Page 10 of Chaos Unleashed

Farren

My eyes are sharp on my surroundings, my back against the cold stone wall. Unfortunately, I am far too fucking familiar with this damn cell. I’m in pain, but that’s the least of my fucking worries right now. In fact, the pain is familiar, it's helping to keep me grounded and to keep the panic at being back in this place at bay.

Barely.

He brought me here after slicing my throat, I'm not dead, but it hurt like a fucking bitch. He’s playing with me by simply leaving me here. I know he is, and I’m surprisingly a hell of a lot calmer than I thought I’d be. Which is a good job because I need to keep my wits about me so I can escape. I’ve done it once, and I will do it again.

I have already tried the same little hack that I used last time to escape after the voice told me, but they clearly figured that out because it didn’t work. Thinking of the last time I was here makes me think of Grey, which automatically makes me think of the other guys, and a pang of pain pierces my nearly pierced heart. I can’t reach them through our bonds, and the pain of not knowing if they’re okay and of needing them is not something that I’m used to dealing with or dealt with last time, and it certainly adds another dimension to this whole situation.

I wouldn’t say I like it.

Stupid feelings.

In order to distract myself from my spiralling thoughts about the guys I try to get into the Void again, only to hit a proverbial brick wall. I have tried every ten minutes to get into the Void since I arrived, and I haven’t been successful. Each time I try, it gets more and more painful when I hit the wall that’s stopping me from entering it. I don’t know how long I’ve got before I get really sick. I didn’t have this problem last time I was here, and I can only assume that it was because I wasn’t as connected to the Void as I am now. It’s a worry that I don’t have the time for and a bridge I will cross when I get to it.

I need to move. I’ve been crouched against this wall for far too long, and my legs are starting to cramp. I can’t risk being presented with a chance to escape and tripping over my own feet because my legs have gone numb; that would be a really stupid way to die and one that I will make sure that I never live down.

Not that I’ll live because I would’ve died tripping over my own feet, and then I’d be trapped here forever because the dead never leave the Underworld. This may be a happy forever for those that deserve it but I will be in the burning for eternity side, and I have enough bad memories of this place that it will be hell even if by some miracle I don’t end up in that side.

For fuck sake, I chastise myself internally as I yet again go off on a tangent that has no real bearing on the situation at hand.

The wound on my throat is healing a lot slower than it should, thanks purely to the kind of blade that the fucker used, but it is healing and has healed enough that I can at least breathe a little bit easier. I can’t stay still any longer. I have no idea how I’m going to get the fuck out of here. I start to pace, missing Poca immensely, as he always loves to pace with me. The best that I’ve come up with so far is that I need to wait, bide my time, and hope that they slip up, either while they’re taking me to be tortured or monologuing about something because all of them are pathetically predictable in that sense.

The plan is simple and hinges a hell of a lot on luck, which can be hit and miss with me, so there’s no telling whether this is going to work in my favour or not. I don’t stop pacing. Movement feels better than staying still; I can almost trick myself into thinking that I am being productive and not stuck in a damn cage.

Again.

I have spent a good portion of my life in a fucking cell, and I am so over it. I will burn them all when I get out of here. That’s completely irrational and impossible to do, but thinking about it makes me feel better and also allows me to push back at the panic that’s trying to drag me under. I can panic later.

I start to go over things that make me calm, like my weapons, which always calm my nerves. I flick through each of these images, studying them closely and allowing them to calm me. I’m entirely unsurprised that all the guy's faces appear among my usuals.

Chapter Four

Farren

I have no idea how long I’ve been pacing, but it must have been for a while because my wound has healed. I’m now just left with a phantom ache that probably won’t go away any time soon. The stiffness of my blood-soaked clothes is really starting to piss me off now, but the reality is that it’s the least of my problems.

That point is amplified as I hear heavy footsteps echo down the dark, damp corridor that leads to my cell.

A sharp shudder of fear runs down my spine. This is going to hurt, and it may kill me. I know I pissed them off when I escaped the first time, and they’d want to torture me on that premise alone, but I have a feeling that they want me for more than that, although I can’t for the life of me figure out why. Unless I was sent to kill someone that they loved, but I don’t think the evil fucks are capable of loving anyone, except maybe Azreal; he’s always seemed slightly different than the others and never participated in anything else that the other Princes put Grey and me through.

“Oh, Farren,” Dagon sings, his voice grating on my nerves.

I stop pacing and turn to face the bars of my cell; they’re spelled, and it's impossible to touch them without being in excruciating pain. Pulling my shoulders back, I push all thoughts out of my mind and blank my expression as I sink into that dark part of me that thrives on blood, pain, and fear.

The familiarity of it brings me peace, which I’m aware it really shouldn’t.

The eldest prince comes into view; I knew he’d be the first to visit; he’s incredibly impatient.

Dagon’s green-tinged skin doesn’t detract from his good looks, which he uses to his advantage all the time to get supes to trust him before he gets what he wants from them and then ends them in the most gruesome ways possible. To me, he just looks like a fuck boy.

He is strong though, I’ll give him that, and he's built like a fucking house. I mean, he is ginormous, and although I am not entirely sure what species he is, as he is native to the Underworld, I at least know that he is part Demigod, which is why he is one of the Princes of the Underworld. I don’t really know much about the hierarchy here, especially since Hades disappeared, but I do know that the princes are at the top.

“Nothing to say to me?” Dagon asks, his reptilian slit eyes narrowing at me. “Could it be? Are you actually going to cooperate with us? That would be a shame.”

I don’t move; I don’t even allow my face to twitch, let alone make an expression, despite how much I want to sneer at him and curl my lip in disgust. There’s no point, he doesn’t give a shit. In fact, he would be proud beyond measure that he was getting to me.

“Nothing?” he tuts, seeming disappointed. “How about this? I’m going to ask you some questions, and you’re going to tell me what I want to know.”

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