Grace Goodwin - Ascension Saga - 2

“Fuck you.” I was proud of the sisters, of my mate. They’d thought ahead, Destiny and Faith covering themselves, remaining hidden from the cameras as they’d bolted into the citadel. I’d thought it odd, at the time. But then, I’d assumed they’d come out the way they went in. Through the front door.

Instead, all three of them had vanished into thin air.

Just like their mother had, twenty-seven years ago.

The cleric sighed. “Use the stim.”

I cringed before the small device touched my flesh. The moment it did, I bellowed in rage and in pain. The device was impossible to defeat, sending a burst of power through every nerve receptor in my body.

My body arched off the chair as if I were having a seizure and I had no control of the movement. When it was pulled away, I slumped over like a bag filled with sand. Dead weight. My limbs, my head too heavy to hold up for another moment.

Silence. Cool, cold silence.

“He’s no longer responding.” The big brute said, his voice bland. It was as if he’d done this before, as if I were just a single person in a long line of many who’d been tortured in this room. And died. As if he were bored.

“Stop then. I want him to suffer. He’s no good to me dead.” The cleric’s order was soft, but annoyance was clearly audible in his tone.

“He hasn’t given up anything. Not one word about the spires. Who the other two royals are who entered the citadel. He hasn’t even said why they were with him.” The deep, gravely voice of the one who had beaten me filled my head. “I’ve seen his kind before. He’ll let us kill him, but he won’t break.”

“He will.” My hair was gripped, my head lifted by the cleric. While my eyes were open, I could barely see the male before me beneath the swollen eyelids. “He will. But not today. Tomorrow morning is soon enough. Cut him loose. Water. No food.”

The cleric released his hold on me, and I felt my head fall forward. I tried to lift it, but it was as if the stupid thing suddenly weighed a hundred pounds. Perhaps I was in worse shape than I’d realized.

With a grunt, the giant released my restraints. The bindings fell away from my arms and legs, and he kicked the chair out from beneath me. It tipped and I fell with a hard thud to the stone floor.

The cold felt good against my swollen face.

“Do we give him a ReGen wand this time?”

The question made me wince. For several hours now, they’d beaten me to the brink of death before healing me with a ReGen wand just enough to start again. I knew this could go on for days. Weeks.

I didn’t care. I would survive. For her. Trinity. My mate.

The cleric’s laugh was pure evil and I shuddered, faced with the evidence of my stupidity. For years I’d believed the clerical order when they’d claimed their soldiers were just for protecting the citadel and the queen’s future. I’d believed their stated purpose of serving the people and having no ambition to rule Alera themselves.

I’d been wrong. Three families were powerful enough to fight for the throne. Just three. But the clerical order had its own army, spies, a network so vast I wasn’t sure they could be beaten if they decided to take the throne. And if they had allied themselves with one of the other power-hungry families?

War. We were on the brink of war. And I was falling hopelessly in love with the female who would be at its epicenter.

The cleric stepped on my hand as he walked away, crushing the already aching digits into the cold, hard floor of the cell. “Let him suffer. Perhaps in the morning he’ll be ready to talk.”

They were hoping I’d do just that. But I wouldn’t. The only other Alerans alive who knew about Trinity, Faith and Destiny were the Jax guard who’d been injured—and, with Faith’s help, hopefully recovered—and the assassin who escaped. Everyone else was dead. No consort, no other guards. I doubted these men knew of the injured one. Perhaps were aware of Lord Thordis Jax’s involvement, but doubtful. Definitely not of Prime Nial’s request for my help.

As for the assassin? I’d recognized him from my time in the Coalition Fleet. He’d worked in their Intelligence Core. He’d killed Hive, mowing them down without remorse. Among other things.

He was very good at killing.

I never knew his name. Had never asked. But I’d been happy to have him at my back or watching over an op through a sniper’s scope. And now? Was he working for the clerics? One of the royal cousins? Lord Jax?

If he’d been sent by the asshole leaving me here to rot, I doubted they’d be torturing me for information. They would already know who the sisters were. Where they were from. When they’d arrived.

They appeared to know nothing, only became aware of them once the spires lit. Which meant my mate had more enemies than I knew about. And the assassin was still out there.

The cleric had shown me vids of my EMV, of the females as they exited the vehicle, their faces intentionally hidden. They’d even captured the look of disbelief on my face the moment Destiny stunned me before pushing me out. Luckily, the door of the EMV had obscured the camera’s view, the females’ faces remaining hidden. But I couldn’t lie and tell the cleric I knew nothing. The citadel guards hadn’t seen Faith’s or Destiny’s faces, but they were eyewitnesses to my stunned ass landing on the ground, the door closing, and the females driving through the energy field that surrounded the citadel. Their dash inside. The way the spires illuminated after they entered the sacred building. And worst of all, Trinity, standing proudly facing all of us, giving us her name. Her true name.

Trinity Herakles, royal heir, daughter of Queen Celene. And she was my mate.

I was the only one who could give these brutes answers. Yet, I had none. Or only a few. I realized now that was intentional. Trinity had kept secrets. For my own good? Was the stubborn female trying to protect me?

They were from Earth. Trinity had the Aleran Ardor, which meant she was at least part Aleran.

But the spires? The lights? The females were royalty. Their ages were right for them to be Queen Celene’s daughters… but could that be true? Was my Trinity actually Princess Trinity, as she had claimed? She was the eldest, and I’d seen the other two defer to her on more than one occasion. But a princess? The royal heir?

Heavy footfalls reverberated through my cheek and ear where I had them pressed to the floor as the giant followed his master out of the room. The cell door slid shut behind them. I was alone.

Earlier in my captivity, I’d checked out the small space for any means of escape. There was nothing of use. No cameras, no knobs. Smooth walls and floor, fortified door. There was nothing but the stark, white light that shined brightly to prevent me from truly resting. How long had I been trapped here? How long had Trinity been alone? I had no idea what day it was, how much time had passed since I’d been captured.

I used my feet to push myself across the floor to the thin mattress in the corner. It wasn’t soft, but it would keep the cold from seeping into my bones—my broken bones. I would spend the hours until dawn thinking of Trinity.

Reaching between my thighs, I gripped my cock through my pants, stroked it. It was hard… it would remain that way even beaten and bloody. For her. The slight hint of pleasure, of heat that sparked through me at my shifting grip, was my only sense of relief in all the misery.

“You just can’t stop playing with that big cock, can you?”

That voice. So sweet, so sassy. So mine.

“Trinity,” I whispered, stroked harder.

“Yeah, if I had that beast between my legs, I’d probably touch it, too.”

I blinked, tried to see, but the vision before me was blurry and my eyelids were still swollen. I saw the outline of a female, pale hair. I took a deep breath, even with the pain in my lungs. Flowers. She smelled like flowers.