He took that cock, knowing it was only in his mind, but still, feeling as real as ever and torturing him the same as it had so long ago, when he had found himself stranded in the outerlands of Hell during the War. When he had been trapped by glippers, fucked to near death, but managed to escape and murder them.
Focus, he thought.
He had to focus. If the reality of that world pulled him in, he would never escape it.
Sweat rushed down his forehead as he felt the warm blood from his hole running down his legs. He squirmed about, struggling with his restraints, but he was stuck in place. Locked so that he had to just take his abuse.
An appendage wrapped around his neck and then slid into his mouth. It drove to the back of his throat and then farther, and he choked on it.
“You like that, you fucking higherling?”
Quintz screamed as he attempted to keep strong and remember he needed to focus. But it was so hard as the pain on either side of him consumed his thoughts.
***
Eilee lay stretched out on her side at the edge of a fountain.
How did this book get before me?she wondered, turning the pages, struggling to recall even having opened it, let alone where she was.
She glanced around the Great Library, which she was sure she’d been to the day before, yet it seemed so unfamiliar. It was not in its great state, much of it demolished from one of the many Morarke sieges that had taken place during the War.
It felt like months had passed, maybe years, where she had had this uneasy feeling, this terrible, agonizing feeling that something was so horribly wrong. It was almost like she wasn’t really living a life as much as experiencing flashes in a dream. But as she touched the book before her, she was sure it couldn’t be a dream. It was too real.
“Eilee.” She heard Trey’s familiar voice, and she looked up.
He stood in the doorway, his appearance disheveled in his war frader, his sword in the sheath at his hip.
“Trey,” she said, pushing to her feet and hurrying toward him.
An uneasy feeling rose within her.
He’s coming back from battle, coming back from captivity.
He needed her to soothe him, especially after she’d received word of his capture and subsequent rescue.
She wrapped her arms around him, pulled him close, but he resisted.
Resisted? What did that even mean? That was such an unfamiliar word for either of them.
She pulled away and looked into his eyes. “Kiss me, silly,” she said, moving in, but he pulled away.
“Eilee, there is something I have to tell you.”
She smiled. She was prettiest when she smiled, and she knew that.
Whatever he was feeling, whatever he was upset about—this war, the horrible things that had occurred to him—she could make it right with her face, she knew it. If not her face, then her body. However, something in his expression as he made eye contact with her once again let her know things would never be the same again, but why did it feel as though she had lived that moment already?
She giggled. “Trey, tell me what’s going on.”
“Eilee, you know I’ve loved you and I have never pretended or faked anything we’ve shared.”
“I love you too. What’s the matter?”
“I have met someone else, and I love them.”
She laughed, a loud, ridiculous laugh, like she would have if Treycore had told her an amusing joke or done something so incredibly stupid that it was worth the presentation.
She pulled him close. “Don’t tease me. I am only just now seeing you. It’s been so long.”
