“Fineas is waiting for you down below,” Ennis told him. “Reckon you remember the way, eh, boyo?”
Rune didn’t have to ask where they were taking him. There was only one thing below the main floor of the stronghold. And, yes, he still recalled the path, down the spiraling flight of stairs, then through the winding corridor of the underground portion of the keep.
He strode ahead of the guns trained on his back, bracing himself as the sound of his father’s low voice reached his ears. The guttural chuckle had haunted his dreams for years after he’d fled this place.
Now it was all Rune could do to resist the urge to lunge forward and attack in a murderous rage as soon as Fineas Riordan’s dark head and broad shoulders came into view on the catwalk gallery overlooking the pit below.
As much as Rune wanted the bastard’s throat between his teeth, there were five semiautomatic pistols poised to open fire on him the instant he showed any hint of aggression. If he meant to get back to Boston after he was finished here—back to Carys, if she would have him—he had no choice but to keep his rage on a tight leash for now.
Thoughts of Carys put a cold ache in the center of his chest.
She had been on his mind every minute since he’d been gone. The terrible way they had parted. Her beautiful face, stricken with worry and confusion as she saw him with his father’s men and heard the unfamiliar name they’d called him. She had seen their scarab tattoos, and Rune could tell she knew what those marks meant. She knew who they belonged to, and now she knew that he, too, belonged to Fineas Riordan.
Rune had broken her heart in that moment. He only hoped she’d be willing to forgive him. That she might still love him enough to consider taking him back once he returned to her.
But first, he would have to survive the coming confrontation with the monster who’d sired him.
His uncle nudged Rune forward with an ungentle shove as they drew near the catwalk above the pit. “Here’s your special delivery, brother. All the way from Boston.”
Fineas Riordan swiveled his head away from a pair of armed Breed males who were watching the combat along with him. When his dark gaze met Rune’s eyes, a brittle chill seeped into their fathomless depths.
“It has been quite a while, son. I have to say, I was very disappointed when you left.”
Rune couldn’t curb his sharply exhaled breath. “You must’ve been bored without me here to provide your entertainment.”
A thin, evil smile spread across his lips. “Oh, I managed to find other diversions.”
Rune’s guards guided him out onto the viewing gallery. In the dirt-floored, stone enclosure below, a pair of Breed males were engaged in a tremendous fight.
Sweat-soaked, bloodied, with flesh torn in numerous places, the two combatants fought with fists and fangs. Their eyes blazed with hot amber, and their pupils were so thinned, the vertical slits were hardly discernible. The males’ dermaglyphs churned like tempests on their bruised and lacerated bodies as they crashed into each other in a blur of gnashing teeth and punishing blows.
The fight was brutal, animalistic. A feral display of Breed strength and savagery.
Worse than anything Rune had experienced in that hellish circle of granite and sand.
It was . . . unnaturally violent.
Rune’s question must have shown in his eyes, because when his father glanced over at him, a broad smile broke across his face.
“Exciting, isn’t it? Talk about performance enhancement.” He glanced back down into the pit. “The drug was only a prototype until a few weeks ago. Soon it will be in every major city across Europe and the United States. How long do you think it will take the humans before they beg for someone to make the madness stop?”
Rune stared at him, abhorred. “About as long as it will take them to declare war on the entire Breed population.”
His father shrugged, thoroughly unfazed. “Ah, well. Either way.”
He laughed, and was joined by Ennis and the rest of the guards.
Rune’s veins throbbed with disgust. He had always suspected Fineas Riordan was insane, but now he realized it was something even worse than that. He was psychopathic. “You really wouldn’t care, would you? Not so long as you can get off watching others in pain.”
Riordan stared down at the worsening combat below. “You always did have a weak stomach when it came to these things. I blame your mother for that.”
“Is that why you killed her?”
He glanced over, brows raised in surprise. “I didn’t realize you knew that.”
Hatred seethed in Rune. “I didn’t until you just confirmed it.”
Riordan waved his hand as if to dismiss the whole idea as he returned his attention to the pit. “She was a bad match from the start. I should’ve known better than to take her to mate. The bitch could take a punch, I’ll grant her that. But raise a hand to anyone else and she crumbled. She never approved of my . . . inclinations. Eventually, I simply got tired of her judgment.”
Rune listened in simmering fury to his father’s admission. He thought about the gentle woman who’d borne him. Her unique Breedmate gift for withstanding extreme pain had been passed down to him. As a boy thrown into the pit, Rune had leaned on that ability to endure his father’s training. Over time, he’d learned to fight without calling upon it, and hadn’t used it once since he’d left his father’s domain.
But his mother . . .
Rune had been too young, too blind. He had no idea she was being abused, as tortured by Riordan as he was. The realization now made a growl boil
