A soft gasp came from the girl who I assumed was Madison. “Then how were we transported here if they can’t physically touch us? None of this makes sense.”
A tense silence ensued before the first voice spoke again. “I don’t know, but we really need her to wake up. It’s only the three of us left, and if we’re going to have a fighting chance, we need to band together.”
Well, shit. It sounded like two of the girls who came with us had died already, but the positive side of this conversation was that the two remaining didn’t seem to be freaking out and were thinking logically. I could work with that.
Deducing that I wasn’t in any immediate danger, I opened my eyes and announced, “I’m awake. Let’s come up with a plan.”
The way their voices bounced around the room we were in, like an echo, had given me the briefest of hints that we were somewhere new, in an area that was somewhat enclosed. So when I saw the dark crevices of a rocky formation above me and a solid wall behind them, I wasn’t completely surprised to find we were in a cave.
What was surprising was the small glimmering pieces of the rock, like a sparkling mineral of sorts that gave off quite a bit of soft light.
Their sharp intakes of breath showed that my sudden addition to their conversation had scared them. I heard a shifting against the hard dirt floor we were on as I sat up, and when I turned to where their voices had come from, they were both facing me with wide, determined eyes.
The first voice I had heard belonged to the pretty brunette girl who asked me, “What’s your name?” Gesturing to herself and the raven-haired, petite girl, she introduced herself. “I’m Mishka, and that’s Madison.”
So, Hope and Olivia hadn’t made it, if my memory served correctly of the names involved. The image of my name and the others on my TV screen was practically seared into my mind.
Brushing my hands off onto my pants, I offered, “I’m Serafina, but you can call me Sera.”
Looking down, I gave myself a once-over and did a mental check to see if anything was injured, but I felt fit as a fiddle. Even my previously burning chest and lungs felt back to normal. Glancing around at the cave we were in, I saw no passageways behind us, so I turned my attention to the cave’s opening. That was where the danger lay—outside.
“Mishka was the only one of us who was awake as she was transported here,” Madison informed me. “You and I were already here when she was deposited into the cave. She was just telling me everything she remembers about the creatures.”
I gave a nod of my head as I took in the ashy landscape that was void of any natural growth. “If you wouldn’t mind filling me in on those details too, we can hopefully piece together a plan on how to move forward.”
My vision definitely wasn’t the best, and I was struggling to make out any landmarks to get some type of lay of the land. Was it night time here? I really needed more light to try to give us a leg up.
Giving up on trying to discern anything of use outside, I turned my attention back to the two girls as Mishka began from the beginning. “After you left the shuttle, a group of…” she trailed off, her brow furrowing, “I don’t know how to describe it other than incorporeal shadow forms, appeared.”
This part I had heard, so clearly I had woken up right on time and hadn’t missed anything.
“They came in quickly, hovering over the other two girls who had dropped to the ground first,” she recounted and shook her head. “But they quickly moved onto Madison and me, as if dismissing the other two.”
“Hope and Olivia,” I said softly, feeling it was important to give them the respect of using their names.
Mishka continued on as if she hadn’t heard me, or maybe she just didn’t care. “Madison passed out just a few seconds before they came, and as they approached us, it seemed like a small stone or something attached to the shadows began to glow.”
A tracker?
A beacon?
My mind whirled with the possibilities of what that could mean.
“I suppose they picked us up, but really it felt like I was being suffocated by shadows and suspended in the air as we traveled,” she explained.
“They had no solid body parts at all?” I asked, miffed at how these monsters could have ever physically fought us in a war if that was the case. It just didn’t add up.
Were they the monsters, or were there multiple species down here? I had too many questions and no answers, which infuriated me. I needed to find a way to keep us alive long enough to find an escape.
Before she could answer me, the cave walls around us suddenly roared to life with peach-colored runes that pulsated like a heartbeat. What was this place? Some type of safe zone from the air?
Acting on instinct, I surged to my feet and placed myself in front of the two younger girls, facing the opening of the cave. I had never fought a person in my life, and I definitely didn’t work out unless you considered lifting my wine glass to my lips exercise, but I would defend myself and these girls to the best of my abilities, until I died.
I felt their hands grab onto my arms like a lifeline. Small whimpers came from them, and Madison’s voice trembled as she said, “W-w-what’s going on?”
“We’re about to find out, I’m sure,” I answered, my eyes darting around the dark expanse in front of us, looking for any sign of an attack. Sure enough, I saw dark blots coming closer, and I whispered to the girls, “They’re coming. Back up against the wall so they can’t surround us.”
They did as I ordered, and I shuffled backward with them until we had created about a six-foot gap between us and the mouth of the cave. To my utter shock, the space of the entrance rippled like a forcefield as the shadows entered, confirming my thought that this small cave was somehow a safe zone from the air outside.
The girls trembled behind me, and I heard their soft sniffles as their fear took hold. Taking deep breaths, I fought my racing heart and instinct to cower away from the wraiths. Mishka had been right—there was absolutely no defining body parts to them other than a human-shaped outline.
Four groups of three shadows each blinked into existence and spread out in front of us, making my heart rate spike. There were too many of them.
My eyes caught on the front shadow of each group, each of which seemed to have a crystal hanging around where their neck would be if they were human. This had to be the item Mishka had spoken of that glowed. It seemed like a vital clue as to what was going on here, but my mind was coming up blank.
None of them moved and no one spoke, and I found my temper flaring as I barked out, “Tell me what you want with us! Or are you too cowardly to explain yourselves?”
A deep chuckle floated through the room, but it wasn’t scary or intimidating. At least not to me. The girls shook even more violently behind me, but I…I found myself intrigued. My body felt like it roared to life, shocked by an electrical surge.
The sound of his laugh—and I say his because it was definitely a masculine one—felt like it had wrapped around me in a teasing caress, bringing goosebumps to my skin, and my nipples pebbled painfully against the material of my bra.
What the hell was going on, and why was my traitorous body turned on in a moment like this?
Attempting to clear my brain of this heady feeling, I yelled, “Whatever you are doing to me, I demand that you stop!”
It was clearly magic of some kind forcing my body to react this way.
“Impossible, beauty.”
My pussy throbbed at the second sensual voice that floated through the air like a promise of pleasure. What was going on here?
Before I could snap back, a shrill voice that grated my ears called out, “Enough! Line up and let us test our crystals one by one to see if any of you are our match.”
Instinctively, I knew the owner of this voice was the one I needed to protect us all from. I could tell by the way the hair on my arms stood on end and the chill that ran up my spine at his voice that he was our immediate threat.
I snarled as I push
ed the girls against the cave wall with my arms in a defensive move. “Not until you explain what you are doing and if we are in danger.”
“She’s fierce. I believe she will be ours,” a softer voice said, and my heart hammered in my chest at his tone. It was so gentle and soothing. Why did I want that statement to be about me?
Fuck, get it together, Sera. You cannot afford to let their powers or whatever the fuck is in the air here distract you from your goal. Get out of here alive.
The owner of the first laugh spoke—don’t ask me how I knew it was the same one, because I didn’t have the answer for that. “We are each a Trifecta looking for the woman who will be our match and carry our offspring.”
I spluttered, practically choking on my spit. Disgust laced my tone, dripping from each word as I asked, “You bring human women down here to breed?”
“Not just to breed, but to love,” the softer voice answered. It shocked me to my core at how genuine he sounded. That wasn’t true, right? It couldn’t be.
This was fucking ridiculous, and there was no way I would be cooperating. However, I couldn’t deny the fact that butterflies had erupted in my stomach at his proclamation. Was it possible not all of these creatures were vile? That maybe they didn’t kill or consume human sacrifices?
Shit. I couldn’t afford to soften, even a minuscule amount. This could be detrimental and the deciding factor to whether I lived or died.
In seconds, my vision was obscured by shadows before I could fight them off, and suddenly I felt myself tugged to the left. I stumbled before falling onto my hands and knees painfully, small stones digging into the soft flesh of my palms.
A feral growl ripped through the cave at my harsh handling, that had not come from me.
When I could see once more, Mishka was to my right and Madison was to hers, tears streaming down their faces as their bodies trembled. They didn’t dare look up, instead focusing on the ground beneath them.
My blood boiled, heating rushing to my face as I yelled, “You claim to want to find a woman to love and then shove us around? Learn some fucking manners.”
Maybe I shouldn’t be insulting monsters that we knew nothing about, other than the fact that the women sent to them never returned and they wanted to use us as monster breeding machines, but I couldn’t keep the lid on my mouth at this point. I had been quiet my entire life, accepting the mannerisms I was forced to adopt, but no more. If I was going to survive down here, I needed my fire. No more hiding it.
“Begin,” the same shrill voice commanded, ignoring my insults, making my cheeks redden with fury.
In complete silence, each trifecta of shadows began to move down the line, starting with Madison and ending with me. As they got close, each crystal lit up with that same peach color that the runes of the cave had, but it was a dull light.
Thankfully, the creatures didn’t attempt to touch any of us, so I remained still as I watched, trying to understand their actions.
It wasn’t until the last set began to move down the line that I had a reaction and understood what the hell they were looking for. My breath caught in my throat as they reached me, and their crystal shone so brightly that my hand moved to shield my eyes on instinct. It was damn near blinding, and I felt my head searing with pain from just the second I was exposed to it.
“I knew she would be ours,” the soft voice said as I felt a phantom brush of lips pressed to my shoulder.
“Such a beauty,” the second voice said, a reverent tone to his words like he was worshiping me.
“All ours,” the deep voice agreed. I mustered the courage to drop my hand and look at what was happening to me, sensing the dimming of the light from behind my closed lids.
But all I could see was darkness now, like I was wrapped up in a cocoon of shadows. That wasn’t what scared me, though—what I felt inside was what truly scared me.
I felt euphoric at having this set of shadows to myself. They were mine. Their voices called to me, mentally and physically, with just the few words they had uttered.
A piece of me felt content being within their darkness, and that was the most dangerous thing that could happen to me down here. I needed to remember my mission and the danger of this unknown land.
I had a feeling they were going to make that damn near impossible, but I had to hold onto my light within their darkness. I’d be my own nightlight down here as I held onto my reasons to fight.
My parents.
Gizmo.
My freedom.
No one and no monster would take that from me, no matter how their powers controlled my body’s reaction to them.
Chapter Four
SERA
As my feet lifted from the ground, I began to panic. “Madison! Mishka!” I yelled, needing to know what was happening to the girls.
“There’s nothing you can do for them,” the soothing voice whispered in my ear, but this time it didn’t bring me peace of mind. It enraged me.
“Bullshit! Put me down! I’m not leaving them.”
I wouldn’t leave them here to die. I couldn’t.
“We must protect you, precious.” The rough voice swirled around me, seemingly explaining everything that mattered to them in just five words.
Attempting to stand and push at the shadows around me, I tumbled back to my knees, completely disoriented and off-kilter in the darkness. I yelled the girls’ names once more, the answering silence all I needed to know. They were gone.
I allowed a few tears to stream down my face for the four girls who had lost their lives senselessly. They’d been ripped from their homes and forced down here for what? To die because they weren’t properly matched to be breeding machines for these monsters?
A scream of rage tore through my throat, and I surged to my feet and dove headfirst through the wall of shadows that cocooned me, collapsing on the other side of them.
It had been the wrong move.
Once again, the searing pain and feeling of suffocating clogged my throat and lungs, my eyes burning with unshed tears as I confirmed my two assumptions:
The two girls lay unmoving with their eyes wide open, staring at the ceiling with open mouths of terror. Dead.
And the cave walls no longer glimmered, the forcefield no longer rippled at the cave’s entrance. It was seemingly gone, a steady breeze of air blowing through now.
“Damn…you,” I wheezed out, including all of these monstrous fuckers in that statement.
Trying to push from my hands and knees to stand, my limbs trembled with the strain. My eyes fell to the ground as I focused all of my energy on the desire to stand and fight, but shock stunned me from moving as I felt the ground shake beneath me.
“Get away from her! She is ours!” the gravelly voice roared as I looked up and felt the weight of the remaining three Trifectas focus on me just before they converged on me.
Oh shit.
Falling onto my ass, I scrambled backward as quickly as I could, which was honestly at a snail’s pace with the toxic air still poisoning me. Why was this place no longer safe all of a sudden? It was becoming increasingly clear our lack of knowledge of this world was a huge component of why so many of us died.
I found myself in the corner of the cave as I watched the creatures swirl and vibrate with energy in front of me. Were they fighting? It was so hard to make out their individual shapes, but my eyes continuously found the same three figures, and I knew they were mine somehow.
I felt the pull to them like a moth to a flame, and maybe that was the perfect analogy for what this was. Because despite whatever unexplainable draw I felt to them, I knew in the end I would be burned and likely killed.
Voices echoed through the cave, many of which I didn’t recognize, but I did manage to understand that they were arguing over who I belonged to. This confused me, as even with what little information I possessed, it seemed clear that the crystal had shown exactly who I was matched to.
“You cannot force a match, Azmunch!” one of my shadows yelled
, echoing my own inner thoughts
Despite the panic that I would soon face the same fate as the other girls if I didn’t get clean air, I couldn’t help but snort out a precious breath at how close to “ass munch” that sounded. Maybe it was the lack of oxygen making me a little loopy, but it was funny.
And of course it belonged to the voice I had been fearful of as he roared back, “You will not stop me from trying! We have waited far too long to find our match.”
“You leave us no choice.” The whispered threat floated through the air a second before my three shadows came together in front of me, reaching for me with their tendrils. Upon contact with me, the crystal lit up and I quickly slammed my eyes closed once more to protect my vision.
Shrieks ensued, and I couldn’t help but crack one of my eyes open to see what was going on. My mouth dropped open in shock as the shadows stretched and lengthened into menacing blobs that reminded me of the grim reaper—all smoke and death. The three of them advanced upon the other shadows with ominous intent.
“You would slay your brethren?” Azmunch scoffed, acting like he was calling their bluff.
My Trifecta responded instantly and with unwavering certainty.
“Yes.”
“Without a second thought.”
“She is ours.”
My heart squeezed at their possessive and protective nature over me—or maybe that was my heart shutting down as I gasped for air to soothe my heaving lungs.
For a heartbeat, everything was still. I would have said that I was holding my breath, waiting for someone to make a move, but really I just couldn’t breathe properly, black dots beginning to litter my vision as I felt my consciousness slipping once more.
But not before I heard scuffling and insults flying through the air, mostly centered around my three monsters threatening to send the others into oblivion if they laid a hand on me.
Then, as quickly as a snap of fingers, the other Trifectas were gone, leaving me alone with my three monsters in utter silence. The sudden change gave me mental whiplash.
Were they mine? Was that right to say? And what exactly was mine? They weren’t my men…
Captured by the Monsters Page 3