What Lurks Between the Fates (Of Flesh & Bone, #3)(18)
He stepped aside, motioning me through the open cell door with a dramatic flourish. The tight smile on his face made it clear what he thought of my flippancy, but he didn’t move to make me suffer for my blatant disrespect. I imagined he would leave that to his queen.
I approached the iron, glaring at the pair of shackles held in Malachi’s grip. He held them out, presenting them to me as he stared at the hands clenched into fists at my sides. I lifted my arms, twisting them so that my palms faced the ceiling, then lowered my wrists into the shackles slowly. I stared at Malachi’s face as he dropped his gaze to the shackles, then fastened them around my wrists. The hard swallow that made his Adam’s apple bob gave away his nervousness. He wasn’t all bravado in the way he wanted to appear when faced with something that had hurt his queen. He latched the first shackle, shifting his hands to the second one as my lips twitched into a smirk.
I clenched my fingers so that the tips of them touched his wrist, shifting forward quickly. “Boo,” I whispered, finding too much pleasure in the way his body jolted and the shackle clattered as he hurried to lock it with nervous fingers.
“Fucking bitch,” he muttered as he glanced up at my grinning face.
Malicious, cruel laughter filled the dungeon, and it took me far too long to recognize it. The chuckle was the ruination of everything that had once been innocent within me, a twisted creature that thrived on the promise of tormenting my enemies.
I raised my shackled hands to my chest, ignoring the burn on my wrists as the iron melted through my flesh. “I don’t know how I will ever recover from such a grave insult to my character. That one stung right in the place where I do not care.”
He dragged me forward by grabbing the chain, making my skin tingle with the added proximity to the iron gates as it very nearly brushed against my skin. I felt it like a hum echoing within me, as if it was as much a part of me as it was a repulsion. We strode past Caldris’s cell, and my desire to remain with him made me pause in front of the cage that still contained him. His jaw clenched, his body taut as he warred with the idea that I would be out of his sight, away from his protection, when I faced Mab this time.
“Your boyfriend isn’t coming with us, Pet,” Malachi said, touching the palm of his bloodied hand against my lower back. He gave me a firm push forward, forcing me into movement as a growl rumbled out of Caldris at the contact.
“Keep your hands off my mate,” Caldris warned, the promise of retribution humming in the threat. He might be contained for the moment, but the expression on his face promised that one day, Mab would be in need of his services. That one day he would be freed from his cage, and those who harmed me would be the first ones he sought revenge from.
“Don’t worry, Caldris. It is not me who intends to play with her,” Malachi said, a cruel, stupid smirk gracing his face. As if he could not resist the challenge waiting to come for him. The promise in my mate’s eyes left no doubt that it would be painful when it did arrive.
I couldn’t fucking wait for it.
Malachi guided me forward, and I allowed his hand to continue to touch the bare skin of my spine where my dress was split down the back. With every step we took, every breath he continued to have the luxury of inhaling, one thought repeated in my mind: One day.
One day I would take that hand and shove it down his own throat so that he suffocated on it.
We strode through the gate from the part of the dungeon that had become our home to find a narrow, winding staircase waiting for us on the other side. We passed a guard who refused to so much as look at me as we made our way around the bend at the bottom. The steps were steep enough that I had to wrestle the fabric of my dress into my shackled hands so I would not humiliate myself by doing something as mundane as tripping.
I held my head as high as I could as we ascended, the light from the windows at the top of the steps casting a dim glow into the dungeon. It wasn’t the light of the sun that I glimpsed through the window, but the light of the twin moons of Alfheimr shining down upon the Court of Shadows.
The stairs never seemed to end, like we were ascending out of an endless, inescapable abyss. A guard waited at the top of the stairs, his hand grasping the hilt of his sword as he reached out with his other and inserted the key into the lock. He opened it, bowing his head like a gentleman, as if I wasn’t covered in filth and hadn’t been deprived of a bath for a straight week.
The hallway outside the entrance to the dungeons was crowded with people. The citizens of the Shadow Court lingered against the stone walls as I strode through the path they created in the center. I ignored the hushed whispers, the subtle judgment in their stares when their eyes clashed with mine for a few moments.
In this place, with Mab’s people, I was the one who was unwanted.
Sconces lined the hallway, the bright amber glow of flame pulsing within them and illuminating the white stone statues of creatures—some Sidhe, some inhuman in appearance—placed on pillars beneath them. The ceiling overhead arched into a point, meeting at a wooden beam supporting the center. It had been carved into the ornate figure of a snake, winding its way through floral medallions where the support beams curved from floor to the apex of the ceiling.
There were no windows in this part of the palace, bathing it in the shroud of eternal darkness. Only the light of the candles offered any reprieve, and I greatly missed the light of the moon and stars shining down upon me as we walked through the crowd of people lining the blue stone walls.