Prologue: The Penance Passover
Part 1 of the Elorcan Hades/Persephone Series! I’ll be absent for this coming week as I’ll be flying out of country with no complimentary data. In return, I decided to post this dull introduction as a slim means of compensation. Trust me, the action and angst will come.
It is not clear why we choose the fire pathway
Where we end is not the way that we had planned
All the spirits gather 'round like it's our last day
To get across you know we’ll have to raise the sand
Elide counted away the seconds in the silent cell, sucking on her bottom lip. The flares of pain latched onto her ankle never faltered, an obstinate obstacle ousting her will of lesser fortitude, marring her own feeble attempts to simply endure the anguish.
She released her lip, wobbling. The chain shackled to her ankle thrummed against her own marred skin, slick with sweat, rubbing against cold metal. Her shoulders rolled back, and her back cracked at the next fleeting second.
Her own body danced to a frenzied cacophony flaming the unwritten despair reflected across her dark orbs, darting within the darkness. Her muscles moved without meaning, tendons twitching, throat run dry and barren, a desert of all words never spoken and severely silenced.
The mute marathon rolled on, an endless momentum of memory and mishaps. She waited for the simple sounds of twelve strikes, the sounds of subservient release, drowning in her own single sea of sorrows.
When the jarring bolls tolled twelve times—as they did, shaking her out of her stupor—the devil in her dreams would fling open the wooden doors—mocking her limpless and limping figure—and unclip the cruel chain. A recurring sorts of twisted fate, the vicious cycle glazed with vices sewn across her every step.
Elide expectantly stared at the door in front of her, waiting—the only laborious action save for the strength to breathe. Her ribs shuddered at the familiar jangle of keys rattled.
A click chimed, inserted through the keyhole.
The key twisted, and jerked upwards.
A series of other traditional beepings followed, unlocking the additional security codes to the room.
The finger and eye scanned sequence pierced through the room.
Elide watched the door fling open, and shivered at the dark robes peeling into her vision. A phantom hand wrapped around her, choking her air and silencing her words. The boots scraped along the floor, an ever familiar leer coating a stubbled and warped face bent in as if reflecting the distorted sense of crookedness.
Her own overseer of wretched slavery and dreaded torture, worming through her mental barriers and twisting through every pore.
“You’ll be serving two very important guests of mine today,” her Uncle rasped. “Make a mistake, and I’ll chain you with snakes. Impress, and the chains will not compress.”
It must have been a very occasion indeed if he were to bribe her, Elide mused, and roughly swallowed, forbidding any strangled sound to slip. A meaty hand gripped her chin, nails digging into her flesh. Pale, porcelain skin slathered in grime’s filthiness lathered away all the bruises and cracks and fissure, all the rage and despair and melancholy bubbling inside of her, hissing in no sight of no means of escape. Hope held no clean facade, stringing away all inches of hope, dragging her under each plate of cold touch.
Her Uncle had served her raw, bloodied on a plate.
Upon drawing the first drip of liquid sopping to the ground, he released his hold on her, curling his ragged nails back into his large fist.
“Understand?” he hissed, dark, unfathomable eyes cutting through her.
She meekly nodded, a weak sound of confirmation escaping her throat.
Satisfied, he reached down to unchain the shackle from the wall. It was an irony of strained sorts, watching him bend over to slightly free her. Some days, when the taunting ran high, he’d loosen the chains, just enough for her to breathe, and for her to feel a forbidden future. It only left the little falsities of hope to run dry within her, no longer appeasing her or alleviating even the smallest sliver of stress.
The chain now dangled, clasped at her ankle. For every freedom, she still remained chained. She choked on the bitterness, swallowing day by day the crucifixion of her own sanity without a resurrection of any reassurance.
Before he yanked her out the door, she squared her shoulders, channeling the last ounce of stripped strength within her.
“Uncle Vernon,” Elide said, her voice firm and solid. “I have a bargain for you.”
For a man who held all the power in the world, he had everything to lose, and if a simple bargain from the bottom of his bearings could usurp him, then rest assured the supposed power would crumble to ashes at his feet. While he found ground by the need for more, a dark domination of descent, the inherent, fundamental need to survive drove her. And here she toiled away into the abyss forever tunneled by that futile fall.
The door creaked, halting halfway through.
“A bargain?” his voice snarled, thickened with pure distaste. “You think you have a position to do so?”
“Afraid?” Her voice cracked, but did not waver—a feeble willow blowing in the fields, firmly rooted in the soil.
Atrophy held her captive, battered down with assault. At the bottom of the abyss ran numbness, an insensitivity to fear. Great winds of the withering whirled around her, wrecking shards of ruins within her. Trickles of trepidation traversed across her body, urging an awakening tsunami of tears.
The figure in front of her whirled around, hand flying outwards. Her cheek stung, pain flaring, but she did not move her hand up to cup her red-hued skin. Instead she remained as stone, reverberating in her spot from the shock.
“Seems I haven’t beaten you enough.” The door slammed shut, vibrating vice’s finality. “You think I have to be afraid of a mangled girl?”
Elide lifted up her chin. Instead, she merely asked, with a mask of indifference, “Do you?”
The scars burned over her skin as the shadow, her ingrained nightmare, stalked over her. Her heart thrummed faster as the chain clasped within the hands of her captive. This is it, she thought to herself, swallowing harshly.
The door flung as easily as it closed, and the figure of a tall woman stood at the crux, neither divine nor infernal. The hue of white-moon hair enamored Elide’s vision, a different type of dark aura pulsing around the room—one that even took her Uncle aback.
Vernon’s grip on her neck tightened, and Elide could not push away the cry that escaped from her throat. Both heads twisted towards the exit, which Elide had never seen as an entrance nor an element of euphoria.
“Is this our evening entertainment?” the woman said smoothly. She flicked her red cape around her, revealing long nails that promised sudden and deeper pain than the chains littering the cracked floor. Not human, a voice whispered scratched out in Elide’s head.
Vernon hissed and dropped Elide into a bundle on the floor. A sliver of severed synergy, a curdled connection, swept through the dimness, a strand of Elide matching the otherworldly woman’s dark and deadly, vicarious and vicious vibes.
Elide shivered—and flinched when a foul breath clouded over her ear.
“We’re not done yet,” her Uncle snarled under his breath, and Elide knew each syllable rang true with his penchant for pernicious promises. “I’ll teach you fear. Thoroughly.”
The woman raised a brow. “Vernon,” he snapped.
“What?” he growled, sandpaper grating thoroughly into the grave.
“Hear out her deal if you want ours to continue.”
Elide swallowed, and slowly watched Vernon turn around, a nasty scowl on his sunken face. If her Uncle saw her shoot the other woman an appreciative glance, he’d exacerbate her evening beating.
So she kept her eyes on the ground.
“Talk.” The white-haired woman looked at her expectantly, orbs a glaring dark gold.
Elide squared her shoulders. “I want—” She rubbed her arms, goosebumps running rampant over her skin. Her practiced words vanished from her head, reduced to ashes. “—I want love.”
The woman craned her head down, a flicker of disappointment flashing across her young and ancient features. Vernon smirked, and her tongue felt swollen. Perhaps this was why it was better to never speak, with the stolen sounds to be sucked out from her soul into the soiled.
“Easy,” Her uncle simpered, a touch of early triumphant written on his face. “I’ll give you seven days—one week—from today for a man to prove his dying love for you. Even out of your home. You can’t say I’m not generous.”
Elide ignored the bait. “And if I do?” Find love.
A sick smile. “Then you’re free.”
A sure smile. “Then you become my slave.”
Her Uncle and the white-haired woman left the room, the latter’s red cape sweeping the air in a graceful swirl. The former left the door open, light creeping through the sunken darkness. And she—she slowly raised herself up, and hesitantly balanced herself on her mangled ankle.
Elide wobbled out of the room, palms flat against the walls, shadows shimmering through the sinister space, spiteful shapes swallowing the sincere and secure. The single hall led down in a silver, shattered spiral stairs, and each step send flares of agony shooting up her leg.
But all of it could not triumph over the new promise set in stone, numbing the suffering and all of his sensations. She did not look to savor the stale static, the deformed doors, the pale portraits,or the crooked chandelier. She did not hear the fleeting flutterings nor the fear’s flaws flying forward. She did not stop at the scratched, peeling paints coating the grimy and ghastly walls.
She did not bother to look back—did not want to see the two shapes of dark shadows staring out from the marbled windows, watching her flee—as she shoved upon the heavy door with all her weight’s worth, and was blinded by the strength of the sunlight.
Monday: Lorcan Salvaterre
Despite their sadistic, flashing grins etched on their blood-coated faces with leather torn and ragged, all the fully armed mercenaries could agree on one thing: the run-down warehouse was no place for a woman.
The half-naked, snarling men in the ring halted their blows, the chanting at the side subsiding into hushed growls. The ringleader’s head whipped to the entrance so hard his neck cracked with a pop.
A curtain drew over the walls hanging an ornament of weapons, ranging from crimsons coated spears to palm-sized daggers. The hilts had long faded to reveal the bony structure underneath, mended over with spare material. Lorcan’s own hatchet slung lazily in his hand, rubbed with chalk. Dust filtered through his eyes, squinting at the sight before him.
Lorcan’s opponent gaped at the dark-haired woman striding in, her skirts swishing delicately around her ankles, a slight tilt in her gait. Lorcan merely rubbed his jaw in frustration, as time would have told ten seconds ago he would have pummeled his puny partner.
But this was a new punch. Never before had silence so quickly fallen in the night rush where money wormed out of pockets and tongues eased into lucid speech.
“Can we help you, ma’am?” The nearest bloke managed to stutter out, wiping perspiration from his forehead. The brute miserably failed to tuck in his pit stains, the bulge from the belly of his stomach boasting and belching all things bloated and beastly.
The money no longer slid to the referee, hands instead gripping the ruffled clothes, eyes sliding to soak in the figure of a female. A bark slipped from Lorcan’s throat, and he easily hurled himself over the cage.
There was something so inexplicably ineffable about this woman that drew him to her, and the horny, haunted faces of all the males around him only drove the edge of his enmity over the thin line. And though he had entered this illegal place to take down that feeling to a notch, it seemed that the devil couldn’t treat him kindly today—nor ever.
The onyx-eyed female held a darker spark in those orbs than the males around her, save to match the storm in Lorcan’s own. The woman held her ground as Lorcan stalked towards her, raising an eyebrow at the rivulets of sweat running down his roped arms and torso. He refrained the urge to devour her whole, leave his scent over smooth—and scarred—skin, claiming, marking, holding her as his.
“Does he leave the bed cold?” A man crowed. “I can offer better company.”
Before Lorcan could snap another neck, the woman turned towards the nearest man, who proceeded to give her a mock bow, eyes raking unabashedly over her form.
The woman sniffed in distaste. “I’d prefer an actual man.” Dismissing the leering male with a glance, she turned towards Lorcan, who watched her carefully. “I’m looking for Lorcan Salvaterre, bodyguard. I hear he often frequents this place.”
Lorcan Salvaterre’s eyes narrowed. Then he abruptly grabbed the woman’s elbow and yanked her towards the door, ignoring the sharp whistles piercing the air. When she stumbled, he easily tossed her over his shoulder, ignoring the tiny fist pounding against his back and curt cries slithering down his ears.
He brought her to her toes as soon as the door slammed shut, the bouncer waving them past with a curious glance that only meant trouble. Pulling her several feet forward, he slammed her spine against a dumpster.
“Figures you wouldn’t have manners,” she huffed, and massaged her knuckles. Her eyes glassed over, and he had to crane his head forward—and down—to hear her. “I shouldn’t have expected more.”
Lorcan decided he did not like those judging, doe eyes staring at him. “What business do you have?”
“I’m looking for Lorcan Salvaterre. He’s a renowned bodyguard.”
“I know who he is. And his services are not cheap.”
Dark eyes flashed. “What’s cheap is that you have the audacity to drag me to this—” she waved her hands around, nearly smacking the stubble of his chin— “dark place, and demand of me.”
His mouth curved up into a smile. “But did you not demand of Lorcan Salvaterre?”
Her own lips formed an o, and his pants suddenly seemed all too tight. This woman oozed precious pureness tainted with temerity beyond the torn, trampled, and tortured. The gleam in her eyes hinted wariness, and he noted the spread stance of her legs beneath her skirts that seemed to be stolen of the hangers from the nearby shops.
“I—” her face flushed, and he could not stop himself from bringing the pad of his thumb to caress over the curve of her cheek, slowly stroking her soft skin. “I have a request.”
He studied her gaunt face, and the thinness of her arms, the rest of her horribly slim body covered by the pile of laces and silk, hem already muddied and ripped—which did not seem to faze her in the slightest. Onyx eyes skimmed over the sunken, hollowed face and curved over the column of her throat, exposing the outline of her bones, and down to the slope of her breasts.
“My eyes are up here,” she snapped.
He snorted. “And your breasts are down there.”
Lorcan didn’t have time to think before pain shattered through his lower area, a growl rumbling through his chest.
“And your groin is down there,” she equally sniped back.
He grunted, briefly closing his eyes, warily carefully the woman caged in front of him. When the pain subsided, he snarled in her face, the tip of his tongue laced with malice.
She beat him to it. “Don’t lecture me about pain when you hand it out willingly—as in the ring.” The woman hiked up her skirts, and he skirted back a respectable distance from her, cautious of her next strike.
The breath left his lungs. A thunder escaped his throat. Pure, undiluted rage flashed through him. “Who did that to you?” he managed to gut out.
Mangled and marred skin straight to the marrow, marked with the branded outline of crisscrossing chains that would undoubtedly follow her no matter how far nor how long she walked, reddish and purplish and brownish blemishes painted her ankle in a patterned painting.
A chain could either mean the sex or slave trade, but by the clear, unmarked neck from the collar, none had manacled her. Someone did—because she needed a bodyguard. This was a different type of vermin swarming the streets, something cruel enough to lock something up, but not tarnish the beauty enough to ruin her hopes and dreams.
Lorcan could only prolong the inevitable end. He could tell her that it was pointless. That unless she was filled with testosterone, could handle the blood and fists, and drank the fill of blocked, hazed emotions, she would not outrun her own personal demon.
“How much?” she croaked out. “Before my other ankle looks like that.”
His fists clenched. She saw his reaction, and knew that he could not turn away now. Bitch, he thought bitterly to himself. This was exactly why he allowed his emotions to diminish into a pulp, and allowed his brashness and brawns do the talking. This was exactly why he only worked with men who desired one simple life lost in the wind, or the occasional jealous, embittered woman who wanted another one gone.
If he refused, he would live. But this woman would not. And that was that.
The woman stared at him, eyebrows slightly drawn together, a fatal, focused look washing over her face. He wondered what inner demons ate her up—or if her outer one feed on them to sustain his own body. He wondered if she looked through a shattered mirror and saw the pieces of herself staring back, forever fragmented. He wondered if he would take part corrupting in her soul—and if that demon would be able to handle her.
Because whatever was stewing in this woman’s body was not human. It was past beyond the mortal scent, breeding hatred, hollowing hope, and secreting obscurity. The tip of her nails may have been human, but what they were willing to grasp and choke certainly was not.
And it was that curiosity that had him inclining his head towards her just as the bouncer had followed them here. And it was toeing the line of the unbridled unease that had him reaching for his hatchet slung low on his hips. And it was that last glance towards the abused ankle that had the weapon whistling through the air and solidly sinking through the chest of the other man.
Lorcan stalked over to the fallen body, careful to not step in the seeping pool of crimson, and jerked the blade out. He nudged his head towards the other end of the alley, and the woman—devil forbid—smiled at him, and swished around—and did not look back.
And Lorcan Salvaterre strode behind her, guiding her to his home and hell.
