Page 15 of The Endless One

“I’m not falling in line for anyone,” she snarled. “And why do you care, anyway? You’re just going to put a goddess in me and never see me again. Isn’t that how it works? You’re expecting someone else to take over my body, and then you won’t have to worry about me anymore. Dealing with me is just temporary.”

He didn’t say anything. He just stared at her as though he were trying to peer through her skull to understand what her thoughts were. It was an unnerving stare, and she wondered if he could read minds.

But the longer he stared, the more she realized why he was looking at her like that.

Jessamine let her accusation fly like an arrow. “You need me willing.”

The words hung between them. They were dark and dangerous in their meaning, because if she had to be willing, well, he would never get her there. She could hold out until the very end of time, if that’s what it took.

Ajax’s face split into a smile. “Willing comes in many ways, princess. There are people who desperately wish for what I am going to give them. Some have always believed they deserved to be a god, and that I should offer them all the magic they can take. And then there are those who are just wanting the pain to end. All it takes is a few moments of weakness after ages of suffering, and I do believe those are the strongest of them.”

“Why’s that?” she asked, her voice shaking just slightly.

“Because they endure so much before they finally break.”

The gold in his eyes flashed as though sunlight had hit them, and then all she could feel was pain. Her body crumpling in on itself, her muscles contracting all at once.

Her head split in an ache that surpassed anything she had experienced before. It was as though he’d put a spike through both of her temples, then used them as reins to drag her to her knees. Her mouth parted on a silent scream, because the pain was so much she couldn’t make any noise come out.

Her guts twisted with a horrible ache. Like the pains during her monthly menses, but somehow so much worse. It felt like there was a knife in her ovaries, slowly slicing them out of her body as they wrenched back and forth. Stomach muscles clenching, she tried to ignore the suddenly fiery pain. But there was no containing it.

From the top of her head to deep in her guts, something was wrong. Very wrong. He was grinding her beneath the heel of his magic, and there was nothing she could do to stop him.

Finally all the pain disappeared, and she fell onto her hands and knees, gasping for air. Jessamine tried to get her bearings. She could start a fire again, all she had to do was reach out her fingers…

He stomped on her hand. Hard.

Her fingers snapped. She could feel them breaking. Not just the image of it in her head or the pain he had put there. They were all broken in her right hand where she had reached out for a rug that wasn’t as singed as the others.

And then he lifted his foot and kicked her in the face.

Jessamine didn’t know how she’d moved, but suddenly she was leaning against the stone wall as he crouched in front of her. Warm blood trickled out of her nose, and she could taste metal on her tongue.

“I don’t want to hurt you,” he said, fake pity on his features. “You are so beautiful, Jessamine. Don’t worry. I will piece you back together after I am done. But you will work with me. You will take a goddess into your body willingly, and you will help me bring about a new age with more powerful gods.”

“I would rather die,” she spat.

“Oh, come now. You’ve already done that once or twice and it didn’t stick, now did it? All you have to do is cooperate, and I won’t have to hurt you anymore.”

Some small part of her whispered to play along. She didn’t want to hurt like this. Jessamine had been through enough torment in her regular life. She’d been killed multiple times now, and injured more times than she could count. Rolling over just this once, at least until she could escape, wasn’t a bad idea.

But a much louder voice just kept screaming “Fuck you!” in her head. And that voice felt so much more right than the other one.

So she gathered as much blood and spit in her mouth as she could while pretending to be thinking. Then she spat that large wad at his face the moment he seemed to relax.

Blood and spittle dripped down his face, another satisfying moment of rebellion as she hissed, “Do your worst, God King. I have no interest in ever working with you willingly. You are a sad excuse for a god, forcing others to worship you. I vow I will never do so.”

He arched a brow and shrugged. “Fine. I like it better this way.”

And then the pain hit her even harder.

“I was unaware when you asked us to help you with a spell that we would be hiking, Deathless One! If we are going to cast a spell, why can we not cast it where we are?”

“Because we are looking for a very particular location to cast said spell, Agnes.” He didn’t turn around. It was taking every ounce of his concentration to bring them to where they needed to be. After all, few places in this realm were still imbued with magic.

He had a lot of energy from their sacrifices, but not nearly enough to do what he wanted to do. A location spell was easy enough to cast, but finding a person who was likely protected by countless wards was significantly harder. He needed earth that was steeped in old magic. A part of this land had to have been used by witches. They were in every kingdom, after all.

Orenda wasn’t completely vacant of witchcraft, as much as the people here would like to think that it was. And he’d been hunting the perfect spot through this entire “hike,” as Agnes wanted to call it.