Marching up the hall, a cool draft brushed past Samael’s dick. It swung as he walked, and in his old life he might have felt some embarrassment at his nudity. It didn’t take long in here before he’d overcome that particular emotion. He’d not had any clothes since his arrival. Part of the breaking down of who he was. Who he used to be.

I was almost a king.

Now, as his jailor liked to remind him, he was a gigolo. Or would be if he’d give in to the suzerain’s demands.

Fuck her if she thinks I’m giving her anything. He might not have much left. No home. No freedom. No power. But the sperm in his sac belonged to him!

I’ll choose who gets it.

For now, at least. Until the suzerain tired of his refusal and took it by force. Just like she’d taken other things without permission.

The journey from the dungeon to the upper levels of the castle proved interesting. The stone work intricate and vast. The halls long and winding. The windows few and far between. Not that he saw much through them. The drapery kept them covered.

As a man who enjoyed an extensive nightlife, he never thought he’d miss the hot kiss of sunlight.

But he did, and he missed real food and his bed and playing Stickman Golf on his phone. So many things he took for granted. So many things he’d never done or achieved.

So much pussy he’d never dipped his dick into.

I would have liked a taste of Deka’s. The woman might only have gotten a cursory glance from him before, but mostly because he was otherwise preoccupied.

Now, however, with her residing in the cell across from him, he couldn’t help but notice her.

Want her.

She would look lovely draped in jewels. His hidden hoard had more than enough to cover her body. Even better, he could imagine her splayed upon his heap of precious stones. Unlike a fragile-skinned human, he’d wager she wouldn’t whine if the gems bit into her skin as he pounded into her sweet flesh.

And she would fuck him. The damned crazy woman said she’d come for him.

Why?

She made it sound as if she were interested in him as a man. As a lover.

She’d soon change her mind. Who’d want a broken thing like him?

Some days, when he opened his eyes, he cursed the fact that he’d woken, because the hopelessness weighed him down. Even the voice in his head, the one he’d listened to most of his life, had given up fighting.

He’d come to grips with his nightmare. Or thought he had. Her arrival, though, had him feeling off balance. Hope tried to break out of its cage. His arrogance simmered at the edges of the moat he’d surrounded it with.

This place didn’t allow for either, and should the suzerain even guess he was ready to fight, the hammer would come down—and he didn’t want Deka to hear him scream.

The jailor—that he tried not to think of as Jabba like Deka named him—stopped in front of a pair of regal doors. The black metal had been beaten into panels carved with intricate swirls. Despite Jabba not raising a fist to knock, they swung open at their approach, the lack of creaking more ominous than the cavernous room they opened to.

“Go in. The suzerain awaits. And you know she hates tardiness.”

He knew, and a tiny part of him screamed, Don’t make her wait.

Another part of him thought he should go find the kitchen and make himself a sandwich.

He stepped inside, and though the temperature didn’t drop, his balls shrank, practically crawled back up inside his body.

Good thing Deka wasn’t here. She wouldn’t be so impressed with him now.

Nothing much had changed since his last visit. Still a ginormous space with an arching, ribbed ceiling, and pillars holding it up over a polished stone floor. All in black with striations of red.

The epitome of an evil throne room.

If it didn’t evoke such painful memories, he’d covet it.

The room had a stark opulence to it. There wasn’t much in the way of decoration or furniture—no paintings of ugly heirs, or spindly-legged antiques. The few pieces scattered in the vast room were expensive and decadent.

Take the super-sized throne, built out of the skull of some massive beast—say it, you know what it is.

Fine. It was the skull of a dragon with spiraling horns inset within it, framing it on the sides. The white of the bone was covered in dark gems, not exactly rubies, although he’d seen the heart of them pulse with red fire.

Other than the throne, there was a fireplace, a massive open hearth that he’d yet to see filled with any flames. A shame. The cold room could have used some warmth.

The chain hanging from the ceiling was comprised of the dull metal that inhibited his dragon side, the dangling cuffs lined with velvet. The suzerain wanted to be the cause of his screams, not the metal.

He preferred the throne room visits to those of the bedroom with its massive four-poster bed, though. Some instinct for preservation wanted to keep him out of the mad woman’s boudoir. A female he’d seen, yet knew for a fact wasn’t the true face behind the illusion.

Could I handle seeing the truth?

Would she have tentacles? He hated tentacles. Nasty, wiggly things.

The air in the room changed, charged with a malevolent chill that pimpled his skin.

I am not afraid.

You should be.

The cowardly voice he’d acquired since his incarceration advised him to stand down. To behave, lest he incur punishment. There were times he wanted to ignore its sage advice. To rant and rail and fight.

Don’t fight. You know what happens when you do.

Yeah, he felt like a man. As if he did something rather than accept his fate.

This is my life now. I can’t change it.

Can’t or won’t?

As the chilly air was displaced by the approach of the suzerain, he didn’t fidget.

He didn’t run.

He didn’t even turn his head to look or give a disparaging glance.

He wanted to. How he wanted to laser that bitch with his stare. To cow her with a sneer.

Don’t fight. Obey.

The soft words in his head drew a sigh.

“Arms up.”

Disobeying wasn’t an option.

He raised his hands over his head, knowing the drill.

Magic pulled at the metal cuffs on his wrists, reeling them even higher overhead until he stood on tiptoe. The chain only jangled lightly as it clipped onto the eyelet hooks.

The position stretched his body tautly. Exposed him. Then again, he’d long ago lost anything to hide.

He stared straight ahead, and not just because he knew better than to turn. He didn’t want to see. Perhaps if he pretended the suzerain didn’t exist, then he could go back to his cell and that distracting temptation across from him.

The soft whisper of fabric on the stone floor let him know without peeking that she approached. His body held itself taut, a bowstring pulled tightly, ready to twang with release.

“There’s my pet.”

He didn’t reply.

“I hear you’ve made friends with the new prisoner.”

I have no friends.

Or family.

Probably because he’d screwed them all over.

“I wouldn’t get too attached to her.” The lilting voice had a husky undertone to it. “I have plans for her.”

“She’s a Silvergrace. Her disappearance won’t go unnoticed.”

“I should hope not. I am hoping for some pure panic on their parts as they run around like dragons with their tails cut off.”

“Why?”

“Because it amuses me.”

“What’s the point of all this?” For the first time in a while, he found himself questioning. Wondering at the suzerain’s purpose. She had power. Why these stupid games?

“Are you looking for a reason why I hate the dragons? Why I hate all of those you call cryptozoids? Do I need one?”

“Uh, yeah.” He’d had one. He’d been jealous of his full-blooded Golden brother, so jealous that he wanted to take his place.

“If you knew my story, you’d understand why I do this. Why I taunt and tease. After all, where’s the fun in killing? Once they’re all dead, then who will amuse me?”

“You sent humans after the Silver Sept.” He’d been there for that short, bloody battle.

“Expendable creatures. Not as fun or valuable as dragons. The mighty drakes, rulers of the skies and seas. Once also keepers of magic until one of them betrayed them all.”

“How do you know all this?” Even Anastasia, as the Golden priestess, only had chunks of their past. Yet the suzerain spoke as if…as if she’d lived through it.

Impossible.

Is it? There were many things about this woman that made no sense.

Such as her capture and torture of him.

She took something of him each time they met. Not his seed, though. She never touched him.

Not once.

Good thing. His dick might never come out of hiding again.

But he wondered at times if what she did was worse.

She swayed closer, the tingle of her magic rippling over his skin. He fought not to flinch as she crept closer and spoke. “I am the keeper of the lore. The last bastion of true magic. The only one left of those locked away. As if they could keep us prisoner forever.”

“Us?” This was the first time she’d alluded to someone else.

“A misnomer. And you are awfully inquisitive today. A good thing I find myself in a mellow mood. But don’t test it.”

Sharp pain jabbed at his skull, and he writhed, jaw open wide in a rictus, the scream caught in his lungs.

As quickly as it had begun, the pain ended, and he sagged in his bonds, letting the chain hold his weight.

It never got any easier.

“On to your purpose. Have you replenished enough to give me what I need?”

“Fuck you.”

The slap cracked loudly across the skin of his cheek. It didn’t really hurt, and didn’t even move his head. Having suffered worse, it proved easy to stare straight ahead.

“Dragons. Always so stubborn. You continue to hurt yourself when it would be so much easier to give in.”

Giving in would hurt less. When he stood still, he truly got to view the horror of watching his soul being sucked from his body. “I’ll never give in.” The words came out with a bit of force.

“Someone is a little feisty today.” The laughter emerged low and chilling. “Show a little respect. We both know I could send you to your knees, begging me to kill you, with but a twitch of my hand.”

“Why not just kill me?” He didn’t want to feed this creature, and yet, he wasn’t given a choice. Even now, his tattered soul had barely recovered from the last leeching.

The figure in the dark cloak moved in front of him, the wispy curls of the fabric dancing in an invisible breeze. “Kill you? But we’re not done. However, you aren’t quite ripe for the picking. We’ll have to let you rest up a little longer. Which is why we picked up a spare.”

“Spare what?”

“Your new dungeon companion, of course. A Silver dragon. So much tastier than those Reds I played with.”

The thought of Deka suffering at the suzerain’s hands roused an anger in Samael he’d thought doused. “Don’t you dare hurt her.”

“Or else what?” The cloak swirled against his skin, causing him to shiver as his skin contracted from the icy touch. The suzerain moved around him. “Will you promise to obey me and not fight if I leave her alone?”

Obey this foul creature to save a stranger?

Who is she but a girl who thinks you’re more special than you are?

You are nothing.

Nothing but a traitor to my own kind.

Yet he could redeem himself. It would start with one act. One moment of bravery and heroism.

He looked at the cloaked figure, saw within the deep cowl the red, glowing eyes. The alien gaze that stirred something dark and frightening within.

The world will burn if she gets what she wants. Lovely, dancing flames. And screams. So many screams.

Surely, he didn’t want that.

Give in, it’s easier.

But on this, he wouldn’t listen to the voice.

He dropped his head. “I don’t care what you do to the woman. She means nothing.” She only served as a reminder of the things he could no longer have.

“You heard the man. Take him back to his cell,” the suzerain ordered. “And fetch me the girl.”

A voice inside him, not the one that advocated he roll over and bare his belly, screamed, Don’t let her do this. You can save her. You can do it.

No, I can’t.

In this dark place, he didn’t hold the title of king. He could barely call himself a man.

He was nothing but a coward.