Page 90 of Gilded Curses

“He’s telling the truth about Sheree being the last living Elite who helped create the spell with the stones,” Aurora answered. “Whether or not she told him where the stones were, I don’t know, but I doubt it. She enjoyed the power she wielded over this realm and all those beneath her, which was everyone.”

“Did she really kill the other Elite?”

“That’s what everyone has always believed. While there are accidents, and the Elite love to kill us, we have no real threats here other than that. The original Elite are rumored to have died from a sickness. It took all of them… except Sheree.”

“She poisoned them,” Orin stated.

“Most likely,” Alda confirmed. “She had them help her with the spell and the stones and then killed them to keep her secret and the rest of us trapped here.”

Desmond lifted his head and hurled a rush of gibberish. Orin lowered his knife and put his hand against the gag. “I’ll remove this, so you can say what you have to, but if you try to scream, that will be the end of you.”

He lowered the gag from Desmond’s mouth. He worked his jaw before his lips curved into a sneer he directed around the room. It wasn’t intimidating from a dickless man tied to a chair with a blindfold on.

“She did all that to keep you ungrateful pieces of shit safe. You just said our population flourished here; do you think that would have happened without them… without her? She loved you all.”

“She didn’t love anyone, and neither do you,” Alda said.

“We did all of this for you!” Desmond spat.

“You did it all for you,” Aurora retorted. “You did it because you liked having the power and ability to unleash your cruelty and abuse on all those weaker than you. You got off on tormenting us, killing us, and making us play your stupid games. Those games are over now, and you’ve lost.”

Desmond started speaking again, but Orin shoved the gag back in his mouth. Desi had nothing left to offer him, as Orin believed him when he said he didn’t know where the stones were.

Sheree had established this land and killed off all those who helped her do it. In her sick, twisted mind, she probably believed she was helping her species survive and thrive as she protected them from the same fate as her daughter.

In doing so, she’d also ensured most of those who lived here had far worse lives than the short one her daughter lived.

Orin stood and rested his hand on Desi’s head. “I’m done with him. I can kill him if you’d like, or you can both have the honor.”

Alda and Aurora exchanged a look before smiling. Even before they went to pick weapons from the room where Desmond stored them, he knew their answer.

Orin was determined to kill Desmond when he set out on this mission, but the man had done far worse to these women, and it was only fitting Desi should meet his demise at the hands of those he’d claimed to “help.”

Desmond screamed against the gag as Orin left the room to let the women have their fun.

CHAPTER SEVENTY-SEVEN

Sahira couldn’t stop herself from gaping as she entered the round twenty-by-twenty room. The multihued, gray stone floor ran in a circular pattern around it. She hesitated to step on it after everything they’d endured to get here, but all her instincts screamed at her to run for the middle.

Instead, she stood with Pip by her side as they gazed around the space. The ceiling was ten feet high and made of white bricks, as were the walls.

Their stark color emphasized the beauty of the five crystals in the middle of the room. All the crystals stood out from a base with smaller, clear stone formations rising from it, but the main five were various shades of orange and pink.

The tallest stone stood at three feet, while the smallest was barely a foot. All the others fell somewhere in between. With the base, the entire structure stood about five feet tall.

“Are those the Augmentation Stones?” Pip breathed.

“It could be another game.”

Sahira didn’t want to believe that was possible, but in this land of sick freaks, she couldn’t deny it might be. But….

“I can feel their power.” It vibrated against her skin and sent goose bumps up her arms. “If they’re not the Augmentation Stones, they’re definitely something magical.”

“Is it safe to go to them?”

And that is the could-end-my-life question.

Sahira studied the floor again. If this room was another trap, she doubted the same stones as the hallway before would be safe to step on.