Chapter 365

Elain choked as the invisible hand around her throat tightened. She closed her eyes, not wanting to see the grinning fae before her, and the knife in her hand clattered to the floor several feet beneath her. Something slapped her across the face and she opened her eyes, glaring as she struggled for air.

"Do you think he felt that?" the grinning fae flicked a glance at Lucien on the ground and then looked back to Elain. Her blood began to pound in her head, and she felt her face growing hot. The hand at her throat relaxed just a little, and she struggled against the invisible bonds. "Maybe we'll have to test more to find out…"

"Do we really have time for this?" The second male asked, standing just behind the first. "We are expected back in the Throne Room."

"They'll forgive a little lateness when they see what we've found…"

"Why don't we just take them down there?"

"Where's the fun in that?" The first asked, his eyes still on Elain's face. "They're going to have their fun with them anyway, why shouldn't we have ours first?"

The second male sighed, running an irritated hand through his short cropped black hair as he turned to look at the tall one who had picked Sheera up off the floor and slung her unconscious body over his shoulder. Elain looked at her friend, trying to determine how badly she was injured. The male who held Sheera ran a hand over her backside, grinning at the dark haired male and winking as he did so.

"You see…" the first, the one who held Elain to the wall, said. "Plenty of fun to be had with the Garden Slut and this one." He grinned again at Elain, "I've always been curious about the Mating Bond." He told her, "I'm going to have lots of fun testing it…"

Panic flared to life within Elain and she looked down at Lucien unmoving on the ground beneath her. Cold brown eyes held amusement when she looked back up, and then a phantom hand slid across her chest and down her body.

"Don't. Touch. Me." Elain growled with as much venom as she could. She was fairly impressed with the way it sounded and she thought that even Nesta would have been proud of the savagery behind her words. The fae male just grinned more broadly, however, and she realised that he really did like this. He wasn't just playing with them because he found it amusing, this was truly the kind of thing that he liked, and that scared her even more than she had been.

"Are you going to stop me?" he asked, laughter just behind his tone. The hand at her throat tightened and any reply Elain might have tried to make was choked off.

"Is this really what you want to do?" The dark haired male spoke again, and the first turned his head toward him in irritation.

"Don't you want to have some fun?" he asked, and the dark haired one flicked a repulsed look at Elain before back to his friend.

"With that?"

"Yes… unless you prefer the Garden Slut?"

A sneer worked its way onto the dark haired male's face and he shook his head. "Neither…" he said, "And I don't know why you would." He looked at Elain again, "Cauldron-made, isn't it?" he said, "Not even a real fae female…"

"Sure." The first said, his own brown eyes looking Elain over again. "But it is pretty…" he grinned, "Might not be fit to sit beside a High Lord and rule, but it'll do for other purposes…"

"Ugh…" the dark haired one wrinkled his nose.

"Besides.." the first said, "I am interested in testing this bond… If you're not wanting to play, maybe you can keep watch up the corridor…"

"Fine." The dark haired male threw Elain one last disgusted look and then turned and strode away up the hallway.

"Now…" the male moved closer to Elain until she could feel the heat of him, as he grinned up at her. She struggled against invisible bonds again, but she stopped when that only made him smile even more widely. One of his fingers brushed against her arm, and shivers of revulsion and panic moved through her. "Can your mate feel this?"

Elain bared her teeth, unable to move to do anything else. "Get your hands off of me." He just shook his head, both of his hands moving to her waist.

"Can he feel this?"

Anger mixed with the fear now, and Elain struggled again. Her heart was beating wildly, and she could hear the blood pounding in her head. She wished that Lucien would wake up, she hoped that he was healing himself, and that he would stop this before it went any further. She knew that if the bond had been active, that he would have been able to hear her screaming for him through that connection, but all she could do now was grit her teeth and close her eyes.

A hard slap across Elain's face told her that was not going to be permitted to close her eyes and block this out. The sound of the blow echoed up the hallway as tears stung her eyes and she snarled at the male standing before her.

"How will I know what your mate can feel if you're not paying attention?"

"I don't care."

"You might not…" he smirked, "But I bet he will…" Elain gasped when she suddenly slid a little way down the wall so that she was now only several inches off the floor, and the male before her lifted a hand to touch cold fingertips to her burning cheek. "I wonder if he felt that…?"

"That's not how it works…" Elain snarled, well and truly over this sick game.

"Is it not?"

"No…" She tried to bend her knees, tried to kick at him. He just laughed.

"I know there's something like that. I've read about the mating bond… the connection between mates." He looked down at Lucien and then back up to Elain, "If you really are mates…"

Elain blinked. "Of course we are…" She figured that this idiot must not have known that she and Lucien had been dosed with faebane, and that the bond was therefore muted. If he wasn't aware of that, then she wasn't going to tell him. That would be letting him know that their magic was also muted, and that wasn't something that he needed to be privy to.

"We shall see…" his hand smoothed against her cheek, and his brown eyes flicked back and forth across her face, and then down at Lucien. Lucien stirred gently on the ground, a soft pained sound coming from him and the male standing before Elain grinned once more. "Let's see if we can really get his attention…"

Elain was about to protest but that phantom hand closed around her throat and began squeezing and she was unable to make any sound other than a short gasp. She tried to struggle, but was held firmly in place against the wall. Her blood began to pound in her head again and she began to panic more fiercely when one of the male's very real hands slid up the outside of her thigh, gathering a handful of her dress as it did so. She didn't stop struggling then, despite knowing that it pleased the bastard standing before her. There was no way that she was going to let this happen, not without fighting the entire way. The hand at her throat only tightened.

Elain's vision went dark, and the throbbing in her head only got louder. Her blood pounded through her veins, and it was almost as if she could hear Lucien's heartbeat again, as her own body struggled for air and to keep her body functioning. Could she hear Lucien's heart? Or, was that her own blood pounding through her? She couldn't tell, and she figured that it didn't matter. If she didn't get some air in the next few moments, nothing would matter again.

Elain's fear flowed through Lucien, leaving a bitter taste in his mouth. That was the first thing he was aware of, even before he realised that he was sprawled on the ground. He remained still for a few moments, sorting out everything that hurt, and sending what healing power he could into those pains. He was fairly sure that one of his ribs had punctured a lung, and he took a moment to try and sort that out. It was going to take a while, and he wasn't sure that he had that time. Panic reached him from Elain then, and Lucien realised that the bond had reawakened, and that the faebane must have left his system.

Gingerly, he turned his head, opening his eyes. Heat flooded him when Elain gasped, and he realised that something was choking her. His blood began to pound through his veins, hot and fiery, and he couldn't help the light snarl that slipped from him when the male standing over him began to trace his hand up Elain's thigh. Elain struggled, but continued choking, and Lucien knew that she wasn't going to be able to get free. He could feel her fear, her panic, and her rage at the fact that she was unable to stop this. He could also feel what the lack of air was doing to her, and he felt the moment she thought that it was all over.

Lucien launched himself from the ground, grabbing the blade that Elain had evidently dropped. In an instant he had seized the male with his hands on Elain and ripped him away from her. Throwing him across the hallway, Lucien followed, on him again a second later and, without pausing to think, he had driven the blade between the male's ribs over and over several times before they both hit the ground. Lucien had ridden him to the floor, still driving the blade into his chest over and over, despite the fact that he was unable to draw a complete breath. He could hear his ragged breathing, and feel the pain in his lungs as he tried to force them to work normally. The male beneath him was still, and had been for several moments, before Lucien was able to stop repeatedly stabbing him, and he fell to the side, letting the knife clatter to the floor. He turned to look for Elain, finding her struggling to get to her feet from where she had slumped on the floor having been dropped by the male he had just killed. She pointed, and Lucien looked in that direction, getting to his own feet again and taking several strides to grab a tall male kneeling over an unmoving Sheera. The surprised look on the other male's face didn't even give Lucien pause as he approached, grabbed the male by the throat and hauled him to his feet, while sending as much heat and flame as he could through his grip and into the body of the other. Lucien watched as the other male gasped, and then his eyes went dull and his body went slack and Lucien dropped his body to the ground. Then, Lucien turned back to his mate once more.