The closer they got, the more horrifying the scene became. Moans of pain came from the twitching, swaying pieces of human. Eight of them. Impaled on pikes.
Her attackers.
She stopped just out of reach of Oricus, shifting her attention from one morbid display to another. There wasn’t even enough of their bodies left to be recognizable. Only some still had mouths. But those were the ones that made wretched, agonized sounds.
“What is this?” she whispered.
“Retribution,” he answered. With a single step he stood before her and tilted her head up with a finger beneath her chin, forcing her gaze to meet his. “I made these men. I gave them the power that keeps them alive even now. Nothing will ever take it away, but I will see to it that they suffer every minute of their pitiful existences for their despicable act.”
Harlow jerked away from him, shaking her head. Bile burned the back of her throat. What they’d done—and what they’d thought to do to her—was unforgivable. But this…
“Can’t you just put them in prison or something? This is…”
In the space of a breath, Oricus closed in on her, their breaths mingling as his whispered words caressed her lips. “Their punishment fits the crime. No one harms what is mine. No one. They knew that and acted anyway.” His lips pulled up, revealing a flash of white. Cruelty radiated from him, as did his immense body heat. “Get used to this, Puppet. We protect what’s ours. And in every sense of the word, you belong to me.”
Harlow scoffed, taking a shaky step away, trying to clear away his presence fogging her mind. “I’m yours in some imaginary bond only, as well as with eleven other men. But make no mistake, I belong only to myself. Not you or any of the others control me. You might protect me, but I’m not your property.” Her voice was steel, though when she spun and started down the hill toward the castle, her knees wobbled.
The men that attacked her were monsters, there was no denying that. But Oricus was even more so. She saw the unflinching cruelty in his eyes.
Who was the man that held her in an iron grip? His secrets, every horrible deed he’d ever committed, she’d discover them all.
ARIAN
The phone rang though Arian no longer expected Elentis to answer. It had been two weeks since he went missing. Pulling the phone away from his ear, he jammed the “End” icon and tried Prodepheus instead.
His gruff voice answered on the first ring. “Yes?”
“Did you find out where he went?”
His brother was silent a moment. “Yeah,” he sighed, “I did.”
“Where?” Arian barked.
A jumble of mumbled curses in different languages grated on the last of Arian’s frayed nerves. He dropped onto his firm leather chair and plucked the last of his crystal glasses that remained upright. The amber liquid inside was nearly to the brim, and when he put the edge of the glass to his lips, drawing in a long swallow, he barely tasted the stale whiskey.
He’d had to raid the last of his private stores from a log cabin he occasionally used deep in the Canadian Rockies. Being the heat of summer now, the air inside was muggy. Not hot, but not the wicked frigid air he was used to when he visited.
It was the end of August already.
Which meant that Harlow had been missing for almost three months. Elentis was gone now too, and with the final moon phase only days away, there was no telling what disasters Arian would be forced to clean up until he found his brother.
“Out with it,” Arian ordered.
“You know where,” Prody growled.
His untethered rage shot through him so violently the glass shattered, sloshing the alcohol onto his trousers. He snarled, brushing the bits of glass off his lap, only to feel the minute sting of the shards embedding into his fingers and palm. Blood smeared the dark fabric, and Arian shook his head, scoffing at how his life had gone so quickly from complete and utter bliss to a hell that would never fucking end.
He disconnected the call, letting the phone clack onto the dusty desktop where old books were stacked.
His other hand lifted in front of his face. The skin glittered where the light caught tiny flecks of glass speared into his flesh. Rivulets of blood coated his palm, trickling beneath his sleeve and staining his eight-hundred-dollar shirt.
A cold, humorless laugh bubbled from his throat.
He knew it.
Scondelade.
Which meant either Oricus had gotten to him, or Onoliza had. Perhaps the Empress held his brother captive in an attempt to get him to visit her.
She loved her sick games.
“Very well,” he told the silence. “You have me intrigued.”
With a blink and the familiar fluttering sensation in his chest, the cabin vanished. His shoes sank into soft, plush grass, and before him was the family mansion. Scanning it briefly, he knew it was empty.
Turning from it, he leapt into a sprint. There was something he’d put off for too long.
He managed to sneak into the city despite the extra protection surrounding it and slowed to a jog outside the boring beige twelve-story building. Paint peeled off the walls, the windows murky. The robotic sentinels floating around looked much the same. Unwashed, their limbs were squeaky, their engines no longer the gentle purr they once were. Now, their presence was easily broadcasted within several city blocks by the sputtering, rumbling sounds they emanated.
Onoliza didn’t care for the world she ruled over, that much was clear.
Arian threw open the door and jogged up the stairs, wiping sweat from his forehead. His limbs shook. It had been too long since he’d fed on blood. But it was Harlow’s blood he craved. Without it, the alcohol he kept a steady stream of and the powders he snorted just to help him sleep made him feverish and weak.
He, the immortal prince.
By the time he got to the top he was sufficiently winded, his undershirt soaked through. Arian knocked on the door in the usual fashion: two rapid raps, a pause, then two slow raps.
The door shot open, breezing away the strawberry-blond strands from a heart-shaped face that punched him in the chest with its familiarity.
Maribelle’s blue eyes narrowed on him. “You look like death,” she commented, stroking the subtle bulge of her growing belly. Two small, boyish faces peered around her legs, glancing up at him fearfully.
“Good to see you too, Mary. Can I come in?”
Harlow’s older sister leaned to one side, trying to see around him as if he’d concealed his mate behind himself.
“Where is Harlow?” she asked.
The words made the ever-present ache and acute sense of loss flare through his body until it took up every cell. He placed a hand on the wall beside him, steadying himself.
“May I come in, please?” he asked, his voice trembling as violently as the rest of him.
Her brows rose, then her eyes filled with tears. “Is she…?” She swallowed hard. “You swore she’d be safe.”
“I know,” he grunted out, fighting the simultaneous urge to hurl at her feet and to rip open her veins and see if her sister’s blood could sate his raw, agonizing hunger.
Her lip curled, like she’d heard his inner thoughts. “Where. Is. My. Sister?” she demanded.
“Mary, you have two seconds to let me into this damned apartment so I can sit the fuck down and explain everything.”
Glaring, she stepped aside, scooting her sons back and allowing him passage.
He didn’t wait for formalities before dropping onto the threadbare couch in their tiny, minimally furnished space. It was better than the warehouse they’d been in before, however. They now had documentation, albeit forged, that allowed them Scondeladian residence. Kaimon had gotten Mary’s husband a job in a factory repairing the hovercrafts. Slowly, they were making a life for themselves.
“Where is Olivia?”
Olivia, the one and only female in his clan, was the permanent guard of Maribelle and her family.
“Gone to get food,” Mary answered, her hands planted firmly on her broad hips. She was attractive for a human, but her features bore only the slightest resemblance to Harlow. It didn’t stop him from searching them out though.
Arian grunted in response, his eyes pressing closed when the images of Harlow surfaced.
“Babies, go play please so Mummy can talk to this silly man,” Maribelle told her sons. They obediently fled, not wanting to remain in the same room with a man that looked like a strung-out drug addict—which, he guessed, he was.
When the door clicked shut softly behind the boys, his eyes opened just in time to see Mary round on him. “Where the hell is my sister, you dirtbag?” she hissed.
Arian couldn’t help but chuckle at her ire. He deserved it. But not even the wrath of a protective older sister could inflict the pain he truly deserved. Sitting up, he took a deep, steadying breath. “Oricus took her.”
Maribelle recoiled like she’d been struck. Hurt and anger warred on her delicate face. “How could you?” her voice broke. “You said she’d be safe.”
“I know,” Arian said, letting his head fall back. “Take a good long look at me, Mary. How do you think I feel about this?”
“It’s the…Mark…or whatever, right?”
Swallowing the lump that rose in his throat, he nodded slightly. “It’s deeper than that, but our bond was severed. I can’t feel her or sense her in any way. It’s like she’s dead, but I know she isn’t.”
“How do you know that?” she demanded, angrily swiping the tears that fell from her rounded cheeks.
He met her distraught stare. “Because this is punishment. He wouldn’t kill her so quickly. He wants me to search for her. He wants me to suffer.”
She sniffled. “How long?”
He sighed, scrubbing a hand down his face. “She was taken right after you last saw her.”
Her eyes went wide, and she screeched, “Three bloody months! She’s been missing for three bloody months and you only deigned just now to drag your sorry ass here to tell me?”
He was on his feet before he knew what he was doing, his rage burning hot, boiling to the surface of his thin control. “I’ve been busy scouring every planet I can find for her! You think I don’t agonize over her safety every second of every day? I am coming apart at the seams, Maribelle. I’ve looked everywhere. Even here. She’s nowhere. My brother is nowhere!”
She cowered from his thunderous voice, though her expression remained hard. “Let me help you. She’s my sister, that has to count for something.”
Arian shook his head before running a hand through his hair. He stared at the floor. Truly, he was at the end of his rope. There was only one other thing he could think to do. One last avenue to venture down.
But once he did, he knew there would be no coming back. Even if he managed to find Harlow, she’d never be his again.
Maybe he’d already known that but simply denied it for the sake of his fragile mental state.
He brushed a kiss to Maribelle’s cheek. “I just wanted you to know. I should have told you sooner and I’m sorry.” Stopping at the door, he turned toward her. “I doubt I’ll see you again, but just know my people will continue to protect you. And I will get Harlow back. Nothing short of hell spilling over and consuming everything will stop me.”
Then he left, feeling the resolve of what he was about to do harden like steel in his veins. As he ran through the streets, he pulled up the memories of his beloved.
And with a final gut-wrenching snap, he let them flutter away in the wind.
HARLOW
Two weeks passed with nothing to show for it. Rex was gone and Rasimus wouldn’t say where he was during their grueling training sessions. Having her ass handed to her ate up her mornings, and in the afternoons she either spent time with her paints and brushes, getting reacquainted with her artistic nature, or Emuria would sit with her in her room. The servant girl had become a fast friend with her easy smiles and radiant beauty that Harlow couldn’t help but envy. Some of the time she thought Emuria only stayed with her late into the evenings to keep her occupied with fittings for new clothes or the puzzles Geoff had lent her, but they had no shortage of conversation.
The girl told her about the village she was born in, how it had been cut off from trade routes well before she was born and how they’d learn to survive on their own as master crop growers and seamstresses. Her extended family even made shoes, and Emuria snuck her a pair of knee-high boots made from a material that looked like studded grey leather, whose name Harlow couldn’t pronounce. They were not only gorgeous—embroidered with black thread in whorls and mesmerizing patterns—they were the most intricately crafted boots she’d ever seen in her life. In exchange, she gave Emuria a painting of a lavender field she’d seen on a puzzle box stacked on Harlow’s table.
But most importantly, she didn’t see Oricus for those two blissful weeks. His cunning stare and crooked smile were absent, but she felt him nearby always.
The first few nights after she’d planned to sneak away to find information on Oricus and the other guys, two or three of the men would be fast asleep outside her door. The moment the door opened, they were jarred awake. When it happened the first time, she made the excuse of wanting a glass of water. She tried only two more times, attempting to be as quiet as possible, but both times they woke the moment the door was open. Thereafter, a glass of water was set on her bedside table each night, and she knew by feeling through the bonds that several of the men slept outside her door. She decided to give up…for now anyway. The memories of the attack were still fresh in her mind and when they haunted her dreams, there was always someone that came in to check on her.
So when she felt a body heavy on hers, pinning her to the ground, she fought against him, screaming. Fists cracked against her face, boots kicked her legs, and hands groped for her, grabbing her breasts and squeezing painfully. Their fingertips turned black and long claws erupted from them as they slashed away her clothes, not bothering to avoid her skin. Blood welled from her injuries and her skin tingled, healing them all. Over and over.
Harlow felt the darkness calling to her. To close her eyes and disappear from that place, but this time she wouldn’t. She fought harder, but still she felt impossibly weak against eight men.
When the first undid his zipper, freeing a thick, meaty cock, a sob broke from her and she jerked upright in her bed. The door whooshed open and Rex burst in, his palms glowing with blue light.
“Rex,” she choked out.
A clicking sound came from above her, and she craned her neck back to look at the ceiling. It was dark in the room but she could make out a serpentine shape as thick as her thigh and at least three feet long. Thousands of legs tapped and shifted.
Harlow sucked in a sharp breath, her scream building until it burst from her so loud, it sent the creature jerking and crawling across the ceiling. The door flew open again and more men poured in. She leaned against the wall, her heart battering her ribcage.
The blue light from Rex’s palms tossed the massive centipede to the floor with a loud thump before it winded back toward Harlow’s bed. A shriek caught in her throat as the whistle of a blade sang through the air, cutting the insect in half. Blood spurted on Rasimus’s face and hands holding the sword embedded into her rug. The light above slowly began to glow, as though awakened by the commotion.
She closed her eyes, chest heaving with ragged breaths.
Before she knew what was happening arms were around her, pulling her tightly to Rex’s chest. She knew him by the smell of his soap and his lean body embracing her.
“Are you okay?” he asked, voice hard.
She nodded, the nightmare all but forgotten. “What was that thing?”
“Qauitocent. Basically a centipede on steroids,” Lefayon answered.
“Yeah, except they eat your face off,” Koen added.
Harlow shuddered. “I don’t want to be here anymore.
”
“Your maids are supposed to check your room for them before you go to bed. I don’t know how one would have gotten past all of us, and your door isn’t on auto anymore,” Rasimus said, his voice gruff. When he turned to address the figure at the back of the room, Harlow realized it was Viktor. Her surprise had caught her that for a moment, Rasimus’s next words didn’t register.
“Fetch her maids. They need to see what their carelessness wrought.”
Viktor was out the door before Harlow knew what was happening. She whirled on Rasimus. “No, that’s not necessary. It’s not their fault. I live underground, bugs happen. Usually they’re smaller than my fist, but, again, that’s not their fault.” She couldn’t help but wonder what all of the men would do to Emuria and Jezzebelle for—in their eyes—putting her in danger.
Her mind conjured the images of the men on the hill, skewered like bits of meat fit to be a sacrifice to the wolves in the woods—if there even were wolves in those trees. She fought to dismiss the sight of thick, dark blood oozing down the spears and the parts of their bodies which should never be on the outside but were. And because of their immortality, they were all living through it. Trying to heal with a shoot of wood forever a part of their mangled forms.
Oricus’s cruel, unflinching, unapologetic gaze filled her mind next. The way he looked at her as though she might thank him for what he’d done. As though she’d be pleased.
Her stomach churned as her eyes opened.
“I’m fine,” she answered, pulling out of Rex’s grasp, though it took some effort.
He looked down at her, studying her expression. “He showed you.”
It wasn’t a question, but Harlow nodded anyway.
Rex ran his fingers through his blond hair, which now hung down his forehead, the strands unruly. Turning away from her, he shifted his gaze into the stone wall that desperately needed a window. As though he could see through the walls and into the hills decorated like an offering to the gods. “It’s just his way. He punishes with an iron fist. It’s how he’s amassed so many loyal followers.”
Chained to Darkness Page 11
