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This was it.
I took a tentative step forward, and then another, pushing myself through my fear of returning to this spot.
What if this had all been a ruse, and I was about to be chained again?
The thought stopped me in my tracks, and Ruslan hesitated only a moment before folding me into his chest and stroking my hair and back. “Shh, sprite, I’ve got you.” I didn’t realize I was crying until the fabric of Ruslan’s tunic became wet beneath my face, and I forced myself to breathe. “You are so brave.”
He continued to stroke and whisper words of encouragement to me until I felt calm enough to break from his embrace. I swiped at my eyes, then opened them to the sight of a hundred candles and lanterns scattered around the space, casting light around the cave where I had been chained, raped, and abused. Ruslan’s black fire was intimidating, but I wanted to leave my own mark on the minds of these males, so I swapped each black flame for ones of brilliant white, so bright they were nearly blinding.
Thirteen males were chained and gagged, lined up side by side against the rough-hewn wall that was more familiar than my own face. Most were covered in dirt or blood or both, with scraggly hair and beards on some, while others lacked the layers of grime.
“How long did this take you?” I asked Ruslan as I stalked along the line of males, examining each of them closely as I passed, finally looking upon the faces of those who had hurt me.
“Too long,” Ruslan hissed, squatting next to a leather wrap and unfurling it to reveal an array of gleaming metal objects. They glinted in the white light cast by my flames, nearly as bright as Ruslan’s iron eyes as he plucked a wicked-looking knife from the leather. The male closest to him whimpered at the sight of the serrated blade, his eyes going wide with fear as Ruslan stalked toward him, flipping the blade over and over in his hand.The slice of the knife through the air sounded more like a death knell.
“You want them to know what it's like to live in darkness, like what they did to you?” His raspy voice held all the wickedness he showed to everyone but me, and the heat that pooled low in my belly was nearly shameful.
Ruslan stopped in front of the first male in chains and caressed his cheek with the sharp blade. With a few tentative steps, I joined them, gazing down on my former captor trembling with fear, a tear tracking down his cheek and ghosting over Ruslan’s blade. The smell of the unwashed males hid most of their scents, but the musky odor of the males who’d raped me was a scar on my mind just like the scars on my back from their iron-tipped whips. The blade paused just below his eye, and the one beside him widened his eyes as he waited to see what would befall his comrade. Down the line, the pathetic bastards trembled, and some even began pleading with us through the thick gags that robbed them of words.
“I do.”
My words were the permission Ruslan needed to carry out his task, and without warning, he sank the blade into the male’s dark eye. He screamed through his gag, muscles of his neck straining as he fought through the pain of Ruslan twisting the knife around in his eye socket, sending blood cascading down his cheek. As quickly as he entered, he yanked the blade back and plunged it into the other eye, permanently blinding him.
My stomach churned at the sight, but I held firm, needing to see this vengeance carried out. The male slumped forward, chest heaving, once Ruslan had finished with him, and the river of ruby running from his eyes began carving its path into the stone floor. One by one, Ruslan repeated the process, blood coating the faces of these males who had raped and abused me while chaining me in darkness. The metallic scent was nearlyoverwhelming when mixed with the smell of excrement, and I had to breathe through my mouth as my former prison filled with the noxious fumes.
Their screams were nothing compared to the ones I’d made, ones that left my throat raw until I learned to hold them back and float my mind anywhere else. Ruslan had not even breached the surface with what he planned to do to them, of that I was certain, and I hadn’t yet gotten a turn of my own.
Locking down my empath magic, I steeled myself against their anguish, not allowing their emotions to become my own, not when exacting pain in kind for what they had given me was so high on my priority list.
They had no mercy for me, and I would have no mercy for them.
Stalking to the roll of instruments, I selected a thin knife that looked like it would draw shallow cuts without killing them. These males would die, but I wanted to drag it out like they had so often done to me when they split open my back. “Strip them,” I ordered, glancing up from my weapon to Ruslan, whose sinful smirk held no objection.
“What my mate wants, she gets,” he crooned, crossing the length of chains that bound my former captors to the wall of this prison and selecting one of them at random. The guards around him all jumped, sending a tinkle echoing through the chamber as their irons shifted. Ruslan moved up and down the line, never giving them a chance to figure out who his next target was as he stripped them bare, leaving as much skin as possible exposed for me to carve.
The whimpers and pleas from the blinded males fell on deaf ears as I followed Ruslan’s game of psychological torture and selected one simply because he smelled like one who had raped me until I nearly fainted from blood loss. Carefully stepping over his bindings, I raised the knife a breath from his back, watchingas the hairs stood on end and goosebumps broke out across his flesh like a plague. He knew I was there, and he trembled with anticipation, ignorant to what pain I planned to inflict upon him.
And that was the sweetest revenge of all.
A slash drew a shallow cut across his shoulder that bled immediately, hitting at just the right angle to draw the most blood. His back arched, much like mine had when they’d whipped me, desperately trying to move out of the reach of my blade as I carved him like a roast.
Pathetic.
My former guards held none of my inner strength, for even I knew when their actions were inevitable and that lying down and biting my tongue were my best options for survival. Yet they still pleaded through their gags, veins in their necks popping from the effort, sweat rolling off of them as I not-so-accidentally caused their chains to clang while I navigated the space around them, delivering a shallow slice here and there.
The blood that spilled down their backs was not enough to atone for everything they had done to me.
I stopped at random among the males, carefully picking my way among the iron until I could lean down and whisper in his ear. “What would you do to stop the pain?” I asked, barely recognizing the sound of my voice when it was filled with teasing malice.
“An-an-anything,” he whimpered around the gag, garnet tears tracking over his jowls.
I threw my head back and laughed, the manic sound echoing off the domed ceiling of the hewn cave. Every one of them jumped, sending a sick satisfaction up my spine.
“It’s funny that you say that,” I purred, resting the sharp tip of the blade on his shoulder and lightly tracing it across his chest as I rounded to his front. “Because no matter how many timesIbegged, you never did.” The tip rested between two of his ribs,and I shoved it through the muscle. A cry ripped from his throat, short-lived as the air fled his lungs. He wheezed, thrashing against his bindings as he slowly began to suffocate.
Ruslan’s face glowed among the white firelight, watching me with a dark heat as I worked my way down the line again, enjoying every moment of torture I delivered to the guards. “You’re so fucking good at this, sprite. I want to see more of your darkness.”
He held out what looked like clawed prongs, and I accepted them, threading my fingers through the holes and snapping them open and shut with a sharp click. “What are these for?”
