“A party?” Bryce asked, looking up from his laptop and turning to Jace as he stood in the doorway.
“You remember Nik, right?” Smiling, Jace walked over to Bryce’s desk and carefully closed his computer shut to ensure he had the man’s undivided attention. “Well, his grandparents are out of town, and he’s throwing it at their house, which means food, lots of liquor, and a pool.”
“What happened to pizza, a movie, and just the two of us? You know I have this damn paper due tomorrow.” Crossing his arms, Bryce sat back with a self-assured grin, knowing all too well Jace wouldn’t be able to enjoy a quiet Saturday night in and expected there’d be an invitation to a party at some point during the evening.
“So, I take you there; we have a little fun, I get you home by midnight before your carriage turns into a pumpkin,” Jace gently removed Bryce’s glasses and sat them on the desk. “We’re in bed by one, we get up at seven, and you finish your paper before noon. See?”
With a sudden tug, Bryce pulled Jace onto his lap, seeking ticklish spots and holding him by the waist with a secure grip. “I should’ve known when you showed up dressed like this and smelling so good that it wasn’t only to see me.”
Jace stirred with laughter until Bryce showed him mercy and stopped, then their foreheads meet in a breathy sigh. A few soft giggles lingered on Jace’s tongue, and his smile didn't fade. Nor did Bryce loosen his arm. “You can say no, but I did tell him I was bringing my best friend along, the party animal who vandalized Glennwood High’s football stadium on a dare with his truck and a bottle of whiskey. Everyone back home loves that story.”
Unpleasant memories of drunken teenage shenanigans made Bryce blush in embarrassment since people still talked about that night eight years later. But those memories were gone in a pinprick after he realized what Jace had said. “Wait…best friend?”
With an excited gasp, he was lifted into Bryce’s arms when he stood, and Jace crossed his legs behind the man’s back by reflex. Sometimes he forgot how strong Bryce was—and how persistent he could be.
“Alright, we’ll go on one condition.”
His grip tightened, and Jace played coy.
“We talk about the ‘best friend’ title tomorrow.”
With a mischievous pinch on Bryce’s firm jaw, Jace smiled.
“Deal.”
“…are you listening?”
Blinking the past away, Jace looked up and caught his master’s hollowed gaze.
The Red One was indeed a demon crafted in the darkest pit of human fear—his face was that of a skull Jace couldn’t identify, not an otherworldly beast like the Dark One nor as human-looking as the Pale One, but a creature caught in between. From that skull, just under the red scars surrounding the bone of his face, grew horns in long, thick points that stabbed the air like blades aimed for the Heavens. And he had the massive build of a god meant to wield those blades—defined lines charted hard muscle adorned with the endless scars of war.
There were times, more often than not, when Jace would absentmindedly trace those jagged wounds, and imagine how each one made its mark on this demon warlord.
Shifting, Jace realized he was tucked in-between the Red One’s arm and body, practically laying on his chest, still naked but decorated in the strands of gold chains holding dark jewels draping across his skin.
“No, Master. I’m sorry.” Short and simple. Don’t avoid eye contact, and don’t piss him off.
Too much begging would arouse the Red One, who would take it as an invitation to fuck him again. Too little would be disrespectful, thus angering him to the point of punishment. So, Jace fought to keep his voice even, calm and remorseful: everything he wasn’t feeling inside.
He took the demon’s large hand and kissed it, glancing up as lips touched calloused fingers. “Forgive me?”
The Red One said nothing, merely looking away and relaxing against the mountain of pillows overlooking the hall they had relocated too. And Jace laid his head back down.
Their realm altered its appearance often—sometimes, there was a grand bed surrounded by a silk canopy and covered in fox-red fur that warmed his skin. Other times he woke up on cold stone cloaked in white sheets and staring into the darkness of the ceiling that echoed with screaming. This time it was a great hall surrounded by walls covered in tapestries depicting horrible scenes of gore and death and ancient writings Jace couldn’t comprehend nor would he want to. There were no doors and no windows, just four walls of a well-lit prison.
How long has it been?
Scurrying around all corners of the room were Familiars—hellish abominations of shadows and rot—who roamed the marble floors serving each master withered goblets filled with wine and tarnished trays carrying fresh meat. A few of them stood in a gathering around strange animals chained to walls, tormenting them to the point of death and exchanging conversations in the form of low chittering or shrieking. Sometimes, they’d gang up on an unfortunate chosen one out of sheer boredom or malice, ripping them apart with sick amusement and devouring what was left.
In the middle of the hall, the Dark One violently tore into the neck of his victim, who twisted in pain and wailed for the end of pain.
Jace heard the melody of death and suffering so often that he knew it by heart, and any fear it should’ve inflicted was absent. And that’s how he liked it—no fear, nothing that would bring him closer to breaking.
And they won’t break me.
The shadowy-demon played with the poor creature, he ripped off strips of flesh and tossed them to hungry Familiars observing in ravenous delight.
And Jace watched the Dark One feed.
A heavily-jointed body—all length and sinew—leaned over the crying victim on disfigured hands, causing the shift of ivory bones and glass beads hanging from thick locks of dark hair. And each strand fell over skin the color of a sky before a terrible storm. His snout was longer and more monstrous than an ordinary beast, creating a wide grin of too many pointed and uneven fangs that remained open in an endless desire to bite. And like the Red One, the Dark One’s body was marred with numerous scars from unidentified sources.
Disgusted by his sadistic recreation, Jace narrowed his eyes and imagined the Dark One choking on every sliver of bone disappearing into that freakish mouth. He wanted to hear the beast gag until his heavy breaths turned into wheezing pleas for help. And he’d watch the Dark One writhe in pain as each bone cut open his throat, drawing blood and blocking small passages of air, slowly taking every ounce of life.
Suddenly, the Dark One turned to him.
Jace winced in fear the demon lord had caught his narrowed gaze and sensed traitorous thoughts.
But the Dark One merely stared back, his dark eyes filled with the essence of moving shadows, and his fangs dripped with a flow of blood.
Jace followed the fall of scarlet droplets to the floor until the Red One squeezed his ass with a painful pressure. He shivered, suppressing a needy moan on the edge of his lips as fingers found his still-wet hole and teased the sensitive spot with slow strokes.
And with a quick thrust, those fingers slid in deep, forcing Jace into the Red One’s hard body, which he held onto by digging nails into the demon’s skin, and he exhaled a moan.
“I see you can focus when your attention lays within the gaze of others,” He was irritated, Jace could tell by the stabbing movements tearing up his insides to create wet noises. And he felt that wetness running down the back of his tense thighs.
“N-No…” Jace panted hotly as his hips lifting, shaking on their own accord as one of his legs hooked around the Red One’s large calve. “Master, the Dark One’s victim…that’s who I was watching. I felt…sorry.”
His movements didn’t change, and Jace liked it that way.
At that moment, a curious familiar—drawn in by the musky smell of sex and longing—crawled close to Jace’s leg and began licking his foot. It’s cold tongue leaving a thick, black substance across his skin, sending a chill up Jace’s spine.
Annoyed, he glanced down at the creature just as the Red One’s foot met its face in a satisfying crack, a force that sent it across the room.
The creature crashed into a table, snapping the wood into pieces in a spill of blood, wine, and meat. The clatter of dishes and shattering glass became a prelude to the chorus of cackling onlookers—a mundane melody followed by a peal of low laughter rolling out of the Dark One’s snout, a thick and terrifyingly long chuckle that might’ve risen from the bottom of an oubliette.
And Jace smiled in cruel amusement.
Once their infernal shrieks subsided, a swarm of those contorted figures rushed at the body in a fury of fangs and claws to feast on wine-flavored flesh.
With a low growl, the Red One stood with Jace cradled in his arm. “First strangers, now lowly beasts meant for the slaughter. Your sympathy is disputable and quite troublesome.” He said, heading for a door that appeared on the other side of the room, and stepping over their demon servants without a second thought.
When he crossed paths with the Dark One, the Red One snatched his beastly kin up by the horns, lifting him from the still-suffering deer and forcing a snarl from the depths of the shadowy demon’s fangs—a noise the red demon countered with a vicious sound of his own. And the Dark One snapped, and if the Red One hadn't shifted his arm, Jace would've lost a leg.
Furious, the Red One stomped down on the dark demon's chest in a satisfying crack of bones, drawing a gasp from that long muzzle.
“End it.” He warned, and tossed the Dark One from his path.
Near the door, the Pale One leaned his head back, forcing the full leg of a mutilated carcass down his swollen throat and remaining oblivious—or uninterested—in their bickering. With a single swallow, the limb disappeared, and his talon feet ripped off an arm in a snap of bones and the sleek tear of meat.
At times, the Pale One was most comforting, for his appearance was less touched by a demon’s misshapenness: he was whiter than snow, starting with the sharp features of his beautiful face to the translucent talon-claws connected to massive, winged arms. Peaked ears surrounded by feathers of their own—like small wings blossoming out of his head—guarded antlered horns growing from silken strands of moon-soaked hair which fell down his back like an iridescent river. And from the flow of hair appeared a trail of prism scales running down his spine to connect with a serpent’s tail.
However, tender moments were often replaced by silent desires to draw blood, something about him that Jace avoided.
Curiously, his gaze—pure black pools of strange and shimmering glints of color—lifted and followed them to the door with an avian tilt of his head. “Do not tire him.” He spoke in a whisper, but the threat was there.
A threat the Red One heard but walked out on.
Each step turned the light and sounds of the hall into a distant glimmer in the dark.
The outside corridor was a canvas of blood-smeared walls, and every stain brought a grim image to mind—fingernails dragging across the stone, fangs ripping into a jugular vein, bones snapping and stabbing through flesh. And each image bringing a dissonance of long-dead screams no one could imagine nor forget.
And Jace closed his eyes in an attempt to shut away from the sounds of the past—so much blood, so many people dead.
But not Bryce. Never.
There was a possibility he could one day get used to the violent nature of his masters, of screaming, and even the sounds they made in their ancient decay of humor, but some things in this world still frightened him—like centuries of victims who lurked unseen through this dreaded hell trapped in a constant purgatory. Still screaming, still suffering.
The touch of light opened his eyes, and a hearth across the room they entered ignited in a dance of flames, giving life to a place that appeared as though it’d been untouched for a long time.
The Red One lowered Jace to his feet, allowing him to glance around while he took a seat on an old throne made of worn wood.
The walls were lined with an array of weapons—strange blades that looked centuries old, having lost their luster to time and still dirty with the past. They hung from walls or sat displayed on shelves gathering dust, but there was one that hung in the middle of the collection, a sword with a crystal blade and a silver handle spreading into wings, that remained untouched by time or filth.
“There,” The Red One spoke, and Jace turned to him.
He sat in that chair, pointing to a chest in the corner of the room. “Look inside and retrieve the box.”
Jace obeyed, feeling those red lights tracing his every movement.
The chest opened without resistance, breaking cobwebs and stirring the dust, and inside he found it: a box of dark wood sitting among the clutter, of old pieces of cloth and broken trinkets.
“Open it.” The Red One growled.
He wanted to hesitate, but he learned that demons were not patient. They took mortal hesitation, even a faint breath of uncertainty, as disobedience that deserved a fitting punishment.
And with that in mind, Jace opened the box.
Every heartbeat slowed with time, and his eyes widen astonishment.
Tucked into a bed of velvet was a blade: a long, serrated dagger made from dark material that shined like obsidian with the clean surface of black steel. His eyes focused, seeing tendrils of shadows rising from behind the resting blade and wrapping around him like dark wings. Jace heard the stirring of feathers, and for a moment, he felt like a wave of shadows surge over him, through him, warning him.
A brief flicker of dark-light pulsed deep inside that cold weapon, awakening it from its deep sleep and calling to Jace with dream-like sounds, speaking to him in a language no human should hear and whispering delicious temptations that made him tremble.
“What...is...this?” Jace couldn’t control the fear in his voice. And his eyes desperately tried to escape the moving lights that called to him, begging him not to look away.
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