Page 74 of Heavenly Bodies
Gem laughed softly as an image was now fed into Elara’s mind. It was hazy, showing Enzo hanging from a ceiling, blood pouring from gashes in his skin, his mask still on.
Elara frowned. Why was his mask still on? But she cried out as another vicious burst of pain cut through her mind, blurring the image. When it became sharper again, Ariete was there, red starlight lancing over Enzo’s body for every time he refused to answer the Star’s relentless interrogation.
She fought back a sob, gritting her teeth as her magick tried to fight past the venom. A wisp of her shadows swirled out of her, and lashed around Gem’s neck, though it did little.
The goddess growled in frustration, before Elara was hit again by stabbing needles of light, piercing hot, the pain nearly making her black out. But the claws that sank into her brain wouldn’t relent, wouldn’t let her sink into oblivion. An inhuman sound escaped her, and she clenched her jaw, shaking.
I will sweep your mind to find everything you love, and then I’ll destroy it,Gem’s voice whispered.
Elara lay, panting raggedly.
She didn’t know if what happened next went on for hours, or days. All she did know was that it was the most acute pain she had ever felt. Again and again, Gem’s claws raked her mind, searching for information of the last months. Elara’s willpower was slipping slowly, her mouth fixed in a soundless scream as Gem silenced her cries. She sat there suspended in agony.
Finally, she heard the chair drag back.
‘Your mind will be mine before the end of this,’ Gem snarled. Elara felt the Star grip her mind so tightly that she began to convulse. Then finally, Gem left her in the dark.
When Elara next woke, it was to warm liquid seeping down her throat. Her eyes fluttered, to Ariete perched on her bed, his wrist at her mouth, as she drank greedily. Blissful numbness swept through the pain.
The moment Elara realized who he was, she yanked away, spluttering up blood.His blood.
‘Hush,’ he said as she wretched. ‘I need you lucid for this conversation.’
‘Why are you doing this?’ she whispered, forcing her sob down as she wiped her mouth, staining her hand scarlet. ‘If our fates have been tied, then we can do nothing about it. If I’m to fall in love with you and be your death, why not just accept it?’
Ariete tipped back his head and laughed, a manic gleam shining in his eyes. ‘Let me ask you, Elara. Do you accept it?’
She thought of Enzo. Of what he’d said in the forest.You deserve to feel true love.
‘No,’ she replied.
‘Our fates are tied. But I am the god of war. If you are to be my death, then I will go down in battle.’
The room spun as the Star’s raw, unfiltered magick from his blood worked its way into her system. Her eyelids fluttered as euphoria pumped through her. His blood was better than ambrosia. Utter bliss and divinity.
‘Who is Alec?’
The bliss stuttered. ‘Where is he?’ she demanded.
‘That’s what I’d like to know,’ he murmured back. Everything within Elara abated a moment. The visions from Gem, they weren’t true. Ariete had lost him.
‘Tell me everything, Elara, and I can stop your pain.’
But Elara had latched on to it now, that one ray of light shining in the night. Enzo was safe. So she only smiled at Ariete.
His face contorted in rage, the indifferent, immortal mask shattered. ‘So be it,’ he said, before he plunged his fangs back into her throat.
This time, when the pain came, blissful darkness was already there to eat it whole.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
‘Elara?’ a voice whispered urgently. ‘Elara?’ it urged again, louder.
Dreamscapes swirled around Elara as she staggered, half intoxicated with Ariete’s blood, half poisoned with his venom. The two fought each other, struggled to control her magick. But she dreamwalked on.
‘Elara,’ the voice beckoned.
She recognized the dreamcloud up ahead, had wandered to it so many times growing up. And with a sob, she fell into it.