A Court of Blood & Mercy || Elriel Dual POV

Chapter 18 - Disgust

Azriel squinted, his eyes blurring and slightly stinging as he felt the drums thunder in his ears and chest, the noise crowding and overwhelming his senses as he leaned his shaved head back against the cold ground.

His eyes lifted toward the stars, the constellations peeking and whispering beyond the grey clouds above him, sparkling and twisting into ancient patterns that he still, after many centuries, could not decipher. They fell out of focus as the music began to crescendo, building toward a climax as Azriel flicked his eyes down, watching the nearby dancers begin to unite hands, circling the raging fire with their palms united. The females began gyrating their hips to the thick beat as they stepped, sensual and powerful as he felt his eyes lose focus again, his head falling back with a dull thud.

Azriel felt like he was sinking beneath the earth, his wings so loose and heavy, as if they were being buried in the dirt beneath him. He felt the liquor and stimulants fighting in his veins, swirling and pounding as they fought to win his psyche, dragging him into heart-thundering anxiety before pulling him back up toward numb relaxation.

The coastal desert outskirts of the Day Court had long been his favorite hideaway for whenever he needed to... forget.

His eyes scanned the dark-skinned dancers, their breasts peeking out from behind sweaty swaths of linen. Jewels and beaded feathers swung from their hips as they danced, their faces tossed up to the sky, worshiping the Mother and the body and pleasure herself. Bawdy male laughter swelled from across the party as heady moans erupted from a nearby thicket. He closed his eyes, scrunching his forehead as he felt his skull pound with blood and memories.

And then he was not alone, a soft hand coming across his arm, running her fingers up his scarred skin as he opened his eyes, only to be disappointed by the face of a stranger, kneeling next to him. The female narrowed her sharp eyes and licked her lips as she lifted her leg, attempting to straddle him here in this mound of dead grass and desert sand. Her pointed ears were sharp, stretching up toward the starry sky as the moonlight illuminated her silken hair falling from her dark face, the thunderous bonfire crackling behind her.

He felt his deadened body respond, lifelessly attempting to forge an ounce of passion, perhaps to fall into her touch and join the rest of the revelers in sickened orgasms. She leaned down, running her sharp teeth against his waist band as she angled her hips before licking his bare skin. Another female arrived then, raising a brow as she caught sight of the Shadowsinger, taking her hand to his shorn skull with a catlike grin, letting her nipples fall from her linen close to his face as she offered herself to him.

But instead of descending into absolute nothingness, his body and mind numb as the drugs and alcohol and females took over, he felt his brain explode, parading a series of images of sickening he would do anything to forget: watching Lucien in that damp tent in Osenya with his hands wrapped around that female, fucking the godsdamned life out of her.

He felt his body freeze up, his eyes shooting to the females who were now running their soft fingers under his clothes, pulling and tugging and licking at every offered part of him.

And he felt disgust.

Pushing his hands to the ground, he stood, letting the females topple to the side and onto the sand and grass he strode past their offended whimpers and through the other drunk and lost partiers beyond the bonfire. He wobbled to the side, struggling to remain balanced as he walked he found himself stumbling in the desert sand before suddenly remembering he was a fucking Illyrian.

Launching into the sky, Azriel flew upward, soaring and pushing into the misty clouds before realizing something quite horrific: his left wing had gone completely numb.