Page 32 of Bitten By Chaos

Immediately, I found myself in the cavernous throne room where the queen sat alone and in her glamoured form on the sharp quartz seat. She rose the moment I appeared and rushed down the steps from the dais to meet me.

“You’ve brought me the heart,” she stated as numerous twiglike creatures melted off the dark, twisted walls ringing the room.

I held out the box, which she snatched from my fingers, throwing open the lid. Her eyes glittered with delight as she yanked the thing from inside and cast the box to the ground like trash. She raised it to her nose and inhaled like it was the first flower of spring then giggled with glee, actually bouncing on her slippered feet.

“Behold the heart of my enemy!” she screamed, hoisting it into the air.

All around, a chorus of cheers rang out as dozens upon dozens of creatures of all sorts filed into the room from winding tunnel pathways as though somehow summoned. The roar of the crowd reached a crescendo as the queen floated straight up to better be seen with her prize. Hoards of goblins, nymphs, and strange creatures I had no name for pressed in from the sides, making the space feel like a fraction of the size it actually was and forcing me forward almost beneath the queen’s feet.

I had the mad urge to grab her ankles and find a way to drag her back to the vampire estate, but even if I could reach her with a jump, we’d surely drown in a sea of her minions.

“I wish to make a speech,” the queen yelled, and the entire crowd hushed. “For eons, the demons have been jealous of our superior skill and magic.”

A brief cheer as she paused.

“They’ve tried many tactics over time. The closest they ever came was when they stole the sword of souls from our smith.”

Soul Eater was a fae weapon?

“But it was crafted by fae hands, and its full power will never be successfully wielded by anyone with lesser magic.”

Another roar from the crowd as I was jostled around beneath the queen. A part formed as several twig people stepped aside and a moment later, Bres, the king of the unseelie court appeared, tail dragging behind him.

“And now I shall finish the demon rule with a curse,” the queen continued, lowering the heart to eye level. “And you shall call me The Devourer.”

“What’s she saying?” I whispered as Bres sidled up next to me. He wasn’t my favorite person, but he had killed the general, saving me from being crushed.

Bres glanced at me, clearly annoyed. “She curses any demons left, and when she eats the heart of her enemy, they all die.”

“No!” I screamed as she opened her mouth larger than should be possible, revealing rows of tiny, pointed teeth.

An entire race destroyed by consuming the heart I’d offered her? I’d learned the hard way that all vampires weren’t monsters, and I refused to assume all demons were as well. The Board was gone now—there was no need for any of this. I couldn’t live with having contributed to the genocide of an entire species, bargain or no. I leaped into the air, pushing hard against the ground and knocking the heart from her hand where it flew over the heads of the crowd and disappeared among them, causing an immediate panic.

Her highness’ face contorted into one of monstrous rage, jaw still unhinged, and teeth poised to take a bite of whatever was in her way. It was then I noticed I wasn’t falling back to the ground. Instead, I was floating directly in front of her. I tried to swipe at her neck with my nails, but my arms dropped to my side, legs pulling together as though bound. I couldn’t so much as open my own deadly mouth in protest.

“Bring me the heart,” she commanded Bres as we both floated to the ground. The next moment the crowd was gone, silence clinging to the air. It took a second to understand that it wasn’t them that moved but us as we were now in a hollowed-out room filled with glowing moss and florescent purple mushrooms the size of cushions.

The queen reclined on one of the mushroom caps and beckoned, causing me to float stiff as a board toward her, still suspended in the air by a foot or so. “You have been nothing but a nuisance, psychic. And since I’ve now defeated the demons, or I will shortly, you are no longer valuable to me as anything but entertainment.”

She flexed a finger and I dropped to the ground on my knees.

“You will suffer for embarrassing me,” she promised, snapping her fingers.

A crystalline collar decorated with small stalagmites surrounded my throat so tightly that I would have choked had I still been human. Heavy chains bound my wrists and ankles, connecting back to it and weighing me down to the floor.

Leaning toward me, the queen smacked me across the face, nails tearing across my cheek. “I wonder how long it will take Bres to retrieve the heart.” Her tone was one of boredom, but she wrung her hands together in the air and every bone from my shoulders down through my fingers snapped at once, wrenching a scream from the depths of my soul.

I lay twisted on the ground, wildly searching around me as I tried to make sense of what had just happened as my arms knitted themselves back together with my vampire healing. And then just as I was able to climb to my knees…my ribs and vertebrae shattered, blinding me with agony beyond anything I’d ever experienced. And so it continued, the queen waiting until I was nearly healed and then pulverizing another section of my body.

My healing abilities had slowed considerably as my blood energy was used, and I lay splayed over the moss covered rock, my fractured pelvis worked on mending, when Bres finally entered the cavern. One hand clasped the heart, the other stayed behind his back as he bowed before the queen.

Moving was torture, but I had to do something. Slowly, I reached inside the remnants of my top and pulled out the thing Merlin had dropped there. It was a tiny vial of blood. His, no doubt, and spelled to keep its scent hidden. Under any other circumstances, I would burn it, but maybe this tiny bit could help me recover enough to do something…

The queen snatched the organ from Bres’ palm as he watched her carefully. Neither cared anything for what I was doing, so I tugged the cork out with my teeth and sucked it dry. The taste nearly made me moan, but I choked that down and lifted myself up on my palms, finding my voice.

“Please,” I begged Bres. “Don’t let her do this.” He was the unseelie king, and the queen’s enemy. He wasn’t likely to dole out kindness, but perhaps I could convince him to refuse her what she wanted out of spite.

The queen’s glare preceded the onslaught of all-consuming pain by a mere moment. And I lay broken and limp on the ground yet again, out of breath even to scream as she licked the surface of the awful thing.

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