“Get up, Declan! I can’t hold her for long,” Kevin shouted.
Declan crawled to his feet, one hand on his chest, and stalked forward. With brute force, he kicked my legs out from beneath me and shoved me to a seated position. Then he sat on my lap to keep me still while Kevin wrapped a tight cord around my body, strapping me to the chair before I could sink my teeth into Declan’s back. Both of my ankles were tied to the chair legs, but those bindings didn’t feel as secure.
When Declan finally stood up, he wiped his brow and strode to the fireplace. A log snapped as he gripped the handle of an iron poker and withdrew it from the flames. The metal had a dull glow that made me straighten up in my chair.
“I have a few questions to ask, and you’re going to cooperate, aren’t you?”
I won’t die from this. I won’t die from this,I kept repeating in my head.
He loomed over me with the hot tool. “Who do you work for?”
“I’m self-employed.”
I clenched my teeth when the poker neared my face.
Declan scanned my body. “Too bad you’re wearing that sweatshirt. All that clothing doesn’t leave me with many options of where to put this.”
He flicked a glance at the man behind me, who gripped my hair and held my head back.
When the tip of the poker seared my neck, I jerked violently.
He lowered the torture device and glanced at his friend. “You’re going to need to hold her head tighter.”
Kevin’s hand covered my forehead, and I found myself unable to look away. “Don’t you burn me with that,” he warned Declan.
“I’m not telling you anything,” I snarled. “The only person I want to speak with is Darius, so call him in here.”
He bent down, holding the rod close enough that I could feel the heat. “Whodo you work for?”
“No one. I’m a rogue. Why would I be walking around with a duffel bag full of dirty clothes if I had a job?”
“Wrong answer.”
He lowered the flat end of the poker until it branded my left cheek. I screamed, slipping into a primal state of survival. The pain was unfathomable—sharp and real, pulling me right into the moment. My eyes watered, and my skin pulsed with searing pain that intensified with each passing second. He stood up, watching me writhe and bare my teeth like an animal caught in a trap. Tears were streaming down my face, reawakening the fresh pain that continued to burn as if he had never removed the iron.
Oh God, I can’t survive this.Now I knew why men cried for their mothers when dying on the battlefield. I just wanted someone to make it stop, to get me out of there.
Kevin let go, and as I sat there and sobbed, I became incensed that these two men were standing there watching me and laughing. I jolted forward, tipping the chair and sinking my fangs into Declan’s thigh. The momentum tore my teeth down his pants, cutting through his flesh in the process.
He bellowed in pain, but I barely heard it over my own roar. When I hit the ground, Declan stumbled backward, almost losing his footing. If he kicked me in the legs, I didn’t feel it. I wriggled my body, trying desperately to loosen the ropes—the smell of burning flesh sending me over the edge.
“Dammit, pick her up!” Declan shouted.
Kevin wasn’t a threat to me; he was more of an annoyance. Men who couldn’t think for themselves would spend the rest of their lives as followers. Declan… Well, he had officially penned his name in my book of people I wanted to destroy.
They righted my chair, and my chest heaved as I tried to capture a satisfying breath. The taste of his blood in my mouth made my stomach twist into painful knots.
The door opened, and Darius entered the room. “What’s going on in here? What have you done?”
My black hair curtained my face, and I was beginning to feel the pattern of the burn that started at the corner of my mouth and stretched across my cheek to my eye.
I finally looked like the monster I’d become.
“Get out,” he said, snapping his fingers. “Both of you.”
Some of my hair blew forward as I breathed steadily, in and out through my nose. I must have sounded like a fire-breathing dragon. I was vaguely aware of the pain around my wrists from the handcuffs pinching my skin. My teeth were clenched, muscles tight, and shoulders hunched. Rage funneled through me in the form of energy, and I focused on leveling it down before it spiraled out of control and caused me to black out. That was the first lesson every Mage learned whether someone taught them or not: control your energy before it controls you.
Darius tilted my head back and threaded my hair away from my face. “I instructed them to rough you up. This was certainly uncalled for.” He grimaced when he got a close look at my face. “That’s going to take a while to heal on its own. It’s a good thing they didn’t have any liquid fire.”
