He sat up with a groan and pulled her into his arms. “Never thought I’d…” She couldn’t make out his face well enough in the darkness, but it sounded like he’d choked up emotionally.
Knowing how Slayers admired the strong outer appearance, she took his face in her hands to ground him and bring him back. “Hey. You’re okay. We are all alive, and we need to hold it together to get out of this with our lives. Lie back and heal, because we’re going to need your strength soon.”
The door at the entrance to the dungeon creaked, and several sets of footsteps descended the stairs. The cellblock door flew open with a bang, and Elena squinted against the light of the torch carried by the big Slayer called Commander Mihai. With him was a hideous woman with tangled hair, wearing a filthy dress of sorts. It looked more like a burlap sack with armholes and a hole for the head.
He unlocked the door and grabbed Elena, yanking her out with him, then slamming the door shut. Nik tried to rise to his feet but couldn’t get past his knees. Having seen her memories from his perspective, she knew how hard this was for him to be helpless. It broke her heart to see him struggle.
“It’s okay, Nik. Recover. They are not going to kill me right now. I know what I’m talking about.” And she did. She’d seen his mother bound to a stake. What she hadn’t told him was that the point of view of the vision was from a stake right next to her. She’d at least live long enough to be burned alive.
The big Slayer pulled her into the cell where she’d first met Fee. He pointed to the stone bench at the back of the cell. All the surfaces undulated in the flickering light of the torch, giving the cell an eerie fluid quality. Not wanting to cause a scene and agitate Nik, she sat on the bench.
The old woman got right up in her face, but didn’t look directly at her. Her weird, cloudy eyes stared straight ahead. She ran her fingers over Elena’s face and grunted. Then she placed her palms flat over the markings on her chest and grunted again. It was all Elena could do to sit still while the old woman ran her hands over her breasts and down her ribs. She gasped when the woman shoved her hands under the front of the leather top, laying her palms on her belly. “No.” she said. “Not going to do it.”
Mihai shifted uncomfortably. “You have orders.”
“No.”
He pulled out his sword, and the old woman cringed. Holding the torch in one hand and his sword in the other, he looked fierce. Too fierce. Charge built in Elena’s hands, and she nailed him in the chest full force with a bolt of electricity.
“Elena!” Nik yelled from the cell across from her. She grabbed the key ring off the unconscious Slayer and inserted it into the keyhole of the cell where he and his mother stood just inside the narrow bars.
Before she could engage the tumblers, a tsking sound came from the entrance to the cellblock followed by a sharp sting in her arm. Almost immediately, she ripped the dart out, but not soon enough. Her vision blurred within seconds.
“You will now insert that elf ore in her body, witch, or I will kill every man, woman, and child in your coven. Are we clear?” Fydor said.
“Y-yes,” the old woman answered, pulling a wicked-looking medical instrument from a bag slung over her shoulder.
Nik looked ready to roar in anger, but she shook her blurry head. “Let them,” she slurred. “S’okay. Heal. Trust.”
His mother put a comforting hand on his arm as Elena sunk to the ground, too dizzy from the drug to stand.
Too bad it hadn’t been enough to knock her out, she thought as the woman placed the instrument against the inside of her bicep. Yeah, really too bad, she lamented as the steel penetrated her flesh with an intolerable breath-stealing sting. The woman, hands shaking, depressed the plunger that inserted the metal plug of ore that would dampen her powers, leaving her one step short of human again. She gritted her teeth and held in a scream as the procedure was completed and the instrument removed. No anesthesia, no sterilization of the instruments, not even a freaking Band-Aid. She pressed her palm to her arm to stop the flow of blood from the incision sight. Welcome to the Underveil.
Several Slayers entered the dungeon, swords drawn.
“Showtime!” Fydor said.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Dread, fear, rage, regret—Nikolai’s emotions had run the gamut by the time he was bound with elven chains to one of four stakes. The execution site had been fabricated on top of a raised stone platform on the enormous fortress balcony overlooking the open field below. He hadn’t even fought the men he thought at one time were friends because Elena had asked him not to. She wanted him to save his strength. For what? So he was in top form when they fucking burned them all alive.