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CHAPTER ELEVEN

1--Terreille

The only thing in the cell besides the overflowing slop bucket was a small table that held a plate of food and a metal pitcher of water

Lucivar stared at the pitcher, clenching and unclenching his fists The chains that tethered his ankles and wrists to the ere long enough to reach one end of the table and the food, but not long enough to reach over and tear out the throat of the guard who brought it

He needed food He was desperate for water These little ovens that Zuultah laughingly referred to as her "enlightenment" chambers were located in the Arava Desert, where the sun was voracious The heat was sufficient by midday to make his oaste steam

The first three days he’d been locked up, the guards had brought food and water and e the first two, he’d eaten what he was given The third day, the food and water were laced with safframate, a vicious aphrodisiac that would keep a h to satisfy an entire coven at one of their gatherings It would also drive a man to the point of madness because, while itparticipant, it also prohibited him from physical release

He’d sensed it before he consuilant man wouldn’t have noticed, but Lucivar had experienced saffraain for Zuultah’s entertainment

Lucivar licked his cracked lips as he stared at the pitcher of water, his tongue prodding the cracks, wetting itself with his blood

His answer, that third day, had been to throw the plate and pitcher against the wall The viper rats--large, venomous rodents that were able to live anywhere--scurried out of the shadowy corners and fell upon the food He’d spent the rest of the day watching the

For the next two days no one came There was no food, no water The slop bucket filled There was nothing but the rats and the heat

An hour ago, a guard had come in with the food and water Lucivar had snarled at hi until the tips touched the walls The guard scurried out with less dignity than the rats

Lucivar approached the table, his legs shaking He picked up the pitcher and licked the condensation off the outside

It wasn’t nearly enough

He looked at the plate The stench of the slop bucket warred with the ser, and over all of it was the need for the water that was so close So very close

Holding the pitcher in both hands so that he wouldn’t drop it, he took a h him, a fiery ice

Lucivar’s rin His lips cracked wider and bled

There was only one reason to eat, to submit to ould come, and it wasn’t to stay alive He fiercely loved life, but he was Eyrien, a hunter, a warrior Growing up with death had dulled his fear of it, and a part of hi a demon

There was only one reason One sapphire-eyed reason

Lucivar lifted the pitcher again and drank

2--Terreille

Lucivar clenched his teeth and squeezed his eyes shut He hated being on his back All Eyrien s It was the ultia he could do but endure

As one of Zuultah’s witches moved on him, intent on her pleasure, he silently swore the most vicious curses he could think of His hands clenched the brass rails of the headboard, had been clenching theht with such pressure that the shape of his fingers was eain, one after another With each the pain greorse He hated thehter, for the food and water they taunted hi

He was Lucivar Yaslana, an Eyrien Warlord Prince He wouldn’t beg Wouldn’t beg Wouldn’t

Lucivar opened his eyes to silence The bed curtains were closed at the botto off his view of the room He tried to shift position and ease his stiff muscles, but he’d been stretched out when they tied him, and there wasn’t any slack

He licked his lips He was so thirsty, so tired So easy to slip away from the pain, from memories

Male voices murmured in the hallway Movement in the roo, "Bring hiray where the light danced through shards of glass and voices were heard under water

The guards untied his hands and feet, retied his hands behind his back Lucivar snarled at them, but it was a faraway sound of no importance, no importance at all

For a moment, when he saw the s buckle The guards dragged hi straps, forced him to his knees, and strapped him to the floor behind his knees and at his ankles They rolled the marble cylinder, with its smoothly carved orifices, into position When he was fitted into an orifice, they held him in place with a leather strap beneath his buttocks There was enough slack for hih for hiray