I glanced at him. “Bet you’ve been waiting all day to say that.”
Kieran lifted a bloody middle finger.
“How about I call you a filthy dog?” Devries retorted.
I snapped forward, bringing my boot down on his ruined shoulder. The Lord screamed. “That was rude.” I kept pressing. “Apologize.”
“Fuck you.”
“Apologize.” I dug my foot in, cracking bone. “You have a hell of a lot more bones to go.”
He swung with his other hand, reaching for my legs I supposed, but I wasn’t sure what he thought that would accomplish. Kieran easily caught his arm, snapping it back and cracking the bone in the process. Devries howled, kicking his foot at Kieran as he jerked upright, fangs bared as he went for my thigh.
I sighed.
This continued for a while, proving that the Lord was not all that wise. Both legs were broken when he finally stopped trying to bite us. So was his left arm. The right hung on for dear life. He was a messy heap of flesh and bone, leaking all over the floor.
Cleanup would be a bitch.
“Tell me where Prince Malik is being kept,” I said for what had to be the hundredth time.
“There is no kept Prince,” the vampry moaned, and that was, at least an improvement over telling me to go fuck myself.
I kicked him in the chest, knocking him flat on his back.
“Motherfucker.” Devries groaned.
“Where is he being held?” I repeated.
“Nowhere,” the vampry roared, spitting blood and saliva.
Fury erupted. Moving toward him, I raised my leg, but Kieran grabbed my arm, stopping me before I brought my boot down on the vampry’s head.
“You level?” Kieran asked.
Inhaling deeply, I stepped back and nodded. I didn’t even know what level meant at the moment. “Okay. Moving on, Devries. I want you to tell me about the Maiden.”
The Lord moaned, rolling onto his side.
“Why is she important to the Blood Crown?”
“She’s Chosen,” the vampry groaned. “By the Queen. By the gods.”
Kieran looked over at me.
“You forget who you’re speaking to,” I advised. “We know the gods have Chosen no one, least of all a mortal girl.”
“She is Chosen, you fool. The bringer of a new era,” he gasped, pale features contorting in pain. “And you are a fool.”
“I think he wants to die,” Kieran remarked, his brow raised.
One black eye opened and fixed on me. “I…I remember when you wanted to die. When…when you begged for it.”
My chest lurched.
Kieran’s head whipped back to the vampry. “What did you say?”
“He doesn’t recognize me. Do you? Of course, not.” Lord Devries’ laugh was bloody and wet. “You were out of it, screaming and biting at the air one second…”
I stiffened.
What the Lord spoke of hit Kieran in an instant. “Shut up.”
“Then pleading for death the next,” the Lord said, laughing as he eased onto his back. “I was there in the capital when they had you.”
I’d frozen, but my chest moved with each rapid breath.
“Shut the fuck up,” Kieran growled.
“I remember where they kept you underground and in that cage.” His arms flopped uselessly at his sides as images of those damp bars flashed in my mind. Glimpses of bloodless skin. Dark eyes. Sharp nails. “How you writhed in pain and then ecstasy—”
Lord Devries’ words ended in a gurgle, startling me. I blinked, my surroundings coming back into view. The hung meat. The thick blocks of ice. Blood and clumps of matter strewn across the stone. Lord Devries’ body twitched as Kieran moved back, his steps smearing gore.
“Cas?”
When I didn’t answer, Kieran clasped my shoulder. “You okay?”
I closed my eyes and nodded, but I wasn’t. Kieran knew that. No matter how many times I said I was, I wasn’t.
I never would be.
PRESENT IV
“I’d forgotten all
about that,” I said, eyeing the elegant curves of her jaw and then the brave lines cut through her cheek and brow. “Lord Devries. What he said about you.” I dragged in a ragged breath. “What he said to me.”
It was late, sometime in the middle of the night. Kieran had left to check on things. I lay beside her now, my body cradling hers. There wasn’t even an inch of space between us. I found her hands in the candlelit chamber without taking my eyes off her face. They rested on her stomach, just below her chest. I ran my fingers over hers. They were incredibly still between mine, smooth. The bones beneath felt so damn fragile.
Her skin was still icy.
“He was right, you know? About you being Chosen. Neither Kieran nor I got it then.” I threaded my fingers through hers. Seconds ticked by, turning into minutes. “I think we both blocked that whole thing out. I…I did because it was something I didn’t want to remember.
Kieran would’ve done the same because he knew it caused me pain.”
I wanted to close my eyes. It was hard thinking about my time in captivity, let alone speaking about it. It was that lingering shame. Still as difficult to talk about as it was to admit I’d hurt myself.
“I didn’t recognize him, Poppy, and I thought I wouldn’t forget a single face of those who had taken part. But I did, and it…it fucked with my head. Made me wonder how many I’d blocked out. I don’t even know why it mattered. I don’t think it does now.” My gaze flickered over her profile. “But it gets to me, you know?
That I can’t remember what this Lord bore witness to. Did he see me used? Was he there when I hurt others—when I fed from them until there was nothing left? Was he there with Malik in the beginning?”
I dragged my thumb over the top of her hand. “He was also right about Malik.” A low, rough laugh left me. “He said, ‘There is no kept Prince,’ and he’d spoken the truth.”
In the silence, I had to ask if that really was the truth.
Malik may not have been kept in a cage and chained the entire time he was with the Blood Queen, but he had been kept.
“His chains were invisible,” I said aloud, glancing toward the closed chamber door. “And those chains had a name.”
Millicent.
His heartmate.
I looked at Poppy and didn’t even want to imagine our roles reversed. Poppy in place of Millie. Me instead of Malik. But I knew one thing. “I’d gladly serve any monstrous being if it meant you were safe. I can’t fault him for that. I really can’t. But…” My gaze returned to her cheek. To those scars. I leaned over, kissing the one on her temple. “I don’t know how I can forgive him for what he planned to do to you.
He may not have harmed you with his own hands, but his actions left their marks on you.”
Marks that were both physical and emotional. Ones she still carried and likely always would.
“You probably want me to forgive him. I want to, but…” But I needed time. I needed to talk to him. I needed to understand, and none of that would happen right now. Still, I wanted to.
Because I’d seen Malik die in the Bone Temple. Struck down. And, fuck. That had taken a part of me out there. He was my brother, fucked-up choices and all.