A Castle of Sand (29 page)

She shook her head. “You didn’t do this.”

“I’ve failed to protect you so many times…”

“Don’t do this, Derek. Just don’t. We have to get out of here—you, me and Ben. Staying here will be the end of all of us.”

Borys cleared his throat. “Much as I hate to break up this sweet reunion between husband and wife, I have to interrupt.”

Husband and wife.
I creased my brows in confusion as I reluctantly let go of Sofia. Ignoring Borys, I bit into my palm to draw blood and coaxed Sofia to drink the blood so that the bite on her neck would heal. The moment the skin on her neck closed, I glared at Borys. “I demand the life of whomever it is that has tasted her blood.”

“You’re king of The Shade, Derek Novak.” Borys frowned. “But I’m king here.
I’ve
had a taste of your wife. Do you demand
my
life?”

 “Yes.”

“You insolent fool!” Borys smirked. “She is my betrothed, offered up to me by her own mother since she was a child. She is
mine
. You never should’ve touched her in the first place, and because you did, because you spoiled her for me, I’ve invited you a day before our wedding so I could make a widow out of her.”

Sofia’s hand found my arm and she held on so tightly, it felt like she was trying to break my arm. “Derek…you can’t possibly take on this many men…”

“I don’t have a choice, Sofia.” I pushed her out of the way and the fight began. One vampire after the other attacked me. I was able to rip several hearts out, but I didn’t stand a chance. Though a lot of Borys’ men proved to be ill-trained and a lot weaker compared to the vampires at The Shade, I was simply outnumbered.

The moment they had me subdued and bound on the ground, I was sure that it was the end of me. I cast a desperate glance at Sofia who was being held back by Borys, delight evident in his eyes as he saw me fall.

“Kill him!” Borys gave the order, his eyes fixed on Sofia.

Sofia took one look at me, tears streaming down her beautiful face. She began shaking her head and I knew how difficult it was for her to do what she did next. She knelt in front of Borys to plead for my life. “Please…don’t do this…I will do
anything
you want me to do.
Anything
. Spare his life.”

Borys sneered as he gestured for the guards to wait. “Anything?”

“No, Sofia!” I yelled.

Sofia nodded and all I could think of was the horrors her agreement would put her through.

“Very well then.” Borys nodded. “Take the king of The Shade to level seven.”

I didn’t need to ask what level seven was. The terrors done within the walls of The Oasis’ dungeons were no secret to vampires.

“What are you going to do to him?” Sofia croaked.

“Whatever it takes to punish you for daring to bargain yourself in exchange for my enemy’s life, my beautiful bride.” His voice was cold and merciless. “You’ll soon find, my love, that there are fates far worse than death.”

Borys pushed me into my chamber, a wicked grin on his face. Ingrid stood beside him, staring at me with blank disappointment.

I tumbled backward, attempting to balance myself from the force of his push. I eventually tripped and crashed to the ground, tears streaming down my face as I glared up at Borys. “What’s in level seven? What are you going to do to Derek?”

I groaned in pain when Borys leaned over and once again grabbed a fistful of my hair. “You’ll find out tomorrow on our wedding day, my love. Don’t worry about him. I’ll take care of him. Just get some beauty sleep so that you can be the bride that I deserve.”

I choked on my tears
.
“Please. We’re not actually married. We’re just engaged. Let him go. I’ll do everything you want. Please…” I sobbed.

“Kiss me, Sofia.”

I sealed my lips, sickened by such a horrible thought. “Please…” I whimpered.

“You let
him
touch you and you respond to his every touch, his every kiss, his every caress, don’t you? You shall not refuse to do the same with me—especially not after you’ve said your vows and surrendered to the inevitable. The
immune
will be my wife and you will show me that you enjoy everything I do to you.” He grabbed my jaw. “Do you understand?!”

I was staring pure madness in the face and all I could do was tremble as I nodded, wondering to myself how on earth I could survive even just a night with him without completely losing my mind. Everything about him revolted me. I couldn’t help but recoil with even just the thought of his touch. To even pretend and act the part of a blushing bride who found pleasure in his presence was sheer torment.

“Now, respond…” He pressed his lips against mine—painfully, his fangs came out and drew blood from my lower lip. For a moment I thought about forcing myself to return the kiss, but I found that I couldn’t. I simply didn’t know how. Every part of me was just wishing for it to end. It didn’t seem to matter to him, because the blood on my lips quickly shifted his attention from forcing me to kiss him back to his craving for my blood.

His mouth quickly left mine and found my neck, and he once again sunk his fangs in and drank my blood. I was trembling uncontrollably as his arms clamped around my body, crushing my chest against his. I tried to push him away, but found that I couldn’t. I stared up at Ingrid, who was still standing by the door watching everything that was happening and I wondered how she could do it.
What kind of mother do I have? How could she just stand there and watch him do this to her own daughter?

She looked at me blankly, her arms crossed over her chest.

“Please…make him stop…” I mouthed at her.

She rolled her eyes and sighed. “That’s enough, Borys. You’re going to drain her of blood before you marry her.”

Borys withdrew his mouth from my neck. “I love how she trembles. Your daughter is so beautiful, Ingrid. Untouched.” His eyes darkened. “Except for that brute, Derek Novak.” He let go of me and stood up, looking down at me as I curled into a ball on the floor. “I’m going to make him pay.”

“Please don’t hurt him…” I begged. For that, I got a kick in the gut.

As I coughed, he looked at me coldly. “Your pleas only make me want to hurt him further.” He then turned and brushed past Ingrid. “Put a bandage on the bite mark,” he instructed her before leaving. “I don’t want it healed. I want to see the scars tomorrow. It will be a sign that she’s mine. Make sure she’s a stunning sight tomorrow. Make me look forward to our marriage bed.”

The door closed and I was alone with my mother. That’s when I realized that neither Ben nor the guards were in the room. “Where’s Ben? What did you do to him?”

“Your best friend is fine. Don’t worry about him. I instructed Claudia to be gentle with him. We need him to be presentable for the wedding tomorrow. He’s the best man after all.” She walked past my still curled up form on the floor. “Get up, Sofia. Why must you be so stubborn and pathetic?” She began to rummage through a drawer in one corner of the room.

“What kind of mother are you?” I managed to say in between broken sobs. “Your king is about to kill the man that I love.”

I shuddered when she sped my way and threw me onto the bed. “Understand this, Sofia,” she hissed. “The man you love is Borys Maslen, not Derek Novak. The Shade’s prince has obviously brainwashed you…”

Despite my tears, I laughed wryly. “It’s
you
who’s been brainwashed, Ingrid…or maybe I ought to call you Camilla…is there still any part of her left in you? Dad was right about you. You
are
insane. You left your own family to blindly serve this villain of a king.”

“You have no idea what you’re talking about. You don’t know what my life was like. I loved Aiden. He was everything to me, and then you came along. I never wanted you, but I gave in to his requests for a child, because I loved him. You stole him from me.” She was saying the words calmly, her eyes set on the bite marks on my neck as she proceeded to tend to the wound.

The spite every word contained mixed with the calmness and affection by which she expressed them made her one of the scariest people I’d ever met. I couldn’t begin to fathom how broken a creature my own mother was. I was certain, however, that even though I had been born of her womb, she was now a complete stranger.

No more words were exchanged until she was done. As she turned to leave, I couldn’t help but cry out, “Please…help Derek. Help Ben. They are dear to me. I love them.”

She stopped right by the door. She didn’t bother to face me as she shook her head. “No, Sofia. You love Borys. He’s the only man you’re allowed to love from now on.”

That’s when I accepted that my mother was completely gone. Camilla Claremont wasn’t just insane. She was dead and her body had been replaced by Ingrid Maslen.

The silence and solitude was driving me crazy. It’d been more hours than I could count since Ingrid left me. I had no way to track time, nothing to take my mind off of Derek and Ben and what torment they were most likely going through. I couldn’t stop crying. At some point, I just crumpled myself up on the bed, knowing that there was no way I could escape that bedroom, hoping that sleep could provide me with an escape from the tormenting thoughts and emotions coursing through my mind and soul.

I could still feel the stabbing ache of the bite marks on my neck. My lips felt swollen from the cuts caused by Borys’ sickening kisses. The heaviness in my chest made it difficult to breathe.

I’d never felt more helpless and distraught than I did at that moment. I lay there for hours, sleep eluding me. My stomach was already grumbling. No one had bothered to bring me food since Ingrid had left. I wondered if it was some sort of punishment.

When my eyelids began to get heavy and sleepiness began to overtake me, I gladly gave in, hoping that when I woke up, I would find that The Oasis was my nightmare and The Shade was my reality. The Shade had its own horrors, but though firelight flooded the tombs of The Oasis, to me, it would always be darker than the island Derek spent a hundred years establishing and fighting for.

I had no clue how long I’d been asleep, but disappointment washed over me when I woke up to find that The Oasis was still the reality I was being forced to inhabit. I couldn’t help but sob when I realized that maids were milling around my chamber. A dress that was far too revealing for my taste was laid out on the bed beside me.

“You’re awake!” an elderly woman exclaimed. “The wedding is in a few hours.”

The mention of the wedding once again turned on the waterworks. “Please…help me out of here…”

She sighed and smiled. “There’s no way out of here, beautiful.” She paused as if to give me time to let the words sink in before clapping her hands together. “Now, get up and let’s take you to the shower. You look awful and we can’t have that, because the king wants his bride to be stunning. Right now, you’re an absolute mess. Did you not get any sleep at all?”

I ignored her question. “What’s in level seven?”

She gave me a sorry look. “Darkness…things a bride shouldn’t be thinking of on her wedding day.”

“The man I love, the man I want to marry…he’s in level seven.”

“Then you best forget him and love the king instead.” She heaved another sigh—now more exasperating and impatient than kind. “Come, come…hurry.”

I was pulled out of the bed and from that point on it felt like my body wasn’t my own. I went where they led me, did what they told me to do. I sat when they told me to sit and stood when I was instructed to stand. They stripped my clothes off and dressed me. They adorned my hair with pearls. They dabbed makeup on my face. They tried to chat with me and lighten my mood as they went about the process, but they knew that I was an unwilling bride and sometimes, I would catch them giving me sorry looks. They knew that my plight was not one any woman would envy.

The whole time, it felt like everything was happening to someone else. By the time they were done, the elderly maid pushed me in front of a full-length mirror.

“I would’ve chosen another dress, but the king picked this himself,” she explained apologetically.

When I saw my appearance in the mirror, I fought back tears. Derek would’ve been horrified. The neckline was too low, stooping down almost to my navel. The back of the dress also showed a lot of skin. The dress clung to my curves like a glove. I wondered what the dress was intended for—whether it was meant to reveal or conceal. I clenched my fists. I knew the maids had done their best to make me look as decent as possible. They chose to keep my hair down instead of pull it up in order to have my long locks cover at least some skin. Still, I thought I looked more like a whore than a bride. The heart-shaped ruby red necklace adorning my neck only added insult to injury.

I was about to break down into tears when the door creaked open and Borys stepped in. I didn’t even dare look at him. I didn’t want to see the grin on his face.

I asked him the one question on my mind. “Where’s Derek? I want to see him.”

The atmosphere immediately tensed. The maids began to exchange nervous whispers as Borys slowly approached me. My entire body tensed when he stood right beside me. He didn’t seem to mind how rigid I was against his touch, because he took all the liberties he had as both his hands and eyes roamed my anxious form.