Chapter 20

The Shadow Master

Adelicate hand rests on my shoulder. Gentle fingers caress downwards and feel my chest.

‘My Lord,' the whore says sweetly, her tits pushed up and swaying in front of me. ‘Are you quite well?' Her other hand grabs my cock. ‘I can help ease your burdens,' she grins.

‘You better,' I reply, taking her hand in mine and placing a silver coin in it. ‘That's what I'm paying you for.' I nod to the stairs at the rear of this old tavern. The air is stifling hot as the fire in the fireplace burns. The human villagers add more wood as the wind howls outside.

Fuck. I can hardly breathe as it is.

I take her arm and lead her upstairs, keeping my head down and hood up. Seeing as the king and the guards have now become our enemy, it won't be long before word has spread that we are no longer in the new king's good graces. The royal soldiers will come for us very soon. The humans will turn on us.

But first things first.

The whore.

I lead her down the hall, past the rooms where heavy grunting and drunken giggles travel out. I take her to the room at the end and open the door. The fire has been lit up here, too, and casts the room in a warm orange glow. The double bed sits beneath the window, its sheets rumpled and stained with old blood.

I close the door, hoping to make it dark enough that she doesn't notice too soon, and watch her look around.

‘And what does My Lord have in mind?' she asks with her well-rehearsed seduction. She lowers her shawl, revealing her back. ‘The usual will get you what you have already paid. But if there is anything else, I will require more coin.'

‘Anything else like what?' I ask, locking the door.

‘You have bought my pussy. If you want my mouth or arse as well, that will be extra.'

She glances back at me. Her eyes dark and full of promise.

‘How much more?'

‘How much do you have?'

I toss her five more coins. She grabs it quickly.

‘Well. You have bought every hole, My Lord. I have not been with a witch killer before. You are a legend.' She looks at my crotch. ‘Which of my holes would you like to begin with?'

The floorboards creak in the shadows, and she startles. The fa?ade of confidence cracks. After all, she is up here with me. A beast. One well known to leave carnage and pain in his wake.

‘Forgive me, My Lord,' she offers a slight bow as Shaw steps out from the shadows. ‘I was unaware I was being bought for you both.'

His skin is pale and filthy from the fight back at the coven. But he's smeared with bright red fresh blood across his mouth and neck. He holds his weight on his right and clutches his side.

She straightens as he steps forward, and she staggers back, seeing his dark eyes and the fresh blood dripping from his hands and chin. A low rumbling emanates from his chest, and she shudders. The scent of his dream powers seeps into the air. That scent of lavender and sulphur all mixed together.

The whore starts to gasp and yelp, looking at the floor and backing away as dozens upon dozens of black spiders crawl out from behind Shaw. Her foot slams repeatedly into the hardwood as she begins to panic.

‘Spiders!' she cries. ‘There are spiders!'

She begins swatting at her skirts and then her bodice as they crawl all over her. She opens her mouth to scream. I slam my hand over it, not wanting to draw any more attention to us up here. The spiders aren't real. Just an image. One made solely for her.

When she spots the corpses of the two girls I procured before her lying beyond the bed, her screams fill my palm.

Now, they're real.

The girl is terrified as she thrashes in my arms, fighting off the spiders Shaw is making her see.

I drag her towards him, and he sinks his teeth into her shoulder.

Her heart hammers in her chest as he feeds from her. She doesn't know what to do first.

Fight me off? An impossible task as holding her is like holding one of my dolls.

Rid herself of the spiders that aren't even there?

Her greatest fear. The subject of her nightmares.

The girl before was terrified of her father, who staggered drunkenly towards her with clenched fists. The one before that was heights. She fell to her knees, screaming as if at a cliff's edge as the ground around her fell away.

Shaw's strength is growing. With access to Ashe's blood, we're all getting stronger with powers thought long gone resurfacing.

Shaw's ability to see another's greatest nightmare and make it manifest has only been with him for a couple of days, but he hasn't lost any of his skills over the decades he has been without it.

Shaw tears at her flesh and drinks deeply, gripping her waist so hard I hear her hip bone crack in his palm.

Her flailing slows, as does her heart rate. She falls limp, and as she falls to the floor, he pulls her into his lap. Stepping over her sprawled-out legs, I sit on the bed, waiting for him to finish his feed.

The squelching and gulping drown out her soft whimpers, and I watch the coins she held in her hand roll across the floor, coming to a stop when they hit one of the other girls he killed.

I feel her again. A swell of emotion. I close my eyes and feel my poppet doll.

Alive and with Archie. He's a fool at times but lethal when needed. She's in safe hands.

‘Are you ok?' Shaw asks, his hand resting on my shoulder as he sits beside me.

‘Fine. You feeling better?'

‘A bit. It will help until I get what I really need.'

He lifts his shirt and pulls away the makeshift bandage. The wound still bleeds and looks angry.

‘I need her blood to heal properly. Whatever Neve hit me with is nasty. Human blood isn't enough. Even charged up with fear.'

He covers himself and picks up the bottle of whiskey, drinking from it deeply and leaving a smear of blood on the opening. He watches me rub my heart and shift uncomfortably.

‘Is it you? Or is it her? Is she okay?'

‘She's okay. She's been getting bursts of anger. And then dread. Then she's happy. I think that's what she's feeling. Her emotions are a little erratic.'

He scoffs, applying another layer of bandage to his side. ‘I never struggle to tell when she's angry. I usually find myself ducking for cover.'

‘She is also sad.' I rub my chest. ‘She's utterly heartbroken that the coven was killed. I just need to get used to this feeling of… well. Her. Of emotions I'm not used to feeling. I don't give a damn the coven is dead, but she's really torn up about it.'

‘Should have thought about that before you made that link with her.'

He winces at the deep wound on his side. I'm glad it hurts. Saves me from making him pay for that snide remark.

‘That spell Neve cast. It wiped them all out in a second.'

‘Yeah,' he groans. ‘Did you notice the marks they carved onto their foreheads?'

‘It was the same one the healer Archie spoke to drew for him. The one Neve marked her belly with when she was pregnant with Pix.'

A flash of something green catches the corner of my eye. I move quickly, grabbing the pixie before it can escape. I hold it between the two of us.

‘Fucking pixies,' Shaw grunts. ‘They're everywhere.'

I crush it, ending its life quicker than it deserves, and drop it to the floor.

This pixie won't report to Neve, but there are hundreds more that will. That may have already!

‘We need to find Pix,' I say. ‘Before someone else does.'

He nods and glances at the three dead women.

‘We can't stay here much longer,' he says. ‘Our allegiance with the crown is done. The prince hunts us. So now the soldiers will, too. If those below hear we're hunted, they will turn us over without hesitation.'

He stands, groaning and holding his side as he does. He looks out of the window, watching the rain lash down and the trees sway in the growing wind.

‘Neve and the prince are working together,' he says. ‘And they were after Pix. Not to kill. But to take. Neve got her out of the way of that wave before it could kill her.'

‘Neve needs her for something,' I sigh. ‘Something bigger than killing off an entire coven.'

Shaw slowly shakes his head. ‘I have no desire to be at war again. We barely survived last time.'

‘If Pix were here, she would remind us that we're the ones who brought the blood queen back. And it is our responsibility to return her to hell.'

‘And I would fill her mouth with my cock to shut her up,' he laughs.

‘Well. If you come at me with your cock, I'll be slitting your throat.'

‘Noted,' he laughs again, closing the curtain and facing me. His face falls. ‘If Pixie dies and Neve dies, our curse will be lifted, and blood magic will be no more. They are the end of it. The last ones. They die. We're freed.'

He watches me closely, looking for my reaction. And I, in turn, watch him. Watch his cold and unreadable expression. He could be talking about the weather. Not our girl.

‘What are you suggesting?' I ask.

‘I need to hear you say it, Dorian.'

‘Say what?'

‘The truth, Shadow Master. Logic dictates that she needs to die. That killing both her and Neve will solve a plethora of problems. We could be free of this curse and leave the humans and witches to their own fates. Let them deal with the unseelie. With the prince. We can be free.'

I stand, every muscle tensing.

He watches me but doesn't move. When I close the distance between us, he offers me his whiskey. I take it, drinking down my fill.

‘Logic does dictate killing her would be the path of least resistance,' I agree. ‘That regaining our natural forms and leaving this mortal realm to devour itself is the easiest option.' I hand back the bottle. Our eyes lock. ‘But I'm not killing her. I'm not allowing her to leave me. Even if she begs for me to let her go. And Neve will not be permitted to win. I'd rather die. I'd rather watch everything burn than let her get a moment of happiness. Ashe belongs to us, and I will watch the humans and witches kill each other with a smile on my face as long as that crazy little witch is waiting for us in our bed.' He drinks. ‘I've been in hell, Shaw. I've felt its heat. Its pain. I've tasted its blood. And the only time I don't feel its misery is when I'm holding her in my arms. When her blood slides down my throat. And when she moans against my lips. Call me selfish, but I don't care about anything else. Just her. Just what she gives me. Just how I feel when she breathes my air.' My palm settles over my heart again. ‘I've been numb for decades. Unless you count blood thirsty rage and indifference, that is. Feeling her is like being alive myself, so if you think I'll stand by as you look to resolve our plethora of issues by killing her, you won't see my shadows until it's too late.'

He hands me back the bottle and looks at the door.

‘Yeah,' he sighs heavily. ‘I love her too.' He slaps me on my shoulder. ‘I'm keen to get my fingers wrapped around that chain we put around her neck.'

‘I took it off her.'

Shaw blinks at me.

‘She said she loved us. I was overcome. The chain is gone, and I vowed not to put it back on her.'

He smiles. ‘She said she loves us?'

‘Well. She shouted it as she was losing her ever-loving mind and raging her words. But yes. She loves us. I offered her my life in exchange for her freedom. Said she could kill me and run. That I wouldn't stop her.'

‘What did she do?'

‘She fucked me senseless instead.'

He laughs and shakes his head, drinking again from the bottle.

‘We should go. Before the pimps come looking for that lot.' I nod to the dead whores. ‘You feel up to travelling?'

‘Yeah,' he replies, despite his tone being tired and pained. ‘There's an air coven a few miles through the woods. We'll head there.'

‘A coven?' I ask. ‘You certain that's the best idea?'

‘It's the last place they will think to look, and a witch is hardly going to report to the humans that the witch hunters are lurking about in their village.' He nods. ‘The coven is the safest place to be.'

We leave through the window and disappear into the night.