“You’re not dying, Aria. I won’t allow that to happen. You are mine. The other men? They won’t satisfy that need burning in those pretty eyes. They won’t destroy you like I do, nor would they even satisfy that hunger you feel when replaying those memories of our time together through that pretty head of yours. You’re lust, and I’m carnage. You’re a beauty, but that hides that vicarious bitch that’s itching for you to release her.
“You’re fucked in the head, just like me. You’re bare-bones that unleash the moment you discard those clothes because without them, you shed your humanity and give in to the monster you truly are. You and me? We’re kindred spirits that come together and shed our fucking skin and go to war against one another. It’s glorious, and you fucking know it, don’t you? Just now, you imagined me pinning you against a wall, driving into you until the only name you know is mine. Didn’t you?”
“I’m imagining someone else doing something similar, yes.” I teased, but he knew the truth. His eyes smiled, calling me out on the lie as I caught his scent. Fighting to remain in control, I shivered with the need to throw him down and make new memories with that thick cock of his.
He knew that only he could fix the ache that throbbed through me. He let me lie to myself, knowing that only he could take me to bed and show me both heaven and hell, making me choose hell because we were both sinners, and we would end up there together. Somehow, that thought didn’t bother me. I didn’t care, so long as Knox was there with that glorious cock for me to ride straight past the gates and on through eternity.
“I marked you, and no one else would dare touch you. So, when you go into heat, and you will go into heat, you’ll come to me. I’m sure you’ll try to fight it, but you’re too fucking young to do that yet.” Knox stopped in front of the portal, inhaling deeply as a sinful smile played on his lips. “How hard are you already fighting it, Aria?” His head canted to the side as his eyes slid to obsidian. “I’m going to mark you again so fucking hard that you never want to leave me.”
I swallowed, and his scent caused my mouth to open, releasing a moan of need before I slammed the portal closed. The sound of his laughter sliding through the portal as the fabric of the world closed was unnerving. I dropped to my knees, exhaling and inhaling slowly to get control of my body. Knox was dangerous because even though I knew I shouldn’t want him, I did. My basic genetic makeup didn’t have emotions. It didn’t get angry. It was like my creature—basic needs driven by a monster that never grew tired or sated from hunger.
This wasn’t what I expected.
It wasn’t what I’d planned on happening.
Knox was mucking everything up, even though technically, me being in heat wasn’t his fault. However, I still blamed him because he was an asshole.
Dark witches had messed with things that they shouldn’t, calling up dire wolves from Hecate’s tomb and using forbidden dark magic. I never thought I’d enter the Nine Realms and discover that Knox had told the truth, let alone to figure out he’d sprinkled a lot of sugar over the details of what was going on here.
Whatever was happening, I had to stop it before dark witches slaughtered more innocent people. The only way to do that was to get ahead of Knox and find witches who weren’t playing in the middle of this mess. Someone powerful was leading deadly, evil witches onto a very dark path that they wouldn’t survive. I would make damn sure that happened.
First, I had to figure out how to shake the alpha male gnawing on my butt cheeks and nipping at my heels. I spun as a shadow moved over my shoulder, staring up into the other male’s eyes that pushed my every damn button on purpose.
“Hello, Puppy,” I muttered, standing up.
“I’m your escort tonight, pretty girl,” Dimitri stated softly, offering his elbow as I slipped my hand through it, resting my head on his shoulder.
“Well, then, escort me, handsome.”
Chapter Four
Soraya, Deep within the Kingdom of Vãkya in the Palace of Magic
Standing in the line of witches chosen to serve Ilsa, High Queen of Witches, I swallowed against the need to spew my lunch, or what little I’d held down after watching body after body added to the large, unending human grid we were building at her behest.
Slowly, my eyes moved to my sister, hearing her eternal scream, calling my name, Soraya, echoing on repeat in her mind. I couldn’t save her from what was coming. I hadn’t been strong enough to prevent this evil bitch standing before us from taking my sister, so instead, I joined her coven to save myself, and I’ve done horrid things to reach the notice of the high queen, doing whatever it took to get here.
Instead of finding my sweet baby sister, I’d found a mindless follower in some kind of stasis serving Ilsa unquestionably. Julia was only a mere twelve moon rotations around the Nine Realms, too young to be this lost within the darkness so soon. Whatever Ilsa was doing, it was sucking the life from the witches at an expedited rate, allowing dark magic to take everything from them too soon. It was pure, undiluted evil that was swallowing the young witches whole.
Scraping sounded against the marble floor, reminding me where I was and in whose company I stood. Turning toward the sound, I examined Ilsa, positioned beside the large window. Her cruel, blue eyes scanning the endless miles of corpses, creating an enormous, winding power grid that fueled her infinite reign of terror. The hair on my neck rose as Ilsa moved her cold, dead gaze to the witches entering the room.
“We have a problem,” Kalan announced. She was one of the witches sent to murder an entire village to add to the grid, spreading wide into the Nine Realms.
Ilsa tilted her raven-colored head, glaring at the newcomers. She nodded toward the shadows while her magic flowed endlessly through the room, slithering against our flesh. It was a warning, the power raw and smothering to those within its reach.
“I don’t feel the power that should have added to the grid, Kalan.” Ilsa turned toward the corner, nodding her head again slightly, and my eyes narrowed as I inspected the empty space.
A tremble of unease trickled down my spine as magic pulsed thicker in the room until my body threatened to bend and yield to the woman before me. Kalan’s blackened eyes turned, noting the witches who stood silently while Ilsa decided our fates.
“That’s the problem, Mistress. We were interrupted before we could seal that grid and add the magic to your amassing powers.”
“By whom?” Ilsa hissed, her blackened teeth clenching as my stomach churned with the grotesque visual her character and person had become.
“We don’t know who she is, but her power was… different. The magic she unleashed as a warning was unlike anything I’d ever felt.”
Ilsa turned her dead eyes toward Kalan. Sweat beaded on my nape from the coldness of her stare. Hatred boiled to the forefront, and Kalan’s failure sent my lips twisting into a wicked grin. Ilsa’s mouth pulled back into a tight snarl that vibrated from her with displeasure.
“Explain to me what happened, you idiot!” she screeched, her hands balling into fists as her body slithered, turning to face the group of witches who had failed her.
I buffed my nails on my skirt, watching as Kalan and her group tensed from the force of Ilsa’s full attention directed at them. Magic suddenly filled the room, a sign that more bodies were added to the grotesque grid that stretched all around the Palace of Magic. Steeling against another shiver, I watched as the blackening ooze of putrid magic pulsed through the witch’s veins.