Blood of the Infinity War (Afterlife saga Book 8)

by Stephanie Hudson

  It was pure white chiffon and it floated around me every time I moved. It almost looked as though all my movements were being made under water as it danced around my skin. The skirt was long and hid the gold sandals that were wrapped up my ankles. All the material was edged with a thin gold border in the same design as the filigree on my crown.

  It was as if a huge square piece of chiffon had been crossed over a tight silky underdress, one that at least managed to keep my breasts firm and secure. The overlapped parts of the chiffon then gathered at my shoulders, creating a plunging neck line and the excess flowed down my back, draping like a cape that followed me. A thick gold belt pulled it all in under my bust, tying into a knot at the back. At first the girls had wanted to keep it knotted at the front but I thought it looked silly, so I spun it round once they had left.

  Now I had no clue why I was dressed this way as Lucius hadn’t told me anything before leaving. The only thing he had done was open the doors for a team of girls and issued some snapped order at them in Latin. Things had seemed tense for him since waking and I didn’t know whether it had anything to do with my nightmare and his failed attempt at trying to get a read on it or…well I didn’t really want to think about the ‘or’ bit.

  It had started when I woke to find him staring down at me, my torso encased safely in his embrace. But then once conscious thought started to become clearer in my head and the fog of sleep had left me, I realised exactly what he was looking at. I instantly tried to pull my arm from his hold and the fingertips that were softly caressing my scars. However, he wouldn’t allow it and merely tightened his hold on me as I struggled.

  “Easy now for I am not hurting you,” he informed me softly and I quickly gave up the fight.

  “Who did this to you?” he asked me gently and I wanted to groan out my frustrations as I really didn’t want to be doing this again.

  “It was a long time ago…for me anyway.” I added this last part as that time hadn’t arrived yet and wouldn’t for too many lifetimes to count.

  “Then I only want to know one thing,” he said surprising me, as unlike Draven, Lucius wasn’t interested in all the details. No, he only wanted to know one and something he classed as the most important,

  “Did he suffer?”

  “Yes.” I forced the word out through gritted teeth, thinking back to the day he died and I almost died with him. This one worded answer told Lucius the two things he wanted to know, one was if he was dead and the second was it painful enough. I would say first being flung across a cabin, having a knife plunged into his heart and then finding himself at the bottom of a ravine could be classed as suffering. But then again to these guys, if it didn’t include some medieval looking torture chamber, then it was probably not what they called ‘suffering enough’.

  “Good, my only regret is that it was not by my own hands and I wasn’t there to care for you after the ordeal.” I raised my hand to his cheek and whispered a sincere,

  “Thank you.” Then I reached up and kissed him lightly on the cheek. To be honest I was just grateful that I didn’t have to explain it all again and I could just marvel in the fact that seeing them bare like this, didn’t seem to affect the way he looked at me at all. He just continued to stroke along each line as if he had the power to erase it with just his simple caress.

  Of course, now I looked down at them and no longer saw the shadows of my past looming over me but more the journey lines that enabled me to walk towards my future. I took that decision from Morgan that day and chose freedom, whether that be death or life. I took away his control and all this time I should have looked at these scars feeling proud, instead of ashamed.

  It was like Vincent had said to me that day, the scars are only skin deep, they don’t connect to my heart or my soul and they don’t define me, I defined them. And he was right. All this time I had been defining them as a sign of weakness when in actual fact, I should have been defining them as strength.

  A strength I certainly needed when the door suddenly flew open and in walked someone who had tried to kill me twice before.

  “You!” I hissed, balling my fists in anger. I should have known that she would have been slithering around this time and trying to cling onto Lucius. I knew when I heard the name Lahash that something was tugging at my memories and now here she was in the slutty flesh. Even now in this time, she was dressed like a hooker, with a dress that looked barely covering her breasts. It was made of two measly strips of silk tied at her shoulders and gold braided thread coiled around her body, and bare sides. Her blonde hair was pinned as high as she could get it and her lips curled in anger, snarling at me like an aggressive dog.

  "Tu putas turn te non tantum ut est hic et uxores peregrinas?!" (‘You think you can just turn up here and take him from me!’) She shouted something furiously at me in Latin and I actually rolled my eyes thinking, ‘Christ, not this shit again!’ Seriously, was there even a place left for me in the world where there wasn’t some asshole trying to kill me?!

  “Do me a favour and fuck off, Layla I don’t have time for your shit!” I snapped and her mouth dropped and nearly hit the floor. It looked as though I was the first person to ever speak to her this way and I revelled in the idea. Good, it was about time for some payback…now if I could just find my ‘angry powers’ to follow it up with then that would be just peachy. Preferably before she tried to kill me this time. But unlike last time, I decided not to make the same mistake twice and do something that I should have done every bloody time she had approached me with death in mind. Well, that’s the good thing about hindsight…I now finally had some good sense to use it. Oh, and there was the whole, travelling back in time thing, so that helped.

  “I will kill you…” she started to say, meaning she did so in Persian for I could now understand her. Well, at least she got the hint and so did I when she started to pull a deadly looking blade from behind her back. She raised it high ready to run at me. But that’s when I unleashed my best weapon against her,

  “AHHHH LUCIUS SHE’S TRYING TO KILL ME!!” I screamed with everything I had in me and I wouldn’t have been surprised if glass had shattered from the force of it. She looked back to the door with panic clear in her eyes, no doubt trying to judge how long she had to get the job done. But in this time, I reached off to one side and grabbed a big gold statue of the eagle that Lucius had told me symbolised Rome. Then I stormed over to her as she was still looking at the door.

  “Hey bitch, miss me?!” I said getting her attention and the second she looked back at me I swung the heavy beast by the legs and let it smash into her face. I could not express the satisfaction I felt when I saw her eyes grow wide with shock before the gold wings connected with her head. Lucius ran through the door just in time to see her hit the floor like a meat sack but he didn’t miss the blade that fell from her hand as it skidded across the marble floor.

  “For the Senate and People of Rome, bitch!” I snarled down at her the words I now knew were written on the plaque before dropping the big bird with a cracking thud on the floor beside her. Then I looked up to Lucius and said,

  “You know that’s the third time that bitch has tried to kill me, so you have no idea how good that felt.” His eyes widened in shock and then narrowed down at the writhing Layla, who was now looking very worse for wear. But I had to say, the blood looked good on her. Man, he looked pissed.

  “Master, look what she did to me!” Layla started to moan, holding her bloody jaw before reaching out a hand to Lucius. He looked down at it before taking it in his own. I was just getting ready to step up to him and kick him in the balls for being so blind stupid when thankfully he proved me wrong. He yanked her up hard enough to pop her arm from her shoulder and her screams died when he spun her round and in a single second, he had her slammed against the wall with his hand encasing her throat.

  “You dare come here and attack her!” He threw the words at her and she flinched before trying to defend herself and when I say defend herself, what I ac
tually mean is lie through her asshole with the amount of shit that spewed from her lips!

  “It was her that attacked me! I came here to merely congratulate her on your upcoming wedding!”

  “Umm…my what now?” I asked but no one was listening to me as he just gripped her neck in a tighter hold, one that had her desperately trying to tear his hand from her. Then he looked towards the knife on the floor, one she didn’t know he had seen fly from her hand just before she hit the floor.

  “Is that right?” he asked her dangerously, luring her into his false acceptance.

  “Yes, yes my lord. She must have attacked me out of jealously, for I only wanted to wish her well,” she said adding even more layers to her mountain of lies. I couldn’t help it but I snorted a laugh, one Lucius snapped his head at, giving me a dark look. I wanted to roll my eyes at him but seeing him this way, nearly on the verge of dismemberment, well then, I thought it best not to add to his pissed off killing state right now. Thankfully, he turned his attention back to the bitch at hand and asked her in a murderous tone,

  “Then tell me Lahash, do you usually bring a blade with you when offering such happy sentiments or did you suddenly find yourself fearful of mortals?” Layla knew that she had fucked up when she shot a panicked look to the blade on the floor and then back to him.

  “My lord I…” She never got chance to finish as he pulled her head back a bit so that he could then hammer it back into the wall, cracking it with the force. Then he roared mere inches from her face,

  “YOU TRIED TO TAKE HER FROM ME!” Now, unlike my own mighty scream for help, his bellowing rage did smash glass as a wave of power emitted from him, smashing shutters, pottery, mirrors, and even cracking one of the posts on the bedframe. Oh shit, but Lucius hitting that level of anger was enough to make a person pee themselves and beg for a forgiveness they didn’t even know they had sinned for.

  After roaring this in her face he flung her body off to one side making her roll a few times before hitting into the furniture like a human sized bowling ball.

  “Get her out of my sight!” Lucius lashed out the order and for a crazy second I thought he was talking to me but then I saw Dariush step into the room followed by the general he had called Marcus. Dariush strolled over to the whimpering Layla and hauled her up by the back of her dress. Then he passed her over to Marcus and said only two words,

  “Carcer Tullianum.” (‘Tullianum Prison’) Even Marcus looked stunned and I had to wonder with both his and Layla’s reaction, what that place was. Layla let out an almighty scream and started trying to twist free, frantic eyes pleading with Lucius.

  “No! You can’t do this! Don’t…not there! Not there please, my Lord!” but Lucius wasn’t listening, no instead he walked straight up to me and took me by the shoulders.

  “Are you alright?” he asked me tenderly. I bit my lip and nodded, momentarily stunned to silence at the sight of his worry. I looked over his shoulder to see Dariush nod once for Marcus to take her. He did and when she started to try and fight against him, I was surprised to see that he too wasn’t without his own powers. Marcus simply placed a hand inches from her face and after muttering something I couldn’t hear, she quickly passed out. He hoisted her up into his arms and left with his burden, now a little more compliant.

  “Dariush, go and make the necessary excuses and tell them we won’t be long,” Lucius ordered without looking back at his brother.

  “It is typical for the woman to be late, or so I hear,” Dariush commented strangely and I frowned, making him chuckle as he left the room, closing the door behind him.

  “Did she hurt you?” he asked again as if he had to make sure.

  “No, not this time.”

  “You said that this was the third…am I to believe that she attempted to take your life twice back in your own time?” he asked, his voice dropping dangerously low.

  “Yes. She stabbed me the first time and then pushed me from your balcony into a frozen lake the next,” I told him, quickly flinching back when he growled. However, he just stepped back into me and wrapped an arm around my waist.

  “My balcony?” he questioned and I nodded.

  “Yes.”

  “What happened?” he asked clearly curious, as it was obvious I didn’t drown or become a Keira popsicle sitting at the bottom of the lake like she had hoped.

  “You saved me.”

  “Good…and then I killed her I presume.”

  “Ah well, not exactly…she escaped and is currently still at large.” Okay so he did not like the sound of that if his sudden crimson stare was anything to go by. So, I decided to brave calming him down by reaching up my hand and cupping his cheek.

  “But if it makes you feel any better, this is the first time I got chance to finally hit her back…” I then reached up on my tip toes and whispered,

  “…And it felt oh so goooood.” I was happy to report that this finally had him grinning again and I wondered if it had anything to do with the comical way I dragged out the word ‘good’.

  “I am glad to hear it, little one,” he said tapping me on the chin.

  “Where is he taking her? That place Dariush said…”

  “Carcer Tullianum.” Lucius repeated his brother’s words cutting me off.

  “What is that place?” I asked quietly.

  “A place reserved for Rome’s fiercest enemies, an underground prison that is as old as Rome itself and has more tales of horror there than any other place on Earth. It also holds a direct portal to Hell itself and therefore serves my needs when faced with a traitor of a different kind,” he said and I shuddered even thinking about it, remembering all too well where Draven had kept her under the unsuspecting grounds of Afterlife.

  “But enough talk of such dire things, not on this day.” I was just about to ask him what he meant when he suddenly paused.

  Then his eyes grew wide as if he had only just noticed something. I was about to ask what as I looked up at him with a frown, but he took a step back so that he could take in all of my image. He gave me a leisurely look up and down, making my cheeks heat as he scrutinised every inch of me. It was only when I finally braved meeting his eyes that I saw the animalistic lust staring back at me.

  He liked what he saw…very much.

  “The Gods will envy me on this day, for I have no doubt,” he told me, making my blush deepen. So, I asked him,

  “Why, what happens today?” He gave me a bigger grin, one I knew to be wary of especially when he told me,

  “Today I make you mine…” Then he paused, yanked me forward and finished his sentence in whispered torment by my ear.

  “…By marrying you.”

  Chapter 31

  One Wedding and a Death Threat

  After this Lucius kissed me lightly using my stunned reactions against me and then whispered,

  “Don’t keep me waiting, little Keira girl.” And then after that he was gone. I was left standing there alone and utterly speechless. Could he be serious! He wanted to marry me!? I mean was the guy insane!? Okay, so these questions continued like this for some time as I had no clue what to do next. It was obvious Lucius had lost his ever-loving mind if he thought that he could just kidnap me one day and then marry me the next!

  And seriously, what was it with men back in this time? Did they even bother to ask a woman if she wanted to marry them? Or did they just announce it to the world or worse, plan the bloody thing, stick them in a dress and then spring it on them at the sodding altar! Was I going mad or was this as seriously messed up as I thought it was?!

  Well, there was one thing I was sure of and that was I wasn’t leaving this room, not unless he wanted to marry someone bound and gagged…okay, definitely not going down that road, not with a kinky ass vampire like Lucius. But still, surely the bride had to be A; conscious and B; somewhat compliant, neither of which he was going to get from me.

  Finally, this mental surge of questions and arguing with myself was enough to pull my finger out my butt a
nd act. I needed to escape and after walking through the usual pointless first steps of checking the doors, only to find them with guards outside, I then had to have another rethink. After, of course, mumbling something about leaving my handbag back inside and I would just be a minute. Their vacant looks were enough to tell me they had no clue what I had said. Well, that was good because I wasn’t even sure handbags were a thing in this time. Now, maybe if I had said something about, ‘Oh I just fancy another honey dripped mouse’ then maybe that would have been more believable.

  “Eww, don’t go there again, Kaz,” I told myself aloud as I slumped back on the couch trying not to gag. Okay, so I had to do something as I couldn’t just sit here and wait for mould to grow on my ass in hopes then he wouldn’t want to marry me. So, I got up and checked the small walled garden area outside. Well, unless some ancient version of Spiderman was currently looking for his Mary Jane and happened across me instead, then I don’t think I had much chance getting over that thing. I released a sigh looking up at the ten-foot wall and suddenly wished for ivy. I’d had some luck with ivy. Damn it but why couldn’t there have been ivy!

  “I see you didn’t get far with that escape plan.”

  “Sophia!” I shouted her name before I even turned around to face her as I would recognise her voice anywhere!

  “The one and only…Umpf” she commented drily before I launched myself at her.

  “Wow, it’s been what, three days and you miss me this much?” she said on a chuckle as I clung to her.

  “You know I may be a demon but my vessel still needs to breathe,” she added which made me finally let her go. Sophia was dressed as a servant girl, which explained how she managed to sneak inside the palace and then inside this room.