High Alpha's Risen Mate

Chapter 7: A Black Rose

"If you don't like the road you're walking, start paving another one."

-Dolly Parton

-------------------------------------

Chapter 7: A Black Rose

POV: Lucian Castle

Failure is only another word for try again. It's time for plan B. I've spent millennia on this, and I will not give up because some little girl decided she could defy me.

Inside my laboratory, I stand waiting for Caspian. The room is dark, only illuminated from the deep fiery depths in Tartarus. There are three levels to the underworld. The walls are lined with human skulls used like stone bricks. Tartarus is the deepest place in the underworld. It is the worst place to be sent. Only the worst of the worst are sent to Tartarus.

The true ruler of the underworld is Hades himself. He rules over me. I once stood by his side as an ally, but things change. I was always the demon king at his side, but he saw me as a threat. Prosephonie, his wife, requested my presence one day, wanting the eye.

Hercules took one of Cerberus' eyes as proof to Hades that he truly did defeat him. Hades encased the eye in amber and gave it to me for safekeeping. However, I lost the eye, but Hades believed I hid the eye to use it to overthrow him. He banished me here to the top level of the underworld.

To prove my loyalty to him, I am to give him the one thing he could never have, a phoenix soul. A phoenix never truly dies. Every phoenix soul is absorbed into the next. Hades is a collector, and this is the one soul he does not have. Only then can I return to the rest of the underworld when I give him what he wants.

"Sire, you requested me?" Finally, Caspian arrives. "Yes, how are our guests doing so far?" I ask him, knowing full well they aren't doing so great. "They're not ready yet. They still hold hope in their eyes." Caspian mocks the word hope. This place is anything but hopeful. Hope has no place in the underworld. The disparity of this place hasn't kicked in yet, but it soon will.

"Have Cain pay them a visit," I order. Cain will know exactly what to do. Cain is a dreamwalker demon. If my so-called guests are smart, they won't fall asleep. Though I doubt they'd be able to stay awake with the small doses of wolfsbane they're being given every few hours.

"Excellent." Caspian's eyes hold an evil glint in them, knowing what will happen to them now. I need to break them in any way possible to get what I want.

Caspian leaves me to my work, going to do as he was told. On the table made of bones, I grind the last two volcanic rocks I have from Tartarus in a mortar. I use the pestle to grind them into a fine powder.

Once they are ground up into a fine powder, I take a small knife and cut the palm of my hand, letting my blood drip into the powder to form the shape of a pentagram to match the pentagrams branded into the palms of my hands. It is now ready.

A single black rose sits on the table waiting to be marked with the now volcanic ash. Maddox, my ambassador, enters my laboratory.

When Sierra entered into Valenwood, every faction was alerted to her return when the signal torches ignited into a blazing flame. It would not look well on me if I did not acknowledge this publicly.

Every faction will send its ambassadors to the hall of peace to present the phoenix with an invitation to their kingdom. Some will even percent her a gift as I will. Sierra will soon make her way to the Hall of Peace to find the High King, Kai Alistair.

Kai is a very valiant and noble king. His honor is what shines through. What a treacherous personality flaw to have. I scoff at the noble and honorable. Honor does nothing but get in the way.

The volcanic ash is sprinkled into the petals of the black rose. It won't be long before it all falls into place. "Tell her I hope to see her soon and give her my condolences for her lost friends." I give the rose to Maddox to take to my little firebird.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Later, I make my way to a metal door with a small square window with bars just like a jail cell. I peek inside to see how my guests are doing for myself. Three prisoners in the darkened cell hang on the skull-stoned wall. Their hands are chained and cuffed to the wall above their heads. Their feet just barely hover above the ground.

Each of them, seemingly asleep, struggles against the chains. A bald man with pure white eyes stands in the middle of the room, just looking at them. I am pleased to see Cain has already started. Soon they will tell me anything I want to know.