Borom stared straight ahead, jaw clenched. He didn’t reply to Medb, nor did he turn his attention on either of us. He was wearing a cutoff button-down shirt and ripped jeans. His work boots had a few holes in them. His hair, light brown, was a bit outgrown, and it smelled like he hadn’t showered in a few days.
Medb stood up abruptly, addressing me as she sneered at Borom. “You ready to knock some heads?”
I smiled menacingly, my shadows pulling from my core to play. “Let’s do this.”
“I’m going to start off easy,” Medb told Borom. “How do you know John Greeley?”
No response.
“We’re willing to let you walk, Borom. We try to be a pacifist nation. Don’t mistake that to mean that we’re unwilling or unable to cause harm if it means protecting our people. You can talk, or we can torture the information out of you. Either way, you’re going to talk to us today,” I said as I wrapped my shadows around him, constricting his ability to move at all.
Borom remained silent. We gave him several minutes of quiet before Medb shifted in her seat, taking his hand in one of hers. She stared him directly in the eye, a challenge mostShifters would react to. Borom snarled in her face, but her expression never changed. Medb casually broke one of Borom’s fingers. He stiffened, but didn’t make a sound, so she broke another, then another until he grunted in pain.
It seemed brutal on the surface, and especially because we preached pacifism here. The thing about conditional pacifism, though, was that it didn’t mean that violence was never the answer. It meant that violence was the third option. The third option only came into play when all other options were exhausted. He wasn’t going to speak, and no compromise could be met. The only way we were getting answers was through violence, and my death magic was awakening in my head. I wouldn’t use it—not yet.
“I can play this game all day, Borom. See, one of my strengths is in chaos, but my Goddess powers allow me to heal you, and my powers also let me know when you’re on the brink of death. Adaela over here holds death magic, can create horrors right in front of your face, and her shadows can do some wild shit,” Medb said as she crouched down to the side of his chair.
I let my shadows whisper in Borom’s ear, making him jump. It never failed how much that amused me. “John Greeley, Borom. Who is he?”
Borom refused to speak, but his eyes were now the yellowish-green of his wolf, and his wolf was pissed. He couldn’t shift with the silver on, though, and I could see some of his panic bleeding into his eyes.
Medb broke his wrists, and he yelped in pain. She hushed him. “Tell us, and the torture stops.”
Borom remained quiet, gritting his teeth in pain. “You can break every bone in my body, but I will not talk. I know my rights. I want my lawyer.”
I laughed. “The last time you or your parents were on Earth,this was part of the US. It no longer is. The laws here are different. We play by our own set of rules,” I said, leaning back in my chair as if I didn’t have a care in the world.
It was time to take my glamour for a ride. It had been a while since I used it so intricately. I created a world inside of the interrogation room, one with his two small children and his mate. “See, I know why you chose the life you did. You grew up an orphan, right? I can only surmise that your goal was to give your kids the life that you never had growing up. So, here’s my deal to you. If you tell me what you know about John and the movements surrounding thePax, then I will let you go to be with your family. Shit, if you and your mate sign an oath in blood with thePax, I’ll even offer to protect you from retaliation. However, if you decide not to cooperate, Shoshana—that’s your wife, right? She will be brought in to tell us what she knows. I guarantee, because of your clan’s backward-ass thinking, that she doesn’t even know you’re still involved, does she?”
“Leave my family out of this,” Borom snarled. He was beginning to struggle against the silver and my shadows that were preventing him from shifting or healing.
“Then talk,” Medb demanded, beginning to shapeshift into her monster form. Her body was pure gold, eyes red. This beast was known as a man-eater and was known to cause chaos and fear.
Borom’s wolf stopped growling for a minute, then his breathing picked back up as his beast whined in the face of a literal Goddess’s form. It was clear that Medb had begun using her fear magic on him and his wolf. What Borom didn’t seem to recognize was that Medb, being a Goddess, was stronger than he was as an alpha. She didn’t show these powers often. I’d only ever seen them once, and that was during the early part of the Great War.
Borom started screaming, arms bleeding from trying to scramble out of his chair. I sat back and let Medb do her thing, a sick sort of glee from my death magic playing in my head. Her voice became demonic, sounding like the voice of multiple beings all at once.
“Borom, you have chosen to live a life of sin after being approached by the Shifter god many moons ago to change your ways. You would have been rewarded handsomely. Instead, you reaped what you’ve sown today. Tell us what part you played in attempting to abduct Adaela, and we may reconsider,” Medb’s monster demanded.
Borom, eyes wide, and the wolf front and center, started to calm down. Knowing he couldn’t shift, and knowing that Medb was channeling the Shifter God, he lowered his eyes in submission. “I cannot tell you what I don’t know. All I know is that I was approached by someone who cloaked themselves. Their voice was cloaked, too. They came to me with a lucrative deal. Take as manyPaxmembers as possible and steal their power from them. He gave us a vial of something I’d never seen before and asked us to seduce people before bringing them through a portal.”
“Do you have this vial, or can you obtain another one?” Medb asked.
“I cannot, but I may know someone who can,” Borom stated, practically panting at the horrors in the room—Medb and myself. I put my hand over my mouth to hide a smile, because I hated the bloodthirsty part of myself.
Medb grabbed Borom by the throat with one of her hands, gripping his jaw tight with another. Taking something out of her pocket with the third, she uncapped it and forced his mouth open. “You’re lying to me, Borom. I’m going to give you one more minute to give me the truth before I force this serum down your throat.”
“I’m telling you what I know,” he gasped, eyes wide, panic evident. It wasn’t clear what he was hiding to me, but in her monster form, Medb could smell a lie. I leaned across the table.
“Borom, tell us now—” I let my death magic out to play. Not enough to kill him, but enough to let him know his life was on the line. His body believed he was dying. He was losing oxygen from Medb’s hands, and my death magic caressed the deepest part of his psyche. “Accept the serum, or I will take your life right now.”
Borom, barely conscious, reluctantly nodded in assent, as much as he was capable. I confirmed with Medb as Borom opened his mouth. Medb poured the serum in, and he swallowed down with a grimace. Medb let go of Borom’s face as he went lax and compliant.
“Now, tell me your name and where you hail from,” Medb commanded.
“My name is Borom Mirta. I’m from the Shifter Realm and part of the Scion pack,” Borom started.
“Good. What do you know about the person who approached you about thePax?” Medb continued.
