Chapter 87 Deserving of Recognition
(Apollo & Adelaide)
Apollo stepped closer until his body brushed hers again, heat searing into every inch of exposed skin. A shimmer of hellfire rippled through the air where their bodies met. Her breath came faster, shallow and sharp. The heat rolling off him thickened the air, warping it like glass over flame. Shadows curled up the walls in long, trembling stripes, as if Hell itself leaned closer to witness what its king would carve from her tonight.
His clawed hand lifted, hovering just under her jaw.
“I told you,” he said, voice low and velvet-smooth, “you could hang here until you talk.”
Her fingers spasmed against the bonds. Her shoulders throbbed. Her throat felt like it was filled with sand. Faint embers drifted from the ropes, glowing like dying fireflies before dissolving into the air.
“Talk about what?” she asked again, though she knew the answer.
“About who walked into my palace,” he said, “and thought they could give you something I did not.”
His thumb finally touched her chin, tilting her face up. A low vibration passed through the cross, a deep-boned hum, ancient and attentive. The runes beneath her feet flickered in wary recognition, pulsing like an old heartbeat remembering a forgotten ritual.
Her lips parted on a shuddering inhale.
“Until then,” he went on, “we repeat our lesson.”
She squeezed her eyes shut. “Don’t.”
He exhaled slowly, breath hot against her face. “You know what to say if you want me to stop.”
“I’m not giving him to you,” she said hoarsely.
A muscle ticked in his jaw.
“Then you’re not ready to stop,” he replied.
His hand drifted downward again, following the same path as before. Across her neck. Over her collarbone. Between her breasts. Down her ribs. Over her stomach. Her muscles quivered helplessly beneath his palm. The sensation of his touch crawled outward, threading into her nerves like molten wire. Each inch he passed over seemed to wake in painful clarity, as if her body had been waiting for this contact even as her mind begged for distance.
He didn’t need to touch lower for her to feel it everywhere.
The bond thrummed once under his skin, waiting.
“Breathe, Little Flame,” he murmured. “You’re going to need the air.”
Her lungs obeyed even as the rest of her screamed. A thin ribbon of heat uncoiled inside her, betraying her fear with something that felt far too close to readiness. The cross wood groaned softly behind her, stretching in protest or anticipation—she couldn’t tell.
She wasn’t sure which terrified her more—that he might continue… or that part of her already knew she would burn for it and despise herself afterwards.
She hated him.
She hated him.
She hated him.
And yet when his hand hovered just above the mark on his arm, the part of her that wasn’t human fire or Emberflame or cursed bond whispered one treacherous thing into the silence:
Don’t leave.
The bond pulsed in answer, a faint spark of golden light fluttering just beneath her skin like an echo of distant prophecy. The mark at her neck pulsed, sharp and sudden, like a knock from the inside of her own chest. His answering exhale trembled. Something ancient brushed the edge of her awareness—a whisper of prophecy, a heat older than Hell itself, a warning that this was not a moment easily undone.
Apollo lowered his hand toward the brand.
Adelaide clenched her jaw.
She would not beg. She would not break. She would burn first.
“I suppose,” Apollo murmured, voice low enough to vibrate through the wood behind her back, “I should reward you.”
Her eyes snapped open.
His fingers hovered just above the glowing mark, heat licking along her ribs like anticipatory flame. “You gave me something,” he continued softly. “A truth… or a slip. It doesn’t matter what you intended.” His lips curved, slow and dangerous. “You still talked.”
A shock of dread punched through her chest.
Reward. From him. Cold dread and hot shame tangled inside her, twisting like twin serpents. Even the smoke-ropes trembled, tightening minutely as though bracing for what “reward” meant in the Devil’s lexicon.
Her pulse lurched into frantic, uneven beats.
“A good girl,” he said, almost to himself. “Deserves… recognition.”
The shadows along the walls thickened as if they leaned in to listen.
Fear tore through her like lightning. “Apollo—wait—what does that—”
He flicked his fingers.
The ropes binding her ankles dissolved into ash.
Her legs dropped, weak and trembling, barely catching her weight—just long enough for him to sweep forward and lift her in one fluid, possessive motion. The world tilted. Heat swallowed her. The cross behind her blurred into streaks of obsidian and ember-light. The sudden change in angle made her stomach swoop, as if she’d been yanked from orbit into the gravity of something far larger than herself.
Her breath hitched. “No—Apollo—don’t—”
Her thighs instinctively clamped around his hips as he held her, his hands spanning her back and her thigh with ease. The heat of his body seared into hers. His claws—still half-transformed—dug lightly into her skin, not enough to scratch, enough to remind her what held her.
The bond throbbed violently between them.
Then— The shuddered and Apollo’s body shifted.