The draconian walked away just like Samael had, leaving her to her fate without a second glance.
CHAPTER 10
TWELVE hours later, she thought she might be going crazy.
During the night, she got clever by stuffing her blanket over the grate in her cell and lying on top of it. It wasn’t quite as warm as wrapping up in the blanket but it kept the rat-things out. Unfortunately, that left her no distractions. Hunger. Thirst. Cold. Tired. So tired.
Terror crawled through her veins. Hysteria tickled the edges of her mind. The other thought plaguing her, one that refused to go silent, was her guilt over the draconian youth. Yes, she’d shot that question at him hoping he would give something away. All the draconians trapped by Samael would know each other and would likely have a general idea of where one another were. As he had. But she hadn’t expected Raum’s reaction. She hadn’t expected the boy to be punished. He hadn’t answered her; he’d just looked in Ash’s direction—a simple, innocent reaction to someone snapping a question in his face. She hadn’t wanted him to be hurt for it. Her fault. Her selfish mistake.
In the long, empty silence, her brain plucked up other worries for her to agonize over. Micah’s parting words kept coming back to circle in her thoughts: Blood Kiss. Whatever it was, it couldn’t be good, but she had no way of finding out what it was. Despite that, her mind kept prodding it like a sore tooth, searching for answers that weren’t there.
The jailors eventually returned. Her exhaustion, the hunger and thirst, all took second place to desperation. This time, the stares didn’t bother her as they passed through the complex; she was too focused on her task of communing with the Sahar. Making something happen. Making progress—any progress.
The jailors led her back to Samael’s office. With a cursory tap on the door, one of them pushed it open and the other shoved her through. The door was shut behind her.
Samael sat behind his desk, waiting. His presence weighed on the room like a toxin in the air.
“Piper.” His blade-sharp stare sliced her. “I hope you will not disappoint me today.”
She mumbled her agreement. He watched her. She stood by the door, staring at the floor, afraid to move.
“Sit.”
She crept to the chair in front of his desk and sat. Her head spun.
Samael studied her some more. She hunched her shoulders, keeping her gaze fixed on her scabbed, bruised feet.
“I wish to test a theory,” he said. “I suspect you are not in the proper mindset to duplicate your first success with the Sahar. I think we need to recreate similar circumstances of desperation.”
Her eyes widened. That sounded bad—really bad. “N-no, I—I can do it. I’ll get it this time. I will.”
Her knees trembled. Samael motivated people through torture. Was he going to have her tortured to make her properly desperate?
The side door leading to the sitting room opened. She looked up. Raum walked in, followed by someone else. She stared at the daemon, trying to figure out why he seemed familiar. Tall, older, long brown hair tied back in a low ponytail, a neat goatee. His face meant nothing to her, but there was something about his hazel eyes . . .
The daemon seemed to recognize her too. His eyes widened slightly when he spotted her, his steps slowing.
“Did you complete your examination?” Samael asked.
The daemon turned toward the Hades Warlord, his gaze razor sharp. “Yes. It seems to be working as you intended. The combination is causing severe mental stress as well.”
The daemon’s voice was a deep baritone with an exotic layering of accents—and she realized who it was. Her heart leaped into her throat. The daemon was Vejovis, the Overworld healer.
She remembered her first meeting with him vividly. Five weeks ago, he’d been impersonating a doctor to heal patients in the same medical center where Piper’s father had been recovering after the Gaians had attacked the Consulate. The healer had saved Ash’s life that day, perhaps trying to make up for failing to save Ash’s sister years before.
She opened her mouth—and Vejovis swung his gaze her way. His glare hit her like a punch to the gut. She snapped her mouth shut.
“How long?” Samael asked calmly, his heavy gaze observing the silent interaction between them.
“Maybe two weeks if he doesn’t go mad first.”
Samael nodded. “One more then and we’re finished.” He gestured to Piper. “How is she?”
Vejovis gave her a critical look but didn’t move any closer. “Dehydrated and starved. Obvious, isn’t it? Some of those bites on her feet look infected. Treat them if you want her alive next week.”
Samael’s voice cooled. “That’s the extent of your exam?”
“You don’t need a healer to tell you what you’ve done to her.” An icy pause. “Our deal is complete.”
“Fine,” Samael said. “You’re sworn to silence. Do not forget. You may go.”
Vejovis nodded curtly and turned. He met Piper’s eyes as he passed. Sadness shadowed his gaze. He walked past her and left the room.
She watched him go, feeling as though she were shattering inside. When she’d seen him, hope had sparked inside her. Vejovis had helped Ash twice before. Maybe he could help her. But he’d walked away as if she were already dead. The ashes of hope choked her.
“Let us continue,” Samael said, rising to his feet.
Panic flared through her. Oh God. Was he going to torture her? She had to get it right on her first try. She had to figure out the Stone in one shot.
Samael circled his desk and headed for the side door. Raum pushed her into line behind the Warlord. She followed Samael through the doorway, fighting the blinding need to run. Her knees shook and her breath came fast.
The fight against panic consumed so much of her attention that she didn’t immediately notice the other people standing in the room. When she saw two black-clad jailors, terror seized her muscles and she stopped dead. They must be the torturers. In front of them stood a woman, also in black. Her dark hair was pulled back in a tight ponytail, her makeup dark and dramatic on her sculpted features.
Her smile was acidic. “This must be her.”
Piper gasped and stepped backward. She thumped into Raum and her knees almost buckled.
“Get a hold of yourself, sweetheart,” the woman said, smirking. “We aren’t here for you.”
She stepped aside and Piper saw what she hadn’t noticed before.
There was a fourth person, on his knees between the two jailors. Even before the woman grabbed a handful of dark hair and yanked his head back, she knew who it was.
“Ash!” she screamed.
She lunged forward. Raum grabbed her upper arms and hauled her back. She hung in his grip, her heart breaking.
Ash’s eyes were black as pitch. They rolled toward her but she couldn’t tell whether he recognized her. A cruel metal bit—the same kind used by prefects—was strapped to his face and would have a hidden metal plate pressing down on his tongue, preventing speech. His cheeks were hollow, his face gaunt, dark circles bruising the skin under his eyes.
His bare torso told the story of the last five weeks. She could count his ribs. His skin, normally a warm honey-tan, was pale and sickly. Cuts and bruises marred his chest and stomach, some old, some fresh. Thick manacles joined by a foot of heavy chain trapped his arms behind his back and, if the bruises and dried blood around his wrists were any indication, they’d been in place for some time.
Vejovis had come out of this room because he’d been examining Ash. What had he said? Two weeks? Ash looked half dead already.
Tears streamed down her face. “Ash,” she cried.
His black eyes slid toward her. His blank yet terse expression didn’t change. He was obviously shaded to the max. Shaded daemons didn’t always recognize people they knew, even when they weren’t halfway in their graves from weeks of who knew what kind of torture. As she stared at him, pain ripping through her, pieces of what Samael had said in his off
ice fell into place. A new way to motivate her. Torture experts who weren’t there for Piper.
Horror closed her throat. She wrenched her gaze off Ash and looked at Samael, hardly able to believe he was this evil.
“Sit, Piper,” he said, composed as ever.
She didn’t move. Raum shoved her forward, steering her toward the little table, and pushed her down. Samael slid in across from her. She met his dark stare and let all her hatred show.
He didn’t react, unaffected. “We will begin again with the Sahar. This time, Ash will endure the penalty for your failures.”
She gripped her seat until pain shot through her hands. Arguing would be futile. She choked back the words she wanted to spit in his vile face, fearing Ash would be punished for them.
“Eisheth,” he said, nodding toward Piper.
The female daemon sauntered forward, smiling with sweet venom. “You should know what Ash will suffer on your behalf.”
She pulled a shiny black rod from her belt, the standard weapon of jailors. At the end of its length was an open loop, and at its center, a tiny spot of blue light crackled menacingly. She took Piper’s wrist and stretched out her arm. With her other hand, she lowered the looped end of the rod until it hovered above Piper’s inner forearm. Raum’s hands closed over her shoulders, holding her in the chair.
Eisheth tapped the end of the rod against Piper’s skin.
Fire exploded up her arm. She screamed. The pain ripped up her nerves like lightning from her forearm all the way to her shoulder, before fading to a dull ache. Eisheth released her arm. Piper pulled it against her belly and curled over it, sobs clogging her throat. Tears she couldn’t stop flooded her face. The instant the rod had touched her, it had felt like her arm had shattered. Though the agony had quickly faded, the intensity had been soul-tearing.
“I see little point in applying that kind of incentive directly,” Samael murmured. “You would be entirely unable to focus. I hope Ash’s pain will motivate you instead.”
“Maybe I should explain the extent of his suffering,” Eisheth suggested coyly, smiling at Samael.
He nodded.
Eisheth sauntered back to Ash. “Look over here, Piper. See this?”
She grabbed Ash’s jaw and bent his head backward. A heavy collar circled his neck in three thick, black metal bands. She tapped it like a teacher pointing out something on a diagram.
“This is my latest invention. I believe you encountered one of my other contraptions? The collar controlling the choronzon that nearly had you for dinner?” She laughed. “This one is my favorite.”
“Eisheth,” Samael said impatiently.
“Sorry, my lord. I’ll be quick.” She flashed him a smile before focusing on Piper. “This collar is a very special tool. It has three purposes. The first prevents a change in form; he cannot release his glamour. The second drains his magic and feeds it back into the collar, making him weaker and the collar stronger. And the third”—she sighed happily—“causes pain. Far more than you can even imagine. His own magic feeds the pain, along with whatever I add to it. So every time I touch him with this”—she waved her rod—“the pain will be on top of what he is already experiencing. How much can one mind endure before breaking?”
Piper felt sick. She swallowed hard to keep from throwing up.
Samael tapped a finger on the table. Piper reluctantly turned to face him. Horror churned her stomach. God, why hadn’t they tried to find Ash sooner? How could they have let this happen to him?
“Let’s begin,” Samael said. He dropped the Sahar on the table and leaned back, waiting. It seemed he would not be offering any suggestions this time.
She picked it up and held it in her fist, her knuckles white. Her gaze flicked toward Ash. His black stare was locked on Samael. There was definitely recognition there; poisonous hatred shone in his eyes. The jailors stood on either side of Ash, holding his arms to keep him in place. Eisheth stood over him, rolling the rod in her hands and smiling in anticipation.
Piper looked at the Stone. Cupping it in her hands, she lifted it close to her face and stared into its silvery surface. She tried to calm her mind and focus. Panic filled her head like a thousand screeching birds. She couldn’t think. She had to make it work. She had to.
Squeezing her eyes shut, she clutched the Sahar and bent all her will into making it do something. Anything. How had she used it the first time? She hadn’t even tried. It had just happened. How could she recreate that?
Minutes passed. Nothing.
Samael sighed. Piper’s eyes flew open. Her throat seized.
The Hades Warlord carelessly waved a hand in Eisheth’s direction. Piper twisted in her seat, half rising before Raum grabbed her shoulders and jammed her down again. Eisheth smiled and laid the rod on top of Ash’s left shoulder.
His eyes bulged, face going white. A strangled sound escaped the metal gag as he hunched away from the rod. The two jailors braced themselves, holding him in place as Eisheth pressed the rod down harder. Ash shuddered, another garbled cry ripping from him. His eyes rolled back.
“Stop,” Piper screamed hoarsely. Raum’s fingers bit in as she struggled. “Stop! I’m trying. I’m trying, goddamn you!”
At a gesture from Samael, Eisheth lifted the rod. Ash sagged, sucking in air around the gag. His left arm trembled and twitched with spasms. Blood ran down his chest from the blister-edged cut left by the rod. Piper fought back the howl of misery and despair rising in her throat.
She whirled back to face Samael. “Hurt me instead,” she begged. “Leave him alone. It’s my fault. Hurt me.”
Raum’s painful grip loosened slightly.
Samael’s expression didn’t change. “Try again,” he commanded.
A sob escaped her. She squeezed the Sahar harder. What was she supposed to do? She had no magic. She couldn’t use the bloody Stone no matter how hard she tried. She’d never really used it in the first place. The Stone had just . . . just reacted. She’d never decided to do anything; she’d never formed a thought that involved magic or the Stone. It had gone off by itself.
She curled her body around the Sahar, sobs shaking her shoulders as she tried to do the impossible. Nothing happened. She grew more desperate as each minute ticked by. The Sahar was nothing more than a pretty rock in her hands, useless.
“Eisheth,” Samael said.
“No!” Piper cried.
Eisheth stepped in front of Ash and jammed the rod into his stomach.
His hoarse scream tore through her like a blade. He doubled forward, convulsing. Eisheth dragged the rod upward. He arched back away from it but the jailors held him in place. Blood ran down his stomach.
“Stop! Please stop!”
Raum pinned her in her seat.
Eisheth glanced at Samael. He made no gesture for her to cease. Slowly smiling, she pulled the rod away. Then, with a laughing glance at Piper, she jabbed it back into his belly. Digging it in, she twisted it back and forth, working it deeper into the open wound. Ash buckled forward, retching and choking. Blood splattered the floor.
“No!” she screamed.
Rage and terror and panic swelled inside her, too strong to endure. The emotions roared through her in an inferno she couldn’t control. Something in her shattered. Fear fell away. Rage flooded in on a wave of wild recklessness.
She flung an elbow back into Raum’s kidney. He grunted in pain, his grip loosening. She tore free and lunged out of the chair.
He grabbed her arm. As he wrenched her back, she spun with the movement, still screaming her hatred for all of them. Hooking her fingers into claws, she slashed at his face. He threw up an arm, barely avoiding her strike.
A terrible, alien something rose up inside her. Her mind split in two as another presence shoved its way in. Lightning erupted inside her body in a flood of heat and power. Thunder split the air, shattering the nearby chair with its force. Following the arc of her fingers through the air, white light flashed in four glowing blades.
Blood sprayed hot across her face. Raum slammed back into the wall. The arm he’d used to shield his face was split open to the bone. Three more diagonal slashes cleanly opened his torso.
Shock stopped her for only a second. She whirled, teeth gritted, power coursing through her, the brightly glowing Sahar hot in her hand. Her eyes found Eisheth.
A blast of power with the force of a battering ram slammed into Piper from the side. She flew off her feet and crashed hard on the floor. Invisible bindings hooked her wrists, pulling her arms straight out to her sides. She screamed when the force yanked her arms taut and threatened to dislocate her joints.
Samael appeared beside her and knelt by her hand where she clutched the Sahar in her fist. He held his hand out beneath hers. His power pulled her arms a fraction more. Agony shot through her shoulders. She screamed again, blinded with pain. Her hand spasmed and the Stone dropped.
Samael caught it neatly and rose. The bindings vanished. Piper collapsed on the floor, trembling from the sudden cessation of the power that had charged her blood with electricity.
“Eisheth,” Samael said calmly. “See if the healer is still nearby. Quickly now.”
The woman bolted for the door, flinging it open and charging out, shouting orders as she went. Piper twisted to look behind her. Samael knelt beside Raum. The draconian was slumped on his side in a pool of blood. He wasn’t moving.
Shaking, Piper pushed herself up. Her attention shifted to the other end of the room. The two jailors stood on either side of Ash, who was still on his knees, shoulders hunched and head hanging. Rising to her feet, she glanced at Samael—he had a hand pressed to Raum’s chest as the air around him sparked with magic—before stalking toward the two jailors. Their eyes narrowed almost in unison. One of them stepped forward, pulling out his rod.
As soon as she was in reach, he made to jab her with it. She sidestepped and grabbed his wrist. Adrenaline pounded through her, giving her starved, abused body strength. She didn’t waste her energy on paltry moves. One well-executed twist snapped his elbow. Then she slammed the side of her hand into his neck. He collapsed. If she’d hit the right spot, he was dead.