Page 124 of The Crimson Walls Of Algorath

Azriel glared at her, lip curling in disgust. “I see you’ve been having fun.”

Melia ignored him. “I do admit my displeasure at losing a bet. I had quite a bit of coin put on your death. I suppose the Princeps of Valenul will be pleased with his payment, even if it cost me dearly.”

“Did you call me up here to scold me for living?” He crossed his arm, irritation growing. “Or are you trying to get me to drink some more spiked blood?”

Another laugh, like bells on the wind. “Oh, I’d forgotten how funny you can be. No wonder I’d lost myself to you for so long. Quite the sly fox, you are.”

He didn’t respond. There was no reason to do so. Their history together belonged exactly where it was—in the past. Nothing she could say or do would ever convince him otherwise, though he doubted that was her intention.

No, she’d likely drummed up something new with which to torture him.

“I have something to show you,” Melia said after a moment, “or rather…someone.”

Azriel frowned. He couldn’t remember much about the end of his last fight in the Pits, only that Ariadne had been there. She’d been the only reason for his survival. The way her command struck his bond had moved his body like a puppeteer. He hadn’t known what he was doing until he’d done it—hadn’t felt his body move until it was over. He’d been driven entirely by the bond’s will to heed her words, and when he’d searched for her after, she’d disappeared.

Had Melia seen her? Azriel’s heart sank into his stomach. That same bond that kept him alive stretched into the light, searching for any sign of her. But if she was here…What did the Desmo have planned?

“Melia…” He scanned the room, searching for any sign of what was to come.

She snapped her fingers, and another guard swept into the room, cradling something in her arms. A familiar scent hit Azriel like a punch to the gut. The scent of the bloodstain sharpened into focus. Paerish’s eyes widened, and they looked at Melia in shock as they spoke. At least, he assumed that’s what they did. Their mouth moved, after all.

But Azriel didn’t hear it. The words were lost, too far away, too distant for his ears to register. For a long moment, all he could do was stare at what the guard set on the low table between them. All he felt was the world’s crushing weight.

His bond screamed. He screamed. Every fiber of his being screamed.

Ariadne’s decapitated head lay on the table, her long dark curls swept across her still-open, oceanic eyes. The pale skin, webbed with blue veins along her jaw, held the gray tint and decay of a day’s old death. Dried blood lingered under her nose and at the frays of her severed neck.

Azriel threw himself to his knees, scrambling to grab the rotting head of his wife. The flesh peeled back from the bone, soft and malleable beneath his touch. That perfect skin he’d spent so many nights worshiping now slid like wet clay in his hands.

He clutched the head to his chest and rocked back onto his heels with a low, keening cry. His soul shattered, drowning him in a sea of agony so consuming from which there was no return. It choked him. Crushed his chest. Burned his very being to ash.

Hot tears swelled, blurring his vision and washing down his face. His body shook as he rocked back and forth, the world falling into oblivion around him.

“Kill me,” he breathed, stroking back the hair from Ariadne’s face as he’d done so often. The strands separated from her flesh with the motion. “Just kill me, Melia.”

After all, he was half-vampire. He had a chance, slim though it might be, that he’d be let into Empyrean after her. It was worth risking. Anything would be better than spending another breath in a world where Ariadne didn’t exist.

“Are you begging?” Melia’s voice was razors in his ears. “I like it. Beg.”

“Please…” He dragged his gaze from his wife’s unseeing eyes to look at the woman he hated most in the world. “Please. Kill me. Don’t make me live without her.”

Melia stepped around the low table and crouched beside him. Her silver eyes sparkled, brows pinched. When she spoke, her voice was low and soft. “No.”

“Please!” He sucked in a burning breath, but it shoved out of him fast and loud as he sobbed. “Please…”

“No, darling, I don’t think I will.” She stroked Ariadne’s hair.

Azriel lurched away with a snarl. How dare she touch her? He stared at her through the blurry clouds and encroaching darkness at the edges of his vision.

Melia smirked. “I think I’ll make sure you live for a very long time.”

“No…” he breathed. He’d find a way. Someone in the training yard would be willing…right? He didn’t need her. He’d almost succeeded once before. He could do it again.

“I want you to suffer,” she hissed, grabbing the horn nearest her and forcing him to look at Ariadne again. “And I never want you to forget what she looks like right here, right now. This is your doing. This is your fault. This is what you deserve.”

His heart broke again and again. He tried to fix Ariadne’s hair, but it only fell away from her scalp, twisting into his fingers. When he pressed his lips to her forehead, it was cold and horribly soft. It only served to crack him wider, tearing at him from the inside.

Melia stood. “Take it away from him. Throw it out with the rest of her. I don’t want that mess in my house anymore.”

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