bring her back. I’ll make sure the team doesn’t get too lazy, living here in the lap of luxury.”
Guntram gave him a tight smile and moved along, following Natalie and her mate out of the building and through the darkened gardens to the main house. Inside, he was brought to a salon just off the black-and-white-tiled foyer on the first floor. Alex, Nicolas, and Simon were already inside, along with a red-haired woman who sat quietly beside Alex. Her green eyes widened as she watched him enter—Alex’s phoenix, Guntram surmised. A small falcon rested on Simon’s raised arm, rubbing its head against his cheek.
Odd, the pets these bastards keep.
When Simon spotted him, he gave a last caress to the bird’s feathers and handed it to Alex, whose face grew taut. Perhaps the bird was more than a pet or the mage had a very strange fetish.
Guntram took the seat Natalie indicated on a small wine-colored sofa opposite Alex and Simon. When the others chose seats far away from him, he smiled. He’d made use of the showers, so he knew wolfscent and dirt weren’t what put them off. “Are we going to have tea before we leave?” he asked edgily.
Simon’s lips twitched, but Alex’s eyes narrowed as he transferred the bird to his knee and leaned forward. “Your journey isn’t going to be like serving in any war zone you’ve ever fought in. A little discussion might save your ass.”
Guntram shrugged. “Give me a map and a compass, have the old man stay behind me, and we shouldn’t run into anything I can’t handle.” The words should have been pure bluster, but Guntram felt them all the way to his soul. Nothing was going to get in the way of finding Gabriella.
Simon picked up a paper bag sitting on the coffee table between them and dumped out the contents. Two crystals, both dark brown and cloudy, clattered onto the table. They were wrapped in silver wire and hung from black cords.
Guntram bit back the quip that leapt to mind about dressing for the occasion, but Simon’s brooding expression said the crystals were more than an adornment. “One for each of us?” he asked, keeping derision from his voice.
“Put it on and tuck it under your shirt,” Simon said. “Don’t ever take it off when we’re inside the dark realm.”
Guntram lifted it and curled his fingers around the crystal in his palm. It warmed unnaturally fast inside his hand. He opened his fingers and peered at the stone and discovered that it was actually clear with a brown-black cloud floating beneath its polished surface. “It’s enchanted.”
“The stones will hold the horrors at bay.”
“It’s a shield then?”
“Not the sort you’re thinking. We may still meet corporeal foes we’ll have to battle, but you’ll be protected from true hell.”
Guntram’s hand gripped the stone. Annoyed with Simon’s doublespeak but impatient to begin the search, he held his tongue. “Is there anything else, or can we leave?”
Simon’s chest lifted around a deep breath and his features tightened. “I need you to trust me,” he said, his deepening tone no doubt meant to convey earnestness.
Guntram gave him a wary glance but let him finish.
“I know I haven’t given you a single reason to do so, and you have plenty of reasons of your own not to, but I give you my word that my first priority is to bring Gabriella back. She’s important to all of us. We don’t need a war between the nations. Not when an accord will be vital to all our interests in the future.”
Guntram smiled, showing his teeth. “I don’t care why you do this. And I don’t have to trust you. I’ll be watching. So long as you get me inside, I’ll follow your lead.”
Simon nodded slowly, his expression easing only slightly. Then he gave Alex a level stare. “The promise I extracted from you … don’t waiver.”
Alex’s chest rose. “Don’t make it necessary.”
The two men stood and embraced. Simon gave one more glance at the small falcon and then lifted his chin to point toward the door. “I have everything ready in the council chamber. Follow me.”
Guntram followed closely on Simon’s heels, his heart beginning a steady thrum like a drumbeat. The journey had begun.
As hours past, spent endlessly screwing with the Master, Gabriella came to the conclusion that some sort of magic had to be at work here. She wasn’t tired, but was never fully satisfied. Her lover only had to give her a glance with his strange, gold eyes and she was hot and wet for him. Her pussy burned, and even now her sex throbbed and moistened.
The satin beneath her was still damp in spots. From the water that had streamed from their bodies when he’d brought them both here, and from the arousal and cum that kept her body well lubricated throughout the decadent afternoon.
Her body felt only mildly sore. Odd, considering how explosive their matings had gotten. Demons, it seemed, trumped vampires for stamina.
They’d just finished another frenzied coupling, and their bodies were coated with a thin sheen of sweat. They’d fallen apart, letting the air cool their skin. Staring into the mirror above the bed, she skimmed his body, noting the masculine sprawl of long, muscled limbs and the cock he stroked absently in his hand.
His gaze met hers in the glass, and his lips curved.
“When we aren’t with others,” she said, turning her face toward him. “What do I call you then?”
His lips twitched. “Master.”
Her nipples prickled. Did he insist because he was the Master of the Demons or because he knew of every one of her proclivities? “Don’t you have a name?”
His hand roamed upward, scratching his belly. “Not one you would know.”
“Try me.”
“I am called Marduk,” he said, holding her gaze as though searching for a flicker of recognition.
Something in her memory stirred. Maybe a story she’d heard long ago. “I’ve heard it. I don’t remember where. I’m sorry.”
“I’m forgotten.” Something entered his voice, slipping beneath his grim expression, but it faded quickly before she could determine if it was anger or sadness. “Once I was viewed as a hero in your realm, not a demon. I fought a great battle alongside the Mesopotamians, and ever after, they worshipped me. They told stories about how I fought a great battle against evil creatures, then created the world from their remains. They built cities in my name and worshipped me as a god.”
“Do you miss the adulation?”
His lips twisted, and she could have sworn he looked a little embarrassed. “I miss walking among humans. But the attention went to my head. I began to believe it was my responsibility to save humankind. A friend, someone I admired, asked me to take his place here. I was never meant to stay so long.”
“Did you leave behind many broken hearts?”
His smile slipped. “One.”
The silence stretched, and she knew he wouldn’t continue his story. “Don’t you want to know my name?”
When his response was only an amused quirk of an eyebrow, she gritted her teeth in irritation. “I’m Gabriella,” she said evenly. “I thought you might like to have a name to assig
n to the woman in your bed now.”
“Gabriella,” he repeated, so distinctly and softly the word felt like a caress.
She cleared her throat, not wanting to fan the heat that flared so easily between them. “Is this hell?”
“For some. But not necessarily the hell of Christians.”
“I have to admit that so far, it’s not what I would have expected. That first place, the hall with the demons feasting—that was more what I imagined. But your chamber here … you …” She stopped because the last thing she wanted to do was give him praise, however pleased and bonelessly relaxed she was.
“If you obey me in all things,” he said, reaching over to lift a lock of her damp hair, “you will never know anything other than pleasure.”
“I’m not big into obedience,” she said, although it was only partly a lie. Submission was a game for her. The only way she could find her pleasure. However, obedience as a rule was something she demanded of others.
“Perhaps you haven’t found your true master,” he murmured.
“You think you’re him?” she said, anger beginning to warm her.
His features hardened, darkening as shadows deepened around his eyes and beneath his sharp cheekbones. He wound the lock around his finger until it tugged her scalp. “I know what you need. I will provide it.”
“Because you want me happy?” she snarled.
“Because I want you unharmed.”
Gabriella didn’t need his constant reminders of the dangers lurking beyond the door. “Happiness isn’t important?”
“You will be satisfied, endlessly so. It will be enough.”
The way he said it, as though from personal experience, provoked a moment’s sympathy, which she crushed ruthlessly a moment later. The Master himself was pitiless, and she had no doubts he’d use her womanly feelings to his advantage if she let him. “That’s enough for you? Satisfaction?”
“I serve my purpose. So shall you.”
“And my purpose … I’m guessing … is to satisfy you?” Gabriella’s eyes filled with her frustration. “Tell me, can’t you find other women to give you service here?” she bit out.
He dropped the silky lock, which remained coiled against her shoulder. “Of course, but my appetites are not easily appeased. And I’ve had a steady diet of demon whores and the damned,” he said, some strong emotion tightening his voice. “I would taste something … pure.”
Gabriella sat up, clutching the cover to her breasts. Not for modesty’s sake, because that was long gone, but because she was beginning to shiver. “I’m … not … pure.”
His lips curved in a thin-lipped, almost reptilian grin. “You aren’t chaste by any stretch of the imagination. But you are living and untouched, for now, by the evil that permeates this place.”
“Do you think I can stay that way, living here?”
“I will protect you, but you must never leave this room, this tower, unaccompanied. The cost would be too great.”
“What would happen outside that door?”
His expression tightened more, but he didn’t respond.
“You won’t tell me? You’ll wait until I find out for myself?”
“If you obey me, you will never know,” he said, enunciating each word as though she were dim-witted.
Gabriella drew a deep breath, frustrated with the conversation. She needed clues to what she’d face when she escaped. “I won’t always be such an easy conquest. You’re new. You intrigue me. For now. But I’ll get bored eventually. And you won’t be able to keep me in this cage. I don’t belong here. I’ll want to return home.”
“You followed your curiosity here. Your arrogance brought you to me. You won’t be bored. Neither will you be alone when I am not here.” His face hardened. “You’ll be entertained, prepared for each time I enter this chamber, brought to a fever pitch but left wanting. You’ll beg me for release each and every time.”
“You’re an ass. Those creepy vines won’t continue to do it for me.”
The sudden easing of his expression into amusement infuriated her. He knew something. And then she felt it. A touch that slid along her skin, like flanges cut from velvet, across her back and over the tops of her buttocks.
She reached behind her and rubbed her skin, trying to knock away whatever invisible thing was stroking her, but it wasn’t solid, and kept working on her skin beneath the hands that frantically tried to slide them away. “Quit playing with me. You’re hardly a man if you have to use tricks like these to help you get a woman horny.” Suddenly, she was on her back, staring into his tense face.
“This isn’t a game,” he said, coming over her. “And I have concern for your pleasure only so far as it enhances mine. Worry when I stop caring whether or not you find your own release.”
She shoved at his chest, but he was too heavy, his muscled frame bearing her deep into the mattress so that she couldn’t move, couldn’t strike.
“Xalia,” he said softly.
A musical tinkling, soft and fluid, approached. “Bel,” came an eager whisper from just beyond the curtains.
“I would watch you love her.”
Then he rolled away and tossed the curtains upward, and Gabriella caught sight of the creature and gasped.
She had waist-length black hair and pale green skin, like an apple’s. Shaped like a human throughout her torso, she was as slender as a young girl. Her face wasn’t unattractive—despite the color—with even features, a very large mouth, and deep-set leafy-green eyes, also with narrow, vertical pupils. Her breasts were high, firm little mounds with puffy, dark brown nipples. Her labia were smooth and gleaming.
Gabriella’s breath caught, whether from fear or curiosity she couldn’t have said because she couldn’t stop studying her. When her gaze snagged first on her hands, then her feet, her eyes widened, because they were overlarge, the fingers and toes long and spindly. Around her wrists and ankles were bracelets and anklets with small golden bells.
Gabriella cast the Master a panicked glance. “Please. I don’t want this.”
“You will learn discipline. My needs are all that should concern you. And for now, I prefer to watch.”
Gabriella swung her gaze back to the creature, but she was no longer standing at the far side of the bed. When her gaze searched the room, she felt the end of the bed dip and watched with horror as the creature came over the edge, head lowered between her shoulders, crawling like a spider.
Gabriella rolled off the bed, running the moment her feet slapped the tile. But she made it only a step and learned to her horror that although the creature was smaller, her strength was immense. She pulled Gabriella against her, holding her wriggling body easily, and then carried her back, kicking and flailing, to slam her onto the bed.
Then Xalia was on top of her, her arms extending to hold hers down, her long feet curling around Gabriella’s legs to keep her spread beneath her warm, smooth body. Mons pressed to mons, Gabriella licked her lips, fighting panic.
The pale green head bent toward her, her expression so solemn with eyes so sad that Gabriella relented and laid back, her breath catching on a sob. “You would have me raped for your pleasure,” she said, breaking with the creature’s sad gaze to spear the handsome demon beside her.
“I understand how abhorrent that would be for you,” he said quietly. “I promise that is not what shall happen.”
Gabriella shook her head. “I can’t … with this …”
“Xalia will be your companion. It is entirely your choice whether you want more. But she is skilled—and obedient. Let her serve you.”
“Then she’s to be my jailer?”
“I prefer ‘companion.’ She will bathe you, dress you. Sing to you if you like. Her voice can soothe even the worst penitent.”
Gabriella quivered with outrage, but kept her expression free of anger. “Can she get off me now?” she said evenly.
“Xalia …”
The creature sighed and climbed off sideways, crab-like, then drop
ped off the bed to walk around to the Master. His hand petted the top of her head, and then slid along her cheek. Her eyes, adoration gleaming, closed.
Gabriella wondered about their relationship and knew he must have made use of his precious servant. The thought somehow didn’t revolt her. Again, arousal tightened her pussy.
Disgusted with herself, she sat up. “You mentioned I could dress.”
“After she bathes you.”
And since she was sticky and smelled of sex, she nodded. “But only if the plants in your little bathtub leave me alone.”
His smile wasn’t reassuring, but rather than lose another battle, she rose from the bed, following Xalia to the pool. The water felt like heaven as it enclosed her body. The plants remained deceptively still.
She sat on a lower step and let the water lap beneath her breasts while the green-skinned woman gathered towels and jars of soft soap. When Xalia lathered up a cloth and began to stroke her back, Gabriella gave herself over to the soothing motions, her eyelids dipping. “You can’t keep me here forever,” she said softly. “I will escape.”
“You will try.” Marduk lowered himself to the top step. “But only once. I would spare you even that.”
“Spare me?” Her smile was a grimace. “You sound as though you care.”
His expression softened. “Despite what I am and where we are, I am not a monster.”
She opened her eyes and gave him a baleful glance. “Please, spare me. You dragged me here against my will.”
“Your despair called to me.”
“Don’t even try to wrap it all up like you were doing me a favor. I don’t belong here.”
One dark brow arched. “You are so certain? Did you not conspire to commit murder?”
She stilled, her gaze flashing back to him and locking for a long charged moment. “That was long ago. And I suffered for that mistake. Besides, the attempt failed. He’s forgiven me, and I made amends. I gave him aid.”
“You gave him aid, thinking you would win his favor, that you would win concessions and perhaps become his wife.”
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