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“Don’t try to stay ten moves ahead of your opponent. Stay behind him with a knife.”
—Excerpted from Becoming the King You Are Meant to Be, a work in progress by Lazarus the Cruel and Unusual
Like Alice on her way to Wonderland, Cameo, host to the demon of Misery, tumbled end over end down a long, dark cavern. When the bottom finally appeared, she braced for impact...only to slip through a glistening portal. The cavern walls vanished, and she spilled from a midnight sky—straight into a new realm.
Never should have touched the Paring Rod. One brush of her fingertips against the pretty glass bulb that tipped its handle, and the ancient artifact had opened a door between the physical and spirit world. Voilà! In a blink, her descent had begun.
As she plunged toward a flat clearing, she braced for impact...
Cameo smacked into the ground. A scream split her lips, her brain banging against her skull, her lungs emptying and multiple bones shattering all at once.
Agony seared her, black dots weaving through her vision. Warmth drained from her hands and feet, collecting in her torso. Her body was in shock.
Hours passed before she gained the strength to roll to her side, her wrecked heart tap-dancing a wild rhythm against broken ribs. Her head swam but thankfully her pain ebbed. Able to breathe again, she noted the sweet scent of ambrosia—the drug of choice for immortals—hung heavy in the air. She almost laughed. For once, lady luck had been on her side. If you had to crash-land, what better place than an ambrosia field?
She drifted in and out of consciousness, the passage of time evidenced by the healing of her injuries and the shift from dark to light. When a beam of sun stroked her, blistering her pale skin, she finally woke for good.
Her nose crinkled as she inhaled. The scent of ambrosia had been replaced by burnt foliage. Where had she landed? Hell? The sun blazed so hot it had scorched sections of land.
Cameo crawled into a shadowed haven, exhaling with relief when her skin cooled. She scanned the lavender sky with its pale green clouds, then looked over an unfamiliar forest filled with towering pink trees and plots of azure grass.
Oookay. This is new. A forest fit for a storybook princess. Too bad Cameo was the villain of the tale. Browniebitch and the Twelve Immortals. For her and her family of demon-possessed warriors, nothing had ever been just right.
Cold fingers of dread crept down her spine as a butterfly the size of her fist fluttered past her. Over the centuries, the wretched insects had become an omen. Death and destruction await...
The heavy weight of depression settled on her shoulders, and she wallowed about the travesty of her life.
Lost so much already. All because she’d made one teeny tiny mistake when she’d lived in Mount Olympus.
That mistake? Helping her friends steal and open Pandora’s box. An appropriate punishment would have been a hand amputation or two. Maybe a few hundred years in the slammer. Instead, she was forced to play host to the demon of Misery for eternity, free will a thing of the past.
To commemorate the occasion, a butterfly tattoo had appeared on her lower back.
The beginning of the end.
Misery had quickly peeled away the layers of her humanity, hope and happiness. Again and again he’d wiped her mind of any joyous memories.
The bastard still wiped her mind of any joyous memories. Every day he breathed his poison into her thoughts, hurt others through her voice and ruined whatever relationships she managed to forge. He’d reduced her life to one horror after another.
If only she could control him. But Misery was a separate entity with his own motivations and goals. A dark presence she’d never been able to drown out. A prison she had never been able to escape.
Right now, he’s not my biggest problem. The butterfly...
Disaster was imminent.
Cameo searched for a way out of the forest. At one side, a breathtaking river with rainbow-colored water trickled into a rocky crag. Some type of fish broke the surface. A water unicorn? A long, ivory horn stretched from between his eyes and—
She gasped. Another water unicorn had jumped up and thrust his horn into the belly of the first. Blood spurted, creating a crimson waterfall. Countless other fish converged on the injured one, sharp teeth ripping into scales and organs until not even bones remained.
Mental note: no baths in the wild, ever.
At her other side, a field of ambrosia flourished, unaffected by the over-hot sun. Thick emerald stalks dripped with countless violet flowers, the petals drawn together to avoid the worst of the heat.
The field might be her only viable—
A thorny limb snatched the jumbo-size butterfly from the air. Her ears twitched, the soft breeze carrying the faint sounds of screaming.
Viable path or not, it was time to go.
Cameo lumbered to shaky legs, wincing as twigs sliced her heel. Her brow wrinkled. Her feet were bare, her combat boots gone.
Someone had stolen her shoes?
A quick scan proved her tank top and battle leathers were torn and stained with dried blood, but still in place. However, the daggers she’d made over two hundred years ago were missing.
Someone had robbed her while she’d drifted out of consciousness.
Someone would pay!
This villain had come here to find a formidable immortal named Lazarus the Cruel and Unusual, and she would destroy anyone who hindered her.
According to her friends, she had interacted with Lazarus twice before. Thanks to Misery, she remembered nothing about either encounter. Or did she? On the fringe of her mind was a suggestive montage of images that might or might not have happened.
Flicker: Cameo performed a striptease for a faceless, muscled man, a sultry half smile playing at the corners of her mouth, her silvery eyes smoky with desire.
Flicker: Cameo crawled toward the same faceless, muscled man, clearly intent on his seduction.
Flicker: Cameo sprawled beneath the faceless, muscled man, one of his big, callused hands on her breast, the other between her legs as he drove her closer and closer to orgasm. Her spine was arched, her head thrown back, her expression taut with a sublime mix of agony and pleasure.
Was the faceless man Lazarus? How had he tempted her into his bed?
She wanted so badly to remember.
Sex wasn’t something she enjoyed or usually even risked. Not anymore. She had a Sexually Transmitted Demon, and almost everyone she dated ended up depressed at some point.
Guilt flared, adding to her all-consuming misery. And yet...
Every time she imagined her faceless lover, languid heat wrapped loving arms around her. Blood rushed through her veins with new purpose, molten shivers cascading through her, every inch of her tingling.
Did he miss her? Or did he rejoice, thinking he would never see her again?
Her heart seemed to crack open and seep acid. Memories were as necessary for survival as oxygen or water; without hers, she was incomplete. Weakened, even.
Would Lazarus tell her what had happened between them? If there was even a chance, she had to find him.
Problem was, she and the rest of the world knew very little about him. His past was shrouded in mystery. What she had managed to glean: her friend Strider, the keeper of Defeat, had beheaded him not too long ago. Lazarus’s spirit had traveled through the Paring Rod and entered one of thousands of realms in the afterlife. Perhaps this one, a strange and predatory world.
Soon after Lazarus’s death, her semifriend Viola, the keeper of Narcissism, had accidentally followed him through—while still alive. Also alive, Cameo had followed her, intent on rescuing her.
Cue her adventures with the mysterious warrior.
If her brothers-by-circumstance hadn’t launched a rescue mission of their own, would she have chosen to stay with Lazarus?
Going by the tidbits she’d revealed before Misery had cleaned her mind with mental Windex, she and Lazarus had partnered up to find Viola and Pandora’s box—aka dimOuniak—both supposedly hidden inside one of the realms.
Why he’d agreed to partner with her when he had no stake in the outcome, she wasn’t sure.
Unless he wanted the box? DimOuniak was just as powerful as the Paring Rod—no, more so—and could be used to instantly kill anyone, everyone, who was demon possessed. Or so rumors claimed.
Had Lazarus planned to harm her all along?
See? Loss of memory left her vulnerable in the worst of ways.
So. She would find Lazarus. Hopefully he liked her and wanted only to help her. After he filled in her mental blanks, maybe they could renew their quest for the box and he could make her happy? At least for a little while. What good was a life without happiness?
Going to forget him again. Why bother?
Because...just because! A girl without hope might as well curl up and die.
Maybe he was her faceless lover. Maybe he would help her find Viola as well as the box. The goddess of the Afterlife had been rescued, yes, but she’d purposely used the Paring Rod a second time. No one knew why, and no one had heard from her since.
Resolute, Cameo motored forward. Twigs sliced her feet, but she maintained a steady pace, maneuvering through the thicket of trees. At least the temperature had cooled.
Seventy-two percent of men have cheated on their significant other. The demon’s voice whispered through her mind in an attempt to immobilize her. Twenty-four percent are actively cheating right this second. Forty-eight percent are smug rather than remorseful. How long do you think you’ll intrigue Lazarus? If you ever intrigued him at all.
Horrid demon! Always lobbing H-bombs of gloom. Was Lazarus her faceless lover or not?
Misery smoothly added, If he is, you should run. Considering what happened with Alex...
“Shut up,” she muttered, but the damage was done. He’d hit his target, reopening internal wounds.
Alex, a human who had lived in ancient Greece, had been her first and only love.
At the age of eight, a terrible sickness had rendered him deaf and, apparently, unworthy of his wealthy family’s love. He was cast out of the only home he’d ever known. After months of starvation, a “protector” saved him from the slums. A blacksmith with a sickening taste for children.
Apprentice by day, slave by night. A heartbreaking existence.
When Alex reached his teens, the blacksmith dubbed him too old and kicked him out. Alex snapped, introducing the blacksmith’s heart to his handmade dagger. Then he claimed the business as his due.
He poured his time and energy into metalwork, his talent indisputable. He’d been the only person Cameo trusted to make her weapons. The only male unaffected by the sorrow in her voice.
They fell in love, and for just a little while, she had verged on the edge of happiness. She’d craved more...but all the while, a shadow of foreboding had cloaked her like a second skin.
With every new dawn, she’d wondered why she remembered him. Why the demon hadn’t yet stolen her memory of him.
The answer had proved more atrocious than she’d ever dreamed.
In a vulnerable moment, she’d told Alex about her demonic companion. He’d decided she was worse than the blacksmith and arranged for Hunters, a cult of self-appointed slayers of immortals, to capture and torture her in the worst of ways.
Razor-winged butterflies took flight in her stomach. Did Lazarus know the truth about her? Did he care?
He must know. He was an immortal living among other immortal spirits. And he shouldn’t care. He was called cruel and unusual. He had a dark side of his own. Very dark. Pitch-black without any hint of light.
A sequence of high-pitched squawks rang out as a flock of birds leaped from treetops and scattered across the skyline, soon vanishing behind a wall of clouds.
Whoosh! Thud!
The ground shook. Cameo tumbled to her knees. Wheezing, fighting for oxygen, she reached for her daggers. Her missing daggers.
Damn it! She darted behind one of the bigger pink trees, shadows enveloping her. Adrenaline surged, strong and sure, but it couldn’t mask the sting of bark scraping through her shirt.
Another whoosh. Another thud. The shaking only worsened, trees toppling, the surrounding shrubs falling like dominoes.
Across the distance, a path cleared, and two flying beasts appeared. Some sort of dragon hybrid, maybe? They had red eyes, elongated snouts and teeth better qualified as short swords. Their bodies were long and coiled, but without arms or legs while their tails were thrice barbed. Resplendent scales reflected in the sunlight.
So...the two were flying snakes? Dragon snakes?
They soared above the remaining canopy of trees, their multipointed wings clipping branches and slicing through bark as if it were butter. One creature pursued the other. When he caught his prey, the two wrestled...playfully?
“Does the pretty miss require aid?”
The unfamiliar voice somehow turned the innocent question into a sexual promise. She glanced up—and had to swallow a yelp. A two-hundred-plus pound leopard perched on the limb directly above her, his neon-green eyes steady on her. His mangled tail wagged back and forth. One of his ears looked as if it had been chewed off, and his matted fur sported several bald patches.
Misery took an instant dislike to the animal and snarled.
The cat offered her a slow, toothy grin and batted a meaty paw at a fly. He actually speared the insect on the end of a claw. “I’m Rathbone, and I’m at your service...for a small fee.”
He could talk. He was a cat, and he could talk. And with that voice, he could make millions as a phone sex operator.
Had the Paring Rod transported her into a fairy tale, after all? The porn version? Browniebitch Does Twelve Immortals.
Was Rathbone a shape-shifter? No, impossible. Shape-shifters didn’t retain the ability to speak while in animal form. Although there were exceptions to every rule, right?
“I can save myself, but thanks for the offer.” Having lived over four millennia, she’d waged world wars, fought countless battles against immortal predators, humans with a grudge and monsters of myth and legend. Sometimes she’d lost, but mostly she’d won.
The leopard flinched. Hardly a surprise. Everyone always flinched. Some even cried. If anyone had actually liked her voice, she couldn’t remember.
Her hands curled into fists. Another memory Misery had stolen?
The dragon-snakes resumed their chase, nearly causing a full-blown earthquake this time, and she grabbed a branch to steady herself. Nope, not a branch, but Rathbone’s tail.
He wiggled his brows. “I’ve got something firmer you can hold on to.”
Surely he wasn’t referring to his...
He contorted to lick a massive set of balls.
You’ve got to be kidding me.
She released him and peeked around the trunk. The creatures approached at breakneck speed...only to pass her. She began to relax. A mistake. Of course. When had anything ever gone her way? Both dragon-snakes came to an abrupt stop before slowly pivoting.
Two sets of red eyes locked on her. Long, thin tongues swiped over saber-teeth, and drool dripped from the corners of their mouths. Drool...or accelerant? The pungent stench of something akin to gasoline stung her nostrils.
Well. She’d just been placed on the day’s menu.
In unison, the “chefs” hissed and bowed their spines, the scales around their necks flaring.
You have an eighty-seven percent chance of being deep-fried, never seeing your friends again and never finding Lazarus or the box.
No. She would fight, and she would win. If she died, Misery would be loosed upon an unsuspecting world; he would find new prey, devour sweet dreams, beloved hopes and any glimmer of happiness. He—
Had merely distracted her, the bastard.
Dual streams of fire spewed in her direction. Attuned to battle now, Cameo dived out of the way. Upon landing, she rolled and swiped up two petrified branches. As she stood, she swung at the nearer beast.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” Rathbone began, reminding her of his presence. The pointed tips moved across her opponent’s chest, and the cat sighed. “Congrats. You just made everything worse.”
Argh! The branches hadn’t penetrated a single scale. In fact, the branches hadn’t scratched a single scale.
Enraged now, the dragon-snake roared.
All right. Their scales were impenetrable. Got it. Only two other options remained. Go for the eyes or go for the mouth. Easy, not a problem, if she could hop aboard the dragon-snake express and hitch a ride.
“Ssss.”
“Ssss.”
Two new streams of fire spewed in her direction, the heat level jacked to instant BBQ with a side of ash. Again she scrambled out of the way, but really, she had nowhere to go. The beasts circled her, working in tandem to trap her inside a ringed inferno. Smoke thickened the air.
A tickle irritated the back of her throat, making her cough—at the same time, a wing arced in her direction. She managed to jump backward, barely avoiding being sliced in two.
“Want my help now?” Rathbone remained secure on his perch, his smile as innocuous as a fistful of daisies. “I’ll give you a discounted rate.”
Ignoring him, she sprinted across the white-hot path of soot and char. As another wing swung at her, she used the branches she still held to bat it out of the way. Momentum spun her around, and she dodged another stream of fire. Next, a barbed tail lashed at her, but she jumped over it and motored on, increasing her pace. Almost within range...
There’s no way you’ll succeed, the demon told her, his sadness seeping into her. You’re going to die.
No! She would win, and she would live. She would!
The moment of truth arrived.
Her heartbeat a wild thing her ribs might not be able to cage, she vaulted up, up. One dragon-snake vaulted with her—or rather, at her—clearly intending to snag her midair. The closer he came, the more he snapped his teeth at her. His mistake. She shoved a branch into his mouth.
The limb—as thick as her biceps, the length of her forearm and harder than stone—remained vertical, one end digging into the roof of his mouth, the other pinning his tongue to the bottom. Meanwhile, Cameo tightened her grip on the branch’s center, swung around and straddled his neck.
He thrashed, the jerky movements impeding the glide of his wings, sending him plummeting back to earth.
Yee-haw!
Just before her second crash landing of the day, she jabbed the second branch into his eye. He screeched as thick black blood splattered over her hand and blistered her skin.
Boom!
The dragon-snake absorbed the worst of the impact, Cameo bouncing off him. As he screeched and thrashed, she lumbered to her feet, intending to run. Sharp agony seared her ankle when a hard yank dropped her flat on her face and wrenched her backward.
Her nails left grooves in the dirt. Trying not to panic, she glanced over her shoulder. Nooo! The other dragon-snake had snagged her foot between his teeth.
He began to chew, saliva penetrating her wound. A scream split her lips, her entire leg burning and blistering. She curled into a ball to swing at him.
Damn it! Her hands were empty of branches.
He dragged her over rocks and gargantuan roots, ripping her shirt. Her flesh, too. Her head swam again, oblivion beckoning. She reached for another branch, any branch. There!
He straightened, lifting her off the ground foot-first. Dangling upside down only magnified her pain.
Remember, pain is weakness leaving the body.
She could do this. No, she would do this.
Cameo contorted and strained her body in order to swing forward...back...forward again, faster and faster, coming closer and closer to her enemy’s torso.
He flapped his wings as he soared higher into the sky—and provided a new lesson about pain.
Not sure how much more I can take.
Sweat drenched her and nausea boiled in her stomach, but still she continued swinging. Finally, blessedly, she was able to thrust the branch through the underside of his jaw, where no scales protected him, the end slamming into the back of his throat.
He jerked and roared, releasing her. Down, down she fell. She braced—her lungs emptied once again, the chambers in her bursting like a balloon.
Her pain was so strong, so shrill she could almost understand a man’s suffering when he had a cold.
She remained sprawled across the ground, praying for a quick recovery. Or death. Yeah, probably death. Her mutilated ankle throbbed in time to her distorted heartbeat as the organ regenerated. From her kneecap to her toes, she felt as if her skin had been baked like cheese on a pizza.
Though the dragon-snake tried, he failed to remove the branch; his wings refused to bend as needed. In the end, he could only return to his companion, drill his fangs into the beast’s chest and fly them both away.
She’d...done it? She’d won?
You’ll probably never walk again, Misery told her.
Wah, wah, wah.
“I’ll walk again,” she grated. Over the centuries, she’d had limbs severed and her tongue cut out. Her ankle would heal...eventually. The demon only sought to depress her.
Rathbone prowled from the tree and sashayed toward her. “Ask nicely, and I’ll let you ride me free of charge.”
“No, thanks.” Too fatigued to care if he hoped to lure her into a false state of calm simply to attack her, she said, “Where are we?”
His flinch was more pronounced this time. “We’re in the Realm of Grimm and Fantica, ruled by King Lazarus the Cruel and Unusual, the only son of the Monster.”
Lazarus. Her Lazarus. He was here. And he was king.
Go ahead. Find him. I want you to spend time with the male known as the Cruel and Unusual. Misery laughed his most vindictive laugh. I bet he hurts you in ways I’ve never managed.
The demon lied. Or maybe he’d spoken true. With him, she never knew what to believe.
Maybe she should return to Budapest.
Did Lazarus even miss her? she wondered again. What if they’d parted as adversaries?
Well, so what if they had? Everyone deserved a second chance. Besides, she had no idea how to return. And really, what did his “Cruel and Unusual” moniker matter? Many immortals referred to her as the Mother of Melancholy. Names were just that—names.
“Where is the king?” she asked, her bland tone maybe, hopefully masking her eagerness. Reveal nothing, hide everything.
The leopard traced his tongue over his lips, as if he’d just spotted breakfast. “Do I detect excitement?”
Ugh. Was he planning to charge her for info if he did? “You’d be the first to do so.” How true. And how sad.
“Now I detect desolation.” A calculated glint appeared in his neon eyes. “The plot thickens.”
“Why do my emotions matter to you, anyway?”
“Mysteries and puzzles intrigue me. Come. I’ll escort you to Lazarus. However, I’m no longer willing to help for free.”
Knew it.
“You will pay me a small escort fee,” he said. “But be warned, my pretty. People enter his territory...and they never leave.”