CHAPTER 5. Skye finally returned, smelling of roast venison

Skye finally returned, smelling of roast venison. Paenther’s stomach rumbled even as he watched her, drinking his fill of the sight of her. Her hair and dress were damp, as if she’d been caught in the rain. Her quiet, delicate beauty did something to him, flowing through him like a calming river even as it heated his blood.

Once again, animals surrounded her, though a different collection than before. As before, she ushered the smaller animals into a pair of cages and tied the doe with a rope at the wall. Then she came to him, her eyes at once troubled and lit with a warmth that slid softly across his heart.

“I brought you something.” But as she pulled the wrapped venison out of her pocket, her gaze went to his wrists, sticky with his blood. Her brows lowered unhappily. “You’ve been struggling.”

“Always.”

Her eyes pleaded. “Accept your fate, warrior. There’s nothing else you can do.”

He shook his head. “Never quit fighting, little witch. It means the death of your soul.”

Those troubled eyes of hers darkened as she unwrapped the meat in her hand. “I thought you might be hungry.”

“I am.”

She gave him a rueful frown and cocked her head. “Are you going to bite me again? ”

“No.” He thought of the way she’d curled around her injured arm after he’d attacked her, the blood soaking her dress. “I’m sorry for that. I thought you deserved it. I’ve changed my mind.”

Her mobile mouth shifted into a semblance of a smile as her eyes softened. “I’m glad.” She held the meat to his mouth for him to take a thick, juicy bite.

She stroked his chest with her free hand, nearly making him purr. Yet even as she touched him without wariness, he smelled fear in her. He could hear it in the racing of her heart.

“I won’t bite you, Skye.”

Her gaze flicked to his. “I believe you.” She tried to feed him again, and he shook his head.

“You first. You’re too thin.”

“I’m not hungry.”

He scowled at her. “I find that hard to believe.” But those shadows in her eyes were darkening. “Tell me what’s the matter.”

She caught her bottom lip between her teeth and looked away. “Nothing.”

“You’re afraid.”

“I’m fine.”

“Are you afraid of Birik? ” Her tiny jerk at the mention of his name told Paenther what he wanted to know. “He’s threatened you again.”

“No more than normal.” She met his gaze, unhappiness etched into every line of her face. “This time he’s threatened you.”

“How? ” Paenther’s jaw clenched, his muscles flexing against his bonds. He was all for a battle, but to fight, he had to be free.

“I don’t know. He said the energy we raised wasn’t enough, but when I offered to try again, he said no. He had something else in mind. It can’t be good.”

Paenther captured her gaze and held it fast. “Get me out of here, Skye. I’ll take you with me. You’ll be safe from him.”

“And where would you take me? Your people have been at war with mine forever.”

“What difference does it make? He wouldn’t beat you anymore.”

She shook her head, fisting her hand on his chest. “I can’t leave. I don’t have a choice.”

“We all have choices, Skye.” He stared into her eyes, willing her to hear him. His life might depend on it. “Whether we choose to face them or hide from them defines who we are. Whether we choose to let evil live, or we fight to destroy it, defines our lives. Choose, Skye. Choose.”

A spark of temper lit her eyes. “You don’t understand.”

“Skye…”

She pulled away from him. “You can’t possibly understand! I have fought him. Over and over I’ve fought him, and all I’ve done is end up bloody and broken. He’s too powerful! And his reach is too long. Even if I managed to get away, and I wouldn’t, he’d hurt me until I begged to come back to him just to end the misery.”

“I’ll protect you.”

“You can’t! ” She whirled and fled the room, his dinner still in her hand.

“Skye! ”

He waited, praying she’d return, but she didn’t. He cursed himself for a fool. She was his only hope of escape, his only company other than the animals chirping and whistling with agitation in the cages in the corner. He’d pushed her too hard, too fast, and scared her away.

He was still kicking himself for it sometime later when he heard heavy footsteps in the passage outside the room. The moment the pale-haired Birik stepped into the room, a green snake curled around his neck, Paenther knew this was it. The time had come.

Though for what, he didn’t know.

The Mage studied him with dark curiosity. “Tonight’s your big night, Feral. A night you’ll never forget.” The Mage reached for him.

Paenther fought to free himself, struggling against his chains, but there was nothing he could do to stop the cold press of the bastard’s palm to his chest.

Or to stop himself from spinning into the net of enthrallment.

“Wake up, B.P.”

Paenther heard Vhyper’s voice as if from a distance. The hard kick to his ribs sent pain shooting through his body, propelling him into the thick, mind-sludge of partial enchantment.

Impressions bombarded his struggling brain. He could tell he wasn’t alone with Vhyper by the murmur of other voices and the squawk of crows. Smells drove into his senses. Old blood, new fires, and violets.

Skye.

As before, he was on his back, but the rock beneath him felt different. Cool puddles of water gathered beneath his left calf and right shoulder. He tried to move, but he was caught as firmly as before, the chains clanking on the rock beneath his head.

Finally, his vision broke free. As he looked around him, he saw that everything had changed. He was on the floor this time, in a different, larger room within the cavern. A room that was dark except for a small shaft of moonlight breaking through from high above and the glowing embers of banked fires in vessels scattered around the room.

Though the floor was bare, the walls glowed with whitewash and graphic symbols he recognized as part of the ancient language of the Mage. Among the symbols, he knew only one. Sacrifice.

The rage that lived in his blood boiled over. He was not an animal to be chained and slaughtered! He struggled against his shackles. With a furious growl, he called on the power of the animal inside him and once again tried to shift. Like before, nothing happened.

“Fight it all you want, ” Vhyper drawled, standing at his side, his voice floating down from high above him. “You aren’t going anywhere, B.P.”

With his furious gaze, he searched the room. At one end stood nearly a dozen Mage sorcerers in ritual robes.

Ritual robes. Goddess, he smelled layers and layers of old blood in here. Was his about to coat these stones, too?

He searched for Skye and finally found her in the corner, stroking the agitated deer.

Vhyper squatted beside him, his forearm on his knee, his gaze on Skye. “She’s a pretty little piece, isn’t she, with those big doelike eyes? I told her you were a sucker for a damsel in distress. Wasn’t that how Ancreta trapped you all those years ago? ”

Paenther’s eyes narrowed as he tore his gaze from the woman to look up at the man who’d once been his friend.

A malicious smile hovered at Vhyper’s mouth. “I told her all she had to do was play the victim, and you’d be eating right out of her hand, giving her whatever she wanted.”

Play the victim? A chill of foreboding rolled down his spine.

Vhyper shrugged. “Birik may have overplayed his role a bit when he beat her. He’s been doing a shitload of groveling to make it up to her, but I hear the ploy worked like a charm. You not only let her fuck you, but you helped her enjoy herself.” He grinned and pretended to high-five him. “Way to go, B.P.”

Paenther stared at him. He was supposed to believe that beating was an act? A lie to gain his cooperation? No way in hell. He’d seen the bastard’s face. He’d seen the pain and bleakness in Skye’s. No woman could be that good an actress.

That chill in his spine leached into his blood.

Except perhaps a witch.

With a bit of magic, she could make him believe he was seeing whatever she wanted him to see, couldn’t she?

Hell. Denial roared through his head. Had he really been taken in all over again?

Or was Vhyper the one lying? How in the hell was he supposed to know? The only thing he knew for certain was, he couldn’t trust either of them.

And if this night ended as he feared it might, it wouldn’t matter. Nothing would matter once he was dead.

The smoke of the banked fires teased his nose. He stared up into his old friend’s eyes, a growl grumbling deep in his throat as he saw no glimmer of the Vhyper he knew.

“Am I staked out for slaughter? ”

A cruel smile slashed across Vhyper’s face. “What fun would it be if you knew what to expect? ”

“You’ve turned into a bastard, Vhyper.”

“Oh, I’ve turned into a lot more than a bastard, B.P.” Vhyper rose. “Looks like it’s time to begin.”

As the Mage circled the perimeter of the room, Skye stood. With quick, nimble hands, she pulled off her dress and tossed it aside as if perfectly at ease with her nudity among so many men.

He stared at her and knew he was watching a stranger.

Birik came up behind her and pulled her back against him, one hand covering her breast, the other diving between her legs.

Paenther’s gut clenched with shock. His breaths became labored as he watched with disbelief as the bastard fingered her, working that supple body he’d lost himself in twice now, until she rocked against his hand, trembling. Enjoying it. She was enjoying it.

His mind exploded. She’d tried to mount him last night, cold and dry. It doesn’t matter. Because she hadn’t wanted him. Not him.

And he knew, he knew, what was going to happen. Birik wanted her to ride him again, but he had to prepare her himself since, clearly, clearly, she couldn’t get there on her own. Not with a shape-shifter. Not with him.

Damn her.

But it was him she needed, him with his animal. So she’d played him with her sad eyes and pretense at vulnerability until he’d helped her fuck him.

Anger blazed through him, a fury as raw as it was ancient. A fury turned on himself as much as her. How could he have fallen for a witch’s pretense of woe twice?

Birik finally released her. Without once meeting his gaze, she crossed to where he lay staked and stood over him, one foot planted on either side of his waist. In the shadows between her legs, her flower had opened, and the scent of her arousal blasted his senses, sending the blood flowing into his shaft in a throbbing rush.

Her eyes and expression were closed as she stood there, trembling, her heart racing. But no longer did her delicate beauty pull at him. It was all a lie. She was a lie. His chest ached, the flicker of warmth she’d sparked inside him sputtering beneath the mounting evidence of her deceit.

He struggled against his chains, determined to fight her every step of the way, though he knew with a despair born of bitter experience, his body would betray him. No matter how much his mind hated, his body would always struggle for release when buried inside a woman’s sheath. He’d never been able to keep from coming when Ancreta had him trapped inside her.

And he stood even less of a chance with the witch standing over him now, whose scent drove him to distraction even when she wasn’t aroused.

The witch began to chant, her melodious voice rising in volume until it echoed off the rock. Slowly, her lithe, graceful body began to move, gyrating to the rhythms of the chant, her small breasts softly swaying, raising the temperature of his blood.

In the corner, the deer cried out, then went suddenly silent. He looked at the witch’s face, feeling a twist of empathy for the grief he expected her to feel, but her expression had turned as cold and lifeless as stone. Something shriveled inside him at this proof she was nothing more than a cold, calculating bitch, like all Mage witches.

Birik strode to her, a bucket in his hand. She didn’t startle, didn’t even flinch when Birik tipped it over her head, letting the blood run into her hair and over her bare shoulders.

She’d expected this. With a kick to his gut, he knew this was the reason she’d brought the animals into the cavern in the first place. To dance in their blood.

Hatred seared his mind. She’d had him so completely fooled.

With sick fascination, Paenther watched Skye slide her hands over her breasts and abdomen, slicking her palms. Then she squatted over him and took his swollen shaft in her hand, coating him with the sticky warmth.

He went feral, his fangs elongating, his claws unsheathing as he snarled, fighting his body’s traitorous response to her as much as he fought the woman herself.

But she barely looked at him as she guided him between her legs.

As he had so many times with Ancreta, he tried to buck her off him, but the witch was too well coordinated, moving with him, refusing to be denied. She forced him inside her. Despite Birik’s ministrations, her body was still too tight, but nothing on her face reflected the discomfort.

There was nothing he could do to help her. Nothing he would do even if he could. He wanted her to hurt. Damn her.

Slowly, she began to ride him, resuming her chant as around the room, the sorcerers joined their voices to hers until the sound pounded a thunderous beat echoed in Skye’s movements.

A beat echoed by his own heart.

The chant pounded in his blood and in his shaft, the power rising until the hair on his head felt like it was trying to stand on end. Above him, Skye’s short hair was lifting, as if she’d stepped into an electrical storm. Above her, the orbs he hadn’t noticed before pulsed with dark light, growing.

As the power rose higher, the blue-eyed witch began to gasp, her gasps quickly turning to small screams of pleasure.

The pleasure had him in its grip, too, flowing through his chest and limbs, tightening every muscle, every blood vessel, as desire and pressure built in his cock to a fevered pitch. His body climbed to heights that appalled him until he was driving into her as desperate for the coming explosion as he’d ever been for anything.

His mind rebelled, horrified at the sexual fire burning his body in the midst of such savagery. But the power in the room was driving him now, driving them both. And there was no fighting it.

With a scream, the witch came. As her hard, rapid contractions drove him to a blinding release, his gaze caught Birik’s. The bastard stood over them, watching Paenther utterly lose control, his face a mask of deep arousal, his eyes alive with anticipation. Crawling with evil.

Paenther snarled. Hatred burned inside him as he spilled his seed.

A roar filled the room, turning the air hot and wild until it singed his lungs and scorched his skin. Pain ripped through his body on a sudden tide of fire.

A scream echoed through the walls from beyond, drawing Birik’s shout of triumph.

Caught in the clutches of the pain, Paenther barely noticed when the chanting ended, and the men rushed from the room, leaving him alone with Skye. He stared up at her, at the face he’d once thought beautiful, now covered in blood, her eyes closed, her expression tight with pleasure…or pain. Hatred burned low in his gut as the sharp pain slowly died away except for a throbbing sting across his left eye.

Skye rose, lifting off him unsteadily as she tried to stand, only to collapse by his feet where she lay on her back, gasping.

He didn’t know how long they stayed like that, lying in the moonlight and dying embers, amid the blood, their flesh rippling with the remnants of power.

Neither spoke. There was nothing to say.

Yet again, he wondered what Birik meant to do with the power they’d raised.

Birik finally returned, lightwicks floating above him. He strode to Skye and lifted her into his arms.

The bitch wrapped her arm around the Mage’s neck as he carried her from the room, leaving Paenther chained and alone. With little hope, he strained against his shackles, pouring everything into freeing himself. Useless. He remained trapped as completely as any caged beast.

Outside the cavern room, a single bloodcurdling scream ripped at his eardrums, followed by triumphant shouts and cheers.

Dread knotted deep inside his chest. Goddess help him. What evil had they unleashed?

♥ Uploaded by Coral ♥