The Lily Harper 8 Book Boxed Set

by HP Mallory

  The small amount of light in the cell paled in comparison to the bleak darkness outside the window. Beyond it lay the Underground City, my city. At least, at one time, it was my city. But I turned my back upon this place and allowed Alaire to gain control of everything I had worked so hard to build. Although I never cared much about that fact before, the recent events I had experienced changed my mind on more than a few matters…

  A clanking noise interrupted my thoughts. I did not look up for I knew who was opening the door. Just two people had a key to this cell and only one of them had any real interest in me.

  “It is so dark in here,” she said. “I must remember to ask Saxon to light more torches lest I kill myself in the process of merely coming down the stairs.” The voice, as spiteful as it sounded, was sheer torture to my soul. Torture that was well deserved.

  “Persephone,” I said, the frailty in my voice betraying my body’s state.

  Do not show any weakness.

  I forced my head up and met her gaze. The dim illumination from the two torches on the far side of the prison cast her in a light that surrounded her like a halo but that impression was a total falsity. There was nothing pure about the woman before me, least of all, her spirit. It pained me to even look at her.

  All I could see when I glanced at her face was that poor naif, Lily. Now a foul, immortal bitch had taken possession of Lily’s body and my besom was gone. I was trapped here like a caged dog, without my sword, and without the power of Donnchadh, the warrior spirit what gives me my strength and immortality.

  “I was just doing my daily rounds, making sure you are as miserable as possible,” Persephone said with a grin, her white teeth reflecting the low light of the cell.

  “Aye, ye’ve certainly left meh in as rough ah position as Ah think Ah’ve ever been.”

  She walked towards me, her heels clicking against the cold stone. She was dressed in a sheer black frock that clung to her hips and breasts like a second skin. Her arms were crossed underneath her ample bosoms, pushing them up and out. I scolded myself for gazing overlong at them.

  She is not Lily, so stop thinking with your cock, man!

  Even though I was thinking with my todger, in truth, it mattered very little. I had no strength left. I was clinging to a slim thread of life by my Druid willpower alone, pulling whatever energy still existed in the earth surrounding the castle to sustain myself. All that effort was taxing and it made my member about as useful as nipples on a breastplate.

  Persephone crouched in front of me, her low-cut neckline revealing the absence of any undergarments.

  “Poor, poor Tallis. There’s something so tragic about your current predicament. Something on the scale of Oedipus or Medea. A great and mighty ruler, feared by the lowest dregs of the Underground City to the upper echelons of Management at Afterlife Enterprises, and brought down by his lover and his very own right hand man.” She laughed scornfully. “How very Greek.”

  “Moost ye come here tae gloat?” I spat back at her. “Ye have yer immortality, ye took the woman Ah love; why not joost leave meh be, eh?”

  I lurched forward, trying to push her away. It was a meaningless gesture, since the black iron manacles pinned me against the wall. But if I could intimidate her even a little, it was worth it. Alas, she did not move, never mind show any fear.

  “Yes… I suppose I do have everything I could want.” She refused to look me in the eyes as she said the words and I recognized the lie in their depths almost immediately.

  Alaire hasn’t given her the spirit of Donnchadh yet.

  “Now I just need for you to die, and then your stench must be removed from this castle before I can be truly happy.”

  “Ye will ne’er be happy,” I said as I narrowed my eyes on her. “Yer nae made fer happiness. Ye will live forever, miserable, oonhappy an’ ne’er knowin’ peace.”

  I spat at her feet.

  She regarded the spittle—the last source of moisture from my body, to be certain— with the same look one might give to a dying insect.

  “That may bear some truth, but you know what the real difference between us will be?” She grinned again, all too eager to tell me the answer.

  “Nae. Nor do Ah care.”

  “I will be alive!” She unfolded her arms to reveal a curvy kris tucked between her hands. Its blade shone in the dimness of the tower cell. She placed the cold steel against my neck, tapping it on my Adam’s apple. “I’ve been thinking about this ever since Alaire took Donnchadh from you.”

  “Thinkin’ aboot whit?”

  “How you will die. Will I let you starve? Maybe just asphyxiate from hanging? Perhaps you will battle against endless waves of demons to the death? I quite like that last idea, by the way,” she said, licking her lips. “But in the end, I decided your death had to be by the blade as it was most appropriate weapon and also the most ironic, given your position as Bladesmith.”

  I leaned back against the stone wall behind me, eyeing the dastardly blade. Of all the ways I imagined leaving this mortal coil, being cruelly stabbed to death by a one-time lover while I was still chained to a wall was surely not one of them.

  “Goodbye, Tallis.” She raised the knife above her head. I closed my eyes, preparing as best I could for the icy steel to penetrate my flesh.

  “What is the meaning of this?!” Alaire bellowed from the doorway.

  I opened my eyes to glimpse my most unlikely savior. Persephone sprang to her feet, whirling around and secreting the knife behind her back.

  “Alaire, my dear, you’re back so soon?”

  Alaire stepped into the cell and eyed me before he returned his angry stare to Persephone once again, studying her with more intense scrutiny. “Give it to me.”

  “Give what to you?” Persephone dramatically batted her eyelashes and twisted up one of her legs as if she were preparing to do a full pirouette.

  Alaire wrapped one arm around her and kissed her angrily. His hand, however, nestled into the small of her back, where he yanked the knife from her grip.

  “Tut-tut, my Queen,” Alaire tossed the knife away, being careful to ensure it was beyond my reach. It clattered as it hit the stone floor beyond the cell. “Is this the proper way to treat any guest?”

  “Don’t condescend to me!” Persephone yelled at him as her face contorted with rage. She walked past him and approached the door. “You promised me!”

  “Enough!” Alaire yelled in response, turning her around and giving her another hateful glare. “We will discuss this later.” He unceremoniously ushered her out the prison door as quickly as he could, reaching back across the threshold to close it.

  “Jist goin’ tae pretend Ah’m nae here, Alaire?” I growled.

  Alaire stopped the door just inches from closing it and stared at me, a false ring of light surrounding his head.

  “Yes.” And with that, he slammed the door shut and latched it from the outside.

  The banging awoke my neighboring cellmate, who came to consciousness with a swine-like squeal.

  “I’m awake! I’m fuggin awake! Jesus!” The sound of rattling chains echoed from Bill’s cell as he yawned. “Fuckin’ A, I am one horngry bastard.” There were a few precious moments of silence before he decided to speak again. “I said I’m… one… horngry bastard! That’s the cue for Room Service to do something ‘bout it, yo!”

  I rolled my eyes. The stookie angel continued to gab inanely, as he was wont to do. I did not understand half the words that came from his mouth—and neither did anyone else—but that did not stop him. For myself, I was too busy thinking about the revelation Persephone had unwittingly given me whilst she was preparing to kill me.

  If Donnchadh is still out there, free of a corporeal body, then Alaire could do anything with him. He could even house the spirit himself.

  That thought made me immediately uncomfortable. If that did happen, Alaire’s power would know no bounds. As it currently existed, the Master of the Underground City only had power within its b
orders. If Alaire joined up with Donnchadh, however, he would be nigh unstoppable. I could only hope he was not yet aware of Donnchadh’s true power. I was fairly certain he believed the spirit supplied nothing more than immortality. How wrong he was.

  Something Bill said caught my ear. I snapped my fingers to grab his attention. “Whit did ye jus’ say, stookie angel?”

  Bill stopped talking long enough to catch my question. “Fuck, Conan, I said ah bunch o’ shit. Which part are ya referrin’ to?”

  “The las’ thing ye said… what was it?”

  “What? Ya mean about Skeletorhorn?”

  “Aye.”

  Skeleletorhorn was the angel’s name for Jason Streethorn, the bigwig of Afterlife Enterprises.

  “I said Skeletorhorn is gonna get a fuckin’ earful from me when this bullshit is all over. Like, yo, I’m gonna bring the wrath of the Big Bad Better Business Bureau so far down Alaire’s sleazebum head, it’s gonna come out his ass vehemuchly!”

  Streethorn and Alaire…

  It was no secret that Alaire desired ultimate control and I could yet not determine if that ultimate control might be directed toward Afterlife Enterprises, itself. But then another thought occurred to me. Was it possible that damned Jason Streethorn, or even Afterlife Enterprises, were somehow in cahoots with Alaire?

  The possibilities were many and variable enough that it could only be speculation at this point. But if Alaire intended to make a move on Afterlife Enterprises, the repercussions could be catastrophic, spanning across all planes of existence. Still, even with the power of Donnchadh’s spirit and maybe Persephone (assuming the traitorous bitch did not double-cross him) Alaire would still require more assistance. And could that assistance come in the form of Streethorn, himself?

  I never trusted the skinny bastard. He was akin to a weasel, not only in his appearance but also his nature, which was not genuine. I would not have put it past Streethorn to assist Alaire but the question remained: why?

  And why do you care?

  In days past, the voice in my head would have been that of Donnchadh, goading me or chastising me for not doing something he preferred I do. But this was my voice, the only one I heard now.

  I care because Lily would care.

  A truth that I attempted to hide from myself for far too long was finally coming out. Deny it though I tried, Lily was my salvation. She was the only way to make amends for the terrible things I had done. Lily was my sole chance at the redemption I long thought impossible to achieve. If she could see the good in a monster such as myself, then mayhap there was still a chance that I could be saved.

  If ever I managed to step foot in Fergus Castle again, it would be strictly owing to her influence.

  I knew not how it could be possible but there was a fire still burning inside me. A fire that urged me to restore Lily back to herself. The same fire that demanded Persephone and Alaire be stopped. Even as I sat chained to the cold stone wall, starving and lacking the strength of Donnchadh, the fire inside me still burned bright.

  Of one thing I was dead certain, Donnchadh was a necessary element.

  “One eyes another under a new moon…”

  - Dante’s Inferno

  TWO

  Persephone

  “You swore to me that Tallis would die!” I protested in a shrill voice I was still growing accustomed to. After all, it had only belonged to me for a very short while, along with this body in which I now resided.

  Alaire sat at the table, unmoved and uninterested. “Technically… he will die eventually,” he said without expression, a frozen smile on his face.

  I balked at his terrible sense of humor. I knew arguing with him was fruitless after days of ceaseless discussion already; Alaire always did as Alaire pleased.

  “How long until he is dead, though?” I spat, my nails digging into the dinner table. An elaborate array of foods was attractively arranged across the length of it: smoked meats, vegetables of every color of the rainbow and steaming hot bread, fresh from the oven, but I would have none of it.

  “Do you not trust me to end his life?” Alaire asked me from under his raised eyebrows.

  “Do not dare question my trust; how long did I wait for you!? How much trust do you think it took for me to wait in that… that… hell before you could find a body and soul pure enough for me to occupy?!”

  Thinking of the circumstances that led me to this moment always made the skin on my throat itch. It was Tallis’s fault. Even though I had once been his queen, he’d skewered me like a wild animal and left me to bleed out when I tried to take what was rightfully mine—the throne. Were it not for Alaire, I would have died there and been forgotten forever.

  The questions were all rhetorical now, of course. Alaire was well aware of how many hundreds of years I had to hide inside the crown while I waited for him to find the perfect vessel in which to transpose my soul.

  Quickly glancing down, I thought once again that the wait was well worth it. Flawlessly clear skin, a perfect, hourglass shape, breasts that made most men temporarily lose their ability to speak… Truly, this body was beyond splendid. And it was all mine.

  “Well, you didn’t have much of a choice, as I recall,” Alaire said, his stupid smile still in full effect. It was meant to mock me, I was certain, but I just ignored it… for now. “Would you rather I left you to die instead?”

  My mouth dropped open in shock. “How dare you!”

  I grabbed a plate laden with sliced fruits and flung it at the nearest wall, screaming incoherently as the plate shattered into shards of porcelain, while an orange slice clung stubbornly to the wall. It eventually slid down at a frustratingly languid pace, the juice streaking the mortar as it descended.

  The rage in me felt unfamiliar but also highly pleasurable. I had little choice in what happened to me. But damn it all! I still wanted Tallis to pay for what he’d done. My former lover left me to die like a pauper and for that, I would forever hate him…

  I found myself staring at my liege and savior, unflappable as ever with his blonde, close-cropped hair and cold blue eyes. I was quite disgusted over how much I owed him. Now and forever, I was a queen and, as such, I never wanted to owe anyone anything. But perhaps… just perhaps… Alaire was a little bit different. He was on my side and he proved it by bringing me back from the brink of death. I owed it solely to him that I was standing here now and able to have this satisfying fit of rage.

  A not-so-insignificant part of me fought the urge to throw myself at the self-satisfied bastard who sat across from me, acting as though nothing was amiss. That part of me wanted to go mad from his touch and feel every part of him inside me. Yet something… I knew not what… but something so foreign in my consciousness imagined taking a shard of the broken plate and cutting his alabaster skin from his muscles. I slammed my hands down and kicked away from the table, unable to deal with all the raw emotions raging through me.

  “Why don’t you just calm down and eat?” Alaire suggested before he put a piece of meat in his mouth. “After all, I don’t want you to waste away.”

  My chair clattered as I seized it like I had the table. “Stop it with this insolence!” I bellowed, my fingernails digging into the mahogany of the chair back. “Explain to me why Tallis isn’t dead yet!”

  Alaire leaned forward, putting his hands together and placing them on the table in front of him. “Of course, my dear, raging, sweet…” His lips barely moved as his voice trailed off and his eyes tracked my now-pacing body. I knew he was enjoying the show.

  We had left Tallis Black, the former Master of the Underground City and recently turned reclusive Afterlife Enterprises stooge, chained to a wall to contemplate his newly regained humanity. I changed into a sheer, emerald dress. Even more than the black frock, it outlined my form in the extreme. Every curve of my superb breasts and hips were so visible that I may as well have been naked. My original form, the one that belonged to Persephone in body as well as in soul, was undeniably beautiful. But this body�
��oh! It was beyond stunning.

  Alaire had done well.

  How had this all come to be? The woman whose soul once inhabited this body had been foolish enough to lust after my crown. The moment she touched it, a bridge between our souls enabled me to take her body as my own.

  But returning to Alaire… It drove me wild to know he desired me so. It had been so long since I felt a man’s lust or his touch. But it also made the rest of his behavior so damnably infuriating.

  “Why haven’t you killed Tallis yet?” I demanded again, no longer interested in verbal sparring. I wanted the answer and I wanted it now.

  “At this point, it is more a matter of personal pleasure to see Tallis Black in the miserable condition which he has been reduced to.” Alaire picked up a fork and teased the tiramisu that was quickly losing shape in front of him. “I could kill him, of course. I could even let you do the deed as a welcome-home present. But why would I?” He pushed the dessert away and sat back once more. “After all, Afterlife Enterprises has been more than accommodating when it comes to my most recent… activities.”

  At his words, a faint memory returned to me. I was walking through an endless desert, harried by the chatter of insane voices. That alien thought sent a shiver up my spine, one that I despised. I didn’t understand the memory so I shelved it inside my head.

  Alaire continued. “However if AE ever found out that I let the Yeti die at the hands of a traitor…”

  “I am no traitor!” I screamed in protest, coming around the table to stand next to him as I glared down at his face. True to form, he did not even bat an eyelid as he looked up at me. “I am… merely an opportunist,” I corrected him. His only response was a thoughtful hum and an insolent smile.

  Oh, I wanted to slap him on the spot. He knew how I hated the word traitor. Yes, I went behind the backs of Tallis and Afterlife Enterprises all those years ago, but only because I was forced into that position. In order to take what was rightfully mine, sacrifices had to be made. The Underground City needed a queen, a position only I was meant to fill.