and squeezed, her eyes light with satisfaction as the priest fought for air, fought to be released. He choked, legs and arms desperately trying to break from Raphael’s ties. But it was futile.
Eventually, Raphael lowered him back to the ground, and the noose slackened enough to allow him to breathe. The priest gasped for air, then he let out a scream, filled with frustration—filled with the opening notes of defeat.
Noa rushed toward him. “The woman? Tell us where the woman is, and this will stop.” Diel smirked to himself. Because he knew his woman. This would never stop. This priest was going to bear the brunt of all the Fallen’s hatred toward his fellow black-robed brothers and their fucked-up organization.
The priest’s eyes rolled. Noa lifted his head by his hair. “Where is she?”
The priest fought unconsciousness, the pins still in his body, the knife Diel had inserted in his shoulder still handle-deep. Blood seeped from the wound. He was bleeding from where Sela had taken his fingers and ear. He was losing blood, and Michael was watching him from the corner of the room as if the priest was his next meal.
“The …” The priest tried to swallow through the noose around his neck. “She’s a … Sh-shunned,” he stuttered, his voice barely audible, ruined by pain and the rope. But Diel heard it. Noa whipped her head to Diel, eyes wide.
Diel shot forward, crouching down beside Noa. “Shunned? What are the fucking Shunned?” When the priest’s eyes rolled again, Diel grabbed him by the shoulders and wrenched him and his chair off the floor until his eyes met Diel’s. “What are the fucking Shunned?”
The priest tried to focus on Diel. Then he smiled, igniting hellfire in Diel’s veins. “Pun …ish … Punished,” he said, fucking pride in his tone.
Punished, punished, punished … Diel ran the word over in his head. The Shunned. The punished. What did that mean? What did that fucking mean?!
Diel dropped the priest, sending the wood crashing to the floor. The chair fell back, and the noose pulled tight against the priest’s neck. Noa quickly righted the chair, then came after Diel. “Diel.” She forced him to turn and face her. “We’ll get more from him.”
Noa looked at Michael and nodded. Michael moved from the far wall and slowly approached the priest. He licked his fangs, and Diel felt as though his blood was scalding him from the inside. He needed more from the priest. He needed to know what and who the fuck the Shunned were. Why Cara was one of them and where the fuck she was.
The priest’s scream was deafening as Michael ripped his head to the side and sank his teeth into his flesh. But Michael didn’t drink from him. He recoiled, releasing the priest’s neck, and spat the blood onto the floor. Diel blinked, momentary shock rendering him motionless.
Michael always drank. He never wasted blood.
Diel glanced at Raphael, Michael’s closest friend. Raphael was frowning, shock in his expression too. The priest looked at Michael as if he were the anti-Christ. He screamed, trying to edge away from Diel’s blood-loving brother. But Michael sank his fangs into the other side of the priest’s neck. Seconds later, he wrenched his head back and spat the blood onto the floor once again. Michael’s facial expression didn’t change, it never did, but his body shook, Diel guessed with rage.
A low snarl sounded in Michael’s mouth as he wiped the blood from his lips with the back of his hand, smearing red across his cheek.
“Please …” the priest said, showing the first signs of surrender as he glared at Michael with wide, fearful eyes. But at the sound of his plea, Michael curled his long metal-clawed fingers and slashed them across the priest’s face. He did it again and again, until the priest was screaming so loud it rang in Diel’s ears.
“Stop! STOP! I’ll tell you anything!” the priest shouted, but Michael didn’t halt, as if he couldn’t hear the priest’s begging, or he didn’t want to. Diel went to rip him away from the priest, but Raphael was across the room before he could, wrapping his arms around Michael and wrenching him away.
Michael’s ice-blue eyes were wide as Raphael pushed him against the wall to calm down, keeping him from charging back to the priest. Michael lapped at his fangs, but as if the blood was repugnant and sour, he spat it onto the ground. It took minutes for Michael to calm enough for Raphael