Page 12 of An Empress of Earth & Darkness

The big not so nice prick was entertained.

“Just shut up!” she screamed as he made their way through an opening in the old stone that led to a preparation room. A lot of the fighters used them before a match, but Torin never did like them much. It felt more like a cage before he was unleashed. And he liked to roam before a fight, letting the vicious energy of the crowd soak into his skin.

Walking in, he slammed the door shut and placed her down.

She fixed herself before straightening and pushing the wild hair from her face. His heart crunched as the last moments they had spent together seeped into his memory; he had swept the silky hair from her beautiful face, and she had looked at him like he was the only star in a sky full of darkness.

“Why are you in the fighting pits?” he said with a little more anger this time.

She shouldn’t be here; he couldn’t get carried away with the fact that she was.

She ignored his question and just stared at him, her lip a little swollen from someone’s blow.

White-hot anger poured into Torin’s veins. and his fingers flexed before turning into a fist. The amusement of her being here passed quickly and the startling reality of the danger she was in crept in, sobering his buzz. “I will not ask again, Emara. Why are you here? Who told you about this place?”

She swallowed, the truth lying thick in her throat, not willing to come out that easy. “I—”

Just as she began to speak, the door flew open and in bounced Artem Stryker and Gideon.

Not giving another thought, he grabbed Artem by the tunic and growled, “Why is Emara Clearwater down here? Huh? Did we not have a deal?”

Artem pulled at Torin’s hands, but he shoved him back against the wall. “Get the fuck off me, Blacksteel.”

He heard Emara squeal something, but the buzzing rage drowned her out. Before he could hit Stryker’s jaw, Gideon pulled Torin back.

“She’s here because of you,” his brother spat as Torin turned to face him. “Like you didn’t know that. She is here because of you. No one else.” A little venom washed over his tongue and then he glanced to where she stood—but only for a moment, because it was all he could bear. Her eyes. The hurt crept into her face as she tried to stand so proudly to mask it all.

He almost crumbled there and then.

But he fought it. He had to.

“Emara, you need to go,” was all he said.

“I don’t need to do anything I don’t want to,” she battled back, her voice losing the fight she had in it a few minutes prior. “I need to talk to you.”

“There is nothing left to say,” his ghost said to her without even looking at her face. “Why the fuck did you bring her here?” he asked his brethren, the yell vibrating off the ancient walls of the underground tunnels.

It wasn’t safe. Not for her. Not here. If one of these dodgy bastards got a sniff of who she was, he had no idea what they would do to sell her, kill her, or worse.

“You know how determined she can be,” Artem said, straightening his tunic sleeves that were covered in blood.

“I don’t care how determined she is. It is not safe for her down here and you both fucking know that.” He scowled at them both, and he could feel the veins in his neck pulling through his skin.

Emara took a few steps forward. “Let me tell you what’s not safe, Torin. Only having one guard in my unit.”

He shot her a cutting stare. “I told you to make the changes. Transfer someone else in.”

She blinked a few times and then continued, “What’s not safe is not having my guard trio in unity. Or a trio at all, in fact.”

She hadn’t picked another guard since poor Magin had been murdered, and one had not yet been appointed by the prime that had much more pressing matters to deal with. They were up to their balls in investigations due to the traitorous hunters who had chosen the Dark God over their oath.

“What’s not safe,” she added, that fire igniting in her eyes again, “is for you to be down here, in the underground of Huntswood, whilst my coven suffers the adversities of the Dark Army—”

“That is not my problem anymore.” A gust of muggy air swept through the room in a blanket of silence. “Take that up with Gideon.”

He shouldn’t have said that. He wanted it to be his problem. He wanted her protection to be his to manage. But it wasn’t. And it killed him, slowly.

She gathered herself before speaking. “You have made it abundantly clear that you choose to neglect your duty to me and my coven. It is evident that you have forgotten that you took an oath to protect my life. After you rooted your pledge to me in the soil of the Caledorna mountains—”

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