The room he took her to was entirely empty, aside from a ring hanging from the ceiling, and she looked around. Vincent followed, smiling at her as he withdrew a length of rope from his belt.
"I'm getting déjà vu," she said.
Vincent laughed softly as he reached up and tucked the end of the rope into the loop.
"But this time I won't be letting you go. I am curious to know how you got out of our deal though."
"Dying does that," she said, watching him with amusement as he paused from tying the rope around her from the front and instead stepped around behind her so as not to give her access to bite him.
"Dying? Aren't you immortal?" he asked.
She tilted her head in a shrug, given her shoulders weren't working all that well.
He looped the rope around her throat and pulled it tight enough that she needed to nearly be on the balls of her feet, and he tied the other end to her wrists behind her back, crossing her arms and binding them fully together, with one arm resting over the other.
Alez moved around her, and he ripped the hooks from her shoulders, ignoring her screams while Vincent tugged her hair out from the rope, and he adjusted it to the length he wanted.
"Can you get the blood off my nose? It's really quite distracting," she asked a short while later. Vincent stopped in front of her, seemingly surprised by her total lack of fear, and he shrugged, licking his palm and scrubbing the blood off her nose. To compensate, he pressed his palm to her chest, and she frowned, feeling the solid print on her skin.
"See you in two days," he said.
She glared, watching him go before looking around at Alez as he rolled up the sleeves of his shirt.
"He's super confident in your abilities," she said conversationally, rolling her neck to get the rope to settle in a different position. It was loose enough to rest upon her shoulder right then, but that was with her standing.
"Yes, he's a cocky little bastard," Alez agreed as he approached, looking her over in her beautiful dress and elaborate hair that had only partly come out of the style.
Without a word, he reached behind her and started to undo the ties at the back of her bodice, and she took full advantage of him, not knowing any better. Her teeth sank into his shoulder, and he howled, his blood hitting her tongue like a shot of energy.
He jerked back from her, and his skin tore. Tilting her head back slightly, he watched her in horror as she chewed on the hunk of flesh and then swallowed it, mostly to gross him out, but partly because she thought she might need it after he was done.
The strength of his slap was brutal, and she slumped, quickly finding out that the position she had been bound in was not designed for comfort. The rope around her neck pulled tight and her arms jerked up painfully, making her already-hurting shoulders scream in agony.
Gasping as she was choked by the stupid rope, she got her feet back under her and was able to breathe again, her head bowed slightly as her cheek throbbed.
"I'll get you a muzzle," he growled, but didn't leave, still horrified that she had eaten part of him.
"If you feel like it," she said in a strained voice, the rope now uncomfortably tight on her.
She realised the little snot had used a slip knot to tie it. The more she struggled, the tighter it was going to get, with her unable to slide it free.
"Smart-mouthed little bitch, aren't you," he growled as she looked at his shoulder, the skin shiny and red looking as it healed over, but it would take time for the wound itself to heal.
"You're not the first to say that."
He didn't so much as hint at moving. One second, he was still and the next his fist sank into her stomach. She dropped again, unable to scream as the rope pulled tight and strangled off the sound. While she was mostly incapacitated, he moved around behind her and undid the ties of her dress, pulling the fabric down and throwing the beautiful thing into the corner to leave her naked. She silently cursed Winter for not giving her anything under the dress. She could only assume it hadn't because going without was far more comfortable.
His eyes dragged down her, and she lifted her brows. "Like something you see?" she wheezed snarkily, and he smirked in amusement.
"Are you really a virgin?" he asked, seemingly surprised when she nodded. "Perhaps I can fix that before we finish up here."
"Perhaps we could not. I'm not all that into blonds."
"I had noticed you like to collect dark or silver-haired men," Alez said, seeming to enjoy their banter.
"I do like the dark-haired ones, with a few exceptions."
"And yet none of them have managed to get between your legs."
"I'm a picky eater."
"Clearly."
"I hear you can change your hair colour, if you're that keen to have a go."
"I'm not that desperate."
"Beggars can't be choosers, Alez."
"What makes you think I'd be begging for it?"
"You don't strike me as a particularly sociable man."
"You just didn't get the chance to get to know me."
"If we both get out of this alive, I'll take you to dinner, then," she quipped.
He snorted. "It's a plan, then. Let's see if you get out alive."
"It's not me I'm concerned about."
***
He tried simply hitting her first, sinking his fists into her torso and face, but she had taken worse than that, and she controlled the flood of energy rushing to the area to heal her, slowing it to a trickle to last as long as possible. She hung limp, finding out quickly that if she held her head in the right position, it eased the pressure on her throat, at least allowing her to breathe.
"You're a stubborn woman," he said angrily after a few hours of hitting her failed, and he wasn't getting anything out of her.
"Thank you," she whimpered, her body aching and her throat on fire. Forcing herself back onto her feet, she tried to ignore the way her legs trembled.
"Perhaps we should try iron next," he said.
She looked around at him, frowning. "You know, it would be awfully easy for me to kill myself when bound like this. Hanging to death isn't really all that bad." She didn't think it was possible for her to die that way, but he didn't need to know that, and he looked from her throat up, and then to her arms. "The fun part about me is, I can die like anyone else. I just don't stay dead. And as soon as I'm back, I'll be coming for you at full strength to pop that stupid blond head right off your shoulders."
Did he know she could lie? She didn't think so, and he growled in frustration as he unbound the rope from around her neck and she was able to breathe easily.
"Why would you tell me?" he asked warily as he tied off the hook.
"I'm having fun."
"Fun?" he asked, looking confused.
"You're not having fun?"
"Are you crazy?"
"I don't think so. But does someone who is crazy know they are crazy? I'll have to ask my sister." Etani stopped.
His eyes narrowed on her. "Sister?"
She suddenly realised that if she was the queen by blood, that meant that while Aurora was her chosen heir, Letari was the blood heir. That was likely why Aurora had struggled so much through her reign. She was the chosen, not the born.
"I didn't know you had a sister," he said.
She shrugged, thinking fast. "Neither did I until a few years ago. My mother wasn't overly keen on discussing who her father might be." If it took slandering her mother to protect her sister, she didn't think their mother would have cared so long as it worked.
"Liked to collect men as well, did she?" he asked.
"When you have three children by three men, it's a safe bet," she lied.
Alez seemed to buy it, but she was very aware that she needed to get out alive and get to Letari, or at least reach someone who could keep her safe.
He started in on the iron after he had secured her properly. Her body partially bent forward with her arms pulled up behind her. It hurt, but it was less uncomfortable than the rope around her throat. Pressing the blade of his sword against her hip, she screamed and jerked away from it, unable to escape, and the jerking motion only added to her pain.
Alez was enjoying it all far too much for Etani's liking, and she worked to remain silent, but there was no stopping it as her skin boiled under the contact with the iron. Her screams echoed around the room, and he reached down under her, using the flat of the blade against her ribs to pull her up straight. Her shoulders were on fire, along with her skin.
Slumping forward, she gasped, and the smell of her burning flesh was rancid in her mouth and nose, flinching away as he placed the blade against the backs of her thighs, and she whimpered.
He jerked the sword across her skin, and she buckled, the sharp blade cutting deep into her skin while the iron cauterised the wounds.
She strangled off her scream with a sob as she hung limp from her arms, losing her grip on her magic and it flooded into her.
He smiled as he watched the cuts and burns healing over, reaching down to lift her jaw up. "Open your mouth," he growled.
She jerked her head away from him, but he only gripped tighter, squeezing her jaw until he forced her mouth open. With a care she didn't expect from him, he placed the tip of the sword against her tongue and then clamped her jaw shut around it, smiling at her strangled scream as her tongue burned. Waiting a moment, he then ripped the blade free, blood splattering his front as the sharp blade cut into the corners of her mouth.
"Not such a smart-mouth now, hmm?" he asked as he lifted her chin, looking down at her blood-coated face and tear-streaked cheeks.
She didn't respond, only allowed her head to hang down as he moved away from her, apparently done for the day, as she was unable to talk with her mutilated tongue.