Dance with the Devil (Dark-Hunter #4)(14)
Author: Sherrilyn Kenyon

Like the rest of his family, he hated Valerius’s tender heart. Better Valerius should spit on him as did the others. Because in the end, Valerius was forced to hurt him all the more to prove to everyone else that he wasn’t weak.

Zarek, following the scent of baking bread, limped his way to the baker’s stand. The scent was wonderful. Warm. Sweet. The thought of tasting a piece of it made his heart soar and his mouth water.

He heard people curse him as he drew near. Saw their shadows scurry away from him.

He didn’t care. Zarek knew how repulsive he was. He’d been told so since the hour of his birth.

Had he ever been given a choice, he would have left himself, too. But as it was, he was stuck in this lame, scarred body.

He just wished he could go deaf as well as blind. Then he wouldn’t have to hear their ringing insults.

Zarek approached what he thought might be a young man, standing over a basket of bread.

"Get away from here!" the young man snarled.

"Please, master," Zarek said, making sure to keep his blurry gaze on the ground. "I’ve come to buy a slice of bread."

"We have nothing for you, wretch."

Something hard hit him in the head.

Zarek was so accustomed to pain that he didn’t even flinch. He tried to hand his coins to the man, but something hit his arm and knocked the precious coins from his grasp.

Desperate for a piece of bread that was fresh, Zarek fell to his knees to collect the money. His heart pounded. He squinted as best he could, trying to find them.

Please! He had to have his coins! No one would ever give him any more and there was no telling if or when Marius and Valerius would fight again.

He searched frantically through the dirt.

Where was his money?

Where?

He’d only found one of the coins when someone hit him across the back with what felt like a broom.

"Get out of here!" a woman snarled. "You’re driving off our customers."

Too used to beatings to notice the broom strikes, Zarek searched for his other two coins.

Before he could find them, he was kicked hard in the ribs.

"Are you deaf?" a man asked. "Get out of here, you worthless beggar, or I’ll call the soldiers."

That was one threat Zarek took seriously. His last encounter with a soldier had cost him his right eye. He didn’t want to lose what little sight he had left.

His heart lurched as he remembered his mother and her scorn.

But more than that, he remembered the way his father had reacted once they had returned him home after the soldiers had finished beating him.

His father’s punishment had made theirs seem merciful.

If he were discovered out in the city again, there was no telling what his father would do. He didn’t have permission to be outside the grounds of their villa. Let alone the fact that he had three stolen coins.

Well, only one now.

Gripping his coin tightly, he ambled away from the baker as fast as his ravaged body would allow.

As he headed through the crowd, he felt something wet on his cheek. He brushed it away only to discover blood there.

Zarek sighed wearily as he felt his head until he found the wound above his brow. It wasn’t too deep. Just enough to hurt.

Resigned to his place in life, he wiped at it.

All he wanted was fresh bread. Just one piece of it. Was that so much to ask?

He looked around, trying to use his blurry eyesight and nose to find another baker.

"Zarek?"

He panicked at the sound of Valerius’s voice.

Zarek tried to run through the crowd, back toward their villa, but didn’t get far before his brother caught him.

Valerius’s strong grip held him immobile.

"What are you doing here?" he demanded, shaking Zarek’s bad arm roughly. "Have you any idea what would happen to you if one of the others found you out here?"

Of course he did.

But Zarek was too frightened to answer. His entire body shook from the weight of his terror. All he could do was shield his face from the blows he was sure would start at any moment.

"Zarek," Valerius said, his voice thick with disgust. "Why can’t you ever do as you’re told? I swear you must enjoy being beaten. Why else would you do the things you do?"

Valerius grabbed him roughly by his damaged shoulder and shoved him toward their villa.

Zarek stumbled and fell.

His last coin rolled from his grasp and tumbled across the street.

"No!" Zarek gasped, crawling after it.

Valerius caught him and hauled him to his feet. "What is wrong with you?"

Zarek watched a blurry child scoop up his coin and run off with it. His stomach clenched from hunger pains; he was completely defeated.

"I just wanted a slice of bread," he said, his heart broken, his lips quivering.

"You have bread at home."

No. Valerius and his brothers had bread. Zarek was fed the scraps that not even the other slaves or dogs would eat.

Just once in his life, he wanted to eat something that was fresh and untasted by someone else.

Something that no one had spat into.

"What is this?"

Zarek cringed at the booming voice that always went through him like shattered glass. He shrank back, trying to make himself invisible to the commander who sat on horseback, knowing it was impossible.

The man saw everything.

Valerius looked as panicked as Zarek felt. As always when addressing his father, the youth stuttered. "I-I-I w-was…"

"What is that slave doing here?"

Zarek took a step back as Valerius’s eyes widened and he gulped. It was obvious Valerius was searching for a lie.

"W-w-we were going to the m-m-market," Valerius said quickly.

"You and the slave?" the commander asked incredulously. "For what? Were you hoping to buy a new whip to beat him with?"

Zarek prayed for Valerius not to lie. It was always worse on him when Valerius lied to protect him.

If only he dared to speak the truth, but he had learned long ago that slaves never spoke to their betters.

And he, more than the others, was never allowed to address his father.

"W-w-well… I…"

His father growled a curse and kicked Valerius in the face. The force of the blow knocked Valerius down where he lay beside Zarek with his nose pouring blood.

"I am sick of the way you coddle him." His father dismounted his horse and stormed toward Zarek, who fell to his knees and covered his head, waiting for the beating that was to come.

His father kicked him in his still-sore ribs. "Get up, dog."

Zarek couldn’t breathe from the pain in his side and the terror that consumed him.

His father kicked him again. "Up, damn you."

Zarek forced himself to stand even though all he wanted to do was run. But he’d learned long ago not to. Running only made the punishment worse.

So he stood there, braced for the blows.

His father grabbed him by the neck, then turned to Valerius, who was now on his feet as well. He grabbed Valerius by his clothes and snarled at him. "You disgust me. Your mother was such a whore that it makes me wonder what coward fathered you. I know you didn’t come from me."

Zarek saw pain flash in Valerius’s eyes, but he quickly masked it. It was a common lie their father uttered whenever he was angry at Valerius. One had only to look at the two of them to know Valerius was as much his son as Zarek was.

His father slung Valerius away from him and hauled Zarek by his hair toward a stall.

Zarek wanted to place his own hand over his father’s to keep his hold from hurting so badly, but didn’t dare.

His father couldn’t stand for him to touch him.

"You’re a slaver?" his father asked.

An older man stood before them. "Yes, my lord. Can I interest you in a slave today?"

"No. I want to sell you one."

Zarek gaped as he understood what was happening. The thought of leaving his home terrified him. As bad as things were, he had heard enough stories from other slaves to know that life could get significantly worse for him.

The old slaver looked at Valerius gleefully.

Valerius stepped back, his face pale.

"He’s a handsome boy, my lord. I can get a pretty fee for him."

"Not him," the commander snarled. "This one."

He shoved Zarek toward the slaver who curled his lip in disgust. The man covered his nose. "Is this a jest?"

"No."

"Father-"

"Hold your tongue, Valerius, or I’ll take him up on his offer for you."

Valerius passed a sympathetic look to Zarek, but wisely stayed silent.

The slaver shook his head. "This one is worthless. What did you use him for?"

"A whipping boy."

"He’s too old for that now. My clients want younger, attractive children. This wretch is fit for nothing except begging."

"Take him and I’ll give you two denarii."

Zarek gaped at his father’s words. He was paying a slaver to take him? Such a thing was unheard of.

"I’ll take him for four."

"Three."

The slaver nodded. "For three, then."

Zarek couldn’t breathe as their words resonated inside him. He was so worthless that his father had been forced to pay to be rid of him? Even the cheapest of slaves was still worth two thousand denarii.

But not him.

He was every bit as worthless as everyone claimed.

No wonder they all hated him.

He watched as his father paid the man. Without another look at him, his father grabbed Valerius by the arm and hauled him away.

A younger version of the slaver came into his blurry sight and expelled a repulsed breath. "What are we to do with him, Father?"

The slaver tested the coins with his teeth. "Send him in to clean out the cesspit for the other slaves. If he dies of disease, who cares? Better he clean it than someone we could actually sell for profit."

The younger man smiled at that.

Using a stick, he prodded Zarek toward the stalls. "Come on, rat. Let me show you to your new duties."

Astrid came awake from the dream with her heart pounding. She lay in her bed, surrounded by the darkness she was used to, as Zarek’s pain washed over her.

She’d never felt such despair. Such need.

Such loathing.

Zarek hated everyone, but most of all, he hated himself.

No wonder the man was insane. How could he have lived with such misery?

"M’Adoc?" she whispered.

"Here." He sat beside her.

"Leave some more of the serum for me and Lotus serum, as well."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes."

Chapter 7

Zarek woke up just after noon. He very seldom slept through the day. It was more like napping. In the summertime it was too hot in his cabin for him to sleep comfortably and in winter it was too cold.

But mostly it was because his dreams never allowed him to sleep for long. The past haunted him too much to give him peace, and while unconscious, he couldn’t keep those memories away.

But as he opened his eyes and heard the wind rushing outside, he remembered where he was.

Astrid’s cabin.

He’d sealed the curtains tight last night so he couldn’t tell if it was still snowing outside or not. Not that it mattered. During daylight, he was trapped here.

Trapped with her.

He got out of bed and walked down the hallway, toward the kitchen. How he wished he were at home. He really needed a substantial drink. Not that the vodka could really chase away the dreams that lingered in his mind. But the burn of it was a bit distracting.

"Zarek?"

He turned at the soft voice that went down him like a silken caress. His body reacted instantly to it.

All he had to do was think her name and it made him rock-hard and needful.

"What?" He didn’t know why he answered her when he normally wouldn’t have.

"Are you all right?"

He snorted at that. He’d never once in his life been all right. "Do you have anything to drink in this place?"

"I have juice and tea."

"Liquor, princess. Do you have anything in this place with a bite to it?"

"Only Sasha and of course, you."

Zarek glanced down at the vicious cuts on his arm where her pet had attacked him. If he were any other Dark-Hunter those wounds would be gone now. But lucky him, they would be here for a few days more.

Just like the hole in his back.

Sighing, he reached inside the fridge and pulled out her orange juice. He opened the top and almost had the container to his lips before he remembered that it wasn’t his and this wasn’t his place.

The vicious side of him told him to go for it and drink it, she’d never know, but he didn’t listen to that voice.

He went to the cabinet and pulled out a glass, then poured it full.

Astrid could only hear faint tell-tale signs that Zarek was still in the kitchen. He was so quiet that she had to strain just to make sure.

Walking forward, she headed for the sink. "Are you hungry?"

Out of habit, she reached out-and brushed her hand against a hot, nak*d hip.

It was smooth, inviting.

Scintillating.

Stunned by the unexpected sensation of her hand on his bare flesh, she lowered her hand down his leg before she realized Zarek didn’t have any clothes on.

The man was fully nak*d in her kitchen.

Her heart hammered.