Page 24 of Magpie
“You say you wish to feel again? They can make you feel. They can light you ablaze with it.”
My eyes go wide at his declaration, at the tempting promise held within.
“Choose your answer carefully, Magpie. My creations are not things of the living world. They are born of the wicked, the low, and the desperate. They were denied their true nature for too long, so in return for their service, I deny them nothing in this house. That includes you.”
“You’ll give me to them?” I balk, taking a step back from him, betrayal clear in my voice.
He smiles, crossing the room to envelop me in his arms. “I will never willingly give you away. You are mine, and mine alone,” he whispers into my ear, and I feel the tension leaving my shoulders as warmth follows his touch. “But if they want to taste you, and if you wish to sample them in return…that will only fuel me. Fuel this house.”
His voice is seduction incarnate, sending tingling shivers tracing down my skin as he trails the tips of his fingers down my arms. His words do not make sense, but I am used to that aftermy time spent drifting from one hazy dream to the next. His lips find my neck, searing it with his icy touch, and I feel heat building in me, but before that heat can grow to a fever pitch, he pulls back.
“Save it for them, Magpie,” he whispers, gripping my hands and kissing the backs of them.
I stifle the urge to let out a growl of resentment when, with a flourish, he twirls me, like we are in some intricate dance. Feeling my simple black nightgown growing heavy, I look down to find I am draped in a slinky black dress, the bottom half covered in white feathers that tickle my thighs. He admires me, a sensual look in his dark eyes as he takes my hand and draws me to him.
“Come. They are waiting.”
He pulls me from the room, and I can’t help the rapid beating of my heart. It is nothing like the gripping panic that I am getting better and better at ignoring. This is the heady thrill of anticipation, the excitement of the unknown. We walk silently through the shadowy hallways, and I find myself relaxed in the darkness, eager to meet the other creatures who call the night their home.
“This house, the home that I’ve created for you, takes immense power to maintain,” Alister says, and a shiver crawls down my spine at the idea of the almighty creature holding me. “Everything comes with a price, especially power. Magic takes a toll, demanding more and more with each drop of it I use. I am not an endless well. I need to be fueled like any other being.”
“Fear…” I whisper. One of the few books with words that do not drift from my eye explained the exchange of energy required for great feats of magic. Every living thing gives off energy, attached to acts or emotions. And the emotion that produces the most energy…
I pull away from Alister, stopping in the middle of an ornate sitting room. He takes a few more steps before he realizes I am not at his side, and turns to regard me.
“Fear is what fuels you. This home…Alister, where are you taking me?”
He does not hold his hand out for me, does not wait for me to cross the distance to greet him. Instead, he strides quickly across the room, and I retreat hastily from his looming form. I trip over a side table, sending a lamp crashing to the ground before I slam into a wall behind me. Alister is on me in a moment. His arms cage me in, his face so close to mine I can see the feverish gleam in his eyes. He leans down, nuzzling my neck, inhaling deeply the fear that rolls off me in waves.
“Yes, Magpie, fear is powerful.” He chuckles as I quiver, his lips pressing icy kisses to my neck, traveling up to my jaw, until they hover over my mouth. “But so is desire.”
He pulls away from me so suddenly I am left reeling, my mind having little time to catch up to his words. His heated gaze roams over my bare shoulders, the plunging neckline of my dress, the feathery hem that barely covers my ass. He grins at me. “I told you that if you stayed with me, I would give you every desire of your heart. I make good on my promises, Magpie.”
A burning need begins to build low inside of me as the smallest understanding of what might await me this evening settles in. To be thrown into a den of desire…
He holds his hand out to me, and I don’t hesitate to take it. He pulls me from the room, and my heart beats faster with each step we take.
“Don’t hold back tonight, Magpie,” he says as we descend a set of stairs I have never been down before. The house is normally full of rich, dark wood, but these stairs are made of stone. They’re cool to the touch, growing colder the further we descend.
“Hold back from what?” I ask as we finally reach the landing. Cool stone walls surround the open space before us, illuminated by several black iron candelabras. There is a large maroon door directly across from us, and I feel a…pullcoming from it. Like ghostly hands reaching out, stroking me, caressing me, begging me forward. It takes everything in me not to give in to it.
Alister turns me, pressing a gloved hand under my chin, tilting my head back so I am locked in his gaze. “Your desires, Magpie. Do not deny yourself a single one of them.”
He takes my hand in his and pulls us toward the maroon door that I almost think is pulsing. It isn’t until we are closer that I realize it is the thumping beat coming from behind it that I am sensing. I’m nervous, unsure what I’ll face on the other side of this door. Before I have another moment to prepare, he pushes the door open, and together we step through.
The interior is dark, and I have to blink rapidly to adjust my eyes to the low lighting that borders on nonexistent. Simmering blue flames provide the only light, and they seem to cast more shadows than they illuminate anything. The first things I see are bodies, and a severe lack of clothing. I can’t help myself; my mouth falls open at the sight of the carnal dance in front of me. The music is blaring, the noise pounding through my skull, drowning out any other thought as Alister pulls me deeper into the throng of people.
He steers me around a sitting area full of great leatherback chairs and couches covered in entwined bodies. A woman wearing nothing but leather pants in grinding on top of a man who has his head thrown back, a feral smile spread across his face. I gasp when I realize she has horns curling from her forehead. She looks at me as we pass and blows me a kiss. I gape, but Alister doesn’t give me a moment to respond as he leads me on.
“These are all your creations?” I ask, unsure if he can hear me above the thundering music as we round a corner and enter a room lit entirely in red, filled with writhing bodies. The deep red casts fiery shadows as the throng of people churn and dance together. The aura in the room is staggering, and I’m finding myself intoxicated by it. The fear of the unknown eases out of me, replaced with the pulsing beat and the achingneedbetween my thighs.
“They are,” Alister answers, his voice barely above a whisper, but I can hear it perfectly as he drags me from the dance hall.
We meander from room to room, each one featuring its own level of debauchery, its own depraved dance. There is a midnight-dark room filled with the sound of cracking whips and great moans of ecstasy, and I find myself wanting to peer through the layers of darkness to see what hides within. But I’m not brave enough, not yet, so I hurry after Alister as he trails out of the room. The music grows quiet behind us as we come to a wide, circular room with doors lining the outer wall. Couples and groups stroll in after us, tugging each other through the various doors.
Alister pulls me into the center of the strange stone room, dropping my hand and taking a step back from me. I am entranced by the room and the people who pour in around me. The horned woman from earlier passes by, her hand trailing down my arm, and my eyes are drawn to hers, which are entirely black, no hint of white in their bottomless depths. When she grins at me, I see fangs.
“Care to dance?” she whispers.
