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I focus on the sounds around me. Footsteps. Heavy. A man, no, two of them. Metal grazing metal. Breathing soft and heavy, close to a snore. The sharp whistling of fierce winds hitting a window.
Allowing myself to relax, I tune into a special frequency, syncing with minute rhythms and sensations throughout my surroundings. There are five heartbeats in the room including my own. Two are fast as if they’re in motion, and the rest are lethargic. The burning scents of propane, saline, hot coals, and other chemicals I don’t recognize.
“Get them up. I don’t have time to wait.”
That voice.
I know that voice.
A surge of adrenaline dumps into my bloodstream. My jaw tics. The muscles around my eyes fight to wake up.
Why is it so hard to breathe? To shift my body? It’s as if someone is standing on my chest, clamping my arms down at my sides. I press my back into something cold and hard. A wall. Granite.
“Good morning, brother,” Kaspias says too close to my face.
There’s a sizzle followed by a bright explosion of pain against my rib. I grunt through my teeth, not even able to jerk away from the burning of something hot against my flesh. Smoke fills my nostrils, and finally, my eyes pop open, flaring wide and alert as I take in the scenery.
Kaspias twirls a fire poker in his left hand, examining my drugged expression with malice and foreign intrigue. It’s unsettling the way his eyes light up at my pain.
“Guess you all found out about my little white lie with Ruth.”
A snarl rips from my throat as I try to jolt forward, roasting alive with the need to separate his jaw from his face. But my body is stapled to the granite wall. Literally. Metal molds around my waist, hips, legs, ankles, throat, forehead, and arms. I am bolted with no way of breaking free.
I suppose they’ve figured out I can’t be trusted with the shackles.
“Dessin.” Warrose’s husky voice comes from my right side. I can’t even turn my head to look.
“I hope you don’t mind. I thought we’d have a guy’s day. The females make us weak and tender. And by us, I mean you three,” Kaspias taunts.
He brought Warrose and Niles here, too.
Goddamn it.
“What do you want?” I exhale to steady my rising anger.
“I hoped having your friends here might make you a little more compliant about accepting what I have planned for you.”
“Stop toying with him, son. Let’s get on with it.”
My eyes shoot up to the corner of the room. That familiar voice steps out of the blanketing shadows, revealing the tall, spindly man. The one with raven hair and empty eyes. The man who walks with a cane. The man who once grabbed Skylenna by the hair and told her how a woman should behave.
My nails nearly peel off as I grind them into the wall behind me.
“Masten,” I say with a tone cold enough to chill the air. “The Demechnef Traitor.”
44. The Demechnef Traitor
Dessin
“I assume I’m speaking to Dessin.” His distant eyes flick up to me with disinterest. “Your way of coming and going as a boy was always confusing to me.”
I’ll kill him. Not just for the way he once treated my girl. But Masten and I have a long-standing history. He knew me when I was a child. He helped train me into the sick son of a bitch I am today. He was the reason Kalidus split. With the constant bullying, name-calling, and belittlement that spewed from this man’s mouth, we had no choice but to create an alter that could maintain confidence even through the constant ridicule and abuse.
At the sight of this demon, Kalidus presses dangerously close to the front, ready to take over at any sign of mistreatment.
“Not brave enough to face me without these restraints?” I ask in a low, deadly voice.
Masten scoffs softly. “Not ignorant enough is the better way to phrase that.”
