After that first time in the throne room, he ate many sandwiches, in between fucking Deka senseless.

He enjoyed the latter more than the former, which was saying a lot because she actually made a pretty mean sandwich.

In between the sex and food, he explored. The mystery deepened the more he searched.

The castle proved ancient. As in stone crumbling with age, some rooms covered in a thick patina of dust, ancient hieroglyphics.

Taking his time to go through dressers and wardrobes meant coming across strange garments, some disintegrating at his touch. Most had a medieval feel to them, the skirts long for the women while, for the males, the breeches were snug and usually laced. Only in Suzie’s quarters did he find signs of modern wear, for both male and female. But no cell phone. No way to contact the outside world.

No answers to anything.

There was a library in the castle, the tomes, covered in some strange leather, almost like dragon skin yet not, inscribed with strange runes. Since he’d studied archeology what seemed like a lifetime ago, he had plenty of experience with archaic languages, yet he couldn’t decipher a thing.

Nor had he yet discovered what lived, or used to live, in this world. Because Suzie wasn’t the only sentient creature here. The abandoned village showed signs of once having been inhabited, but not by humans.

The chairs had no backs; everything was a stool. The doorways were tall—taller than he was used to seeing. And there were no beds, rather strange bars suspended overhead, almost like perches for bats.

But no bats. Nothing lived in this barren world. Nothing except him, Deka, and the Jabbas.

The first few days, he didn’t pay his former jailors much mind. He treated them as they’d once treated him. He tossed them bowls of gruel and occasionally set off the sprinklers—their hollers at the cold cleansing douse bringing a grim smile of satisfaction to his lips.

The days fell into a routine where he woke and fucked Deka senseless. Then she’d make him breakfast—from supplies that dwindled—then off he’d go exploring, claiming he was searching for a way out.

He found it, and rather quickly, too.

Turned out the portals weren’t all that hard to activate. But…he kept that a secret for now because he was having too much fun.

For the first time ever in his life, Samael could do what he wanted. He worked, fucked, or did nothing at his leisure.

There was no one around to give him orders except Deka, and those were usually of the erotic variety.

No one to punish him for wanting to be his own man.

No one to be jealous of.

No one around to make demands of him but Deka.

His Silver princess.

She, on the other hand, kept trying to find a way out, claiming they needed to escape. Although he would add that she didn’t try very hard and was easily distracted.

Look, a romance novel I’ve never read—the Jabbas’ bedrooms proved full of them—and off she popped to read for a few hours. He didn’t mind because, once she got to the dirty parts, she always came for him, eyes alight with need and hunger.

Dirty, hot, sweaty, and erotic hunger.

Fuck it felt good.

No wonder he didn’t care if they ever escaped. But the food dwindled. And he was running out of places to explore. He even took to playing checkers—the board created on the stone floor, the pieces the cracked bones of the cooked bird he’d brought the brothers—with the Jabbas when Deka thought he was valiantly searching for an exit.

In case anyone wondered, he wasn’t softening on the Jabbas’ incarceration. He still didn’t trust them. But he had no problem buttering them up to get information.

Jabba One—whose real name turned out to be a rather banal, Maedoc—happened to ask about two weeks into their Hell vacation if Samael had been keeping up on the news in between banging his girlfriend.

Yeah, my girlfriend. He’d agreed to that much at least in the face of her persistence.

Pausing the game, Samael glared at the male, who didn’t appear as putrid with regular bathing and a clean robe. “What do you mean news from the outside world? I thought we were cut off.” He moved a fragment of thick bone to a spot and watched the rib with a little bit of gristle adjacent from it.

“Did you not wonder at how Suzie”—the Jabbas had adopted the name—“was so well informed?”

“Not really.” Because he’d been self-involved with screaming most of the time.

“I know you’ve been exploring. Did you not wonder at the number of mirrors in the small parlor?”

“Um, no.” Because he’d assumed they were for kinky sex. It was how he used them. Taking Deka on the one settee in there meant he got to see her from any angle he liked.

His Silver princess was so beautiful when she came.

“The largest, most ornate mirrors are tuned to different worlds, and some of the smaller ones surrounding them to different places in the same world.”

“Why?” He watched Maedoc move a chunk of leg across the board.

Excellent. Samael made his next epic move.

“Knowledge is power. Even though she was imprisoned here, the suzerain always kept well informed for the day she could escape.”

“Why wait? Those portals outside aren’t that hard to activate.” A few of them at any rate. Some remained dark, no matter what he did. He just wished the lightning wouldn’t crackle when he played with them. He kept expecting Deka to notice, yet whenever he experimented, he returned to find her napping soundly. And then, because she looked so temptingly soft, he usually fucked her.

“Those portals work in phases. The one she originally came through went out of alignment shortly after. It took her centuries of waiting before the cosmos moved close enough again for her to create a portal back to Earth.”

“Centuries?” Samael frowned. “Impossible. You told me she was a dragon once upon a time.” The revelation still shocked him. “We age better than humans, but we’re not eternal.”

“Have you not guessed her secret to life yet?” Maedoc mocked him. “For a scientist who specialized in the past, you’re not very astute.”

“I still don’t know if I believe she’s a dragon. Her eyes are all wrong.”

“You mean the red irises?” Maedoc shrugged as he moved another piece. “The solitude of this place and her diet changed her.”

“And made her live longer?”

“The dark magic she’s discovered is what extended her life.”

Samael questioned, and for once, Maedoc answered. What he didn’t understand was, why? “How come you’re revealing this to me? How do I even know you’re telling the truth?”

“You don’t. However, it occurs to me that my brother and I will probably die in this place, and I find myself unwilling to let our story die here, too.”

“You aren’t going to die.” He’d even thought of letting them go once he and Deka left.

“Our fate is sealed. As is yours if you don’t leave before the portal between this world and Earth shifts. The other planets you can access can’t sustain our kind of life. And we’ve stripped everything we could from this one. Once the planes move out of alignment, we will have no access to food and starve.”

Samael absently moved a piece on the game board as he absorbed the information. “In other words, it’s time to move on. What if I took you with me?” Again not altruistic on his part at all. The Jabbas had knowledge to impart, and knowledge was power.

“We cannot leave this place. It is part of our banishment.”

“Who banished you?”

Maedoc looked him in the eye with a gaze so familiar that he wasn’t surprised when he said, “The Septs did. The suzerain wasn’t the only dragon abandoned here.”

He eyed the tubby male up and down and then snickered. “Dragon, my ass. If you’re a dragon, shift.”

“I can’t. Not anymore.”

“Because you’re lying. First off, dragons don’t live centuries. Two, they don’t have red eyes, and three, I’m pretty sure if a bunch of dragons had been exiled for crimes, we’d know about it.” Almost being wiped out didn’t mean their legacy had died. From a young age, they were taught the history of their kind. Hammered with the mistakes of their ancestors so they wouldn’t make the same errors again when they rose to power.

“Our existence was wiped from the annals. No one wanted to remember the truth.”

“And what is the truth?”

“The suzerain, who started her life as an Orange dragon of the Ochre Sept, was a sorceress.”

Huge snort. “Dragons aren’t witches.” They had unique and special powers depending on their genetic color blend, but it was their nature, not mystical power.

“Are you going to listen or just disparage every word I say?” Maedoc’s rebuke emerged tersely.

“You’re asking me to listen to a fairy tale.”

“No, I am asking you to listen to a truth that has been hidden and buried for a long time. Once upon a time, certain dragons, a rare number of us, wielded magic. But we were banished after the purge by the humans. All dragons exhibiting the slightest hint of magical ability, down to the smallest child, were exiled to this land.”

Samael wanted to deny it, and yet there was a somber quality to Maedoc’s claim. A truthfulness he couldn’t deny. “Why banish you?” he asked.

“Because our own people feared us.” He snorted and shook his head. “Feared us because of a single sorceress who singlehandedly destroyed our people.”

“The humans destroyed us.”

“Those puny creatures?” Maedoc snorted. “The humans had help. A dragoness sorceress was the one who brought back the metal the humans used to kill us. From this very realm, as a matter of fact. Then she further abetted her crime by aiding the humans, giving the location of the lairs to them.”

“Why the fuck would she do that?” A betrayal of that magnitude shocked even Samael. He’d only locked up his brother, never machinated his death. Nor the deaths of hundreds.

“Jealousy. The fact that a suitor spurned her advances. She wanted the Golden king to marry her, but he chose her sister. And so she sought revenge. She didn’t live long to gloat about it. Her own sister was the one to track her down and rend her limb from limb. It wasn’t enough to save us. The actions of one doomed all the sorcerers of that time.”

It took only a short moment for him to reason out the why. “The Septs had to eliminate all the magic users because they knew how to get more of the metal. That kind of power…” The temptation of knowing a plane where you could get the one weapon that would make you a ruler over all the Septs…

“Now you understand. All of them had to go. Even the queen and her little magic-using daughter, who had nothing to do with the crime. In order to prevent any more fighting and truly decimating the few dragons that were left, the queen led the way through the portal to this plane, along with as many supplies as they could manage.”

“If they knew how to open it, couldn’t they have just returned?” He had a hard time fathoming people who would sacrifice themselves.

“The queen’s honor meant everything to her, she had a way of speaking that made you believe in her. By the time we realized the hell chosen for us, the planes had shifted. The way home was blocked.”

“And you all should have died of old age, but didn’t. How?” This was the crux of the story.

“While we had food to sustain our bodies, mortality stalked our kind. As we grew older, there was a desperation to stay alive. To extend our life any way we could. The queen forbade it. But once she died…” Maedoc shrugged. “We didn’t all have her fortitude. We chose survival.”

“But how? You’re talking about living centuries past a normal life span. How is that possible?”

A snort shook the male. “Magic, of course. Magic that we found here in our prison. Once we discovered it, we didn’t hesitate. At first, we stole life from others. Using the portals to invade the other planes when they rolled into position. We hunted down the living, bringing them back that we might feed.”

“You ate them?”

Maedoc snorted. “Don’t be dense. You’ve seen how it’s done. Seen how the suzerain uses her magic to imbibe your essence. It’s dark magic, the darkest kind, and yet, it was all we had. That and a will to live. Some of us were so young when shoved into this prison for the simple crime of being born. We didn’t want to die for the sins of others.” The resentment still burned in Maedoc’s words.

“The world has forgotten what happened. No one knows. Why not start over? If you don’t like this world, then why stay? You said you have access to other places—”

“Uncivilized planes, none of which promised the possibility of one day going home. Dead worlds now. Stripped bare of all life in order to extend ours. In our arrogance, we never thought to keep breeding pairs to sustain ourselves. Kind of shortsighted if you ask me. But at the time, we never expected our exile to last so long. And as our soul supply dwindled and age once again crept, we turned on each other.”

“You cannibalized each other?”

“Not at first. We borrowed essence back and forth, only to have the lack of fresh souls fail miserably. We changed. Became unrecognizable.” Maedoc looked at his body. “That was when the madness set in, and the killings began until only three were left.”

“Three?” He eyed Maedoc and then behind them at the other cage with Eogan, his brother. “Three fucking dragons. I don’t believe it.” Couldn’t believe it because looking at them was peering at a perversion of life itself.

“That is the problem with the young nowadays, no respect for the word of their elders.” The disdainful remark floated to them across the way, and Samael scowled.

“You have to admit your story is farfetched, starting with the fact that you don’t look anything like the dragons I know. Or smell like them for that matter.” Rather a putrid scent that no soap or water could rinse emanated from them, one like overripe flesh.

“Because once we began to feed back and forth, we were, in essence, starving. The perversion of essentially eating ourselves caused us to shift. We lost touch with our dragon and became grotesque.”

“Suzie isn’t nasty.”

“Because she committed the ultimate travesty. A century ago, she began picking off those exiled with her. Treated us like a buffet, and with each complete soul, she changed. We might have lost the ability to change into our beasts”—a hint of sadness there—“but she gained the ability to shift into whatever, or whomever, she liked. A true doppelganger. But one who grew increasingly madder. The curse of killing while feeding.”

“If she ate all your buds, how come you’re still kicking around?”

“Because she needed servants. In the past, we had others to do chores, creatures brought from other worlds to serve her.”

“They were delicious,” Eogan added with a dark chuckle.

“I’m still not understanding something, though. You said the planes shifted, that she had access back to Earth. So why kidnap me? Or Deka for that matter?”

At first, he thought Maedoc wouldn’t answer, and that meant he’d have to grab him by the throat and toss him against a wall a few times to make him speak. But he wouldn’t enjoy it. He kind of—very little mind you—liked the guy. Dragon. Thing. Whatever.

Eogan replied. “Suzie, as you call her, is preparing for the end of times. As this world drops out of alignment, so a darker realm takes its place. The horsemen will soon ride and, in their wake, will sow pure chaos. She wants to be part of that.”

“So she’s what, preparing for Armageddon? Is that why she’s got those humans and wyverns doing her bidding? And how did she find them anyhow?” It wasn’t exactly easy to build an army. Samael had learned that the hard way.

“She has the gift of compulsion, and those with weak minds fall sway to her will.” Eogan approached the bars and gripped them. Samael found it interesting to note that, despite their so-called dragon heritage, they didn’t cringe or react to the metal.

Then again, I don’t always react either.

“Suzie is strong. Stronger than even she realizes at times, I think. As the youngest of those banished, she’s been collecting souls for a long time. A few in battle. Most by subterfuge. But as she learned early on, taking from the weak resulted in weak results, and she’s not interested in weakness. She wants to rule the world. You asked why come after you and the Silver girl. Because you are the strongest of the colors.”

But she’d never had a chance to snack from Deka.

Just me. “All this time, she’s been eating my soul.” It explained his depression. “How do I get it back?”

“There is no getting it back, unless you want to use the same dark magic, and I personally don’t recommend it. But good news. A soul, given time, will regenerate, but slower and slower if continually damaged.”

He bounced a glance between the brothers. “Why are you telling me this? Why now?” He’d been visiting them daily with their meals for two weeks. Playing games for the past few days. Exchanging insults and barbs. This spewing of information appeared out of nowhere.

I didn’t even get to torture them for it.

“Perhaps there is a semblance of honor in us that cringes at the fact that you allowed a mad dragon back into the world. We were banished so that magic would never cause the fall of dragonkind again, and yet, because we chose not to die, because we fought and killed and stole to stay alive, we’ve contributed to the very reason we were banished.”

Eogan began to cackle, a hint of madness in the sound. “Voadicia, the one styling herself as the suzerain, is going to set the Earth on fire. And it’s all your fault.”

Take the blame? Hell, no. Samael shrugged. “How is it my fault? She was popping in and out of her prison before I came along.”

“You should have stopped her,” hissed Eogan. “It is the duty of the Gold to protect the dragon Septs.”

“I’m a half-breed, remember? My brother is there to deal with it.”

“A true Gold leads; he doesn’t sit back.”

“Can’t exactly lead from here.” He gestured to the cell.

“You know how to leave this world. You just choose not to because you’re too busy dipping your wick,” harrumphed Maedoc.

“You also know how to leave, yet instead you chose to serve that psycho bitch,” Samael retorted.

“Leave and go where? Have you seen us?” Eogan remarked, pointing to his corpulent shape. “We are no longer the men or dragons we used to be. We are grotesque monsters. In this new world with humans on edge, and the masses set to revolt, how long do you think we’d last?”

“Isn’t there a cure?”

“Were you not paying attention? How do you think Voadicia regained her true shape?”

“You said she ate the others.”

“She did, and yet they were as grotesque as us. It wasn’t until the portals aligned and she got her first taste of a fresh subject that she discovered the secret, thus beginning her cannibalistic feast.”

It didn’t take a genius to clue in. “Eating fresh dragons brought her back. She’s been picking us off. How the fuck did no one know?”

“People go missing all the time. A few here. A few there. It’s not as if they left a trace once she brought them here.”

“You joined her in dining?”

“I’d like to lie and claim we were too honorable to eat our own kind, but the truth is”—Maedoc shrugged—“she wouldn’t let us.”

“Would you have done it if given a chance?” There was something kind of vampiristic about it.

“What do you think?” Maedoc glared with disdain. “At this point, the only way we can hope to return to our former glory is to imbibe the souls of dragons. Many dragons. Who would condone us sucking the souls of others to save ourselves?” The lips pulled into a blubbery smile.

Samael shrugged. “I can’t deny the will to survive to anyone.” Because dropped into the same situation, he’d have probably done anything to remain alive. And more.

Eogan cackled. “It’s too late for us. They were right to damn us. And we should have taken our punishment and died as expected.”

“But we didn’t,” grumbled Maedoc. “While it’s too late for us, you can still effect change.”

“What if I’d rather not?” Going back out there meant the same shit pile as before.

People who hate me.

People who want to kill me.

People who hate and want to kill me or cut me up for science.

Then there was the brother he probably should apologize to. Not that Samael had done anything wrong, but the big jerk was being a baby about the whole locking him up thing and hitting on his woman thing and he kind of expected it.

Then there was the fact that he’d told everyone he was going to be king, only now, he wasn’t. He was—gack—a nobody right now.

Untrue, you’re the brother to a king. A Golden in his own right.

The world is big enough for two.

If it didn’t burn first.

He frowned, and Maedoc took the chance to bounce his chunk of rib bone around the board and elegantly beat him.

Again.

Asshole.

He got to his feet. “I need to check on something.”

“You won’t find any annals to corroborate our story.”

“I don’t need one.” Because the longer the Jabbas spoke, the more their story rang true. Samael didn’t know if it was a Golden power, or just the fact that he could read their intent, but they weren’t lying.

Which meant a great evil had been released upon the world, and they might not even know it.

The room of mirrors Maedoc mentioned proved easy to activate once Samael knew what he was looking for. It took but a rub of the sand-colored jewel crowning the top of the mirror to ignite the magic.

The sizeable glass illuminated, as did the reflective surfaces nearest it. Their faces filled with a desert of black sand that undulated, swirled in gusts of wind, and, at times, even turned into dark holes that closed without a trace.

Not earth.

He moved over and activated another gem, a crystal-clear one. Frozen tundra, snow of palest mauve piled in drifts, the branches of trees, heavy with icicles that jangled as a breeze shot through them. Round humps gave the impression of buildings, yet not one track marred the snow.

A water world next, just endless waves.

An orange jungle of trees, bereft of life.

Then the world he both sought and dreaded.

Earth.

The largest mirror showed an abandoned temple, parts of the ceiling caved in, a place long forgotten.

The mirrors scattered around the large one seemed to be dotted throughout the world.

The perspective for most was from on high, as if the image were anchored from the sky.

They showed cities with their towering skyscrapers, roads meandering with cars that crept like little ants.

In many, smoke rose in spirals.

Was this the anarchy Maedoc and his brother spoke of?

It’s none of my business.

He kept repeating that to himself and was so focused on it, he missed her arrival until she said, “Guess we can’t avoid going home anymore.”

“You do realize home is about to turn into a war zone. We’ll probably die.”

“Or, we could save the world.”

“Fuck ’em. Leave them to their fate.” They never cared about his.

“And miss out on the killing?” Cocking her head meant Deka’s pigtails bobbed most enticingly. He knew what he wanted to be for Halloween this year and what she should wear to match him. Maybe he’d recreate the scene where he shoved the girl off the platform then dove after her.

He eyed her.

Deka smiled back and mouthed, “I’ll grow out my hair for longer pigtails by then.”

The damned woman was reading his mind, again, wanting to fulfill his fantasies.

“There might not be a world by October.”

“Ye of little faith. I’m pretty sure you and I can handle Suzie.”

“Suzie’s been gobbling up souls for breakfast, lunch, and dinner to get stronger.”

“Yeah, but here’s the problem, muffin. She messed with us.” Deka smiled. “And I think we’re owed some payback.”

The thought of revenge did sound sweet.

“How do you know all this?” he asked.

“You’re not the only one who knows how to question prisoners.”

He glared at her. “You knew and didn’t tell me.”

“You’re the one who keeps telling me you’re so great.”

“As I recall, you’re the one who started calling me god in bed.” And against the wall. And on the throne.

“A god shouldn’t need his woman to tell him anything.” She ran a finger down his chest. “Or are you admitting I’m better than you?”

“I know what you’re doing,” he growled as her hands reach around to cup his ass.

“I know that you know that I know what I’m doing.”

“You’re using sex to distract me.”

“No, I’m using sex because I’m horny.”

“Much as it pains me to admit, we need to go back.”

“I know. I know everything,” she said with a laugh, sliding her hands inside the waist of his pants to cup his butt.

“If we do go, then what do we do about Maedoc and Eogan?” Because, while he’d like to trust them, they had, after all, eaten dragons and anything else they could get their hands on to stay alive.

“Who?”

He didn’t want to say it, but… “The Jabba brothers.”

She snickered. “Are they still kicking around? I guess we can let those leeches go. But only after we save the world and I show those heifers my Gold is better than theirs. Shall we open the portal?”

He blinked at her. “You know how to open those, too?”

A smirk pulled her lips. “You aren’t the only one who can decipher ancient instructions, stud. Wait until you hear my repertoire of dirty languages in bed.”

Speaking of bed, soon he’d have a real mattress under him, not that weird stuffed shit that passed for a mattress here. Because they were going home.

To save it.

Which meant work and not a lot of free time.

Before they left the mirror room, he fucked Deka twice.

And when he found his release inside her from behind, he almost bit her. Almost put a mark on her that would have bound her more surely than anything else.

But he held back.

How disappointing.

He couldn’t have said whom the thought came from. He didn’t care.

She’s mine.

All mine.

Yes, yours.

Dun-dun-dun.