Page 15 of Stealing Mercury
Drake stepped in front of his cage, pulling Mercury out of his thoughts. “You’re right,” said Drake. “I’m not going to kill you, but I am going to lash some discipline into that thick hide of yours. And you’re going to cooperate because we both know there are worse things I could do to your buddy while he’s out. Things you wouldn’t enjoy watching.”
Mercury’s stomach twisted. And he could feel the twitch of muscles in his neck, where he’d locked his jaw.
Drake laid the dart gun on a nearby crate. Then he went fishing in his pocket, pulling out a flex restraint. “Step up to the front bars, then turn around and reach your hands up through the top.”
Mercury warred with the instincts telling him to fight, hesitating for the briefest of moments, but he’d rather take the punishment himself than see either of his brothers suffer in his place.
The restraints slipped over his wrists and tightened.
The snap of the cage lock releasing echoed loudly in his ears and the grating of alloy on alloy, as the front of the cage swung wide, scraped at his guts. In that moment, nothing more than a thin strip of plasmold stood between him and freedom, and he knew that knowledge would haunt him. Thin, soft, malleable plasmold—a substance perfectly designed to be impossible to break by pulling. Experience had proven that hours of pulling with all his strength might make it stretch, but it wouldn’t break. Mercury had experienced Drake’s lessons often enough to know exactly what to expect. So, he stood motionless and readied himself to accept the pain.
The first strike of Drake’s whip crackled in the air and dealt a blow against his back that would have taken a human to his knees. But not Mercury. He visualized the pain rippling through his muscles and dissipating. Blowing out his anguish, he refilled his lungs with another deep, renewing breath of air. He waited for the next strike.
Focused as he was on the pain, he didn’t hear the footsteps.
The press of Drake’s hand on his shoulder blade broke his concentration and made his muscles jump in protest.
“There was a time,” Drake’s fingers traced lightly across his back as he spoke. “When I could count each strike I’d delivered by the scars left on your thick hide. Now there are too many.Layersof them.”
Mercury fought the impulse to pull away from the touch. The fascination in Drake’s voice crept across his skin like scurrying insects. The press of Drake’s fingers disappeared as unexpectedly as they’d appeared and he was back in position, lashing out with the whip before Mercury could prepare. The strike was poorly placed—it wouldn’t create as much of a gash—but it hurt as if it had been dipped in acid. It burned deep, spreading agony in a slow march in every direction.
The next two lashes faded in importance as Mercury pulled that place of peaceful resignation back around him like a familiar old blanket. Only now that he’d let the pain in, the blanket was threadbare, the pain more difficult to ignore.
The next time Drake approached, Mercury heard the footsteps and was ready for the touch. He’d added them to the things the blanket would keep out.
“Why did you do it, Mercury? Why fight back now? Was it because you have nothing to lose? Do you want to go to your final hunt wounded and weak?” Drake’s hand slipped along Mercury’s ribs in a caress that made a mockery of tenderness and had his skin crawling. “Or was it the woman? Some kind of protective instinct?”
Mercury refused to answer, but he failed utterly at controlling his breathing. He couldn’t help the panting that came from both pain and rage. The pain that had been dispersed by the blanket of his meditation now worked its way underneath and gripped him in aching pulses.
“You’ve never cared much for human women before. Or did moving Hera into your group’s cell soften you up? Pretty, submissive Hera. Born and trained to please, yet I don’t think you would have risked your neck or your flesh for her.”
That’s where Drake was wrong. He would have, still would, risk everything for Hera. Not because she was special to him, but because she was Carn’s mate.
Crack. The next lash took him completely by surprise. It pulled all the air from his lungs.Crack. Fuck, he had to focus.Crack.
With each new lash, Mercury channeled the pain into a moan pitched well below human hearing, so low that each one sent vibrations through his body and into the metal floor of the cage. Finally, he drowned out Drake’s words and regained control. It was too late to stop the pain, but he could keep his head high. Control his breathing.
Hide his agony.
Everything but the pain and his need for control faded away.
Distantly, he heard the clink of the cage door closing and he realized the lashes had stopped.
A yank on his hair tugged his head back. The movement sent spikes of pain through his shoulders and made him see spots. As his surroundings came back, he smelled blood. His blood. The feel of it, slick on his back and wet as it soaked into the waistband of his pants.
Drake’s breath puffed hotly against his ear. “I may be losing you and your merry men, but there will be others to train. It could have been yourpup.” He jerked hard, snapping Mercury’s head back. “Owens wantedyouto breed the bitch. He was even willing to sacrifice three good fighters to get them out of the way for you, but you had to screw it up. And now that Hera’s proven completely useless, Owens has promised to give Hera to the trainers.”
A different kind of pain hit Mercury in his gut and there was no way to control the gasp that accompanied it. He heard Carn’s whimper, like the ghost of a sound.
Drake chuckled cruelly. “That’s right. Hera is our fuck toy now... and our whipping girl.” He released his hold on Mercury’s hair and shoved his head forward. “At least that’s one bonus.”
Fuck, fuck, fuck. Not only had he failed his brothers, he’d been the cause of their deaths. And Hera alone in the care of the trainers—nothing could be more wrong.
***
Samantha woke, not with a start, but with a slow sense of dread. She uncurled herself from the small nook where she’d drifted off. Since Drake had left, she’d felt obligated to stay in the med-bay until Resler came around. He was a jerk, but even a jerk deserved the consideration of being told about his injuries.
As she stretched, a dull, grinding ache shuddered through her belly. Her head pounded and she couldn’t fight off the urge to cringe away from... stars knew what. She didn’t see or hear anything, but she feltsomething.
