Page 182 of Eldritch
“Connected in what way?”
He looked around the room. “Come. I’ve shown you what you’ve asked to see. You will return when I summon you.”
“No. I will not. Why are we connected? Who are you, and why do your afflictions look like my brother’s?”
Like a rabid animal, his demeanor snapped to something vicious. “I am the one who watched as you were violated. Tormented. Beaten and burned. I’m the one who commanded your hands to touch them when you couldn’t bear to look upon them yourself! I brought you here to spare you of such sights!”
“For what purpose? Why would you feel compelled …” A deep, cramping ache spread across Zevander’s stomach, and he pressed his palm there. Doubling over, he exhaled a shuddering breath. “Why would you …” The ache sharpened like the point of a blade tearing across his stomach, and Zevander let out a grunt, wincing as it ravaged his insides. “Want to…control …”
Across from him, Alastor also clutched his stomach, grunting as both of them fell to the floor at the same time.
Zevander clawed at his throat, the scalding burn beneath his skin gnawing its way to his chest.
“What have you…done, boy?” Alastor gritted out, across from him.
Pressure at his chest expanded behind his ribs, and he wheezed. As if he felt it, too, Alastor clutched his chest, gasping and wheezing.
“I…did…nothing.” The stone floor smacked against his cheek, as Zevander collapsed forward, desperately sucking in gulps of air that failed to fill his lungs.
Lying across from him, Alastor reached out a rough, tessellated hand. “If you die…I die,” he rasped.
It was in that moment, a dreadful realization settled over him and he was reminded of the stories his parents had told him. Stories of the mage who’d cursed him all those years ago and the pain he’d suffered from throwing Zevander into those flames as a baby. As he stared at the beastly man across from him, Zevander gnashed his teeth, furious of the trickery. The lies Alastor had told to conceal what rotting soul lived beneath his skin.
“Cadavros!” Zevander called out, before he was yanked into the blackness.
Zevander’s eyes shot open on a gasp of air.
Panic crinkled Theron’s face, as he stood over him, his voice a distant echo to the clamor of blood hammering inside Zevander’s ear. Only the occasional word filtered through.
“How did you…poison…for General Loyce…who gave…you weren’t supposed…you were dead.Dead!”
He focused on the last word as he stared up at the dark ceiling above him—nothing but a blur through the tears in his eyes. In the silence of his mind, he heard the soft pounding of hisheart. Felt the sting of his palms, where he’d clenched his fists earlier. The phantom ache of death lingering in his stomach. The burn of the poison he wasn’t meant to consume in his throat.
Shards of images cut through his thoughts—Cadavros, the imposter who’d claimed to be a friend, dying as he lay dying, his sister lying curled into his brother, his mother’s lifeless body cocooned, peaceful and protected from further horrors—and for the first time, he felteverything. Tears broke down his temples as he lay trapped in the fragile grasp of life.
He’d always imagined death to be the most painful experience of all, but it wasn’t.
Living was far more painful than dying.
CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX
ZEVANDER
Present …
Sitting in a chair across from the bed, Zevander watched his moon witch as she slept. He’d cracked the drapes earlier, allowing the silvery bands of moonlight in just enough to illuminate her face in the dark.
His mate.
He pressed the heel of his palm into the freshly sealed wounds at his chest, sinking into the memory of watching her succumb to pleasure, her head thrown back in ecstasy, hair wild and damp, as she raked those claws across his skin, whispering his name like a prayer. He’d torn across the world, had heard his cursed name in the dying pleas of men, the vicious roars of beasts, and the breathless moans of women, but not a single one had ever seared itself in his mind and flesh, had ever given it so much worth as when it’d been spoken by her.
He longed to tear the wounds open, to savor that raw, burning rapture all over again. To remind himself of the exact moment he’d surrendered his soul.
That she’d even imagine he’d dream of any other woman was laughable. No one would ever nourish his starving, ruined heart the way she did. He’d been trained by brutal hands to fuck a woman properly and expect nothing in return. Being with her was the first time Zevander had known pleasure through the pain. The first time someone had ever given without taking from him.
Maevyth. Her name stitched itself into the hollow of his chest, a suffocating chamber in his heart that only she could ever touch.
He loved her.
