Head spinning, he floated, feeling as weightless as when she’d possessed him. . . .

With a tender kiss, she released him. Her face was flushed, her eyes lustrous. “Dessert was heavenly.”

“Come here, beautiful.” He reached for her, drawing her into his lap, squeezing her too tightly. He rested his forehead against hers, catching his breath. He barely recognized his voice as he said, “Is it time for your breakfast yet?”

FORTY-FIVE

Later that night, Jo dreamed.

She’d fallen asleep in a guesthouse bed, her limbs tangled with Rune’s; yet now she found herself in a dank cell, beaten and bloodied after a session with Magh and her torturers.

This had happened to Rune, was another of his memories. . . .

He stared at the ceiling of his cell. Anything that bitch wanted of him, she’d gotten, changing and reshaping him so many times he thought he would break.

Now she was breaking his body over and over in this putrid hell.

She’d just finished with him. “You will surrender your pride, cur.” She hung up the whip she favored. “I won’t rest until you beg for my mercy.” Each time he refused, she set her demon guards upon him.

Tonight they’d broken his right leg; the jagged end of his femur jutted through his skin. Two ribs breached his flesh as well. His hands were bound behind his back, so he couldn’t use runes to heal himself. “Shouldn’t a lowly whore be beneath a queen’s notice?” he bit out, spitting black blood in her direction. “But I now know why you visit me each night. You believe if you could only make me grovel, you could shake your desire for me. Then you’d stop fantasizing about me when you’re fucking others.”

Rage flashed in her eyes. “Tomorrow night will not go so well for you, cur. I’m going to bring out the pincers. . . .”

For hours after she and the guards had gone, Rune stared at the ceiling in agony, muttering his usual prayer: “Gods give me the power to destroy that bitch, and the entire royal house—”

“And what if we did?” a grating voice interrupted.

Rune jerked his head around to find a stranger in the shadows. The male’s face was indistinct, but his eyes were dark, like bottomless pits.

“We?” Rune attempted to sit up against the wall, choking back his pain. “Are you one . . . among the gods?”

The towering male crossed to stand outside the cell, far closer than most did. “I’m one among the number five. In time, I’ll be one among the number twelve. I’m known as Orion.”

“Why are you talking to me? You must not know who I am.”

This Orion merely stared, his expression unreadable.

“I’m Rune. I’ve been a whore for centuries.” He nodded down at his body. “Presently, I’m Magh’s favorite whipping boy.”

“I’ve come to this place for you,” Orion said. “Now answer the question, archer.”

Archer? “If you gave me the power to destroy her and all her line?”

“Would your resolve never falter?”

This being had no idea! Gritting his fangs, Rune fought to stand. Though one of his legs was shattered, he managed to rise on the other. “Never.”

Orion stepped back to inspect the cell door.

“The bars and cell are mystically reinforced,” Rune said between ragged breaths. “No being can break—”

The door flew open.

Rune’s jaw slackened. “How did you do that?”

“The universe is inundated with weaknesses, archer.” Orion entered the cell. With another wave of his hand, he freed Rune’s manacles.

No time for shock. Rune pierced a finger for blood, then began to draw healing symbols on his leg.

As Orion gazed on with interest, Rune told him, “I had to relearn these when patrons got too rough.” The magicks mended skin and knitted bones. Experience had taught him how to manipulate the bones to facilitate the healing.

His broken arm was next. Orion waited patiently until Rune’s body was restored, then said, “Why don’t you make your farewells to Sylvan, archer?”

“I’m not an archer,” Rune said. “If you freed me because you believe that, I appreciate the mistake, but I won’t pay for it.”

“You will be an archer.”

If you say so. Rune had never picked up a bow in all his life. Still, there was something so mesmerizing about the male. As if Orion saw secrets Rune could never know without him.

Orion said, “Upon your taste of triumph, return to me, and you’ll know still more. Lifetimes of it.”

After lifetimes of failures?

Rune didn’t have time to argue. No one had ever escaped this dungeon; Magh would never expect him. She might not have blocked off the secret tunnel leading to her chambers. If he could defeat her personal guard, she’d be helpless.

Like a crazed animal, he traced to the tunnel. It was unsealed? Such hubris!

With each foot closer to his target, Rune grew more enraged. Tonight she would die. Her long immortal life would end.

Yet even in the midst of his fury, he kept thinking of the mysterious male in the dungeon. Rune could tell Orion hadn’t wanted to fuck him—or break him. So what was his interest? Why save someone like me?

Lifetimes of triumph? Rune craved that so badly, he shook.

First, vengeance. He set upon Magh’s guards. Moving so fast he was a blur, he used his fangs to tear out their throats before they could yell.