Page 56 of Heavenly Bodies
The next looked around Elara’s age, and wept through purple and swelling eyes. Blackened blood was encrusted on his lips and lids. The man beside him was cursing, deep lacerations all over his bare chest. The men who had held her down. The men who had watched.
Finally, at the end, moaning wordlessly, his tongue cut down to a blackened stump, visible as he wailed, she saw him. A sandy head, a scar across his temple.
Elara’s breath quickened, her heart drumming such a song that it enveloped her, drowning out everything else—the sounds of the crowd, the gossip, the jeers.
‘No, no, no,’ she uttered, clutching the pillar next to her.
‘Elara? Elara!’ Merissa held her, concern plain on her features.
‘He…He…’ Stars, she couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t speak as the weight of what she saw before her crushed her. ‘Where is he?’ she snarled. ‘Whereishe?’
‘Who?’ Merissa frowned. ‘Who, Elara?’
Elara sucked in mouthfuls of air, anger setting her chest aflame as the incomprehensible became clear. Then she saw him.
Prince Lorenzo, the Lion of Helios, all-powerful Son of Light, the deadliest warrior to grace the land in centuries. As he strolled slowly past the prisoners, clad head to toe in black, his eyes were stormy, his jaw set. He halted and turned to the crowd, looking down upon them.
‘These men are charged with assault of the highest degree.’ His voice carried across the space like the blade of a sword dealing a deadly blow. ‘They have besmirched the name of the City Guard.’ The prince spat at the feet of the ringleader as he moaned in pain. Elara lunged, trying to force the crowd apart to stop him, to make her way to the dais.
The morning light was dimmed in that moment by the glint in Lorenzo’s eyes as he spoke, the crowd murmuring in disgust, taunting as the charges were read.
Elara tried to shout his name, but her voice was swallowed by the crowd.
‘Let this be a lesson,’ he shouted over them all, ‘that this will be the fate that befalls anyone found guilty of the same. Of touching a woman against her will. Let this be a lesson,’ he said, turning to the whimpering figures tied to the posts, one hand raised elegantly against the bright skies, ‘that you willburn.’
A flick of his wrist and flames engulfed them all, theirscreams coating the thick, heaving air. Some of the crowd cried in horror. Others cheered. Enzo scanned the crowd, tall and proud, until his eyes snagged upon Elara’s. Her breath was stolen from her at the way the flames surrounding him burned within his eyes too. The sound of the crowd seemed to fade into the background, registering only as a dull roar in her ears, alongside distant, excited shouts of ‘Burn, burn, burn.’
Enzo’s stare did not leave her, and she couldn’t withstand the fire that surrounded her any longer. Head spinning, she tore from Merissa’s grip and ran at full speed through the palace gates, away from the baying crowd, and the Lion of Helios with them.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Elara’s breath was burning in her chest as she tore up the steep incline to the forest. The rough undergrowth tore at the soles of her soft shoes, her skirt snagging on branches as she passed. Ragged breaths escaped her as she continued, pushing herself into the shade. Far away from the sounds of death.
She slumped under the canopy of trees in the place where she had first trained with Enzo. The thought made her recoil.
She lay down, panting. The horror of what she had just witnessed continued to assault her—the flames, the screams, the stench of burning flesh and fire. Anger and shock mingled in a sickly waltz.
It was not Enzo’s choice to make, and yet, he had made it anyway, the hot-headed fool. The betrayal was a knife in her gut and instead of pushing the emotion down, she let it fuel her, seething until shadows flooded the clearing. There wasn’t even a slice of light, her magick swallowed it all whole.
She wasn’t sure how long she lay there, trying to wrangle her pounding heart and terrible memories under control.The darkness that surrounded her gave no indication of the time of day.
Suddenly, a crack of a twig had her on her feet. She stilled, sliding her dagger out of its sheath. Poised, she crouched low, a panther ready to strike. There was a shadow, and she pounced, knocking it to the ground. Moments later she straddled her victim, who had gone down far too easily for someone so large.
In the darkness, a familiar voice said, ‘You love to force me into compromising positions, don’t you?’
Elara pushed off Enzo, stomach lurching. ‘Get the fuck away from me,’ she hissed.
‘El, we need to talk,’ he sighed as he propped himself up.
‘Don’t you dare call me that. You’re not myfriend.’
Enzo flinched at her words as though they’d struck him.
‘Elara,’ he said, and his voice was hard now. ‘I’m not leaving until we speak.’
‘Then speak,’ she snarled, whipping around to face him, arms folded like armour across her chest. Her eyes suddenly throbbed. She sank on to a flat rock and pushed the heels of her hands into them furiously.
‘El,’ he said again, and she turned to see him crouching near, his height meaning he had to sit on his heels to meet her gaze.