8 | ACT I, SCENE VIII

P R E V I O U S L Y

"There's - there's no need. I - I will... I will marry Tristan Valmont."

RYVENNDEL MANSION, BELLHAVEN, STEFFITH.

TRISTAN

THE SICK, STRONG SMELL OF roses and lilies hit me as soon as I opened the door to my chamber. It was a little too late before I realized what was going on inside. The shower of sparks escaped my fingers as the candles lit and I groaned in frustration. The shapes under the sheets stirred.

A man and a goddess jumped up.

"You just had to get it on in my room, didn't you?" I growled, frustrated. The goddess who must have been up to this clearly knew I hated this, and yet she always insisted on making a huge show of it.

One of the pillows moved, emanating a satisfied sigh as I caught sight of more men under the covers. One, two, three, four... five. An orgy.

By Uranus!

There was another ruffle of silk and some wet noises along with a moan as she emerged from under a coverlet. Her hair was tousled, slick with the sweat of passion, glistening over her whole naked body. One of her lovers was busily fondling her as she looked up.

"Hello there, Tristan," the goddess purred in her sickly sweet voice. "Why don't you join us?"

She slowly shook her hungry - thirsty - lover away with a kiss and got up, pulling on a robe. They latched to her like leeches as she made her way out of the bed. The robe she wore was nothing more than wisps of gold that made a mockery of discretion. As flamboyant as a flamingo, proud as a peacock.

And with as much appeal as a dead gnat.

"If you're finding it hard to laugh at yourself, I'd be happy to do it for you," I muttered, amused yet irked.

I trapped my heel between the door and the wall, propping myself up on one knee. I crossed my fingers, awaiting her excuse for the nonsense she'd be laying at my feet today.

Her eyes gleamed as she raised her inquisitive neck, observing me with hungry smile, not speaking. Slithering over the floor, she glided to me, robe dragging over the tiles.

"What do you want?" I asked exasperatedly, putting a hand out for her to stop.

"You do look a tad... stressed," she mewled, walking the few steps up to me. I noticed leather cuffs and chains strewn around as she delicately stepped over a leather whip. I raised an eyebrow in distaste. "Perhaps you might want to... destress with me."

My eyes fell on her breasts peeking from between her hair, spilling out like overflowing wine.

The sight of the naked goddess could have incited any god to action, but it stirred nothing in me.

"I imagine you're a tad... busy at the moment," I coolly replied.

She giggled. Shoots and bunches of flowers and fresh grass spewed out from her fingertips, filling the room with their sickly sweet smell. I heard her laugh deeply.

Her voice was rich and noble and highborn, and it sounded like a dog throwing up.

"No, never too busy for the master of the skies," she sighed.

"Is it now?"

"Well..." she whined stupidly, "I have been busy. They were asking me to help with the preparations for the coronation. Very busy, as a matter of fact."

"Ah. Do tell me more. And caught in a room at the same time with five others... very busy, I'd say."

"Huh!" she inhaled sharply, stopping in front of me. I noticed bite marks all over her shoulders, and she pressed herself against me. "You never know what you've been missing until you have it. Try it out?" she asked.

Without permission, she reached to unfasten my belt, even as I stopped her just before she fulfilled her purpose.

"Come on," she muttered. "Are you always so cold because you never got laid?"

"I imagine you want me to sleep with you? You'll need a ladder to get over yourself."

"Come on," she whined as I took a step back, "have you never kissed a woman too?"

"I'm a virgin, not a halfwit."

"I do wonder how you manage to keep the women at bay. I fainted the first time I saw you. With your sexy black hair and your dark blue eyes and your-" her fingers were on my shirt, and I firmly took her hands away from my chest, but she placed them right back there. "And that strong, glorious body... ah. The things you could do to me with that body..."

Her voice trailed off as she observed me with the fascination, the delight of a cat with a bowl of cream.

"Sorry to interrupt, but I am going to ask you to get out of my room."

"Why do you want to go out when we could have so much fun here?" she gestured to the bed, where her lovers sat waiting like an army of obedient dogs.

Two of them were busy at work, and the sounds of their passion resonated loudly. It disgusted me to no end, having to witness her perverse afflictions. I tried to breathe calmly, counting from ten to one.

Ten.

Nine.

"You could pin me down with those strong hands and-"

Eight.

Seven.

Six.

"-imagine your wicked tongue on my body and the-"

Five.

Four.

"-and those perfect legs and-"

Three.

Two.

"-your body and mine, entwined together-"

One.

One.

My voice came out in an angry growl, like frozen ice, crusted with venom.

"Stop."

"But I-"

"Leave. Right now."

"But, look. This would be so much fun. All the other gods give in, why don't-"

"Get. Out."

Her eyes widened, but she didn't leave.

"We could-"

"The door is that way - would you like me to show you out?" I clenched my fists, prying my shirt away from her fingers, disentangling her hands which clawed at my chest.

"Come on. Don't be a spoilsport, Tristan," the goddess pouted.

"Are you going to leave before I pour a vat of holy water on top of you? I spat.

"Sheesh, could you talk in terms I understand?"

"Frankly, my humor is for my enjoyment. Whether you get it or not is of little consequence to me."

She backed away, hissing, face contorted with fury.

"So it's true, isn't it?" she shouted. "You are to marry that Tremayne bitch!"

"Well, it takes a bitch to know one, doesn't it?"

Her jaw dropped open and nearly fell to the floor.

"Stay here, then," I turned away and made my way to the door, fists clenched. Before I stepped out, I heard her cling to my chest with her lips at my ear.

"You will pay for this, Tristan Valmont. Days from now, years from now - one day, you will pay. No one dares to scorn me, do you understand? No one."

I paid her no heed and walked out of the door, wondering why fate sent women like her my way to mock me.

Someone ran straight into me. I gasped all of a sudden, feeling soft skin against mine, like silk spilled over glass. I took all my strength to keep my hands to myself instead of reaching out to touch her again. Lust weakened pride once again as her irresistible scent assaulted my senses.

I just wanted to take Edwina Tremayne, then and there.

Anger quickly overcame my feelings once the initial shock had passed, the shock that I had actually touched her. I felt suffocated by how angry I felt, if it was even possible to feel any more anger. My hands itched to snap her lovely neck, and yet they yearned to experience the incredible sensation of touching her skin again.

How was it even possible? To feel such burning lust and resentment at the same time?

I noticed the dagger in her hands. Her eyes were sharper than the tip, shining with such anger that they looked glazed, pupils smaller than normal. Even in anger, the fierce goddess looked glorious, making my breath catch in my throat and almost making my resolve go weak. My eyes had a mind of their own, solely fixed onto her pretty red lips as she spoke, white teeth gritted.

"You bastard," spat Edwina Tremayne.

• • • • •

EDWINA

"What do you want?" Tristan asked in an ominously dangerous tone. He was a bit too good looking, almost making it impossible for me to remember what I came here for.

The maddeningly attractive god's dark blue eyes bored into mine, looking for a reason for the intrusion, anger rolling off him in waves. I held back the obscenities halfway out of my lips. My voice came out choked with anger and irritation.

"There are lot of things I want, and if I begin to tell you, we'll be here for eternity. And we sure as fuck don't want to spend that much time together!"

"The feeling is mutual," he hissed softly, a muscle ticking in his jaw as he gave me a predatory glare. My hands itched to touch his jaw while the dagger in them had a mind of its own.

"And yet you did this. You did this," I said angrily, teeth shaking so hard I feared they'd fall out with the anger in me. His muscles seemed to tighten, almost making me sigh out loud and I tore my gaze away.

"I didn't, woman, and you'd do better to remember that," Tristan Valmont snapped, almost a bark, eyes glazed with such anger that it seemed to emanate from him. "You think I had a choice? They threatened to take my immortality away if I didn't agree!"

"Oh, please," I scoffed, "I know you did this. You did this so that you'd get the Derwentwater, didn't you? Greedy, power hungry, little bas-"

"-I think that's enough character assessment when you've talked with me for only one minute," he said frigidly, eyes raking down my neck and sending flames of passion searing up my spine. His voice deepened further with every word.

"Apollo killed my mother," I growled, "and if you think for one second-"

"-a mother. I lost a sister," he said. I forced the urge to slap him right down my throat.

"A sister. I lost my parent, Valmont. You lost a whore of-"

Before I could finish my sentence, Tristan roughly pushed me and backed me against the wall, his alluring face cold and angry and every inch lined with anger.

I felt his strong, white fingers curl around my throat, and he leaned in, dangerous and deadly, to whisper in my ear.

"What did you call my sister?" he asked softly, eyes furious and gleaming with harshness.

"You very well know what I said," I croaked out, trying to breathe at this too close proximity. His chest was pressed against mine, and even through the layers of separating fabric, I could feel his sculpted muscles and heat.

I tried to keep the delectable scent of wild musk and cinnamon out of my fogged thoughts as Tristan regarded me coldly. Between the wall and his irresistible body pressed together, my throat turned dry, and I hated myself for wanting to beg him to just take me then and there, to let him use my body to vent his frustrations sexually. It wasn't helping the slightest bit, considering I wanted to sink my dagger right into his heart at the same time.

The infuriated god's voice came out like a growl, and I had heard nothing like it before.

"Don't," he whispered, "don't you ever, ever, ever call Elodie a whore again while you live, or I swear to Uranus, I will make your life a living hell, is that clear?"

"Living hell, is it, Valmont?"

"Trust me," he hissed, "you wouldn't want to find out."

"You're bluffing," I spat, clawing at his fingers still around my throat, and dark spots began to appear in front of my vision. His grip relaxed considerably.

"I am not," he said, "and you'd better keep that mouth of yours shut before you find out what I can do to it-" suddenly he stopped, shocked, and corrected himself, "-to you, I meant."

I almost gasped out loud and my cheeks turned redder.

The anger coursing through my veins was preventing me from thinking clearly. I just wished he wasn't so bloody attractive because it made hating him so much harder.

"There's someone there!" I almost shouted, pointing to the glass wall behind him. My hand was shaking due to the lack of oxygen in my blood with his hand around my neck.

There was a woman out of the window, watching us in the dark of the night. She had platinum blond hair and her dress was darkly colored. I couldn't see her eyes, her face was shadowed.

"Don't you dare change the subject, woman," he snapped, alluring face twisted in understandable anger. His eyes were deep and dark and harsh, his perfect lips turned up in the deadliest of scowls.

"Your sister-"

"-don't you dare even speak her name. Do you understand?"

"I swear to you by all the gods, you devil - there is someone outside, on the other side of the glass," I whispered.

The air began to smell like acid around me, making my stomach roll. The woman was coming closer and closer, as I watched her through the window. She seemed to be staring at us, but her face was still covered.

Maybe I only imagined it, but the smell made its way to my head, the woman still looming closer.

"There's no one there," he observed, annoyed, turning around to watch the glass. His fingers skimmed my collarbone, and it took all I had to not gasp out loud at the thrill it set up running in my veins, trickling into my blood.

"There is," I said firmly, as the woman took another step forward. The smell of acid increased a notch, and my head spun.

"There's no one there, woman."

She took another step closer. And then I saw her eyes.

Black eyes without the whites.

"There is a woman! Blond haired, black eyed."

"It's empty. There's no one out there."

"Please. I'm telling you. Her eyes have no whites!"

He looked dubiously at me.

The woman was staring at me too, cold black eyes, white skin, hair almost white. And there was something about that empty look. Pale and empty and reeking of death. The acrid smell grew stronger.

"She's standing right there!" I croaked roughly, voice dry. "Stop lying, liar. Stop lying."

"How ironic would it be if your pants really caught fire?" Tristan hissed.

"Gods, I'm not - I swear, Valmont, I'm not fucking lying - can't you see-"

The woman came closer, eyes shining with the light of death, the hollowness - like black tunnels and the smell was making my head spin. She was almost at the window now, her red lips curled up in a proud, cruel smile, as she came closer, black eyes taunting me, hollow and lifeless yet evil in their own way.

Tristan let go of my neck, the inner beast retracting, eyes still dark as his deadly glare. He blinked, looking at the red fingerprints on my neck.

I was about to throw up from that evil, reeking smell of acid - it was making me feel like hell, and that was when the woman reached the window.

I felt another set of hands clamp around my throat, a white garland of bruised knuckles that pressed hard and mercilessly, definitely aiming to choke me.

They were not Tristan's hands. These hands were dead hands.

I tried to speak, and the only thing I could see were his sinful lips and the messy black hair, dark blue eyes shining like stars.

"Fuck you," I snarled, and my hand whipped out, leaving a mark on Tristan Valmont's perfect cheek.

There was a hissing in my ears, as I felt my eardrums explode and the world faded to black with the sound of a sword being drawn.

• • • • •

*cowering under pitchfork* don't hate me, please :( I told you this was gonna happen, uh huh... okay? What do you guys think of this? I feel that Edwina's tongue ran away with her, as always *rolls eyes* Do you think it was justifiable enough for him to say what he said? Clearly, Tristan Valmont has some deep shit protective feelings for his sister :(

Stay tuned to find out what the hell happened to Edwina Tremayne after she passed out, and how the wedding goes! Tata!