Page 39 of Court of Evil

I glance down as a maze of intricate patterns forms in the sand with a circle in the middle. I drop to my knees below his body and pull the blade free, knowing and accepting the cost.

I sink the dagger into my heart, and agony tears through me as the blade plunges deep. My blood runs from the wound and down, staining the sand even as the wound seems to heal around the dagger.

Agony races through my body, tearing me apart as the dagger pulls free on its own and drops to the sand. The man above me groans, as do the shadows, as I bow over my open chest, feeling like I’m dying.

“Shattering the soul hurts,” he hisses behind me. “You must be strong enough to endure it.”

Panting, I glance back at the shadow with narrowed eyes. “I have endured worse. I do not fear pain.”

“Nor death,” it remarks. “You will do well.”

The sand cracks, and I glance back as a hand punches through it. It’s coated in blood.

My blood, I realise.

The claw-tipped hand turns towards me, and my body hardens in anticipation of the pain, but I cannot contain my scream.

My back arches as that bloodied hand reaches inside me, ripping through skin and muscle and reaching my soul.

“Endure it!” he roars. “You are strong enough. Find that strength, find what hides beneath you. Find what has kept you alive when others would have died.”

My eyes roll back in my head as the hand drags me into the air. My legs and arms dangle below me as I hover, my blood dripping steadily to the sand. My soul tears as the claws shred it.

Find it, find it.

Strong enough.

I am. I can endure this. I have to.

I repeat it over and over, even as it feels like I die a thousand deaths. I hold on, gripping onto my life with every fibre of my strength. Even as death comes for me, I roar in its face, refusing to go.

I can taste my blood, and I can feel it filling my eyes and ears. I feel like I am drowning in it as the hand twists inside me, pulling a shard of my soul free. It starts to pull from my chest, causing pure agony as it releases me.

I hit the sand with a thump, my strings cut. My eyes are open, but my body is unable to move as the hand moves up and sinks into the tempest above me. His back arches and his mouth opens on a harrowing scream as the glowing shard of my soul is pushed deep inside him.

The chains seem to hiss as my blood slides across the links, and I watch the tempest turn slowly in the chains until he faces me.

The hand pulls back, leaving a gaping wound in his bare chest, matching mine.

Both of us are dying. His blood steadily drips down, splattering my chest, and magic fuses into my skin. When I look down, I see my skin stitching back together over the wound. My muscles heal, and my bones snap back together. I look up just in time to see his eyes open and lock on me.

“Mistress,” he hisses, showing rows upon rows of sharp teeth, like a shark’s. There’s a roar, and I roll my head back into the sand as the barrier falls and the shadow rushes into the chamber. It brushes over me before plunging into the tempest’sopen mouth. He swallows the darkness, then his mouth snaps shut as the chains release him from the columns.

He falls through the air, plummeting to the sand.

He lands on his knees, blood-coated chains slithering across his skin like snakes as he kneels before me, his arms and legs trapped.

Climbing to my knees, I sway as the magic continues to heal me.

His skin is pale, like he has never seen sunlight, and he has more muscles than I have ever seen. He looks like the gods carved him, and my cheeks flame when I realise he’s naked. His cock stiffens and stands at attention, throbbing and leaking what looks like blood.

As I watch in fascination and horror, a chain slithers across his throat, wrapping around it multiple times to form a collar, and then it fuses together, solidifying and turning into metal. In the middle of it is the hunters’ symbol—a sign of ownership.

The man moans, his hips rolling as if he enjoys it, and I see blood seeping from the collar where it digs into his skin. Somehow, I know if I die, it will fall away, but it cannot be removed any other way.

No other can become his master now. I am until death.

“Mistress,” he hisses once more as he lifts his head. Big pools of obsidian stare up at me in hunger and want.

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