by Larissa Ione
He grinned, and around his neck, the amethyst charm glowed. Suddenly, his hand flew out, and a gash, larger than the others he’d inflicted, split Manda’s skin from her shoulder to her elbow. She shrieked in pain as blood streamed down her arm and pooled on the floor. Gems formed in the blood, some no larger than a karat in size, while others, like the duck-egg sized enchanted lapis they’d stolen from a vampire a couple of decades before were more impressive.
Which was bad. The larger the stones that formed outside her body, the more damage was being done to the inside of her body.
“Do you want to understand the full power of the gems?” he asked silkily, and no, Jedda really did not. She and her sisters had each claimed a stone and absorbed its considerable energy. That energy had given them abilities they hadn’t possessed before, but they’d been aware that the power of the gems wouldn’t be fully unlocked without their mates, and now it looked like they were going to find out how powerful those things were.
Screams blasted through Jedda’s brain, screams that belonged to her sisters, herself...no, wait...
She blinked, realizing she’d been lost in the past, when right here in the present people were screaming from beyond the door. Shrike was grinning.
“More sacrifices,” he purred, the ecstasy in his voice almost as disturbing as what was happening in the other room. “Lothar is demanding. And with every scream, his will is seeping into you.”
Horror left her struggling to breathe. “What...what do you mean?”
“I mean that every day that passes without you bringing me what I desire will cause more and more misery for you. Don’t worry, it won’t kill you. But before the month is out, you’ll wish it would.”
Razr tossed the book onto the pile on the table and spun around. “You sick fuck.” He twisted the ring on his finger as if trying to find something to do with his hands that wouldn’t involve strangling the bastard sitting across from them.
Jedda voted for the strangling.
Shrike’s eyebrows climbed up his forehead. “You’re a fallen fucking angel.” He sneered. “An Unfallen, I suspect, but you still fucked up enough to get kicked out of Heaven. So don’t tell me you’ve never killed anyone.”
Razr’s voice went low and ominous, and the hair on Jedda’s neck stood up. “As an angel I killed thousands of fiends like you. Some of them even deserved it.”
“So will Jedda,” Shrike said, “if she doesn’t bring me what I want.” He speared her with a look that promised agony on a grand scale. “And you will update me daily on your progress, or I’ll send my men to deal with you.”
Son of a bitch. This was why she was in business for herself. Why she refused to work for anyone except on her own terms. She didn’t like being controlled or tied to anyone, and what Shrike was doing both tied her to him and controlled her choices for the next month, at the very least.
Fury scorched her throat with every word. “So you brought me here under false pretenses in order to force me to do your bidding?”
“This wasn’t entirely a ruse.” Shrike steepled his hands on his desk, his countenance so laid back that she got the impression he fucked people over a lot. And got off on it. “I do sponsor a legitimate annual sorcery conference. You can Google it.”
She had, which was why she’d felt comfortable attending. “I’m so going to destroy you on Yelp,” she snapped.
Razr laughed, but it abruptly cut off as he glanced down at the back of his hand, where the raised outline of what looked like a wing was glowing with an eerie crimson light. Had it been there earlier? She didn’t think so.
“Well, well,” Shrike murmured. “An Azdai glyph.”
Razr’s gaze snapped up to meet Shrike’s. “What do you know about Azdai glyphs?”
“I know more than I should.” Shrike’s expression softened, even as his voice grew bitter, leaving Jedda more confused than ever.
“I need to go.” Razr made a “come with” gesture to Jedda and started toward the exit, but Shrike shook his head and the clank of a heavy lock sliding into place rattled the door.
“We aren’t finished here.”
Razr wheeled around with a hiss. “If you know anything about Azdai glyphs, you know I have to.”
“I know you need someone to deliver your punishment.” Shrike came smoothly to his feet. “I’ll do the honors.” He held out his hand. “I owe you for the right hook and the cracked skull.”
“Go to hell.”
“Once again, I’ll point out that you have no choice. This castle is on lockdown and I just decided to keep it that way until you agree.”
“What is going on?” Jedda demanded. “I don’t understand any of this.”
Razr explained, but his gaze remained locked with Shrike’s, a battle of wills that she had a feeling wasn’t going to end well.
“Azdai was an angel before humans even knew what angels were. Before the rebellion that got Satan thrown out of Heaven.” Razr sucked air between his teeth as if he was in pain, but Jedda had no idea what could be hurting him. “Azdai hurt humans in the way human children sometimes pull the wings off flies. He was curious and cruel, and he had to be punished. Fallen angels didn’t exist yet, so Heaven came up with this glyph and the punishment that goes with it.” He held up his hand, where the feather-shaped glyph burned bright crimson, so angry she flinched. “When it lights up, it means that it’s time to experience punishment. If the punishment doesn’t take place immediately, we suffer until some asshole angel shows up to inflict the punishment tenfold.” He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out the most beautiful ivory-handled cat-o’-nine tails she’d ever seen. Even the little bone spurs on the ends of the leather strands had been polished to gleaming perfection. “And we can’t inflict the punishment ourselves.” He unfolded the compact handle and locked it into place, and then he passed the torture device to Shrike. Jedda’s stomach turned over at the realization that the cat was about to be used. “We earn extra credit when the punisher is merciless.”
“Extra credit?” she asked, feeling utterly sick.
“We can go longer between beatings.”
She put her hand over her belly, but it didn’t quell the nausea. “That’s...barbaric.”
“You’ll get no argument from me,” Razr said as he removed his jacket and shirt. As she suspected, he was as fit as an athlete, his well-muscled broad chest tapering to a narrow waist and abs she’d bet would make diamonds seem soft in comparison.
“Wait.” She leaped to her feet and tried to reason with Shrike. “Don’t do this,” she pleaded. “I’ll do whatever you want. I’ll do my best to find the items you want—”
“You’re already going to do that,” Shrike said.
She looked over at Razr, who was now removing the various weapons strapped around his hips and looking at her like she was crazy for wanting to help him. She kind of felt that way, she supposed. This was none of her business. Heck, she didn’t know why he was even in the office in the first place except that, oh, right, he’d tried to save her from the Dinner Party From Hell and had gotten caught up in the trap Shrike had set for her. So, yeah, this was all her fault, and she didn’t want to see Razr hurt.
“What can I do?”
Razr flung his clothes and half a dozen blades onto a chair. “You can make sure this asshole doesn’t fuck with me when I pass out.”
With that, he reached out and grabbed the wall.
Chapter Six
This sucked. Usually Razr’s punishment came from Azagoth or Hades, although Zhubaal had filled in a couple of times. Z didn’t like it, not like Azagoth and Hades, who both seemed to enjoy doling out a little torture, even among friends, but sometimes things couldn’t be helped.
“Please,” Jedda whispered as Shrike’s heavy steps crossed the room. “Surely this can wait—”
“It can’t,” Shrike said, his eyes glowing with that unholy crimson light again. “Even now, he’s feeling pressure build inside. His skin is burning. His blood f
eels like lava. Every minute without punishment increases the agony. Isn’t that right, Razr?”
Unfortunately, yes. “How the fuck do you know?”
Shrike stroked his finger over the cat-o’-nine’s smooth handle, and how fucked up was it that Razr actually experienced jealousy? He hated the cat. But it was his, and he despised the fact that this fallen angel fuckwad was caressing it.
Yeah, fucked up.
Shrike’s voice was soft, almost...tender. “Does it matter how I know?”
Not really, but Razr guessed there was one hell of a story behind his knowledge. “Just get it over with. Six of them.”
“No!” Jedda put herself between Razr and Shrike. What the hell was she doing? He was a stranger to her, and yet she was trying to protect him.
Unaccustomed to being the recipient of such kindness, he hung his head, at a loss for how to handle this. His wings, bound so tightly that they ached, quivered under his skin as if wanting to erupt from his back and shield her from what she was about to witness.
He lifted his head and looked at her from over his shoulder. “Jedda,” he said roughly, “it’s okay. Don’t look. It’ll be over quickly.”
For the span of a dozen heartbeats she hesitated. And then, reluctantly, she nodded and moved aside for Shrike, but she still cried out as the first blow fell across his shoulders, which, although fully healed, were still sensitive from the last flogging he’d taken at Jim Bob’s hand.
Pain exploded and blood splattered. He clenched his teeth and bore the second blow with a grunt. His ears rang, but through the buzz he could hear Jedda pleading with Shrike to stop.
Nothing she said would stop him. She couldn’t stop him. This was something Razr had earned, and he’d learned the hard way that it was much less painful to take the blows than to suffer for days sometimes until an angel showed up to flay him with ten times the number of strikes.
Sixty fucking blows.
He normally healed within a few hours, but it took him days to recover from that kind of angel-inflicted torture.
Another blow landed, and his vision blurred.
He didn’t even feel the next one.
* * * *
“Gods, you’re heavy. You’re damned lucky my species is freakishly strong.” He was also lucky that there was a Harrowgate just a block away from Jedda’s house or she’d have been forced to explain to a taxi driver why she was hauling around an unconscious, bloody man in the middle of the night.
She gasped with effort as she unceremoniously dumped Razr’s unconscious body onto her bed, and so much for her new jade and amethyst comforter and sheets. All ruined by sticky smears of blood.
What was up with that, anyway? Why had Razr needed to be tortured? And why did she care? She hadn’t cared about anyone since the day an angel killed one sister and sent the other into the wind. She’d been lonely at times, but mostly being alone meant not having to compete with anyone else for anything. Like the gems that kept her alive.
Oh, their parents had planned ahead of time to avoid competition between Jedda and her sisters, and for the most part it had worked. But her species was naturally competitive, and honestly, she was surprised that she and her siblings had stuck together for as long as they had. Most gem elf siblings lost touch within a couple of years of reaching adulthood at the age of sixteen human years.
She wondered where Reina was, if she was even still in the human realm. The last time Jedda had seen her sister had been a decade ago at an underworld gem and weapons show on the outskirts of the Ca’askull region of Sheoul. They’d run into each other at a display booth for cursed magnetite, and it had done nothing to heal the hurt between them.
Absolutely nothing. Reina knew how to contact Jedda, but she hadn’t.
Not that Jedda was totally blameless. She’d followed up once, but after finding that Reina no longer lived at the location she’d given Jedda, she’d given up. Sure, she could attend the weekly gem trade in the elven realm where Reina would surely be on a regular basis, but Jedda was stubborn, and she wasn’t going to be the one to make overtures at this point.
A sound outside her front door followed by a wave of intense evil jolted her out of her thoughts and raised the hackles on the back of her neck. Silently, she slipped to the living room window and peeked between the sapphire curtains. There, hanging in the shadows just off her porch, was a demon she recognized from the sacrificial dinner. He just stood there, his back against the side of the house as he looked out toward the street.
What the hell?
She whipped open the door. “What are you doing?”
He turned to her, flashing sharp, ugly teeth. “Shrike wants me to keep an eye on you. Make sure you deliver what you promised.”
“Tell Shrike he can go fuck himself. I don’t need a babysitter.”
The bastard started toward her, but screw that. She wasn’t giving him a chance to so much as lay a finger on her. Throwing out her hand, she summoned the power of the very gem Shrike wanted her to find, the ice-blue diamond of myth and legend. All around her the air shimmered as heat built. With a mere thought, she released the energy, hitting him with a shockwave that sent him tumbling all the way to the street, where he landed in an awkward heap against a lamp pole.
“Stay off my property,” she shouted. “Or next time that wave will take you apart.” It wasn’t true, but he didn’t need to know that. Oh, she could have summoned twice as much power, but she lived in a human neighborhood, and there was no sense in drawing attention to herself. Especially since many humans were aware of the existence of the supernatural thanks to recent near-apocalyptic events, and nothing good ever came of humans and their fear.
Still, she’d always wondered how truly powerful her gem would be if paired with its mate and the angel who possessed it. Before he killed Manda, Ebel the Angry Angel had said that the paired gems were capable of widespread destruction on an atomic level, and she believed it. Even now she could feel her gem’s power like a pulse inside her, as if it wanted to unleash everything it was capable of.
Shivering, she went back inside and fetched the med kit from the bathroom. Razr was still passed out cold, so she gently stripped off his slacks.
He didn’t wear underwear. Oh, my.
Her mouth went as dry as the sand forest in her elven homeland as she took in his magnificent body. Everything began to burn, parts of her she’d all but forgotten she had in the five years since she’d last been with a man. The fallen angel was about as perfect as anything she’d ever seen. Made sense, she supposed—she’d never thought angels would be anything less than perfection. But seeing one naked and up close? No one could blame her for wanting to take pictures and post to all her friends on Instagram, right?
Cursing her ethics, she arranged him on his belly to allow access to his shredded back. Shame at the fact that she’d just ogled him shrank her skin. Gods, he must have been in so much pain. She’d nearly passed out herself during the beating, unable to stomach the sight of muscle and bone exposed by the deep lacerations.
Making matters worse, Shrike had reveled in the gore, growing angrier with each strike, as if he’d been taking some deep inner pain out on Razr. When it was over, he’d thrown down the cat and fled the office without a word, leaving her to gather Razr’s unconscious body and find her way out of the castle.
At least the wounds had stopped bleeding and were already starting to heal. Still, this was one of the times she wished she’d chosen the garnet Gem of Enoch instead of the diamond. Jedda and her sisters hadn’t known what power each of the gems had possessed at the time they’d chosen and assimilated them, but neither Jedda nor Reina had been completely happy with the outcomes. Manda had embraced the killing power of her stone, but Reina had no desire to heal anyone and had been furious. And while Jedda’s gem had given her an ability to violently repel demons that she actually used sometimes, being able to help now and then would have been cool too.
Very carefully, she cleaned Razr’s wounds an
d applied bandages, each one drawing an elven curse from her. Such a perfect body, torn to shreds on a regular basis. He had no scars—at least, none that were visible. She’d heard there were species of demons that could see scars no one else could, and she wondered what one of those demons would see if they looked at Razr.
Jedda saw a very fit, very toned male.
Bronzed skin stretched over thick veins that helped define the sharp-cut muscles of his shoulders and arms, and if there was an ounce of fat on his body, she’d turn her jewelry store into a yogurt shop.
Tenderly, she ran her fingers over his biceps and forearm, all the way to his fingers. His ring fascinated her, and when she touched the black diamond in the center, she felt the oddest buzz, as if it contained an enchantment that was restrained and trying to get out. Even stranger, enchanted gemstones were always aligned with good, evil, or neutral energy, and she couldn’t get any kind of read on it. Was he aware of its potential power? Or its alignment?
Putting her questions aside, she followed a thick vein up the back of his hand and then laid her hand over his, marveling at how much bigger his was. As an elf, she was naturally on the delicate side, but he truly created a stark contrast in not only their size, but their coloring. Where she was light, he was dark.
Even the tattoos that looped around his shoulder blades and ran up the back of his neck in twin Celtic-style braids before disappearing under short-cropped black hair were dark. Not in color––although they were deep blue––but in nature. She recognized the symbols woven into the rope-like pattern. They were often burned or carved into objects, like cursed or enchanted gemstones, to dampen their power.
Were Razr’s tattoos more punishment for whatever he’d done?
Gods, what had he done? It had to have been bad to get kicked out of Heaven, but then to be saddled with extra punishment?
She eyed the door. Maybe she’d made a mistake bringing him home. She’d heard there was a clinic right here in London that treated demons and fallen angels and the like... She could drop him off and then check on him tomorrow.