Cal shifted behind me, and I nodded. A moment later, he appeared in front of the fleeing man. The human lunged to the right, attempting to avoid Cal’s block. The Lycan guard lowered his rifle and smiled, allowing my man to do as he pleased.
The Djinn blinked twice more. Then again. And again.
“What the fuck!” The desperation in the human’s voice echoed through the building. The other captives standing quietly in rows watched, their expressions rotating between horror and fear. Most had probably never seen a Djinn in person, much less watched one move effortlessly from point to point within the same nanosecond.
The human finally gave up and sank to his knees. Cal materialized in front of the kneeling human, pulling a scimitar from the sash around his waist. “Say a prayer to your God, human. My master has granted me your life-force.”
“Fuck you and the creature that bore you.” The human spit into blank air.
Cal reappeared behind the man. He sliced through both of the captive’s Achilles tendons, moving so quickly he barely stained his blade.
The man screamed out, but didn’t fall completely to the ground. He faced his death with pride. A shame he wouldn’t be joining my ranks. Strength of will like that was difficult to come by.
Cal blinked again to face his victim, sliding his sword slowly into the soft part of the human’s belly. Blood poured from the wound, and the soldier clutched at his stomach, holding back his entrails.
I leaned forward in my chair. The tangy, metallic scent of blood permeated the room. I drank in the pain of Cal’s victim, reveling in the fear and horror vibrating from the rest of the waiting, watching prisoners. My pulse spiked, and I held my breath, waiting for my slave to end the human.
The human choked, coughing up blood. Cal drove his sword deeper, nearly running him completely through. Then my slave straightened, wrenching his sword upward through the man’s chest cavity and slicing through rib bones like they were made of twigs. The steel and stones in the hilt of his scimitar glowed red. Cal drank in the man’s life-force through his hands—the sword merely acting as a means of transference. For Djinn, blood was the ultimate high, but even pheromones—especially those released during periods of fear—were as satisfying to most Djinn as a phenomenal glass of wine was to me.
Everyone in the room was silent, even the Lycan guards watched with a still reverence. Death had a way of reminding even the hardest men they weren’t invincible. Lycans lived several hundred years and could recover from wounds that would be fatal to humans, but they were far from possessing power like most other supernaturals who could live for eons—immortals in a way. Even I would eventually die, but it would be thousands of years before that happened naturally.
The gutted soldier’s body fell forward with a thud. Blood ran freely, covering the gray concrete floor with a wide burgundy stain. Cal flitted through the room, appearing and disappearing through the lines of men still standing in formation…waiting, their destinies hanging more in their hands than they probably realized. Their lives depended on how much life they were willing and capable of extinguishing.
Cal appeared again at my side with his head bowed low. “Thank you, Master.”
I nodded and then turned to Martin, mouthing the permission he’d been waiting for. His guards moved between the prisoners, unchaining fifty of the men. The remaining prisoners were secured to steel rings bolted to the floor. The fifty men who’d been freed rubbed their wrists and kept their gazes darting between the Lycan soldiers, Cal, and myself.
“You men are the next lucky group who have the honor of being given a chance to join General Xerxes’ forces. If you feel that chance is wasted on you, please step forward now and kneel before your master.”
“So you can murder us the way you did our—”
One nod from Martin and the man fell forward to the ground, his neck snapped before he’d been able to finish his sentence. The Lycan soldier who’d carried out the unspoken order stepped back from the body with a wry grin on his face.
Cold.
Calculating.
Cutthroat.
Perfection wrapped in six feet and two hundred and fifty pounds of angry Lycan muscle. Martin had trained his men well.
“Anyone else feel the same way?” Martin stepped forward with a thin silver briefcase.
None of the remaining men moved or breathed a word.
“Excellent. Let the games begin. The ten of you standing at the end will join Jasper’s squad.” Martin gestured toward the large Lycan male who’d killed the mouthy prisoner. The soldier opened the silver case and placed it on the floor. Gleaming black knives lined both sides of the case. Some of the unchained humans made a mad dash for the weapons, and the others simply fell to their knees, waiting for death to take them away from the nightmare.
A couple of the men immediately turned on each other, slashing and dodging and cursing. The prisoners completed the task set before them, murdering each other for a place among us. A chance to survive the hell that had swiftly surrounded and ruined their perfect lives.
When the shouts faded and the groans died away, ten men stood quietly in the center of the room, each holding one of the knives. Blood and sweat coated them like a shroud. They were the ones willing to shift loyalties. The ones who would die to protect their families no matter what. The ones who didn’t care who they fought for. The ones content to kill for the sake of killing.
Those were the ones Martin wanted.
The ones I wanted.
I flicked my wrist, paralyzing everything and everyone in the room. A knife was frozen in the air a mere four feet from my face. The man who’d thrown it was one of the standing ten.
Walking forward, I pulled the knife from its place and continued to approach him, feeling the focus of every paralyzed individual trained on me. I loosened my grip on the room, releasing all the men from the bonds of my magick.
No one spoke and no one moved. The man who’d attempted to assassinate me widened his eyes, but did not flee.
Fearless.
I could appreciate that, but trying to kill me was a debt I never failed to repay.
“What are you?”
“The god you tried to kill.”
“You’re no god, just another fucking Other.”
“I am so much more than you could possibly comprehend, human. I’ve seen more history than your world can even fathom. Lived through more wars. Seen empires rise and fall.” Dropping the knife, I raised my hands, letting my magick curl around him, enveloping him from head to foot. My vision tinted blue, and I knew by the reflection in his eyes that my eyes had turned white. I opened up my voice, allowing it to grow and fill the room. “I am your god. And I am sending you to hell.”
The other nine men backed away, fear for their lives lighting a fire under their feet.
Claws grew from my fingers, and my body contracted and released. Muscles tightened and bulged. I roared. The change coursed through me like a lightning bolt, searing every cell with fire. The transformation took a few moments, shifting me from human to the size of a jumbo-jet with four sequoia-sized legs, talons the size of a man, wings that spanned the entire breadth of the hanger, and the head of a human mixed with features of a lion.
I snapped my teeth once, enjoying the terror I finally witnessed filling the eyes of the man who’d thrown the knife. He still didn’t run. Instead, he fell to his knees, accepting his fate. I roared again, my power and form shaking the building to its foundation.
Lifting a paw, I pressed it down against the man’s body, taking pleasure while listening to his bones snap like toothpicks. I continued ripping him apart with my claws until there was nothing left but the tattered remnants of flesh and bone.
I turned toward the fifty chained to the floor on my right. These men would know me as their god—all of them, humans and supernaturals alike. I would rule this entire country. Even if it meant killing every human on the face of its shores.
I would then move on to the rest of the cont
inent before the rest of the Earth.
Taking a deep breath, I pulled the Lamassu back. My form shifted again. My wings tucked away, disappearing into my back. My legs and torso changed to human again, and I stood upright, waiting on my arms and hands to complete the shift.
My vision was still blue, and my voice bellowed through the hanger like I was wearing a personal megaphone. “Please, feel free to insult me again. I would take much pleasure in ripping you to pieces for your insolence or watching my man gut you with his blade.”
I turned to face Martin. “Perhaps we should scrap this entire group and start fresh? I’m feeling hungry.”
All fifty of the chained souls dropped to their knees, then prostrated themselves, pressing their faces against the grimy concrete floor.
Master. The name echoed softly through the hanger like dry leaves rustling in an autumn breeze. Even the Lycan soldiers were chanting along with the human prisoners.
Master.
Master.
Master.
Chapter 4
GRETCHEN
I looked up from the pages of my treasured copy of Little Women, a birthday present from Alek years ago. Rose Hilah herself and the Oracle—head Sister of the House—were both headed straight for me from the far side of the room.
Last night had gone about as expected. Men came. All the Sisters chose, except me. They all went off and had sex while I hid in the corner, doing my damnedest to blend into the potted plants along the gray stone wall of the foyer until I could sneak off to my room.
Hiding had worked for the past three years. That and faking illness. I was a master at always not being where I was supposed to be when the buses of volunteer human man-flesh arrived twice a month to fulfill the Sister’s need to procreate.
“Gretchen,” the Oracle spoke first. Her light tone mixed with disapproval sent a chill of despair merrily skipping its way into the bottom of my stomach.
I put down my book and sat up a little straighter, hoping if I met them head-on the outcome might not be quite as terrible. Destiny or not, this was my life. “How can I help you?” I asked, hoping the shake in my voice wasn’t as evident as it sounded from inside my head.
Rose took up residence in an armchair across from me while the Oracle sat down on the edge of the massive coffee table, her knees inches from mine. The fluorescent lights hummed, revealing to me how quiet the entire room had suddenly become. A brooding anxiousness filled my mind, and I rubbed my damp palms over the fabric of my skirt.
Everyone had left.
The Sisters who’d been working a puzzle in the corner. Gone.
The Sister who’d been playing the piano. Gone.
No one supported me. No one felt sorry for me. Most of them thought I was rebellious or selfish or just crazy.
“We were hoping we could help you. It has come to my attention that you are not participating in the joinings. Are you ill? Is something wrong? Did something happen that wasn’t reported?”
A plethora of lies leapt to the tip of me tongue, but the one that came out was the one I told the most often. “I haven’t been feeling well.” It was true in the moment for sure. My stomach was doing acrobatic flips and threatening to send up everything I’d eaten thus far today in a spewing volcanic display.
“Why are you lying, Gretchen?” Rose asked, her tone as even and as hard as the steel that plated the heavy door guarding the Sister’s basement living quarters.
Of course the all-knowing-heartbeat-reading-Sentinel-of-Sanctuary would know I’d just lied. My racing pulse was probably like a giant red checkered flag waving around in the air. I might as well just get up and scream, Hey, look at me. I’m lying through my teeth. Why did I even try? Every supernatural in this town was a walking-talking-breathing-lie-detector.
“I didn’t want any of them. They didn’t appeal to me, and you can’t force me to have sex.” Shit. Had I just told Rose and the Oracle to shove it?
Yes, I had, and it’d felt damn good. I crossed my arms and leaned back against the couch cushion. They’d come into my space to make me feel bad for a choice that I deserved to make. No one had the right to make it for me.
Not even Rose.
The Oracle’s shoulders slumped, and her brow furrowed. “Rose makes sure the men are vetted, handsome, and kind before they are even allowed onto the bus into Sanctuary. What is there not to like?”
“I just need more time. I can’t just pick someone out of a lineup and force myself to have sex with them. There’s no talking. No connection. It’s not me.”
“This is the safest way to fulfill the urgency welling deep within us to have a child. Don’t you feel it, Gretchen?” The Oracle leaned forward to lay a reassuring hand on my knee. It burned and I wanted to slap her hand away. I wanted to run out of the room screaming that they had no right. That I already loved someone else and I had no desire to ever sleep with and bear a stranger’s child, no matter how hard the supernatural urge in my gut cried out for a baby.
“I know it’s a little awkward the first time, but these men are chosen because they are good to us.”
“Then you sleep with them. I made my choice, and the answer last night was no.”
I shook my head, thoughts of Alek bouncing around like the tennis ball I threw against the wall for hours each day, waiting for it to be time to go to the library and see him.
“I can’t do it. Maybe I’m just not ready.” Maybe if I wasn’t already utterly-completely-totally-unconditionally in love with Alek. Maybe then I could’ve chosen. Probably would’ve.
But I couldn’t now and hadn’t been able to since the moment when I’d seen the possible future I could have with Alek. That we could have together.
He was so lonely and quiet. He needed me as much as I needed him.
Astrid—the Oracle—glanced to Rose, who nodded her head, a silent confirmation that I didn’t want to have anything to do with the men coming in for the joinings and I wasn’t going to be bullied into it. Not that my stubbornness would stop them from trying.
The only man I desired was Alek, but broaching that subject at this point would not benefit anyone. I desperately needed these two women to accept that I refused to sleep with a stranger, no matter how much my genetically-programed desperation for a child reared its ugly head. That was my problem to bear, not theirs.
“Why is it so important for us to have children?” I turned my head and met Rose’s gaze head-on, deciding to try another tactic all together. “Why should we want so desperately to raise another generation in a prison of your making?” Maybe if I could piss Rose off, she’d leave me alone, like the unruly child who nagged until the parents just gave up.
A gasp slipped from the Oracle’s mouth, but she didn’t speak.
Rose’s brown eyes narrowed, and I felt the warmth of her magick rise through the room, creeping around me like a corporeal fog, but I wasn’t scared. We’d always been assured they wouldn’t force us to be with a man. Now I was merely putting that unspoken statement to the test.
“You are the last hope for the supernaturals on Earth. You will be our way back home. Without the Sisters—without enough children to keep the visions complete—there is no hope for any of us to ever get home. To ever get off this human world.”
“But I don’t belong in Veil. We are human.” I jabbed a finger at Astrid. “No matter the funky visions, we are still human. We belong here.”
Rose stood from her chair, her eyes turned white. Her voice deepened, taking on an ominous phantom quality. “You are the Oracles of the House of Lamidae. Your sole purpose on Earth is to fulfill the prophesy that will open the Veil, and allow supernatural beings the chance to go home.”
Each word thudded into the bottom of my stomach, one heavy declaration at a time.
All the urging and posturing in the world wouldn’t make me forsake my hope that Alek would be the first one to ever lie with me. The first man to ever kiss or touch any intimate part of my body. Not even Rose Hilah, playing the Wicked Wit
ch of the West and trying to scare me back onto the proverbial yellow-brick-road, would sway my decision.
“Why do you even care anymore? What’s there for you?” Damn. I shouldn’t have said that. I knew I shouldn’t have, but once I got started, it was difficult for me to put a halt to my thoughts. “A stranger doesn’t deserve the honor of being with me first. If I have to sleep with someone, it should be someone I care about.”
“You do not get to have a typical life, Gretchen. You are special. You have a gift and responsibilities because of that gift.”
“Why can’t we just choose husbands? What could be the harm in a few men taking up residence in Sanctuary? You take in everything else. If it has fangs or fur or fantastical powers, it automatically gets a ticket to stay in Sanctuary. But me? I don’t get a say because I’m just a vessel. I’m not a person who gets to decide her fate. Who gets to fight for what’s right or wrong or make any kind of life choices.” Drawing a deep breath, I focused the anger welling inside me on her once again brown eyes, on her dispassionate, expressionless face. “What makes me worth less than any other person in this town?”
“You are worth more.” Her voice was steady and calm, but her gaze burned with an anger that made my insides squirm. “Everything we do in this town is to protect you. To make sure you can fulfill the destiny you were born to. What gives you the right to feel more important than any of the other Sisters here in this sanctuary? Only in a united group can you produce enough children to raise the magick back to a level where the last two Protectors can be found. Don’t you want to have a child?”
Of course I wanted a child. We all did. We all had this abnormal obsession with procreation, but maybe it wasn’t impossible to have one with Alek. Maybe they’d lied about that, too. If she was so worried about Xerxes stealing us to have children…
What if I could have Alek’s child?
The thought struck suddenly like a crack of thunder. My palms ran slick while the inside of my mouth dehydrated to the consistency of bread flour. I banished the urge to blurt those thoughts aloud.
My Guardian Gryphon (Sanctuary, Texas Book 5) Page 4
