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"Don't give up on me yet, love," he said. His voice was like a gentle balm, soothing me for a fraction of a second until I relaxed and then he ripped at me again. "Don't think of it as punishment," he whispered. "You really have nothing to do with this—I'm sending a message. And you just happen to be my canvas."
As I bled, drop by drop, I could hear tongues rasping against the floor, lapping up the tears shed by my body. My stomach lurched. Dredge noticed, stopped, and tipped me on my side as my breakfast came pouring out.
"Can't have you dying in your own vomit, can we?" he said.
"Fuck you, you bastard," I said, spitting out the vile phlegm that remained in my mouth. "If you're going to kill me, just do it. I'm not afraid to die." Until the moment he'd caught me, that would have been a lie, but the pain I'd gone through in the last few hours made dying seem like a slow cruise into the underworld, where it would all be over and I'd be free.
"I know you're not. That's why we're taking it nice and easy," he said, then stood back. "And now that you're decorated, it's time for the real fun to begin."
I blinked. What more could he do to me? And then he started to disrobe.
"No—no… You're not fit to wipe my boots, you motherfucker—" The pain and fear of what was to come spurred on my anger and I struggled against the heavy cuffs securing me to the stone slab.
He laughed. "Spirit yet. I like it." Leaning over me, his curly hair trailed down to tickle my face and shoulders, hurting as it stuck to the bloody lines crisscrossing my body in a latticed design. Dredge's eyes were steel and ice, diamonds in the rough, and his lips were so full and inviting that his face almost made me weep. How could someone so beautiful be so savage? I shuddered as he climbed on the slab, erect and throbbing in the night.
"You want me, don't you? You want this so bad that you're dripping wet. Well, baby, I'm all yours," he said, driving deep inside me, his shaft of ice-frozen flesh grinding against my hips. The slashes across my body sent stinging jolts of agony through my nervous system as he moved against my skin, tearing the cuts further. I felt like a piece of meat under a mallet.>"Holy shit." I stood up. "You're right. Dredge is forging an army in a world that can't protect itself from him. I have to accept Jareth's offer. I can go up against Dredge if I'm prepared. Otherwise… I don't have a chance."
Camille slid off the bed and crossed to my side, draping one arm around my shoulders. "Menolly, you can do this. You survived Dredge, you came out of the abyss… you can survive anything Jareth throws at you."
"But that's just it," I said, feeling faint. "I'll have to go back to that night, to the darkness when he tried to destroy my soul." My voice ripped out of my chest like a baen-sidhe, and I dropped to my knees. "I don't want to relive it! I remember too much in my dreams."
My sister knelt by my side. She took my hand. "It's not fair, and it never will be. But, Menolly, you have to do this. You know it, and I know it. And when it's over, you can find Dredge and obliterate his soul. The gods will smile on you."
"The gods can go to hell," I said, roughly grasping her hand. "I'm so grateful you're here. Will you help me and stand watch? Will you come with me if Jareth says it's okay? I need you."
She nodded. "You can count on me. You can forever and always count on me."
And then it was okay. Camille would be there. My big sister, who had taken over when Mother died, who had become our rock, who had kept her head when I tore into the house in a manic bloodlust to kill, who had led us against Bad Ass Luke and the first Degath Squad… She would be there, watching over me as always. All of a sudden I realized that, torture or not, I still needed my family. I still needed their love. I needed to belong.
CHAPTER 14
We waited until Camille and Morio ate before heading out to the Hall of Temples again. I perched on one of the beds, watching as they sat at the table. As I tuned out my thoughts, which were raging with fear, I noticed an odd light emanating from their auras. It was a silverish-green cord, linking the two of them. What the hell had they been up to? Camille was linked to Morio in much the same way she was to Trillian, but it seemed more than sexual.
"Menolly," Morio said, tearing a piece of bread in two and handing half of it to Camille, "I've been meaning to ask you something. You don't eat food anymore, right?"
I nodded. "I can't. I can't drink anything but blood, either. I get violently nauseated when I ingest anything else. Food won't kill me, but the aftereffects sure aren't pretty. Why?"
"I've been thinking. My skills with illusions are extremely good. I thought maybe we could play around a bit. I can try to cast an illusion on the blood you drink while you're at home. Maybe I can make it smell and taste like something different… something you miss eating, perhaps?"
I stared at him, mouth agape. Nobody had ever thought to suggest anything of the sort before. "That has to be the sweetest thing I've heard in a long time. But wouldn't that be a waste of your energy?"
"What waste? I don't go around casting major spells every day, and that sort of thing wouldn't require much effort, I think. It's worth a try, if you're interested." He shrugged. Camille wrinkled her nose and smiled.
Not sure exactly what to say, I stammered out a "thank you" and then thought, Why not? What could it hurt?
"I'd like to give it a try," I said. "Maybe after we get this mess with the Elwing Clan cleared up. I miss… there are so many things I miss."
"Like Mother's buttercream biscuits?" Camille said.
I laughed then. Of all the things to discuss on the night before I handed myself over to a shaman prepared to tear my soul apart. "I haven't thought about those in a long time, but yes, her buttercream biscuits. Do you have the recipe?"
She nodded. "I kept all of her recipes. I can't make them nearly as good as she did, but maybe Iris can. I never thought of asking her to try."
And then we were off, talking about the wonderful meals Mother had fixed when we were young, and how she'd done her best to recreate Earthside food enough times to give us a taste for things like hamburgers and fries when we were still very young. I avoided watching the clock that sat on the shelf, but finally, by the time Camille and Morio finished their dinner, I knew we couldn't delay any longer. At least the small talk had kept me distracted from what I was about to do.
"I guess we'd better go. You two going to be shielded enough to come over to Temple Row?"
Morio nodded. "I think we'll be okay. We cast a pretty strong protection barrier to guard against excess magical energy, so we should be fine. You're ready?"
