Page 110 of Love to Defy You
A figure steps forward, and he lowers his hood to reveal himself.Enzo.
I lunge forward with a roar, but Mikhail is quick to pull me back. Enzo watches me struggle with a triumphant smirk, his dark eyes glinting in the flickering torchlight.
“Congratulations, candidates.” Enzo begins to pace the row, looking down at us over his nose. “You have completed five trials—Strength, Mortality, Lust, Hubris, and Envy—and tonight, you will prove yourselves worthy in your final test: the Trial of Sacrifice.”
Mikhail tightens his grip on my arms.
“In each trial,” Enzo continues, “you have come out victorious, thereby proving yourselves to be above the failings of mere mortals. Once you become a god, you must be ruthless to maintain the precious power bestowed upon you. You will be faced with difficult decisions, matters of life and death that require sacrifice. This is the role of the Order of Apollo, to infiltrate governments and corporations and maintain the world order, no matter the cost. We are gods among men.”
“In death, we become gods!” the room chants. “We are gods among men!” Their words reverberate around the room before settling into silence.
“Tonight, candidates, you will complete one final trial to prove yourselves worthy of joining our sacred brotherhood. You must demonstrate the ability to make sacrifices for the good of the whole.” He spreads his arm wide to gesture at the women on the raised platform. “Tonight, you will sacrifice your pythia to your brothers. And when you do, we will use their bodies as we please.”
One of the candidates—Weitzmann, the one who emerged from the cellar with his traumatized pythia at the Trial of Lust—doubles over and vomits on the floor. The retching sounds fill the tense silence of the chamber.
Enzo steps in front of me. I lift my head to meet his gaze, and the two of us remain like this, glaring at one another, as the seconds of silence tick by.
“Should you refuse to sacrifice your pythia,” he says, staring into my eyes, “you will forfeit your life instead.” A maniacal grin spreads across Enzo’s face, twisting into a psychotic caricature.
“Where”—I grit my teeth, which chatter as my body shakes with violent rage—“is Willow?”
“She’s safe.” Enzo continues to hold my gaze while grinning like a madman. “But no more interruptions, Aleksandr. I’ll get to you last.”
I lunge forward with a snarl, but Mikhail holds me back. With a cruel laugh, Enzo walks farther down the line, his hands clasped behind his back.
When he reaches the first candidate, the one who retched on the floor, Enzo gives him a wide berth to avoid stepping in vomit.
“So, Weitzmann, what will it be?” Enzo rubs his hands together. “Will you sacrifice your pythia, or will you die tonight?”
Weitzmann falls forward on his hands and knees and lets out a choked sob. “Please, don’t make me do this!”
“The clock is ticking.” Enzo taps his wrist. “Choose.”
This has to be a sick fucking joke. How is this allowed to happen? The Order has gone unchecked for centuries, taking what they want, but they will never be sated. Each brother grows bored with the power and wealth they’re given, and their entitlement encourages them to take more, more, more, until their fantasies become so dark and twisted that they sell their souls to the devil for a taste of the forbidden.
Snot drips from Weitzmann’s nose onto the damp cobblestone floor as he weeps, and he shakes his head. “I’m sorry, Anneleen. Forgive me...”
Enzo’s teeth gleam with his deranged grin. “You heard him, boys.”
The circle of hooded figures begins to move, and they congregate in front of Anneleen’s cross. A couple of the hooded figures unshackle her, and she falls unconscious into their arms before a horde of men converges on her, swallowing her up in a whirlwind of black cloaks.
Mikhail doesn’t join them. He remains kneeling behind me, and his nails dig into my skin when grunts and groans rise from the hive of figures.
Wherever Willow is, at least she’s being spared from this horror. But that’s my only consolation in her absence. If Willow isn’t here, where is she? Enzo says she’s safe, but I don’t trust a single word that comes out of his mouth.
As Enzo continues down the line, he offers the devil’s bargain to each candidate. Every single one of them chooses to sacrifice their pythia, and as soon as they utter the words aloud, masked men cluster around the next unwilling victim.
At last, Enzo reaches me, his face alight with utter madness, and places his hands behind his back. “Ever since Willow’s exquisite performance during the Trial of Lust, the brothers have looked forward to fucking that pussy most of all. I think you’ll agree, I couldn’t just throw our girl to the wolves like that.”
“She’s notourgirl.“ I spit on the ground at his feet. “Willow is mine!”
“Are you so sure about that?” Enzo bends over to come closer to my face. “In any case, I made alternative arrangements for your Trial of Sacrifice instead.”
Mikhail lifts his head. “What? The council never talked about this.”
Enzo ignores him and tilts his head to the side, grinning like a lunatic. “Let’s make a deal, shall we? If you want Willow back, you’ll have to go to Andarusia to get her.” His dark eyes glint in the flickering torchlight, as though the fires of hell burn withinhim. “If you succeed, you will have your fiancé and a place in the Order of Apollo. But if you fail, you die, and she becomes mine.”
I lurch forward to tackle him, but Mikhail flattens me on the ground as Enzo smoothly steps back. “LET ME GO!”
