Page 1 of Dark Captivation

CHAPTER ONE

LIVY

Iwas shaken awake by the sound of wind rattling a window. Cupping my forehead, I took in my foreign surroundings.

I laid atop a canopy bed in a dimly lit room. Beautiful. It looked like something out of a fairy tale. The room was cold and quiet. The walls were a flawless white with gold spiral patterns trailing along the floor moldings.

Paintings adorned all four walls, showing scenes from bloody battlefields in foreign lands. They were dark and dreary: most displaying silver armor clad soldiers standing atop their bloody, decimated enemies.

I lurched myself up off of the bed, finger combed my hair back when reality dug in. Wait a minute. It was all coming back to me. The last thing I remembered was leaving through a portal with the Demon God. He promised me revenge on Payton, Chasten and Blake.

My mouth soured as their faces nestled in my head. Those bastards! They were the ones who killed my parents and they dared to keep it all a secret, denying me justice. It was them. They drove me here, right into the belly of the beast.

I jumped out of bed and skimmed the floor for my shoes. There were none, so I went over to the closet and rummaged through it.

Wherever I was, it was right where the Demon God wanted me. If he wanted me ‘here’, then ‘here’ was the last place I needed to be.

I was so furious and angry with the demi-gods that it clouded my judgment. What they did made me irrational enough to jump headfirst into a dark hole with the Father of Evil. What was I even thinking? This man was a criminal, committing hostile takeovers against wolf packs all over the world.

He wanted to rule the world. Nobody was safe from his greedy, power-hungry fingers. Not the shifters, mages or even the humans were safe from his twisted plans.

They were the ones who killed my parents. The moment I heard them admit to it, I was determined to have my revenge. But perhaps I was too hasty. I should have come up with a plan to kill the demi-gods while they were still injured. That would have been the best way to get my revenge, but instead, I let my anger get the best of me.

I wanted to hurt Chasten, Payton and Blake so badly that I called on someone powerful enough to help me, that I wouldn’t fail.

Before that, I was the prisoner of demi-god monsters. Now I was in even deeper shit than ever before. I was being held by the most powerful monster of them all, Malek.

I needed to leave, and fast.

I rummaged through the walk in closet. It was in disarray, a stark contrast to the immaculately clean room. A heaping pile of clothes formed a mound inside it, with hangers strewn about. It looked like someone ripped all the clothes down desperate to find just the right outfit for a party. Whose room was this?

I reached into the clothes mound and felt something strappy. I pulled out two pairs of heels, some flip-flops, then a pair of black sneakers.

A little big, but they’d do me just fine I thought as I drew the sneakers on.

The tap of light footsteps sounded, growing louder as someone seemed to approach the bedroom door.

Tightening my shoelaces, I made a break for the window. With no time to gather any supplies, I wrenched the window open and climbed out onto the ledge.

Thanking the gods that I was only on the third floor, my back hugged the concrete. I slowly inched along the ledge that lined the outside wall.

At the end of the ledge, I saw a metal gutter and grabbed hold, laddering myself down the side of the building.

My feet hit solid ground and I gave a sigh of relief, proud I’d made it this far. Malek was a millennia old god, and a king with millions of loyal subjects. It wouldn’t be easy to escape him.

The courtyard just outside the building had a lush garden with green grass and rose bushes popping up here and there. The expansive grounds were perfectly manicured with loving hands, not what I’d expected from a demon’s lair.

I turned to see the building was an enormous castle that cast a wide shadow over the quiet courtyard, giving the otherwise beautiful space a lonely and somber feel.

The Demon King had fancy taste. I supposed only a fool could live for thousands of years without getting fabulously wealthy. By the look of this place, Malek was not that fool.

A twenty-foot stone wall wrapped around the palace grounds, fortifying it from prying eyes. I skirted the wall until an opening came into view.

It was a small, well-guarded opening in this fortress of a place. The opening only went far enough across to allow one car in or out at a time. A tall, shiny steel gate laid wide open like sleeping wings.

Though the gate was open, an electric boom arm formed a barrier to outgoing traffic. The boom went up and down allowing cars through.

Five tall, muscular guards in black uniforms with navy-blue caps stood at the gate. The guards appeared human but that didn’t fool me. They smelt of sulfur, they had to be demons.

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