Kinzer took a deep breath in anticipation. He heard the whip crack behind him and waited for the sting, but apparently, Quintz was just trying to fuck with him. Kinzer cursed his body for how it cowered, fucking trembled at the sound.
“Not yet,” Quintz said. “I’m going to give you a taste—a preview to let you see what we’re talking about here.”
He cracked the whip in the air once again before Kinzer felt it against his back. It took a moment before his nerves acknowledged the biting sting…and another before it intensified, just as Quintz had said it would. It was as if a giant wasp had stung him, the feeling not limited to where the barbs entered his back, but radiating powerfully throughout, quickly intensifying, mostly near his spine. Whatever poison was in that whip was a bitch.
A surge of energy soared through him with the same intensity as when Brock had kicked him in the nuts. It earned a scream from Kinzer as the energy seized control over his frail body.
Yanking at his cuffs, Kinzer pulled so tight that they dug into his skin and made him bleed. He writhed about, tugging, squirming in agony. The pain didn’t last but a few moments before it waned, offering Kinzer a chance to breathe. He gasped for air since it had been such a struggle to catch his breath through the pain. Sweat raced down his face, much worse than before. His legs quaked beneath him, and it took him a moment to realize they’d given out under him and he was dangling from the cuffs.
“Last chance,” Quintz said. “Because I will give you another opportunity to answer…and if you choose not to, you will have to wait some time before I give you the same opportunity again.”
Kinzer took a shaky breath as he considered how easy it would have been to give Quintz exactly what he wanted.
He wouldn’t have to endure the torture.
Why did he need to keep secrets anymore? Sides seemed irrelevant these days.
Even the Leader’s motives could have been more corrupt than anyone knew.
Kinzer questioned his loyalties. What was the point to any of them?
But despite his skepticism about any of it, he knew the one thing he could hold on to—that what the Almighty was after was abominable, and it was something he could be proud to stand against.
It was worth dying for.
He would have rather died than have to endure the agony of whatever Quintz had planned for him.
“I’m ready,” Kinzer said, spitting the words out since it was as much as he could manage as he struggled to control his body, which now warred against him.
The whip snapped behind Kinzer as it slapped against his flesh. Quintz struck him repeatedly, persisting, the pain swelling in Kinzer’s back, overtaking him as it had before, though exponentially faster and with a severity he couldn’t have even fathomed until he endured what felt like shards of glass tearing through his insides, pushing from his back, through his chest.
Another jolt of pain raced from where Quintz struck up to Kinzer’s head. He felt as though his brain was going to be torn in half from the intensity of the sensation. He didn’t have a choice but to scream, his primal, guttural cries pushed past his lips. It was utterly humiliating because it was him at his most exposed, most vulnerable.
Despite his apparent suffering, Quintz showed him no mercy. He laid blows into him like he had with his fists earlier. One after another, and as soon as Kinzer thought it might end, he continued.
Finally, after some time of this, Kinzer couldn’t scream anymore. All he could do as Quintz flogged him was let his muscles shake and tremble, involuntarily, spastically. Warm fluid slid down his ass, down the back of his legs—sweat or blood, he couldn’t be sure which. He didn’t really care.
His face twitched before he burst into tears like a fucking baby. He wept, ashamed of himself for caving like that, but it wasn’t his choice to make. His body had taken control and was pleading for him to give in to their demands.
Quintz stepped beside him and grabbed his chin, forcing Kinzer to look at him. Kinzer fought to turn away, but Quintz had a strong hold on him.
No. He didn’t want him to see him like that. He didn’t want anyone to see him like that. Not just then, but ever.
The more he cried, the more his tears weren’t just about the pain his body experienced, but about the horrors he had endured through the centuries…the millennia…the eons.
Oh, the agony of existence!
He closed his eyes so at least he wouldn’t have to see Quintz standing there, judging him.
The image of Dedrus flashed into his mind. He could see him so vividly in those final moments…his pale face, his tired eyes.
Kinzer’s thoughts shifted in an instant to Janka—that twisted smirk on his face when he’d cornered him in the Christ’s bedroom in Veylo’s mansion. That expression made Kinzer feel like Janka was laughing at him, mocking him for how he’d been able to dupe him for so long.
And finally, when that image let up, he saw Maggie, whose body he’d held in his arms—her withered, tired, defeated body. How could that fucker Hayde have done that to her?
He tried to tuck his head low, but Quintz held him steady by his chin.
“Look at me, Kinzer,” Quintz said, and Kinzer obeyed. “This is what happens as we keep going. You lose everything that you are. Don’t you see? This is why torture works so well. Because I break you. Make you even less than the immortal before me. I reduce you to something even lower than humans. Lower than the animals. Look at how weak you are. Can you feel that? Can you feel how shameful it is to be so humiliated?”
