“Stubborn, isn’t she?” Varro commented.
“She’ll break eventually.” Dominic eyed the Pride fiend sitting at one end of the lineup. “They all do.”
Natalya heard the comments but couldn’t respond. The pain was all-consuming, and the only noise she could make was screaming. If she hadn’t been an immortal being, it would have broken her mind into pieces. Instead, she felt everything with awful lucidity.
She tried to focus on things beyond the pain. The annoyance she felt from Dominic and the fear from Evie. The fear was constant, and it hurt differently than this summoned agony raking through her body.
The feeling created questions that distracted her. What was happening to Evie? Was she safe? It didn’t feel like she was safe. The worry of that was so filling, it could almost combat the pain.
“She’s right, you know?” Vex sat cross-legged in her circle, strumming her fingers against the concrete floor. “Creatures arrive at the Court of Chains every week. Sometimes every day. Unless she had the most recent records, she wouldn’t know theexactnumber.”
Dominic dismissed Natalya’s pain, letting her breathe. “I trust you have the most recent records, Envy.”
Vex stared at her Master and owner. The man who had imprisoned her and tortured her for over twenty years. The weasel she had to obey. She smirked. “I wasn’t told to get the records.”
A sneer and a wave from Dominic made Vex fall to the floor screaming, just as Natalya had been doing.
“The loyalty of greater fiends is not easily won, I see,” Varro said, sounding smug. “Maybe you’ve bitten off more than you can chew, Mr. Fane?”
Dominic muttered something under his breath. There was a point to what Varro was saying. Witches and warlocks usually restrained themselves to binding one or two fiends at most. Dominic hadseven. And not just lesser fiends, but two greater ones. Unable to make them like him, he used arcanely summoned pain to control them instead. He didn’t enjoy the torture. He didn’t dislike it either. He treated the fiends like they were dogs, and the summoned agony a way to discipline them.
Natalya didn’t beg Dominic to stop torturing Vex, just as Vex didn’t beg him to stop torturing Natalya. They both knew the satisfaction of provoking him was greater than the relief that would come from groveling. It was easier with the other one present. They weren’t alone in their torment. They could hate him together.
“Maybe she’s just stupid.” Dominic made a frustrated gesture at Natalya. “Lust is a primal Sin, after all. There isn’t much need for brains in the bedroom.”
“She’s not stupid,” Varro said. “You don’t get to rule alongside Aleksander Voronov if you’re that. No, she knows what she’s doing. She’s disrespecting you, Fane. I’m surprised you’re letting her.”
Dominic dismissed Vex’s pain, and she shuddered. She’d been tortured almost as much as Natalya since Dominic and Varro returned to the lair.
“Careful, Varro,” Dominic said slowly. “In this room, we are not equals. And you are overstepping.”
The two men stared at each other, eyes full of challenge. Varro could overpower Dominic physically, but if he threatened the man with violence, he’d unleash the fury of seven fiends on himself. Even a vampire King in his own domain would have trouble standing against that. He evidently didn’t want to take the risk.
“You’re off,” Vex whispered to Natalya. She wiped ichor from her nose. “You’re not all here. I can sense the desperation in you. You’re craving something. It better not be relief.”
“It’s Evie,” Natalya said just as quietly. The two men were still in a battle of stares, not paying attention to them. “She’s afraid. Afraid enough that I can’t ignore it.”
“Aw, how cute. You just want her safe.” Vex scoffed. “You really are pathetic, you know that?”
Natalya raised an eyebrow. “Jealous, Envy?”
Vex laughed. It made the two men look back at them, clearly annoyed that she’d interrupted their staring contest. Vex kept laughing. Then both she and Natalya screamed as Dominic tortured them again.
There was a soft knock at the door, barely audible over the cries of the greater fiends. Varro and Dominic glanced at eachother, and Dominic called off the pain. Natalya and Vex both flashed their teeth at him.
“Did you summon someone?” Dominic said, turning to Varro and frowning.
“No. And I’m guessing you didn’t either.” Both men looked at the door with suspicion.
“Gluttony, be a good host and see who it is.” Dominic waved forward the lesser fiend—an older woman with yellow eyes. She went to the door, opening it a crack. There were hushed voices, and then the lesser fiend turned towards Dominic.
“A gift for Varro. From Stefano,” she said. “A missing slave.”
The two men exchanged confused glances. Only Dominic, Varro, and Stefano were allowed in the east wing. Not even cleaners came here. That responsibility was handled by Sloth.
Then Varro’s eyes lit up with sudden, delighted realization, and he smiled in a way that was more fear-inducing than the threat of pain.
“Send her in,” he said. Gluttony opened the door, and then Natalya’s world fell apart.
