Imposing, he stood tall even with his lazy posture.
I fought against my wandering gaze. Too hard it tried to drop to the slice of his bare, muscular chest that seemed to glisten under the glow of the lanterns and fireplace.
But what stole my breath were his eyes.
Moons.
Two shining moons, paler than the threads woven through his scarlet coat, gleamed at me without a shred of kindness. They captured me with a glittering intrigue more dangerous than anything I could have ever imagined.
The Prince’s smile faded to a smirk, and my bones ached with the chill of dread. It looked wrong. Alien. As though it was painted on a perfect sculpture made from broken dreams and bleeding hearts.
He was both beauty and deadly sin.
My graze dropped to the floor, and I lowered my head in as much of a bow as I could manage, all bent on the settee.
Really, I should have thrown myself at his sharp-toed boots, but I got the feeling he wouldn’t like it if I moved from where I was dumped.
He had me where he wanted me.
My shoulders rattled in sync with my quivering lips.
“You cower like a vilas,” he drawled. The icy burn of his eyes coated my shivering back. “You look just as a vilas does,” he added. “Your pale skin is dull, your hair and eyes are lifeless. And yet, you do not taste like a vilas.”
The rich carpet threads held my gaze, but a frown buttoned between my eyebrows.
Taste—he must have meant my blood. A taste he liked so little, he threw it into the wall-sized fireplace.
I should have been relieved some. At least he wouldn’t drain me dry for my flavour. But my face turned hard and, honestly, I was a stab insulted.
Guess it’s true when they say we all seek the approval of our Gods.
Even lost in a fog of fear, tasting early death and suffering, who doesn’t want their God to like them?
Prince Poison took a step toward me. The soft sound of his silver boot on the plush rug sent a chill up my spine.
“You are not a God,” he said. “Not an aniel. Yet, you stole power. My power.”
He drew nearer, silver boots winking like blades ready to cut me down, crushing the rug my gaze clung to.
My hands bunched fistfuls of my skirt that punched the air with sea salt and blood. One wrong word—hell, one wrong sound or breath or look—and my head would roll across the rug, severed.
A God’s unwilling sacrifice.
“How did you do it?” he demanded, voice sharper than a pirate’s sword.
It took my fingernails tearing into the flesh of my palms for me to lift my gaze to his. Instantly, I was sorry I did.
Moons no more, his eyes raged like waves battering cliffs, and I knew I was staring into the endless dangerous pits of a Malis. A God to fear above all others—a God who only brought destruction and fed off the terror and souls of humans.
This broad-shouldered, stony-faced, blazing-eyed God couldn’t be further from a Beniyn if we wore the bones of the dead.
Of course, I always knew Prince Poison was a cruel, malevolent God. But that spark of hope that foolishly lingered inside of me was thwarted faster than I could take in a sharp breath.
“I …” My teeth bit down on my lip hard enough to draw beads of blood.
It wasn’t my words that failed me. It was my courage. Somewhere back on the ship, it took sail on the winds and left me behind to fend for myself.
Malis were the most unforgiving and vicious. They created so much death that there were isles and villages lost to the memories of them. So when they created life, like Jasper—his aniel—it was more precious than the stardust walls caging me in.
Finally, I managed a deep, rattling breath and felt the heat of tears on my cheeks.
“I … don’t kn-n-ow.” I shuddered my words. “It … happened. I do-n’t know h-h-how.”
The Prince studied me for a long moment, and I heard every click of a giant, tall clock by the wall.
Click.
Click.
Click.
His hand reached out slowly. So slowly that it seemed he savoured the rise of my fear with every click of the clock.
He’s enjoying this.
His gloved hand came so close that I quickly caught scent of the fresh leather wrapped around his fingers. Silver winked at me from his fingertips—razor sharp nails, pinned into the gloves, like fingertips.
I wondered if they wore the poison he was so feared for. Or were they ordinary weapons to him, and he saved death by a single touch for his especially loathed enemies?
After all, to him I was just a village thief, an avsky to be destroyed.
A shaky breath hitched in my throat as his fingertips reached my chin.
Surprisingly, his touch was gentle. Then he dragged the tip of a silver nail along my skin.
The ferocity of his eyes kept my gaze locked and my body stiff. The nail lowered—down my pulsing throat, slower than the clock’s ticking.
“I can tear your throat out right here,” he said, his voice a hushed whisper of threats and spilled blood. “I could kill you a thousand different ways where you sit.”
The nail cut deeper. Blood beaded, then spilled down my front, over my breasts.
I choked on a whimper.
“Now tell me everything.”
11
I’m not ready to die.
The Prince didn’t give a damn about what I wanted. And since my life was in his hands—literally, with his sharp nailed-gloves drawing blood at my neck—I played his game.
I told him everything.
He didn’t have to press me once. Everything that came to mind, fell out of my mouth and into the air.
I told him about the first time my mother knew I was different. It had been on the shore, when I played with a pirate’s sons in the ankle-deep water. We’d fallen into each other in a game of chase and power moved.
Mother had managed to silence them with shells and some coin.
But the second time…
She’d died to protect my secret.
The Prince said nothing as I told him all of this.
I explained about my father—a man I never knew, and never would—and how I avoided touching visitors with my bare hands to stay hidden. If I did touch one, it was away from others and only ever one at a time.
Still, the Prince drew my blood with his diamond-encrusted nail.
Then, I spilled all about the midnight party.
Soon, I was blubbering my story to him, so lost in the fear that I barely noticed him pressing the mouth of a crystal bottle to the dip between my collarbones, and collecting my blood in it.
Words weren’t coming out of my mouth anymore. My face twisted into something grim and I hugged my arms around myself, trying to settle the fierce sobs rattling me.
“I’ve heard enough,” the Prince sounded bored and turned his back on me.
I heard the pop of the bottle’s cork slotting in place.
Through thick tears, I watched him set the bottle down gently on a table by the fireplace.
“Jasper.”
I barely heard him myself, but somehow Jasper heard his master calling from out in the corridor, and he was sweeping through the drapes before another sob could jolt me.
“Bring me the other,” the Prince said.
The drapes swished as Jasper swept out to the corridor. I expected him to be gone longer. But I’d only managed to choke down two sobs before he was back, shoving Ava into the room.
Ava must have been out there already, waiting in the corridor. Maybe hearing everything I’d said—maybe hearing me sob like a child with a cut leg.
The Prince kept his back to us as he gave a lazy flick of his gloved hand.
Jasper strode towards me.
I flinched as he snatched me up, off the settee, and dragged me to stand beside Ava.
Her bloodshot eyes looked puffier than the cushions I’d sat on, and by the hooded gaze she wore, I suspected she wasn’t entir
ely with me in that moment, but gone—drowning in despair.
Still with his back facing us, the Prince pulled a fine handkerchief from somewhere and began cleaning my blood off of his sharp nail.
“Give back what you stole.”
A simple order. A command that should have been easy to obey.
The better I do it, the easier our deaths might be.
And yet, I had no idea how to do it.
Three times, I had ‘stolen’ power. From one young boy into another. From an aniel sailor into my mother. From Jasper into Ava.
Never have I had to return it.
And it seemed utterly impossible.
How?
That word clutched to my throat.
I swallowed it back down, knowing that to speak it would be a sentencing to death by sea-monster, or worse—the Prince’s poison.
Beside me, Ava shivered more violently than a branch in a storm. Her fingers wrung together at her stomach and, finally, she turned to look at me.
I should have said sorry then. If not with my mouth, then with my eyes. Instead, I only let fear shine from me in silent tears and a watery, grim look.
With that look, I told her, This is the end.
Jasper rounded on us, peeling his glove off, one finger at a time. It was painfully slow and he kept his severe gaze on me the entire time. Finally, when the glove slipped loose and he tucked it into his coat pocket, he offered me his hand.
I chanced a glance at the Prince.
Fright struck through me like lightning on sand—he was already staring at me. And there was nothing friendly about his quartz eyes, only sharp edges and deadly promises.
I took a long, deep breath that filled me so much that the corset shivered in protest. Then I held out my own hands. They shook as much as Ava’s as she gripped onto my fingers, hard enough to earn a wince from me.
She didn’t apologise.
Jasper was gentler. He lowered his hand onto my other one with a delicate touch.
With choppy breaths, I shut my eyes and tried to block the surge of energy that flooded through me.
Jasper’s power was prodding me. This was how it always happened; touch two people at once—the power rushes into the non-magical person. It was how it always happened.
How, suddenly, did I just … change that?
It was costing me just to push his power back. The strain of it pulsed in my skull and made my knees weak.
“Concentrate.” I recognised the icy indifference of the Prince’s voice. “Concentrate as though your life depends on it.”
And it does…
His implications didn’t go unchecked. If anything, they only rattled me more and made me lose my hold on my control.
Jasper’s power slipped—I felt it rush up my arm, desperate to reach Ava at my other hand.
“No—” A sharp gasp cut through me.
I shoved the power back down, into Jasper, and a dizzying wave washed over me.
I stumbled forward. No one made to catch me. But I didn’t open my eyes—I had to focus.
Like my life depended on it.
So I kept trying.
I fished around my hands, feeling for unusual sensations.
Jasper’s hand felt like honey.
Ava’s … It was like holding a warm, freshly baked bun. The harder I focused, the better I sensed the moisture—and that was what it was.
Moisture.
Water, honey, dewy dough.
I sucked in a breath. In a matter of minutes, I learned what power felt like on my palms and how to block it from reaching through me.
Relief flooded my insides, but I pushed through it. I couldn’t let it break my concentration.
Not even when the warmth of blood spread at my nostrils did I break focus. I couldn’t.
I tightened my clammy hand on Ava’s.
“Hold on,” I grunted.
And then I grabbed.
Somewhere in my body, my mind perhaps, a part of me reached out for Ava’s warm doughy texture and snatched—
Agony erupted inside of me.
I cried out and dropped to my knees. Neither of their hands loosened on mine. Bracing myself against the lashes of pain going wild inside of me, I gritted my teeth and I dragged that texture out from her.
“It’s working.”
Jasper’s voice wasn’t as cool as Prince Poison’s. Some excitement managed to break in through the cracks.
But I could feel the Prince come up behind me, slowly, like a beast advancing on its prey.
“It—hurts—” Those words came out in strangled grunts. It never hurt stealing power. But now, my insides burned as if on fire.
Silence was my answer for a moment. Then I heard soft footsteps inch closer to my back.
The Prince spoke in a low voice, so soft and gentle that I almost thought it was meant to be reassuring; “It is the intensity of power returning to where it belongs. Trust me when I promise, the pain I will inflict on you will be so very much worse if you fail.”
A harsh breath rushed out of me. My grip wavered, but I grappled for control. Then the thick, hot rush flooded me.
I felt no more damp texture from Ava’s hand.
I prodded around for a moment but, in all honesty, I couldn’t stand another second of the pain.
There was nothing left in Ava. I released their hands and my eyes sprung open.
Doubled over, I heaved on my strangled breaths.
White dots danced in my sight, and a faint buzzing sound pestered my ears. Blood—more blood—wet the front of my dress, and there were specks of it on the carpet.
I lifted the back of my trembling hand to my nose and wiped. It came away crimson.
“Lissa.” Tone slick with tears, Ava dropped to my side and placed her hand on my back. “Lissa, are you all right?”
Am I all right? Of course I’m not all right, the dizzy twit.
I reached around for her hand and let myself fall into her.
Ava caught me.
“I’m ok,” I managed, but I could barely keep my eyes open. Every slow, hazy blink changed like a picture book.
Blink.
Jasper stared at his hands, a small smile on his lips, and he flexed his fingers.
Ava held me closer and started stroking my arm soothingly.
Blink.
Jasper was looking down at me with his head cocked to the side. His gaze hooked up for a second, then he was bowing and backing away from me.
Blink.
A red coat drifted into view. A beautiful, proud face was angled down at me. Moons for eyes, dancing with shadows and daggers.
Blink.
The Prince was wearing an air of indifference as he lifted his attention from me to Jasper.
“Find them a room in the vilas halls.”
Prince Poison looked back at me, completely unreadable.
I could barely focus my own blurred gaze on him; darkness was creeping in from the edges.
“I’m not finished with this one.”
Blink.
Darkness.
end of book 1
* * *
Captive
Book 2 of Gods and Monsters.
Copyright © 2019 by Klarissa King
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission—this includes scanning and/or unauthorised distribution—except in case of brief quotations used in reviews and/or academic articles, in which case quotations are permitted.
This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons, whether alive or dead, is purely coincidental. Names, characters, incidents, and places are all products of the author’s imagination.
Imprint: Independently published.
CAPTIVE
†
GODS AND MONSTERS
BOOK 2
Gods and Monsters
Our creators make no secret of why they created us: For entertainment. Fun.
What fu
n is to them, torture is to us. But we worship them, because the alternative is far worse. They are our Gods, our monsters, our masters. We will never be equals in their cold, distant hearts.
All we can do with our pitiful lives is to choose a God to worship from afar, and pray we never meet our makers, for there is no worse fate than to catch the eye of a God.
It’s never a story with a happy ending. So in this world, we hide from the ones we worship. Because our worship is fear.
In the world of Gods and Monsters, we are mortals just trying to survive.
1
I woke in a cold, dark room.
Weighing me down was a thick blanket, not as coarse as the one on the ship. Still, it was rough enough to make me squirm out from under it.
Pushing myself up on my elbows, I let the blur of my sight slowly fade away. Shadowy shapes started to sharpen in the dark.
I was in a narrow, unfamiliar room.
Opposite me, a window was shielded by a heavy, moth-eaten curtain and, beside it, a copper washtub gave a chilling touch to the room with its scratched edges.
A torn paper-screen was meant to give the tub some privacy. But with all the tears and holes in the paper, I could see the washtub as clearly as I could see the narrow, hard bed I sat on—and its twin beside me, separated by a mouldy wood-table.
Still, in all its dusty air and stale stink of old stew, the room blossomed a feeling of hope in my chest. Not only was this more space than I had ever had to myself, but it came with an indescribable realisation.
I’m alive.
The Prince’s distant voice echoed in my mind; ‘I am not finished with this one…’
That flower of relief in my chest withered; its petals drifted to the pit of my stomach and turned to lead.
What more was there to be done to me?
I’d completed the task that the Prince had asked of me, no matter how impossible I’d thought it would be. Costing me blood and sickness beyond anything I’d ever known, I returned Jasper’s power.
Gods and Monsters, Books 1-3: A Dark Gods Bully Romance (Gods and Monsters Box Set) Page 6