by Tillie Cole
Contents
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Prologue: 221
1. Luka
2. Talia
3. Luka
4. 221
5. Talia
6. Zaal
7. Talia
8. Talia
9. Talia
10. Zaal
11. Talia
12. Luka
13. Zaal
14. Talia
15. Zaal
16. Luka
17. Talia
18. Talia
19. Luka
20. Zaal
Epilogue: Talia
Playlist
Follow Tillie Cole Web Sites
Acknowledgments
About the Author
PIATKUS
First published in the US in 2015 by St Martin’s Press, New York
First published in Great Britain in 2015 by Piatkus
Copyright © 2015 by Tillie Cole
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
All characters and events in this publication, other than those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
ISBN 978-0-349-41105-7
Piatkus
An imprint of
Little, Brown Book Group
Carmelite House
50 Victoria Embankment
London EC4Y 0DZ
An Hachette UK Company
www.hachette.co.uk
www.piatkus.co.uk
Dedication
To music for the constant inspiration.
To Johnnyswim for inspiring this novel.
“You and I, we’re fire and water …
We’re rain and thunder…”
“You and I” by Johnnyswim
Prologue
221
Poison.
Pain.
Burning.
Unbearable fucking burning.
Rapids of lava raced through my veins.
My skin … my skin was too hot … too tight around my flesh …
I panted with anger … so much fucking anger to keep inside … stabbing at my brain, driving me insane …
Rip someone apart, I snarled in my head, break bones, tear flesh … feel wet blood on my hands.
I paced, my heavy iron chains wrapping around my wrists and ankles. I needed to kill. I needed to get out from under these chains.
Must kill to stop the poison.
Must kill to stop the pain inside.
“You’re back in New York?” a voice suddenly spoke from across the room. “The Georgians have finally made their great return?”
“We have. And it’s been a long time coming. We have business to settle. Business from long ago,” Master spoke, and my heart began to pound. Listen to Master. Listen to Master’s commands.
Footsteps clicked on the cold hard floor. The man was approaching Master. I paced faster.
“With the Volkovs?” the other voice asked. “Because if it is, a lot has happened in forty years. They’re untouchable. Too strong.”
Master laughed. “We’ve returned stronger.”
“Do they know you’re here?”
Master paused, then replied, “They’ll find out soon enough. We’re not hiding from the red scum.”
Master turned to me, bringing a man with him. My muscles tensed and I snarled as they came close … too close.
“What the—”
“We’ve mastered a new drug. Proven to secure one hundred percent obedience in any subject. No other can offer this to you, Nasar. The Italians won’t have seen anything like it. Your business will surpass theirs when your girls can bend to a buyer’s every whim.”
Master’s voice stabbed at my ears. I always heard Master, my body tensing as I waited for his command. I kept my eyes to the dark wet ground as Master ordered, never making eye contact. He told me I was a dog, a killer. He told me I was his slave.
Searing heat enveloped my flesh; the white-hot pain in my head surged through my body. Shaking, I tensed before screaming out the pain. Fury took its hold.
Every muscle in my body was twitching, itching, on fire, thirsting to deliver death. My chains rattled louder as my hands clenched into fists, imagining the slaughter of an opponent, testing the strength of the heavy cuffs around my wrists.
The feet from Master came closer still. I paced faster. My heart pumped louder. I hissed loudly through clenched teeth.
Klavs, klavs, klavs—kill, kill, kill—I needed to kill.
I inhaled a long breath as the strange man approached. I snarled and bared my teeth, warning him to stay the fuck away from me.
He stepped back. I could smell fear on the fucker.
Fear.
Fear stank. Fear reeked. I hated it. Fucking hated it.
Klavs, klavs, klavs …
The poison in my blood boiled hotter still, my veins screaming at the pain of the scalding venom. I pulled on the chains around my hands, seeking release from the torment the poison brought. Muscles tensing, neck stiffening, and back stretching, I roared a deafening roar and increased the speed of my pacing.
Back and forth … back and forth … back and forth …
The man’s feet stepped forward and began to circle me, his sweat dropping on the cracked ground of the cellar. “You have managed to control this one? He seems feral.”
Master stepped forward; he came close, my body stiffening. He slapped his hand on my arm. “221 is my prized possession, my prototype, my dzaghii—my dog. He obeys anything I ask of him. Anything. He’s had a concentrated shot of the Type A drug this morning. Type A drug creates killers on demand, Type B, perfectly obedient slaves; slaves who will do anything you want.” Master’s voice lit with excitement. “221, here, kills with perfect efficiency. Complete annihilation.”
The feet of the man stopped, stood beside me, and I could hear his heartbeat race. “Prove it,” he said quietly.
Master laughed. “You brought the men?”
“They’re here,” the other man replied. “Bring them in!” he shouted, a command to someone at the entrance to the cellar.
He moved to stand beside Master. “I need trustworthy men by my side. Our war with the Italians is heating up. I need men who won’t question anything asked of them. Men who can’t be beat in a fight. I also want my stock to be obedient. I want them open to anything a buyer wants. If this drug you’ve created and its subject prove to be true, we have a deal.”
Master stepped away. A guard approached me and began to loosen the chains. My feet rocked from side to side as the chains dropped to the ground. Looking at my hands, I slowly clenched them into fists, the cracking of my knuckles echoing around the room.
Heavy breathing came from behind me. My lip curled … weakness …
“221, t’avis mkhriv.” Master ordered me to turn and my body swerved, head down, legs bracing in his direction.
“221, mzad.” Master demanded me to get ready. My chin lifted. Six men stood before me. Six men smirking, holding daggers.
As another jolt of lava swept through me, a growl rumbled in my chest.
Klavs, klavs, klavs.
“221, t’avis mkhriv,” Master called again. The guard thrust a pair of black sais into my hands. I never took my eyes off the men who stood before me—they were nothing but prey. I rolled my neck
from side to side, legs parted, ready to attack my prey. My blood rushed faster and faster, my hands itching to slice these fuckers open.
The man with Master spoke. “These are some of the best men I have. If your dog can defeat them, we have a deal.”
“How many do you want dead?” Master’s voice enquired.
The man sputtered. “How many? You’re telling me he will kill them all, if ordered?”
“He’ll kill until I order him to stop.”
The man moved to stand in front of me, his small dark eyes glaring into mine. I bared my teeth and snarled. He immediately stepped back.
A smile eventually pulled on his thin lips as fire lit in his eyes. “I want to see him slay every last one.”
“221,” Master commanded. My body tensed, my fingers gripping the sais. “Sasaklao.”
Slaughter.
My feet lurched forward, just as the six men ran at me at once. A red mist clouded my eyes as I made the first strike, blood spattering my chest.
I sliced.
I gutted.
I culled.
I fucking slaughtered them all.
Chapter One
Luka
The Dungeon
Season Opener
Brooklyn, New York
I blinked … I blinked again. It didn’t fucking work. Didn’t remove the images from my mind.
Reaching up, I clawed at the knot of the silk tie I’d been forced to wear and loosened it off. I couldn’t fucking breathe.
Every muscle in my body was tense as I sat up in this suffocating private box, looking down on the Dungeon’s cage, the wide window giving me the perfect fucking view of the two fighters ripping each other apart.
The crowd noise was deafening; screaming and clamoring for spilt blood, as the first match of the season kicked off.
No matter how hard I tried to look away, my eyes were securely locked on the two men in the cage. My heart raced, my hands curled into fists, and my jaw ached as my teeth gritted together way too hard.
With every blow the fighters delivered, my legs twitched. With every spray of blood on the concrete floor, every body smashed into the wire surrounding the cage, an envious pain sliced through my stomach.
I wanted in, I wanted to rip those fuckers apart. I wanted to feel the cold steel of my knuckle-dusters back on my fingers, feel my spiked blades slowly pierce my opponent’s flesh, and I wanted to watch as the life leaked out of his eyes. I wanted to bring death; I wanted to rip out someone’s fucking soul.
The monster within me wanted out and I was losing the battle to keep him at bay. Six months … six months of being away from that cage, yet every instinct I had was telling me to go back. That it was where I belonged, that I deserved to keep fighting. My nightmares were getting worse … more memories of my killings becoming clearer … the guilt, and the fucking uphill battle of trying to adjust to this godforsaken world. A world that was becoming more and more difficult to be in.
Shit! I couldn’t fucking breathe!
I sat forward, raking my hands through my hair, fighting my thoughts, the urges in my head. I wanted to embrace the demons inside, but at the same time, I wanted to fucking leave this shit hole of a fight ring and not feel the coming sense of death clogging up the air. I wanted to get the fuck away from the cage. It was in a cage where I’d slaughtered over six hundred men. It was in a cage where I’d killed my only friend.
I winced as 362’s face flashed into my mind: his grin as he met me in the gulag as a kid, teaching me how to survive, and his face as I took his life, stealing his chance at revenge on those who had condemned him to the life of a fucking monster.
I saw nothing but red as I straddled his waist and speared a bladed fist into his neck. Felt nothing but rage as my second bladed fist skewered his temple. Felt nothing but single-minded determination to slaughter Durov as I lifted both fists and, pointing them straight down, plunged them into 362’s chest, the wheeze of his dying breaths assaulting my ears, wrenching me from my anger.
I’d killed him. I’d watched as his dark eyes frosted over with the coldness of death. I’d watched as the color from the fight drained from his face, and I’d listened to that final beat of his heart until there was nothing but the deafening scream of silence.
“Revenge…,” 362 had uttered, choking on blood washing back down his throat.
I’d fucking promised him my revenge on the people who sentenced him to the gulag’s cells; the people I still hadn’t found; the people I still hadn’t killed in cold blood.
I was failing 362, my only friend. And I couldn’t fucking live with it.
Jerking on my chair as the crash of memories assaulted my mind, my heartbeat drummed too fast, and the screaming rush of my blood racked through my ears. In that second of panicked movement, my eyes went to the center of the cage as a fighter gripped his weapon of choice—a jagged hunting knife—and sent it straight through the eye of his opponent, the crowd noise soaring in volume.
My father and the Pakhan got to their feet and clapped, demonstrating their superiority to the bloodthirsty crowd below. The bloodthirsty crowd who were already exchanging money and placing bets on the next fight. All of the desperate and sadistic fuckers thanking the Russian kings for this damn dungeon of death.
My father looked down at me and aggressively flicked his chin. He was ordering me to stand, to clap, to stand like a fucking regal God at the window, to show the fuckers jamming up the Dungeon that I was the Bratva knayz, the Russian Mafia prince. The sole heir and the one destined to take charge. We constantly had to show our strength.
But I couldn’t move. This suit I was forced to wear was fucking suffocating me. This silk tie, although loose, still feeling like a damn leash tying me to this Bratva role I couldn’t bear to embrace.
I tried to move, but I couldn’t force myself to lift from this chair. Memories of 362 bleeding out below me were stabbing harder at my brain, stealing my fucking breath.
My eyes squeezed shut, sweat pouring down my cheeks. I was losing it, I was fucking losing my shit.
Six months of this fucking torture. Six fucking months of slowly going insane, too many painful memories and flashbacks scourging the fuck out of my brain.
I abruptly lurched to my feet, and the Pakhan darted his gaze to me. “Luka?”
The room began to spin, the walls fucking closing in on me.
My father stepped forward. “Son? What’s wrong?”
But I couldn’t answer them. I had to get out, needed to get the fuck out of this tiny fucking box.
Staggering to the steel door barricading us in, I used all my strength to smash it open, snapping the top hinge clean off the frame.
“Luka! Come back!” I heard my father shout as I disappeared into the dark hallway. I ignored him as I turned to race down the steep staircase that led to the packed crowd.
“Mr. Tolstoi?” one of the byki called as I ran past him. Heads turned as I pushed through the mass of scumbags trying to get to the side of the cage to fucking see the carnage inside. But all the fuckers moved out of my way, sensing that I’d rip them in two if they got in my fucking path.
I headed for the hallway, the familiar hallway that I’d walked down when I was Raze, the death-match fighter I’d been conditioned to be since a child. The hallways where I’d lived as a Dungeon fighter, stayed each night, only one focus in my mind: revenge on Alik Durov, my childhood friend that, along with his father, had condemned me to a life of killing.
Ignoring the trainers and fighters filling the narrow space, I staggered to the locker room I used to occupy. Smashing my shoulder into the door, it burst open and I slammed it shut, blocking out the world.
It was quiet in this room, no noise fucking with my head. This locker room made me feel safe.
Walking into the center of the room, I kicked off the leather shoes from my feet, feeling the cold from the asphalt ground. Tipping my head back, I stood in the sliver of moonlight slipping through a crack in the wall and ripped
off my tie. Hands shaking, I roared when I couldn’t undo the buttons of my shirt. Gripping the expensive material, I pulled hard, the shirt slicing in two, shreds drifting to the floor.
Bare on top, my chest heaved at the severity of my breathing. I tried to calm down … to think of my life now, away from all the gulag shit, but it wasn’t any fucking use.
Walking to the wall, I slammed my palms against the cold hard stone and closed my eyes, just trying to fucking breathe. But this room made me feel like the old me. I felt like him, Raze. I felt like the death-match fighter 818. I felt like the Georgian gulag’s bringer of death. Luka fucking Tolstoi was a stranger to me. The knyaz of the New York Russian Bratva was a total fucking stranger.
The same feelings of how to kill, how to position my bladed knuckle-dusters just right to cause the most pain, circled my mind … and I fucking embraced it. It was familiar … it felt like … me.
Suddenly, a hand gripped my shoulder. Sensing the familiarity of a gulag guard attack, years of being a “fuck thing,” a punching bag for those abusive pricks taking me back to that lost kid I used to be, I turned and gripped the fucker’s neck under my hand, smashing him back against the wall. A red mist fogging my eyes, I gritted my teeth and lifted the asshole off the floor.
No one would hurt me again … ever. I was stronger now, tougher. I was a built and conditioned fucking stone-cold killer.
Fingernails raked at my skin; wheezing breath filled my ears. But my hands squeezed tighter, the familiar feel of draining a life pumping me the fuck up.
The flailing cunt in my hands began to go weak and I tightened my grip, almost snapping his neck. This fucker would die. He wouldn’t get to rape me no more. Wouldn’t get to push me in that cage and kill another innocent kid. I was an innocent kid, too. This fucker would die. This fucker would die slowly, painfully, under my hands. They wouldn’t touch me anymore. They wouldn’t push me in that fucking ring anymore—
“Luka!”
Too focused on the kill, on the rush that came with feeling a pulse slow to a stuttered stop in a neck, I didn’t hear the door open behind me. My mind was a damn slide show of images, fucked-up images of my kills; kids begging for their lives, guards pointing their guns in my face if I didn’t finish those kids off. Pain, torture, rape, blood, so much fucking blood—
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