They walked away laughing.
I went to him, but his hand shot out. “Stay away from me!” he snarled at me, eyes wild and unfocused. I froze. “Get back against the wall, Ari. Don’t touch me. Please, don’t touch me.”
He released the bars and sank to his hands and knees, his head hanging low. He shook all over, his back rising and falling with heavy breathing.
I wrapped my arms around my body, stepping back. “You can’t hold out forever,” I said, crying. “You’re going to die, Sebastian. You can’t survive like this.” I drew in a deep breath and plowed on. “Just take my blood and get it over with.”
His head whipped around, his expression dangerous. “Don’t.” His low growl gave me goose bumps.
Frustration and desperation kept me talking, rambling on quickly despite his warning. “You’ll be stronger, right? If you drink blood, if you become . . .” I couldn’t even say the word.
“Shut up, Ari.”
“No. I won’t shut up. I can’t. Athena is going to take this to the very end. One more night and you’ll . . . I’m offering to help. You want to die here, like this? On her terms? Just take it.”
He swung around, seething with anger and hunger. “I DON’T WANT IT!” He turned away, slumping against the bars. “I’d rather die.”
I opened my mouth but then stopped. I couldn’t even go and comfort him. “Don’t do this,” I begged. “Don’t make me watch you die when I can save you.”
“And give Athena what she wants,” he said, his face hidden by his arm.
“If it means you live, then yes.”
“I don’t want to talk about it anymore. I don’t want it. I don’t want you. Leave me alone.”
I moved away from him until my back hit the rock wall. I slid down, pulling my knees to my chest, hugging them, and staring at the form curled against the bars.
Sebastian held on to those bars as though they’d save him. But they wouldn’t; the only thing that could save him was me. And we both knew it. Athena had designed this little bit of torture very carefully. The hunger and psychological crap she put him through night after night had taken him to his breaking point.
Here in her realm Sebastian had no powers, and while he could heal faster than a human, he wasn’t immortal yet. She’d backed me into a corner. There was no way I could sit there and watch him die. One more night was all it would take . . . if he lived through this one.
I rested my chin on my knees as my thoughts churned. After a while Sebastian’s grip on the bars eased, and his posture slumped as he yielded to sleep—or unconsciousness; it was hard to tell.
I bit softly on the inside of my cheek, exhausted but too freaked out to close my eyes and rest. Athena was definitely living up to her reputation as the most cunning strategist around. Goddess or not, though, she had to have a weakness. And if it wasn’t power and control, then maybe her weakness lay in her personal life. After all, that’s where she was hitting me the hardest, so why not turn the tables?
But Athena’s personal life and those she loved were a mystery to me—if she even loved; that emotion and ability might’ve been lost a long time ago. Which would explain a lot.
My eyelids finally became heavy, and weariness muddled my thoughts. I rubbed both dirty hands down my damp face, smearing the old tears away. Why was I even trying to come up with a way to beat her? I was a seventeen-year-old peon compared to her, a mouse facing a T. rex.
Waves of hopelessness crashed down on me. My ability to think and reason fled, leaving only a fierce pain in my gut that hurt the most in quiet times when everything else faded away and the distractions of emotions dulled. But even that eventually gave way to sleep.
I woke hot and feverish, unsure of how long I’d been out. My rear hurt and my back had gone painfully stiff. I saw legs in my line of sight. Groggy and confused, I lifted my head. Sebastian stood over me, like a ghost in the dark with his pale skin and bright gray eyes. When our eyes met, he turned away and went back to the bars.
I went in and out of consciousness, my dreams vivid and disturbing, the floor hard and my hunger sharp. Rest was a joke—an annoying, irritating joke.
When I came to again, I was still on my side, arm curled beneath my head. Sebastian sat in the corner awake. I stared at him as my mind cleared and it dawned on me what he was doing.
I sat straight up.
He was hunched over with a sharp rock in his hand, making slice after slice on the soft, pale skin of his forearm, his hand in a tight fist.
Using pain to focus.
Bitter cold shot through my chest. I knew what that was like. “Stop it,” I whispered, pushing myself up. My legs shook with weakness. I held on to the wall behind me for support and shoved my hair from my eyes with my other hand.
He didn’t stop, didn’t even hear me. He was in his own little world.
“Sebastian,” I said louder. “Stop it.”
Nothing. Over and over he drew thin red lines across his arm.
“Sebastian.” I crossed the cell, bent down, and grabbed the rock out of his hand.
The second my skin brushed his, his hand shot out and wrapped tightly around my wrist. Pain tore through my joint as bones and tendons crunched together. I pulled back with a cry, but he held on.
He lifted his head and pierced me with strange silvery eyes set in a face that was somehow more angular, starker, and more frightening than I expected.
In a blur he was up. A gasp lodged in my throat as he grabbed my upper arms and shoved me against the back wall of the cell. I slammed against the rock, the breath knocked out of me. He pinned me, completely covering my body with his.
I couldn’t move and I fought to remain calm, to help him in whatever way I could. His forehead touched the rock wall by my head. His chest rose and fell, and his heart beat so strongly I felt it pounding against my chest like a drum.
Rocks rained onto the floor, and I knew he was digging his nails into the wall, trying to remain in control.
Several seconds passed before I found my voice. “Sebas—”
“Don’t talk.”
In the quiet, this close to him, every sense stirred and every nerve ending lit with fear and anticipation.
I knew this was it. This was the moment, and . . . I wanted it to be me. Despite Athena bringing us to this point, despite the fact that he didn’t want this, I wanted it to be me.
I wanted to be the one to save him.
I drew in a deep breath, forcing myself to relax and accept the inevitable. I still had the rock in my hand, so I moved my free hand to his lower back where his shirt met his jeans, where my palm landed on bare skin.
He shuddered.
His hand slid from the wall, over my head, and down to my temple. “Please stop,” he begged me in a gruff, broken tone.
So much pain in his voice. A tear slipped from the corner of my eye. Bittersweet emotions settled heavy on my heart. He didn’t want this.
Athena had known it would come down to this, had made sure it would come down to this. Another tear slipped out. The choice was never his. It was mine. It had always been mine.
His hands delved into my hair, his lips skimming my temple, then down toward my ear. “Stop, Ari. Stop hurting for me. I can’t take it. . . .”
His words only made it worse. I started trembling. His thumb trailed over my cheek, hitting the tears. He lifted his head a fraction and kissed my tears away.
Then his wet lips settled on mine.
He stayed there for a long, torturous moment, holding my face still, trying to control himself, his closed lips pressed hard against mine. Shivers raced down my limbs, turning my legs to jelly. Warmth and pleasure mingled with heartbreak as he pressed against me, acting on pure physical instinct.
“I can’t.” He tore his lips from mine. He was shaking so hard, trying so hard to fight what in the end he simply couldn’t.
I knew what I had to do to end his suffering. I lifted the rock in my hand and dragged it hard across my neck. The sting brought a gasp to my lips as my skin split open.
He drew back.
Our eyes met. His nostrils flared; he could smell it, the blood. Lines in his brow knitted together in need and despair. But it was just a brief, heartrending flash before his eyes went intense and silvery.
I lifted my hand and slipped it around his neck, twining my fingers in his hair and tugging him down.
As his mouth found my neck, I sobbed, “I’m sorry.”
His breath feathered across my skin. And then his warm mouth settled on my wound. His tongue swirled out and licked the blood. His body went tight. He pressed me harder against the rock. His mouth opened wider. His teeth grazed my skin.
Then he bit. Hard.
An instant gasp burst from my mouth. The rock dropped from my hand. My nails dug into his sides, but he didn’t seem to notice. His heart hammered against mine even faster than before.
The sharp sting slowly receded. As if he sensed it, the decrease in my pain, a moan came from deep within his throat. He sucked harder, that tug shooting all the way to my belly and turning the hurt into a weird kind of pleasure. My eyelids slid closed and my fingers tangled in his hair.
I was lost. No longer cared what happened to me. One of my legs came up to wrap around him, to pull him even closer. His hands slid around my bottom, and he lifted me up, pinning me against the rock wall, holding me there.
Both of my arms wrapped around his neck, and I drifted into a world of warmth and lust.
Eventually my heart rate slowed.
And my world went black.
Twenty-One
I WOKE WITH A THROBBING HEADACHE. MY MOUTH WAS DRY and pasty, and my stomach had curled into a tight, sour knot. I blinked, cracking my hot eyes open, wincing at the low torchlight far down the ledge. Too bright. I pushed myself up slowly and scooted back until I could lean against the wall. The effort had me panting and breaking out in a cold sweat.
I stayed there for several minutes, head back against the wall, eyes closed, and trying not to dry heave or pass out. I hadn’t expected this kind of aftereffect. Sebastian must have drunk too much, leaving me with some kind of blood-loss hangover.
