Wait—
Luella shook her head, feeling the male’s hand tighten around her upper arm, bruising, as he yanked her across the hall.
She knew these gilded floors. These halls. Paintings that were splattered with blood along the edges, stone statues set into crevices, with depictions of the sun hanging from eaves and dripping from the woven threads of the golden tapestries.
Screams cut through her musings.
"Help me! Please."
Luella shook, her heart threatening to tumble out of her throat.
No. She had been here before, lived this before.
Deep, masculine laughter echoed off the walls, choked cries, and pleas for help joining the war-like cheers of victory.
Through the shadows, Luella spied a female splayed on the ground—her gown was torn, eyes half-lidded and unseeing; bloody handprints littered the flesh of her thighs, traveling up past the blood-splattered, frayed hem of her skirts.
Nausea churned in her belly—vicious and unrelenting. She was going to be sick. The crest of Serpentis flashed in her peripheral vision, inlaid in the armor of the kingdom’s army. Hungry hands, shadowed eyes. Heavy thuds as limbs fell to the ground. Slick slicing noises, wet and gory.
Please—
Luella jolted from her dreams, chest heaving as her arms flailed, slapping against a hard chest.
"Lu, Lu, please, what’s wrong?" Hands gripped her upper arms. Her back burned as she twisted, but she was too fearful to care. She wanted him off. "It’s me. It’s Az. Please. Stop, angel."
The soft, reassuring words fell on her unhearing, broken ears.
She struggled against him. "No, get off of me!"
"Shh, angel. Please." The male didn’t let her go; he held her firmly, strong arms wrapping around her body with such care it made the thundering roar in her ears abate and the beatingof her heart slow, skipping as it returned to normal with every ragged exhale that fell from her parted lips.
Her back ached, raw and ravaged. As the terror left her breathless, it was all she could focus on, and a small whimper escaped her.
"You’re okay. Here—lie against me like this."
Az shifted her, holding her shaking limbs against his muscled chest. Her cheek brushed against bare flesh, smelling of deep, thick chocolate and burning sugar.
"Az?" Her voice broke.
"I’m here, angel. What happened?"
She peeked up at her demon, feeling her hair stick to her sweat-slick temples. Her cheeks were hot. It all came rushing back to her—the den, the fever, her wings. She could no longer ignore the aches in her body.
Az’s brows were drawn low over his amber eyes as he peered down at her.
She realized he was waiting for her response—but she… didn’t know.
"I’m not sure." Luella licked her lips. "I was asleep?"
The nightmarish images did not release her from their grip. Bloodied thighs. Screams. Battered, bruised females and warrior males. Soldiers who took carelessly. And the cloaked male that led her forward through it all—carrying her onward, just as he had done in the Temples, seeing her through her first pleasure.
A dream.
Luella touched a hand to the amulet tangled around her neck, feeling the heat of the soft blue-grey stone in her palm.
It had been a dream. A nightmare. And because of the stone, she was forced to remember it all with aching clarity.
Az soothed her hair away from her face. The firelight in the hearth was dim.
