Wings of Hope (2 page)

He curled a finger beneath my chin—my scorching hot skin no more a hindrance than the air itself—and tipped my head up, silencing my thoughts.

“You are not yet grown. But you, little half-blood, will be magnificent.” He smiled, and a sensation like gentle caresses licked down my spine. “And you will be mine.”

T
he chain bit into my flesh and tore free. I’d stopped feeling the lashings long ago. Anger burned in my gut and fizzled through my veins. I could no more stop my element from flaring than I could prevent myself breathing. Da’mean noticed the fire throbbing in my veins, growled, and the next lash sliced deeper. His body trembled. Sweat glistened on his rough skin. With each swing of the chain, his wings flexed, his back arched, and he spat out a gnarled growl. The lashings would end. All I needed to do was absorb each blow, let the pain flash burn through me, and it would be over. All things end.

He clutched my head. Claws pierced my skin. I would not cry out. He liked to hear me beg and mew. He yanked my face close to his. His breath blasted my cheek, and his pungent bitter scent laced my nose and throat. “Did the Prince of Greed enjoy the taste of you at the feasting hall, my sweet Muse?”

If I answered no, he’d beat me for disappointing a prince. If I said yes, he’d beat me for betraying him. I was his. Only his.

You will be magnificent.
And you will be mine.

“Did he speak to you? Did you satisfy him? Did you ruck with him?” Da’mean tossed the chain aside and clamped his hand on my rear. The tips of his claws sunk deep into my flesh. With the hand still clamped on my scalp, he pulled me up off my feet and dangled me in the air before him. His flat, dull-eyed gaze roamed my face, slid down my chest, and rode over the plane of my navel. “Too thin. Too fragile.” He leered. “No meat. No prince would defile himself with you.”

Hot blood dripped from my toes. I listened to it drip-dripping to focus on anything but the consuming presence of pain and degradation. It would end. It always ended.

“Speak.” Spittle dashed my face. “What does he want with you?” His gaze burned with disgust.

“Nothing,” I hissed. “He did nothing.”

Da’mean studied me, his dull eyes seeking signs of deception. Then he laughed, and the sound of it scattered shivers across my superheated flesh. “Nothing? Nothing! He wants you for three nights. That was but a test—a taster—did you like it?”

“No.”

“No?”

“There is only you, my Da’mean. Only you.”

He marched forward, backing me against the gnarled bark of the hut wall. “Only me.” He dropped me to my feet and bowed his head in close. Clenching my teeth, I gulped back the acidic burn in my throat. There was no escaping him like this. My best hope was to let it happen. Any fight had long ago been beaten out of me.

He sucked in a breath, hissing his element through his teeth. Air rushed from my lungs, punched up my throat, and whooshed out of me. A pounding throb numbed my head while the scent of him forced bile up my throat. Da’mean crowded me with his body, closing down around me, smothering my existence. “When he touches you, you think of me. When he speaks with you, you hear me. When he rucks you, you feel me.” He leaned in and drove his arousal against my flesh, hot and huge, too large for my half-blood body, but that had never stopped him. “You are mine, my muse.” His moist tongue flicked out, the two pronged tip swirling around the corner of my lips. He hissed as my heat scorched him. He liked it. Liked pain. Inflicting it, receiving it.

I closed my eyes and battled suffocation.
This will end. All things end.
Perhaps this time, it would end for eternity.

T
he elementals in the feasting hall eyed me like they would a carcass, something disgusting, to be skirted around, avoided at all costs. Until they wanted something.
Make her bleed; make her read.
Da’mean tugged on the chain shackling my wrists and pulled me down atop the feasting table, arms in front of me. Pain burned in my shoulders, protesting the awkward angle, but my expression stayed frozen. I’d perfected the mask of indifference long ago. Somewhere between boredom and acceptance, I wore my mask like armor. My icy visage covered a lifetimes worth of degradation. I’d forgotten what it meant to care.

“Greed has asked for her.” Da’mean’s laughter rolled around the crowd of elementals. Some sat at the table and tore into their meals, sharp teeth flashing yellow beneath the candlelight.

“That?” A guttural voice asked. I didn’t bother to look. Instead, I focused on a knot in the wood of the table. “Revolting. Why does Greed want your pet, Da’mean. She possesses hidden skills, yes?”

“She does.” He held out a hand. “Your blade?”

Do not flinch.

A slither of light skipped over me, reflected off a dagger as it was passed overhead. Da’mean struck lightning fast. He punched the blade through my upward tilted palm, pinning my hand to the table. Pain burned up my arm and battled my attempts to remain numb.
Do not react. Do not flinch. Hold. Hold.
Hot blood bubbled around the dagger protruding from my palm. Rivulets spilled over my cracked flesh and pooled on the tabletop. The elements rippling through the air stirred into motion as their masters caught the scent of half-blood. Chaos energy licked across my skin. My muscles twitched. Da’mean snarled.

A flood of images broke over me in a wave of blood-soaked madness. My cheek hit the tabletop as a seizure tore through me. Hot breaths sawed through my clenched teeth, and I tumbled into memories that weren’t mine.
A fledgling elemental. So young. So small. The dagger kissed his flesh, slashing open a hungry wound in his chest. His skin peeled apart like flower petals, and black blood pumped. “Weak,” the dagger’s owner declared. “Embrace your death, die with strength, for that is all you are worth.” The memories shifted sideways, tumbling over, frothing and bubbling until a new image surfaced. Blades clashed. Sword and dagger. Wielded in unison. Fast strikes. One, two. The dagger plunges into a female abdomen. The blade twists, and a shattering scream burst the memory.

“What do you see?” Da’mean’s voice was a stone outcropping in the dark ocean of someone else’s memories. I returned to him, not because I wanted to, but because he was all I knew, all I could cling to. The memories clamored to be free and sought to drown me. I would not be lost. I would survive.
Why?
A voice in my head asked.
Why go on?
Because there must be more to life than this. I was not conceived to spend my existence cowering among my kin. This must not be my fate.

My eyes flew open. Da’mean demanded answers. But I saw
him
: the Prince of Greed. They didn’t know he was there, but I knew. His eyes broiled with flame. Among the sea of figures, behind the veil of chatter and noise, beneath the acrid scents, I saw him, I heard him, I smelled him. Spicy, tempting, alluring. He captured me with his presence. How did the others not sense him? He was everywhere. His element smothered the rest and called to me.

Da’mean’s fist cracked across my jaw, jerking my head back. The taste of blood flooded my mouth. Rage burst through the gates of my mind. I turned my head and spat blood then watched with morbid fascination how
my
blood splashed across his gray-skinned face. I knew I would suffer, but the spark of defiance flickered in my soul. Just a tiny flame. So fragile. So new. Bright with potential.

Da’mean roared and clamped his hand around my throat. Still pinned to the table, I couldn’t move to fend him off. He raged, reared up over me, his chest a quivering mass of muscle, and brought his fist down with deadly accuracy like a blacksmith hammering a sword. I saw it coming and smiled. This was it. The final blow. In the end, I’d defied him, and it felt
good
.

M 
y muse. You will not leave me. You are mine.

I drifted in and out of consciousness for several days. Da’mean tended to me with gentle hands and whispered words. He enjoyed breaking me, only to rebuild my body with disarming care. I knew why he did it. In order for me to understand pain, I first needed to understand what it is to be wanted, to be cared for, to be loved. He was a master of manipulation. He relished cruelty. And just when I believed he might care for me, he’d rip away my hope and drown me in disgust all over again.

When the time came for me to join the Prince of Greed, I could almost convince myself that this time, Da’mean cared. Pain was too easily forgotten in the face of compassion.

We stood at the foot of what appeared to be a mountain of stairs. Each foothold had been carved from smooth black stone. The steps scaled a sheer cliff face until the ground leveled before a sprawling fortress. But we weren’t taking the steps.

Da’mean pulled me into his arms and hugged me close as he spread his wings and beat the air. I listened to his thudding heart and breathed in his choking scent.

We rose to where the ground leveled and landed before the fortifications. I’d never seen anything like it before. Elaborate interlaced symbols spiraled around proud turrets of polished black rock. The fortress wasn’t so much built with blocks, as carved as one piece from the very rock face itself. No tools could have sculpted the hardened black rock with such effortless precision. Only the elements could mold a mountain of rock as though it were clay.

Da’mean twisted his grip on my arm and pulled me around to face him. “Heed, Muse. You are mine. Three nights, then you return to me.” His eyes swirled like pools of molten lead. Cool air kissed my fire-touched skin. A terrible urge to shiver almost broke over me. He would kill me. Whatever the prince did or said in those three nights wouldn’t matter. Da’mean wouldn’t be able to help himself. He could not defy a prince. Not if he wanted to live. But I’d be soiled on my return—used by another—his precious muse, his grand achievement, tainted beyond repair.

“Half-blood, come with me.” A curt voice announced behind me.

Breaking Da’mean’s gaze took a surge of will. I turned to face the elemental who had spoken, a lithe figure with earthy skin peppered by abrasive tubercles. Da’mean’s whispering touch slid over my flesh. Whatever awaited me inside Mammon’s fortress, Da’mean would not suffer the repercussions. Did the Prince of Greed know he’d sealed my fate?

Inside, the fortress gleamed. Candlelight caressed black stone walls like water rippling over a bed of pebbles. Some elementals gathered in chambers, while others passed on various errands. The screech from hunters—winged lesser demons—echoed through the air. A low murmur carried with it the touch of power, chaos elements mixed, teasing the air.

“The Dark Court is receiving. You will wait for our liege in a chamber set aside for you. Refrain from wandering the halls.” My guide, the earth elemental, steered me toward a door twice my height and three times my width. “It is not safe.”

I wanted to ask his name. He spoke as softly as his fawn eyes suggested. He was tall, spindly, like the trees of the dead forest. No wings. Most elementals had wings, but not all. Those who didn’t were classed as lesser—beastlike—despite having conscious thoughts.

“I am Samien.” He bowed his head. Candlelight rippled across his angular face, playing over sharp cheekbones and an aquiline nose.

I dipped my chin, both acknowledging and dismissing him, and watched his long limbs saw back and forth as he walked away. Few elementals spoke to me. Fewer did it with a measure of respect. Samien was a surprise. I’d expected brutish treatment, not a polite welcome. He would want something. They always did.

Giving the heavy timber door a shove, I stepped inside my chamber. A huge fireplace gaped, cold and empty, behind a simple bed. Arched windows afforded a breathtaking view of the sky boiling with purple hues and shimmering greens. The elements churned. Thunder rumbled, shaking the stone beneath my feet. I walked the chamber like a wraith, running my hands along the walls, the carved bedstead, the forlorn fireplace. The furs scattered across the bed dipped generously beneath my fingers. I couldn’t sleep there. I’d burn the furs with my flesh. This chamber couldn’t be for me. Samien must be wrong. With Da’mean, I slept on the earth, grateful to have shelter. This was too good for me.

T
he warmth of the prince’s element summoned mine from inside my drifting sleep, blooming beneath my skin and swirling around my head; a whisper, a caress, a summons. My eyelids flickered as my addled mind refused to release me. Where was I? The chamber, the fortress, the prince. A gasp scored my lips as I levered my body upright. I’d curled up in the corner and fallen asleep waiting for him. He was here now, a looming darkness filling the doorway. I should bow. Already on my knees, I knew I should fall forward, but my limbs wouldn’t obey. I blinked, lips parted, breath racing.

Mammon shook his head and rolled his broad shoulders. His wings shifted, raining hot ash from their trailing edges. Stalking forward around the edge of the bed, he graced the center of the room and settled his simmering gaze on me hunched in the corner. Every inch of him had been carved with purpose like the stones of his fortress. His honed elemental body virtually filled the chamber from floor to ceiling. His physical presence demanded admiration, but it was his elemental touch that flooded the room and pushed at the walls and at me. His power smothered mine, snuffed it out, and rode over me.

“My liege.” I bowed my head.

“The half-blood speaks.” His words rumbled so deep I felt them tremble through my bones.

“I provide a bed. You refuse it?”

I glanced at the bed and the corner I’d occupied, then back at Mammon, to find his onyx lips pulled back in a grin. “I…” My desolate voice snagged in my throat. Da’mean didn’t like to hear me speak. When I eventually did find the words, my speech was more beast than higher elemental, punctuated with snarls and growls. “My skin, sire… The furs,” I growled.

He sliced his molten gaze to the bed and back to me. “Change.”

I blinked, knowing perfectly well what he wanted.
Her.
My weak affliction. Raising my lips, I bared my teeth, and a chitter rattled through me, a nervous sound, one of submission, and reluctance.