A Gift for the King

by Sara Fields

  There was no white in his eye, no colorful iris. The entire eye was black, almost as though he was the devil himself. She forced herself to stand tall even though she wanted to shrink away with every fiber of her being.

  The man sat down in a chair in front of her and simply looked at her from head to toe. Lana realized she must be quite the sight, covered in dirt, not a stitch of fabric on her body. But still, she continued to stand tall, drawing from an unknown source of strength somewhere deep within herself.

  A dangerous grin grew on the man’s face, one so malignant that it turned Lana’s legs to jelly. Silently, she waited for him to say something, to do anything. Deep inside her, every instinct told her to run, to escape from this man, to get away from whatever strange power he held. There was something recognizable about him, some sort of familiarity that reminded her of the raw terror that burned through her at the sight of the shadow man. Holding her head high, she stared at the alien man and hoped for the best. Clenching her fists, she stood, ready for him to do his worst.

  Her eyes perused her body, taking in her legs, her hips, her breasts, and pausing on the king’s tattoo, which stood out against her pale skin. Finally, he looked up at her face and released a sigh.

  “It’s amazing how much you look like the spitting image of Julia. If she were standing next to you, I bet I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference.”

  “Julia? Who are you talking about?” she replied, trying to keep a sense of bravado in her voice when she still just wanted to cringe away. Her skin tingled as he gazed over her. She felt like a baby deer about to be attacked by a lion. Each moment she stood in front of him, her unease and confusion grew.

  The man’s grin grew even bigger until he began to chuckle. His shoulders lifted up and down in amusement at her bewilderment. She glared as he laughed at her, but waited silently for him to finish.

  “You mean to tell me that Dante never told you about the love of his life? His Julia? And how she could be your living twin if she were alive today?”

  “My twin? How is that possible?” Lana felt as though someone had poured a bucket of ice over her head; cold disbelief raced through her.

  “Oh, this is delicious. Watching the confusion and pain glimmer over your face is especially pleasing. I wonder if it will be as delectable when I’m in your head, feasting on your memories and your dreams.”

  “What are you?” Dread coated her features.

  “I used to be human just like you. Before I was taken to this planet, for reasons that soon became clear to me. D’Lormere is a military kingdom, and they created the man you see before you today. Some call me a weapon; others call me an experiment gone wrong. But I am a Soul Eater. I feed on the pain that survives deep within your thoughts and memories, and it makes me stronger. Your pain allows me to access the magic hidden deep within me.”

  Lana took a step back, realizing just how dangerous the situation was becoming. For the thousandth time, she wished she were back in Dante’s arms. Her eyes flickered back to him, her arms hugging her torso as though they offered some form of protection.

  “Who is Julia?”

  “You mean, who was Julia, emphasis on the ‘was.’ Well, you see, she was the woman I killed long ago.”

  “What do you mean?” she pressed, horror apparent in her tone.

  “Dante and Julia were destined to be married when he was a prisoner in the gladiatorial games. His master wanted to breed him and pass on his powerful genes to future slave generations. Dante and Julia were lovers, and Dante fought for their freedom, but never attained it. That could never be allowed. I was his master. I could never let that happen.” He paused, watching her face, with some sort of strange happiness on his.

  “The Erassan people found him and prepared him to leave Earth. They forbade him from taking his lovely little future wife, believing she would be a distraction in the early years of his rule. So, Dante did the only thing he could think of, and told her that he didn’t love her, that she would be better without him. He broke her heart. And left her behind, hoping she would move on. Only he should have known better. I had always been a cruel master.”

  “What did you do?” Lana whispered, her revulsion suddenly overwhelming.

  “I owned the two of them. I decided who lived and who died. Since I assumed he had run away and cruelly left his lover to suffer at my hands, I did what any games organizer would do. So, in a spectacle like none had ever seen, I placed Julia at the center of the arena, surrounded by beasts, and charged the gladiators with her rescue. Unfortunately, none of them succeeded, and the beasts killed her before any of them came close. I watched her die in the jaws of a bear. Not long after her death, D’Lormere found me and took me as well.”

  “Did Dante know?” Her voice was barely audible, her disgust clearly apparent.

  “The Erassans told him about her death when he arrived here on Terranovum, but there was nothing he could do about it. What I wouldn’t give to taste that grief, to have seen his face when they told him of her fate! But now… now I have you, the spitting image of the long dead Julia. When my shadow self saw your face, and his tattoo, hiding away in the shelter of that tree, I knew I had to have you.”

  “What do you mean, your shadow self?”

  “When I have procured enough painful memories, I become a shadow, enabling me to hide in the dark and stalk my prey. It is one of my many powers that being a weapon of D’Lormere graciously gifted me.”

  She narrowed her eyes, the pieces slowly coming together.

  “So you’re the reason for the people disappearing from Eriborough, and you’re the reason there were dead Erassans. You devoured them and left their bodies behind.”

  “I did.”

  “Why?”

  “We have need of humans here. And the Erassans? They were a delectable snack in order to keep my power strong. They gave me extra strength.”

  “What do you need me for?”

  “Well, little one, I can’t wait to devour his pain when he sees what has become of you, when he sees how I have broken you. Through your demise, I will prevent what is foretold by prophecy, and D’Lormere will rule Terranovum. The kingdom of Legeari will be no more.”

  “No matter what you do to me, it won’t change him. He doesn’t care for me.”

  “Now, even I know that’s a bold-faced lie. You have a face that he could never forget. Just because of that simple fact, he already loves you.”

  He rose from the chair to his full height, standing before her. Brushing her knotted hair out of her eyes, his fingers drifted down and lingered under her chin. It took everything she had not to recoil from his touch.

  “What’s your name?” she asked, her voice quivering.

  “My name is Lord Nero, but for you, I will be known as your master.”

  Lana nodded, unable to utter anything due to the fear coursing through her. He grabbed her chin and looked deep into her eyes. She felt his power begin to dig into her brain, through her memories, tasting her pain. Burning agony bloomed through her skull, starting from between her eyes, spreading outward. Then, all she knew was terrible pain. Awful screams emerged from her throat as he invaded her head, until hoarseness was all that was left. She wanted to pass out, but he forced her to stay conscious.

  When he finally looked away from her, Lana didn’t know if he had been in her head for seconds, minutes, or even hours. The pain was all she knew. Her limbs weak, she collapsed to her knees in front of him. Holding her head in her hands, she rocked back and forth, tears trailing down her cheeks. Surprised, she touched her face. She hadn’t even realized she had been crying. Even though he had withdrawn his power from her mind, it still felt like he was there, and maybe a portion of him was. It felt like her freedom of thought was no longer her own. The burning ache lingered in her head, making her believe that he was indeed always existent in there.

  His smile confirmed that he was undeniably still present in her mind.

&
nbsp; “You’re right, Lana. Your thoughts, your memories, and your dreams are all mine. I am the ultimate information gatherer. My abilities make interrogating an enemy obsolete. The D’Lormere Empire ensured that when they created me.”

  Looking up at Lord Nero, she fully realized the gravity of the situation she was in.

  She was vulnerable, kidnapped by this terrible all-powerful evil beast, and no one was coming to save her. No one knew where she was. She was his prisoner, without any chance of escape. Despair washed over her, and her tears began to fall anew. She was utterly alone.

  Chapter Nine

  Days passed, and Lana was forced into the role of a human slave to Lord Nero. She had been bathed of the dirt that covered her body, but she was required to remain naked. Nero invaded her head multiple times a day, and each time she thought she was going to die, the agony was so great, so terrifyingly strong. Hopelessness took over her. She became a walking shell, serving the man dinner and pouring him wine, even allowing him to touch her without a word. Her head hurt so much constantly that she hardly noticed each time he grabbed her nipples and twisted them, just to remind her that her owned her, mind, body, and soul.

  Sometimes, Nero woke her up from her sleep by investigating a painful memory, or planting some sort of wicked terrible dream in her mind. Each time she woke up screaming, only to find him watching her with a sordid sense of glee. This man was a true monster. Not even sleep allowed her to escape him.

  Thankfully, she was left alone in his tent for much of her time. Nero was called off on important business often, but he was never fully absent from her head. There was always a tiny shred of him within her, listening to her thoughts, tugging at her despair. The worst part about it was she never knew when he was there and when he wasn’t. Sometimes, even if he wasn’t with her in person, he’d invade her mind, and she’d fall to the ground screaming in pain. The other human servants who occasionally served his tent would quickly disappear when that happened.

  On the rare moment that Nero left her to her own devices, she wondered how Dante and Wes were faring, and if the disappearances and deaths that occurred in Eriborough had stopped now that they had traveled deep into the kingdom of D’Lormere. She missed Emma’s kind, but friendly gaze. She missed Tala’s soft fur, her gentle voice speaking into her thoughts. In such a short time, all of them had become her friends, and she had stupidly ruined everything by trying to escape; all she had done was successfully place herself in the hands of the enemy. Crying for what felt like the millionth time, she hid her face in her hands, and didn’t even notice when another female slave entered the tent.

  Strangely, the woman didn’t come in with a goblet of wine or a dish of food, nor did she begin to clean or rearrange things like the other servants did. Lana slowly realized this, and jumped when she looked up and realized the woman had knelt down right in front of her. She was naked, just like Lana, but something otherworldly looked at her through violet eyes. Red hair surrounded her face in beautiful cascading ringlets. High cheekbones accented flushed cheeks that curved downward into plump pink lips. Her mouth was arched into a soft, empathetic smile. Any other time, Lana would have been impressed with her beauty, but she had felt so little emotion since being captured by Nero and his men. She had been so alone.

  “You are Alana? Yes?”

  Lana nodded slowly, a bit confused. She hadn’t been referred as anything but simply the term human since she had been taken from her hiding spot in the woods. Nero had made sure her identity was a secret, that she was nothing but his slave, and that he was her master.

  “I can save you. I can give you back your mind, but you have to trust me.”

  Pushing her body backward, raw terror broke through her. It wasn’t possible for her to be safe again.

  “He’ll know,” Lana cried, her hopeless tears falling anew. “I can never be safe.” She tried to push herself away from the strange girl, hoping Nero wasn’t in her head, that he wouldn’t punish her for speaking with her. Beginning to panic, she tried to put some distance between the two of them, but paused when she heard the woman speak again.

  “Dante sends his love.”

  “What?”

  The woman put her hands on either side of her face, holding Lana’s eyes steady with her own. She thought about escape, but held back, trusting something she saw in those violet eyes. Something within her began to stir, but she couldn’t identify it. The longer she stared into the stranger’s eyes, the more that bizarre feeling surged within her. There was something about it that seemed awfully familiar, like what she felt when she stared at that strange, unnaturally colored fire.

  In response to that strange feeling, she began to realize the woman’s powers were sifting through her head. Lana almost panicked, before realizing her mind was slowly becoming her own again, as though the curtains that had kept her mind shrouded in darkness were opening to the brilliant light of the sun. When Lana’s mind was healed, the woman let her hands fall away from Lana’s face. For some unknown reason, she knew she was free, and that Nero was no longer deep within her mind any longer. The pain had all but disappeared.

  “There now, Nero is gone from you. That won’t protect you forever, but it will be enough so that we can get you far away from this place, so that he cannot wrap his tendrils back around you.”

  “Who are you?”

  “I am Morgana, sorceress to Dante, the king of Legeari. I am here to rescue you.”

  “Am I really free of him? He can’t enter my head again?”

  “Not without direct eye contact. He would need to implant his power back within you.”

  “Really? He can’t hurt me anymore?” Lana still looked terrified, thinking all this was but a trick, but she slowly realized that she no longer felt Nero in her every waking thought, his touch letting her know he was there. She was really, truly free.

  Morgana shook her head, her auburn ringlets moving back and forth. She inspected Lana’s face, concern in her eyes.

  “You’re safe with me.”

  “Dante sent you?”

  “Yes. He told me you were very important to him.” She paused, investigating Lana’s features. “I have to change you, the way you look, your face especially. I have to make you look different so that we may escape.” Without waiting for Lana to say anything, Morgana met her eyes and placed her hands over Lana’s face. The skin experienced the sensation of being molded like clay, and moments later Morgana removed her hands.

  “Am I different?” Lana wondered out loud, pressing her fingers onto her face.

  “I transformed your face so that no one will recognize you. Now come, we must walk out of the city, and no one can know who you are. The soldiers guarding the tent have all studied your face. They will not expect that Dante has me up his sleeve,” she said with a soft grin.

  Lana simply nodded and rose with Morgana, deciding to trust this stranger, who had done nothing but help her thus far. The two of them strode out the tent. She almost spooked when a pair of soldiers stopped them.

  “Now what do we have here?”

  Thankfully, Morgana was prepared to deal with the soldiers. With a calm expression, she touched one of the men’s shoulders before allowing her hand to drift down his chest. His eyes followed her hand as she brought it dangerously low, to the cusp of his hips.

  “Orders from Lord Nero. This one is to be prepared to be examined, so that she will be ready to present to the rival territory as a gift.”

  Lana knew so little about D’Lormere, but said nothing, hoping her quiet submissiveness played the part well. The two men looked back and forth between them, their suspicious glances fading with each moment. The man Morgana touched stared at her hungrily before remembering his place.

  “Lord Nero would like me to bring her to the bathhouses at once.”

  “Carry on then. Make sure she gets there safe, or it’ll be your tight little ass on the punishment block.”

  “Yes, soldier,” Morga
na said demurely, dropping her head in acquiescence while still carrying a teasing smile across her lips. With a final look, the soldiers continued their rounds as Morgana and Lana walked in the opposite direction quickly, but not fast enough to raise suspicion.

  Each time they were approached by soldiers, Morgana used the same technique. The simple mention of Lord Nero terrified most of the soldiers, and a few of them left the girls quickly after his name was revealed. As Lana walked through the city this time, she was able to fully appreciate the desolate sight that met her eyes.

  Except for the area that housed Lord Nero and his men, the rest of the city was in shambles. Building after building looked like they should be abandoned, yet she saw people moving around within them. Most had no windows, and cloth hung within the frames. She thought about how cold it must be at night without glass to block the winds. Many of the building didn’t have true doors. Some were made of wood and others made of brick, but both were disintegrating with age. Some of the wood looked rotten, and planks were nailed to it in order to keep the walls from falling apart. Each structure was so run down that Lana was surprised many of them still stood.

  Dressed in rags and filth, humans slept on the streets. Erassans occupied most of the buildings, and she even saw a couple of Erassan men kick a human out of the way in order to walk on the sidewalk or enter one of the doors. Each face she gazed at had a look of sadness and despair so deep that she couldn’t even begin to understand their pain. Even children that she passed on her walk were quiet, concentrating on work to be done for the day, or where to find his or her next meal. It was all incredibly sad to see.