Chapter 83 Full Circle
(Apollo & Adelaide)
Apollo reached for the mark along his arm. The brand blazed to life.
Her entire body jerked helplessly, a cry tearing from her throat as the connection flooded with white-hot sensation.
Her body thrashed, her legs pulling and straining against the ropes. Her back arched so sharply the smoke-bonds creaked under the pressure. Her neck rolled, and her head lolled to the side, hair sticking to her damp cheeks. A guttural moan—raw, torn from something deeper than shame or fear—rumbled from within her. The sound vibrated through the cross into his hand on the wood, a low, desperate music that made his claws bite deeper into the grain.
Her nipples were pulled so tight Apollo imagined, vividly, how hard they would be beneath his tongue… beneath his teeth. Her bare skin flushed red and pebbled with pleasure she couldn’t hide. Couldn’t stop. Couldn’t fight.
The scent of her arousal spilled through the room in slow, devastating waves—sweet, molten, intoxicating. The evidence of it leaked down the inside of her thigh, forming a thin, glistening path he could trace with his eyes. Each fresh droplet caught the red glow from the runes, turning into tiny beads of liquid gold before sliding lower.
Apollo inhaled deeply, shuddering. “Yes…” he groaned, the sound dragged from his chest.
It was hitting him too—harder, deeper, sharper each time she trembled. The bond. Her reaction. Her scent. Her helpless little gasps. The way she looked—trussed up, trembling, needy, ripe for the taking.
His taking.
His claws flexed involuntarily. His wings twitched. His tail lashed once behind him, molten-hot with need.
He would take her. Just not yet. Not like this. If he took her now—in this state, thrumming with bond-driven hunger—he would break her too quickly, too thoroughly, and he wanted her for far, far longer than one ruined moment.
He wanted to draw this out. To savour it. To savour her. Every. Last. Drop. He wanted to learn every note of the sounds she made and play them back into her until she could not remember what it felt like to be untouched.
Apollo released the bond. The severing hit her like a physical blow.
Adelaide slumped against her restraints, her entire body shaking, breath coming in hard, ragged, uneven pants as the overwhelming pleasure abruptly vanished and left a hollow ache behind. The absence of it was a cold shock, like being dropped from a great height into water that never warmed.
Her voice cracked on a sobbing pant. “Please… I don’t know anything.”
He stepped forward, slow as a shadow unspooling, and ran a clawed finger through the mess trickling down her leg. Slowly. Deliberately.
Adelaide shuddered, her breath jagged, her eyes half-lidded with exhaustion and something far more dangerous—something she didn’t understand, something she didn’t want, something her body whispered against her will.
Her thighs trembled as his touch neared. The ropes creaked again as she tried to pull away—and failed.
Apollo lifted the slick finger to his face and inhaled deeply. A violent tremor rolled through him.
Her scent—sharp, sweet, molten—hit him like a memory opening its jaws and devouring him whole. The same memory of her lips smeared with him, her mouth shining with what he had painted across her skin days earlier. The bond pulsed with it. So did she.
“Delectable,” he purred, voice low and wicked. The word clung to his tongue like sugar and ash.
Adelaide frowned weakly through her lashes. It was barely a reaction, but it pleased him—pleased him enough that a dark laugh rumbled out of his chest.
“Save your voice, Little Flame,” Apollo murmured, stepping close again. “You’re going to be using it a lot.”
He tapped the pad of his slick finger against her lower lip.
Then, very slowly, he wiped her own slick onto her mouth exactly as he had wiped his release there before—a mirrored gesture, a cruel echo. The taste of herself bloomed over her tongue, hot and salt-sweet, and shame punched the air from her lungs harder than any blow.
Her breath hitched. He felt it.
“Full circle,” he whispered. “Just like last time.”
Time blurred.
He watched her. Listened to her. Felt every tremor through the bond as hour after hour he dragged her toward that cliff and refused to let her jump. The chamber narrowed to the rhythm of her gasps, the creak of the cross, the relentless thud of two hearts bound to the same cruel metronome.
Her hair stuck to her temples with sweat. Her breathing turned hoarse. The cross groaned softly with each involuntary pull of her body against the bonds. Tears dried and reappeared, streaking salt tracks over flushed cheeks.
Sometimes she cursed him. Sometimes she begged. Sometimes she fell silent altogether, biting her own lip to keep from making a sound. Each new strategy left its own mark: rawness at the corner of her mouth, a rasp in her voice, a wild light in her eyes that wouldn’t quite go out.
He pushed. He eased off. He pushed again. Never enough to give her the fire she wanted. Always enough to keep her burning.
Once, near what might have been dawn—if Hell cared about such things—her head sagged forward, chest heaving.
“I hate you,” she whispered, voice shredded.
The bond thrummed with the truth of it.
His own chest tightened. “I know,” he said quietly. The admission scraped out of him like something torn loose from bone.
He stepped back, finally. Let the magic recede. Let the intensity ebb just enough for her to suck in a shaky breath that wasn’t wrapped entirely in need.
Her body trembled violently, every muscle trembling from effort and denial. Her eyes fluttered half-shut, swollen with exhaustion.
He studied her for a long, silent moment. She looked wrecked, radiant, ruined; a creature carved from sweat and tears and stubborn, glimmering refusal.
Then, he turned away. He walked to the ruined doorway, wings dragging slowly behind him. At the threshold, he paused—did not look back—but let his voice roll low across the room.
“You can hang there,” he said, “until you decide you’re ready to talk.”
She swallowed hard. He heard it.
“Talk about what?” she rasped.
He closed his eyes once, briefly.
“About who dared step into what is mine,” he said. “And thought they could leave you with hope.” The word curdled on his tongue; he spat it like an obscenity.
He focused on the bond once more—felt her fraying, shaking, humiliated, furious… and, beneath it all, still maddeningly, stubbornly unbroken. Deep under the wreckage of her nerves, a thin, trembling thread of resolve glowed like banked coals, refusing to die.
Good, he thought grimly.
He wasn’t done yet.
Without another word, Apollo stepped through the ruined doorway and vanished into the dark hall, leaving her bound, trembling, and painfully aware that this was only the beginning. Behind him, the cross creaked softly as Adelaide sagged against it, a single hoarse breath slipping from her lips—half curse, half prayer—as he sauntered away, Hell shifted, listening to the girl who refused to shatter.