Chapter 47 Unbreakable
(Adelaide & Apollo)
"I'm in Hell." Her voice cracked. The words felt foreign, impossible, but true. “I’m really in Hell.”
Dragged here. Carried here in his arms. Taken like she was nothing more than a prize he’d ripped from the earth. Like an offering stolen from an altar—except she’d never knelt willingly.
Her pulse thrashed. Another scream ricocheted off the stone—closer this time. Less muffled. As though whatever was suffering had moved nearer to the chamber. Or something had moved it.
Adelaide clapped both hands over her ears, knuckles pressing so hard against her skull that spots danced across her vision. But the sounds weren’t just in her ears—they vibrated through the walls, through the floor, through her skin.
Her breath shattered on a sob. “No—no, please—stop—stop—”
The bite at her neck burned like someone dragging a hot blade across her spine. She gasped and doubled over as the bond—whatever it was—flared to life. The heat there sharpened into a spear of light that shot down her spine, splitting into a thousand tiny sparks that raced through every limb.
A jolt shot through her chest. A violent, electric crack that made her choke.
“Stop!” she cried, pressing both palms against the floor as if she could push the sensation out of her body. “Stop, stop, stop—”
Another pulse slammed into her—hot and wild and terrifying. Then another. Her vision blurred. The world tilted. Her breath came out in short, panicked bursts.
She could feel him. Not just the memory of him. Not just the fear of him. But HIM. Heat. Power. Rage like a caged storm. It crashed through her like an invisible wave, knocking the breath from her lungs. Images that weren’t hers flashed behind her eyes—ash swirling in a black sky, fire wreathing a throne of screaming stone, hands breaking something fragile and smoky.
She screamed—not because he hurt her, but because the connection felt too big for her body to hold. Her heart thudded violently. Her hands shook. Her knees scraped against the stone as she curled into herself.
“What—what are you doing to me?” she whispered into the fur draped around her shoulders.
He wasn’t in the room. He didn’t need to be. His presence flooded through her veins, hot and furious and impossible to shut out. Like fire had been poured into the bite and was now racing through every nerve.
She could feel his anger. His hunger. His lust. His insatiable desire. It rolled under her skin like distant thunder, each pulse setting off a low answering ache in places she refused to acknowledge.
No. She wouldn’t think that. She wouldn’t give those thoughts form.
The screams in the walls grew louder. Her fear surged. The bond snapped. And something in the magic between them lit up.
Bright. Sharp. Alive.
It stole her breath on a gasp of heated pleasure. It stole her strength. It stole any illusion that she was in control of anything.
The connection flared brightly, then suddenly, violently, it pulled away. Not gone. Not severed. Redirected. Toward him.
Her breath stuttered. Her lungs seized. He could feel her.
He felt her.
Apollo moved through the palace like a storm given legs. The obsidian halls widened before him, torches bowing inward as if afraid to burn too close. Every step he took, the bond pulled tighter — a hot, insistent thread cinching around his ribs, dragging him toward the girl he should never have touched. The air thickened in his wake, Hell’s usual stench of sulphur shifting under a new note: jasmine and smoke and mortal fear. Her fear.
Her fear hit him first. A sharp, metallic spike. A trembling inhale not drawn by his lungs but somehow felt in them. It scraped through him, lighting every nerve with unwanted instinct — protect, claim, close the distance.
Then her anger. It rolled into him like a wave of sparks, frantic and furious. She was pacing. Fighting. Thinking the kinds of thoughts that made his teeth bare in a silent, answering snarl. Every muttered curse she flung at his name echoed faintly in his chest, like someone had carved her voice into his ribs.
And then— Her desire. Lingering. Unsteady. Stubborn. A low, molten throb that struck him so hard his steps faltered for half a breath. The echo of her want slammed into him ten-fold, hotter than when her body was beneath his hands, sharper than when her breath shook against his mouth.
He gripped the stone wall as he passed, claws tearing faint grooves into the volcanic glass.
“Little Flame…” His voice came out ruined — a growl threaded with something he did not want to recognise.
The bond pulsed again. Hard. Bringing her scent — wild, terrified, defiant — rushing into his lungs. Bringing the memory of her mouth beneath his. Bringing her confusion, her panic, her self-loathing like a storm battering against his chest.
Adelaide gasped and pressed trembling fingers to the bite. The heat pulsed once more, low in her belly, quivering through her pussy, and then settled into a low, beating thrum through her veins.
Adelaide stayed knelt on the floor, fighting for air, fighting for sense, fighting for anything that felt remotely like solid ground beneath her.
She had none. But she had anger. Familiar. Comforting. Sharp.
She clutched the fur tighter and sucked in a shuddering breath. “That’s right,” she whispered through clenched teeth. “I’m terrified. Because of you. Because you dragged me here.”
Her voice quivered. She swallowed hard and forced steel into it. “You think just because you look like—” The word caught in her throat.
She hated that. Hated him for looking like that. She tried again.
“You think just because you kissed me—just because you can force your way inside my head—” Her hand fisted in the fur.
“You won’t break me.” She said it again, louder. “You. Will. Not. Break me.”
Her pulse steadied—just a little. Enough to push herself slowly back to her feet. Her legs shook, but she locked her knees anyway, forcing herself taller, as if defiance alone could add inches to her height.
It was too much. The overwhelming mix of her delicate human emotions. They hit him in wave after wave, Stronger and more potent each time. He marched faster. The palace felt smaller with every corridor. Shadows flared at his heels like hounds eager to follow. The wards groaned overhead, reacting to the magic building beneath his skin.