Enslaved (The Inbetween Novels)

by R. C. Murphy

  Gently, he pushed her away from the table. “I’m sorry, Shayla.”

  She shrugged out of his grip. Her movements were stiff, awkward. Shayla favored her left shoulder and used her dress to blot the fresh wounds. She was filthy head-to-toe. Her hair stood at all angles, the hairs framing her face were the worst, either stuck to her forehead and cheeks with sweat or dried and sticking out like antennae. Deryck looked her over, thankful she was alive. He wished he had the power to heal her, or at least the ability to call on someone who could.

  He reached for her wrist. “Let me see how bad it is.”

  Shayla’s green eyes bore into his. “Don’t touch me.”

  She couldn’t stomach the sight of Deryck. However, there wasn’t much else to look at, not if she wanted to make sure she’d escape the temple in one piece. She could watch Marduk escape from the portal instead, but it lost its appeal after the third or fourth death threat. Her eyes drifted over the golden dragon closest to her and followed the curl of its tail over the front of the table. Marduk’s fingers grasped the spiny tail. A second hand reached to join the first. His hair tumbled over his left shoulder, pitch black and unbelievably curly. Shayla took another step away from the altar coated in her blood, Marduk, and most of all, Deryck.

  Her head swam. She needed to get away from them. How could she, though? Reality had taken a vacation, trapping her in a Grimm Brother’s fairy tale—they never really had happy endings.

  “Shayla, we need to go while Herryk is down.” Deryck watched her like a police officer watched a man about to jump off of a bridge.

  “Who is Herryk?” She looked at Harry and laughed, harsh and quick. Yet another lie, another betrayal. She’d had more than enough of them in her life. “Is Deryck even your real name?”

  “Yes, of course it is. Please, I will explain everything later. We need to go.”

  She didn’t believe him. She couldn’t make herself believe him, even though he was the only one capable of saving her from the other two beings in the room. Deryck’s involvement rang too many warning bells in her head. Reason whispered in her ear, chasing away the doubt for a moment. Use him to get out of here. You can hate him later for turning you over to them.

  But the moment to run had passed. Anger rooted Shayla to the spot and fear held her tongue. She watched Harry—Herryk—struggle to get his feet under him. He paused, breath rasping loudly in the tense silence between Deryck’s pleading eyes and her frozen anger. Green light pooled in his eyes. Shayla cringed, waiting for it to take her over again.

  It didn’t.

  Herryk—Harry--lurched toward the table. His legs knocked into it, rattling the items on top and knocking Marduk’s grip loose from the dragon’s tail. Herryk grabbed the dagger before it hit the ground. His voice hoarse, he said something in a language she only knew from the spell she’d been reading. What it was, she couldn’t even begin to guess. A gold and teal cup materialized in his hand. He slashed Marduk’s outstretched arm. Bright red blood welled up in the wound, so bright it glowed, casting a shadow onto the table below. He jerked his father’s wrist around. The glowing blood poured into the cup.

  “Stupid whelp,” Marduk shouted. “You’re more your mother’s child than mine. It won’t work this way.”

  “Shut up. You are like all the others, holding me back from my glory, my worshippers. There are many awaiting my freedom.” Herryk’s eyes reflected the blood pooled in the cup. Shayla shivered, seeing the crazy in the dark depths as well.

  Deryck watched Herryk and stepped closer to Shayla. She resisted the urge to cross the few feet between them. It would be easy to hide behind him, to rely on him. But could she trust him? Trust number one, Shayla. Only you can get yourself out of this.

  Marduk’s laughter rumbled out of the portal. “Your worshippers mean nothing. They are simple-minded cattle who believe in the power of sexuality. They don’t care what face they worship so long as a hard cock gives them what they want. There is no power for you, boy.”

  “I’ll show you power.”

  Herryk shoved Deryck out of the way. Deryck grunted and clasped a hand against his side. Blood trickled between his fingers. Shayla watched his blood drip onto the floor, shocked at the lengths Herryk would go to in order to obtain whatever power he spoke of. She backed away from him, but it was like trying to outrun a bullet train. He was on her before she could scream. The knife swung down toward her left arm. Shayla thought he missed, or only grazed her. At first there was no pain, no blood. Herryk lifted her arm. The movement opened the flesh on the inside of her forearm. She got a good look at the layers of skin, fat, and muscle before blood poured out. Herryk flipped her arm over. The cold rim of the goblet was a stark contrast to the blood running over her skin.

  Shayla watched the goblet fill—her blood mixing with Marduk’s. Herryk released her when it was half-full. He swirled the cup. Blood clung to the sides and slowly sank down into the swirled mix of dark and glowing fluid. She hiked the hem of her dress up and held it against her arm. It hurt like hell. She felt bits of dirt and God knew what else grinding into the wound. She’d worry about infections later—if she lived. At the moment, she needed to stop bleeding.

  Grinning, Herryk raised the goblet to his lips. She knew in her gut, if he drank the blood, he’d win whatever power and freedom he’d been seeking. Herryk flew forward suddenly and landed on the ground at her feet. Deryck stood hunched behind him. The cup rattled across the floor, flinging an arc of blood over the bricks as it rolled away.

  Deryck knelt on the ground beside Herryk. He ignored the pull of the healing wound just under his ribs. Any higher and the knife would have punctured a lung. It takes nearly and entire day to heal mortal wounds, time he didn’t have with Herryk so close to completing the ritual. He rolled Herryk onto his back, a hand clamped down on his throat to prevent him from swallowing, but it was too late.

  Herryk smiled, his teeth stained red with blood. “You should’ve taken her when you had the chance.” He drove a knee into Deryck’s side, right where the knife had caught him.

  Deryck could barely breathe through the pain.

  Taking advantage, Herryk rolled to his feet. He yanked up the sleeves of his shirt, sending his cufflinks pinging across the floor. Deryck joined him in studying the incubi bands wrapped around his wrists. Herryk brushed a finger over the topmost curl in the knotwork and hissed. The tattooed slave band writhed, twisted into itself, and expanded again, eating up more and more of the naked skin on Herryk’s forearms. Deryck had never seen the bands act like this before. They morphed and changed with the level of power an incubus attempts to use—such as transporting themselves to the Inbetween or using the latent powers gifted to them through their respective bloodlines—but they rarely were as active as Herryk’s were at the moment. He knew virtually nothing about the ritual, aside from what he’d skimmed through on the paper Wolfrik gave him. Was this ink show part of it?

  Herryk’s brows pinched down so tight, Deryck couldn’t see his eyes. “Why isn’t it working?” He rubbed at the tattoos, as though he could wipe them away and force his freedom.

  “You’re a moron, that’s why it didn’t work,” Marduk called. His arms had retreated into the portal. His face hovered below the surface of the swirling blood—an older version of Herryk with cold eyes and a long beard, decorated with rings to hold the mass into something almost elegant. “I’m still in my realm. No corporeal form in the human realm means no real blood for you to consume. Are you aware of what happens when a half-breed drinks the blood of a god?”

  Deryck cringed. There was another reason, aside from voracious jealousy within the God’s Lands, why the incubi were banned. Demi-gods could borrow traits of the gods by consuming their blood. Marduk was a creation god, some considered him a fertility god. There was only one trait to be borrowed from a fertility god.

  Herryk spat a curse at his sire. He staggered toward Shayla, the front of his pants pulled tight over his godblood-induced arousal. Deryck pushed
himself from the floor to cut the man off before he could lay so much as a finger on her. Herryk’s eyes lit up. He roared a pair of words. Pain jolted from Deryck’s ankle; he ignored it and stalked closer to Herryk. He made it another foot toward his goal before the pain barked up his leg again and he heard a heavy metal clink. He looked behind him. A thick chain trailed over the ground. The metal cuff at the end was latched over his pants and had no lock he could find. The chain was bolted into the ground four feet behind him with a metal spike driven into the brick floor. Helplessly, Deryck watched Herryk stalk Shayla around the back of the table.

  “You did this to me, you’ll fix it.” Herryk grabbed himself. His taunting gesture turned into a stroke, then two, his hips bucking in unfulfilled need.

  Panicked, Deryck squatted down and tried to find the lock on the cuff around his ankle. He kept an eye on Shayla and Herryk, desperately tearing at the metal. The edge of the cuff caught one of his fingernails and tore it halfway off the nail bed. It hurt, but not nearly as much as the idea of Herryk having his way with Shayla with him unable to help her.

  Shayla shuffled around the gold table, keeping it between her and Herryk’s reaching hands. She knew the second he grabbed her, it was over. Even with the worst-case scenario book racing through her mind non-stop since she woke in the outer room, she’d never anticipated this. Sure, he’d threatened her with sexual violence to force her compliance. It was a tool readily available to men in order to control women. Cy used similar threats; he only ever went through with the lesser ones—a smack to the shoulder if she didn’t hurry to do as he asked. Back then, she’d been young and didn’t know better. Her parents didn’t have a bad marriage, but how much of one’s memory should they trust? A lot could go on in a house without the child ever knowing; she’d seen it with her friend’s parents before they divorced.

  “You did this to yourself, Harry . . . Herryk.” Shayla slid to her right. He followed. “Whatever is happening, fix it yourself.”

  Deryck growled and flung the chain holding him to the ground. The noise startled Shayla. He stood; his eyes on Herryk. There was a look in them, maybe pity. She turned her head from Deryck.

  “It is our curse. We may only find our ultimate pleasure when a female tells us to. He will remain like that, in pain, until he finds a woman to lie with.” Deryck’s voice dropped to a whisper. “It is what we were created to do.”

  Shayla shook her head. What was Deryck talking about? She knew something weird was going on, the two men in front of her were different somehow, but he spoke as though they’d been made to . . . to do what? Seduce women? Her stomach rolled at the thought. They’d used her one weakness—her loneliness—to drag her into this ritual business.

  “I don’t ca—“

  Herryk lunged at her, turning her words into a high-pitched scream. His arms wrapped around her, pinning her arms to her side. Shayla stomped on his foot and dropped straight down to the floor. She scurried under the table, keeping her head down so she didn’t knock herself out and give Herryk exactly what he wanted—a warm female body that couldn’t say no or fight back. Her left shoulder screamed from the weight she put on it. She tried to keep her weight on her good arm and shuffled toward the center of the table.

  “Deryck, help me, please.” She hated the break in her voice, but she needed to believe someone in the room didn’t want her dead.

  Deryck slapped the heavy chain against the floor again. “I can’t.”

  Where did the chain come from? It wasn’t there when Harry brought her into the temple. She hated being so far out of her element; everything they said and did confused her.

  “What do I do?”

  “Don’t let him talk, Shayla. He can’t work his magic if he can’t talk.” Deryck spoke slowly, calmly. It did nothing to calm her mind.

  Magic? She understood what she’d done to summon Marduk was a form of magic, but Herryk talked and what he wanted happened? It seemed awfully unfair in the light of all the blood she’d lost during the ritual.

  “I don’t need magic to get her under me, do I?” Herryk ducked under the end of the table, a smile on his lips. “You wanted me since you first saw me. Why else would you be so willing to go out after we met?” He leaned around the table leg and looked to where Deryck crouched. “You have a knack for finding the sluts.”

  “I found you, didn’t I?” Deryck’s upper lip curled.

  “I am what I am.” Herryk laughed. He seemed far more amused with himself than anyone else.

  Shayla scooted forward slowly, hoping not to draw attention. If the men wanted to talk, she’d be the last one to interrupt. She made it halfway across the shelter of the table before a rough hand clamped down on her ankle and wrenched it around, forcing Shayla to roll over or add a dislocated knee to her injuries.

  Instinctively, she kicked out and caught Herryk in the neck with the heel of her shoe. She pulled her foot back. Her shoe didn’t want to move and she jerked harder. It snapped back, like a sneaker breaking away from gum on a sidewalk. Blood spurt across her lower legs. Startled, she could only stare at the jagged hole in Herryk’s throat. He swallowed, tried to say something. The blood pumped harder. His grip on her ankle loosened. Shayla rolled toward the front edge of the table. Her ankle slipped free of his grasp, but her shoulder screamed in agony. It stole her breath, made the world dim around the edges. She tried to get her feet under her. They wouldn’t cooperate. She crumpled, knees bruised from hitting the hard floor, her injured arm cradled in her lap.

  “God damn it.” A sob caught in her throat. Tears flooded her eyes no matter how hard she fought them off.

  “Shayla,” Deryck called. “If you can scoot closer, I will help you stand.”

  She swiped at the tears blinding her and looked at Deryck, really looked at him. Shayla searched his face for the truth. Without his help, she’d be forced to do things she didn’t want to do with Herryk. After, he’d likely kill her and be done with it. She’d heard too much, though none of it made sense. But if they really were some kind of gods, they couldn’t allow a human to run around babbling about how one of them abducted, enslaved, and raped her. No, Herryk had to kill her. Marduk’s temple would become her tomb and no one would know. Her friends, what few she had, would never be able to say goodbye and bury her body. It’d be a necrotic wound, eating at them any time they saw something reminding them of her. Grief did that, haunted you better than any Casper knock-off. She knew all too well, it’d dogged her steps since the day Cyrus died—supposedly died.

  Deryck reached for her. The chain clinked softly. “Please, Shayla. Before he heals. And he will heal. It is very difficult to kill one of us.” He parted the bloody hole in his shirt to show her where Herryk had stabbed him. The wound had shrunk to a thin red blotch.

  She swallowed the panic rising in her throat. It wasn’t too surprising that they could heal fast, but seeing the proof further sealed her fate. “Okay.”

  As carefully as possibly, Shayla scooted over to Deryck. Her good arm shook by the time she made it and she wasn’t entirely sure her legs would hold her up any longer, certainly not in the heels. Reaching down, she unbuckled the straps and slid her shoes off; the right shoe left her hand stained dark red. Shayla wiped it off, adding to the mess covering her dress. The fabric clung to her hand. For a second, she thought she was going to throw up.

  Deryck’s arms came around her waist. Every muscle in Shayla’s body tensed. “I won’t hurt you.” His breath across the back of her neck did not help her relax at all.

  Gently, Deryck pulled Shayla to her feet. Her knees wobbled dangerously when she tried to step out of his arms. He caught her around the waist and cradled her against his body. If Deryck moved, she’d fall flat on her ass.

  She sucked in a deep breath and let it out slowly. The trembling in her legs slowed. Shayla took a half step away from Deryck, fighting hard to ignore the way the blood on her legs made them stick together. “Thank you, Deryck.”

  He kept a hand on her b
ack until she stepped out of reach. “You’re welcome. Shayla, you’ve got to run. Get out of here.”

  Where will I go? She didn’t dare speak the question echoing through her mind. Instead, Shayla nodded and took a step toward the only doorway in the room. What she did after she made it out of the temple was something she’d have to deal with when the time came. Priority number one was getting away from the psychotic, sex-crazed demi-god she’d injured. With each step she took, Shayla prayed Herryk stayed down for the count.

  “Not so fast, little girl.”

  The sound of Herryk’s voice stopped Shayla dead in her tracks. She didn’t want to turn around and face him. Likewise, she didn’t want him creeping up to grab her from behind. No matter what angle she looked at her situation from, she was screwed. Utterly and totally screwed.

  She glanced over her shoulder. Herryk used the edge of the table to pull himself upright. The front of his shirt was soaked; the flames at the back of the table reflected in the blood covering him from neck to navel. He shuffled her way, hands dragging across the gold, smearing it with red.

  “You won’t see the sky again, Shayla, we both know it. Make it easier on yourself and give me what I want. If it’s good, I may be convinced to spare you.”

  Despite the blood loss, he was still aroused. Her gaze fell on the front of his pants and would not move away. He stepped closer and closer. Her legs were slow to realize they should be running.

  Shayla turned toward the door and ran. She made it two yards and suddenly Herryk was there, blocking her path. Unwilling to let him touch her in any way, she backpedaled out of his reach and changed course back into the rear of the temple. Wrong way, wrong way, her mind screamed. Unfortunately, it was the only option left.

  Her big toe smacked into something hard and cold, sending whatever it was skittering over the floor. Shayla stopped and stared at the knife. This was her way out. But how would she grab it without Herryk knowing? An idea popped into her head and she knew she’d regret it.