“You were hurt,” Marcus murmured.
“I guess so,” Divine said on a shrug.
“What happened?” he asked, obviously recognizing that the story didn’t end there.
“We lived in what is now called Tuscany,” Divine told him. “Grandfather had a large tract of land on the Tiber River and I used to like to play and swim in the river, sometimes with my cousin when she visited, but always with Gran or Aegle or Uncle Lucian accompanying. That night, though, Aegle was suffering some mortal bug and didn’t feel up to going. She said to ask my gran, but Gran had company, and Uncle Lucian wasn’t there, so I just decided to go alone.”
Divine sighed and glanced to him to admit, “I guess I was a bit out of sorts that he left without saying good-bye, and . . .”
“And rebelliously did what you knew you shouldn’t,” Marcus suggested softly.
She nodded and was alarmed to feel tears glaze her eyes. She hadn’t cried in ages, especially over this, and had no idea why telling Marcus about it would bring back those ancient tears now.
Wiping them impatiently away, she took on a more matter-of-fact tone and said, “I picked the wrong day to do it, and then to add to my folly, I spotted a hare, and gave chase. I planned to catch it and take it home to show Uncle Lucian when he got back, but the damned thing was quick and led me quite a chase. I was so intent on catching it I didn’t even notice when I followed it off our property.” She snorted. “Hell, I ran right into the center of a group of men and horses before I even noticed they were there.”
Divine closed her eyes briefly as she recalled crashing into Abaddon’s horse and bouncing off. She’d landed on her behind and then had simply stared wide-eyed up at the laughing men standing or mounted around her.
“What have we here?” one of the men had crowed, bending to catch her by the collar and lift her to her feet. Peering at her closely then, his ugly yellow-gold eyes had widened. “Why, you’re an immortal. Such a shame. I was hoping for a snack.”
He’d then laughed when she immediately started struggling and kicking.
“Put her down,” someone had growled, and Basha had turned to stare at a man on horseback with long, lank, dirty blond hair, and ugly yellow-gold eyes. It was Leonius Livius, though she hadn’t known it at the time. Despite not knowing, he’d frightened her from the first look she had of him and she’d stared at him wide-eyed until the dark-haired man on the horse beside him had ridden forward and bent to pick her up and set her on the horse before him. Turning her to face him, Abaddon had looked her over and said, “If I’m not mistaken this little immortal is an Argeneau. She has the Argeneau silver-blue eyes. Am I right, little one? Are you an Argeneau?”
Basha had glared at him, refusing to speak. But he didn’t need her to speak. He’d easily read her mind. “Ah, little Basha Argeneau. The long-lost daughter of Felix, so newly restored to the family.” The words had sounded light, but there had been a look in his eyes that had frightened the child she’d been then.
“Divine?”
Marcus’s voice drew her from her memories and she forced a wry smile. “I was duly repaid for my stupidity. The group of men I charged into the middle of was Leonius, his sons, and his right hand man Abaddon. They captured me and took me back to their camp . . . And there I stayed for a year.”
Marcus cursed. “He was trying to build an army of his own sons. He tortured and raped any woman he got his hands on, mortal, immortal, and no-fanger alike.”
“Yes, I know,” she said succinctly and he blanched.
“He didn’t . . . ?”
Divine stared at him unflinching and he shook his head.
“But you were just a child. Just eleven years old.”
“I turned twelve a week after I was taken,” Divine said, feeling as empty as her words sounded . . . which she didn’t understand at all. She’d cried a river of tears over this during her first two or three hundred years, but eventually she’d cried herself out. Divine had thought when she could remember it without an emotional reaction that she had finally got over that period in her life. Yet, here she was now having to shut down emotionally to avoid a rage of pain, shame, and remembered terror.
“The first couple of months were unbearable,” Divine found herself saying, and while she was surprised to hear the words leave her mouth, they were true. Leonius was a no-fanger, which meant exactly what it sounded like. While he was immortal, he had never developed fangs to feed with. He had to cut his victims. Like immortals he could control his victim’s minds and keep them from feeling the pain of his cutting if he so chose, but Leonius’s mind had been sick and twisted beyond comprehension. He’d enjoyed the suffering of others. He’d cut and cut and slice and dice the mortals he fed on, feeding as much on their agony as on their blood until he drank them dry. But while it was bad for mortals, it was worse for immortals, because he couldn’t feed off their blood, so those cuts were purely for pleasure. At least mortals could die and escape him. Immortals healed . . . and then he’d start in on them all over again, raping, cutting, raping, slicing, sometimes slowly cutting a limb almost completely off just to see if it would heal and reknit itself.
“But then I learned how to shut him out,” Divine breathed.
“Shut him out?” Marcus asked, eyes narrowing.
“He enjoyed the pain and suffering. I thought if I stopped giving him that, he might tire of me and just kill me,” she admitted. “So I started trying to close my mind to him. Eventually I succeeded.”
“Is that what you did to me?” Marcus asked quietly, and when she blinked and glanced to him with surprise, he said, “At the end, just before I passed out, it was as if you suddenly weren’t there anymore.”
Divine swallowed and nodded solemnly. “Yes. I tried to use the same technique with you. I didn’t want to pass out.”
“You wanted to stay awake and tie me up,” he said dryly and glanced resentfully to his bound wrists. “And obviously it worked.”
“Actually, no it didn’t. Not as well as I’d hoped,” she confessed. “I left it too long before shutting down and I briefly passed out as well.”
Marcus looked only slightly mollified, but grudgingly said, “Go on. You learned to shut him out. I doubt he was pleased.”
“No,” Divine acknowledged. “It was no fun if he couldn’t feel my suffering. But rather than stop, it just seemed to make him redouble his efforts.”
“I’m sorry,” Marcus said quietly.
“Well, fortunately before he tired of that and killed me, I became pregnant.”
Marcus stiffened. “Your son . . .”
“Damian is a son of Leonius Livius I, yes,” Divine said wearily.
“Damian,” he breathed with seeming relief and then frowned. “You say fortunately, as if that was a good thing? I mean, some women—”
“Some women would loathe carrying the child of their rapist and torturer and giving it life,” she said quietly. “I understand that, but . . .” Divine swallowed and peered down at her feet, realizing only then that she’d been going to leave without shoes. She was barefoot. Sighing, she raised her head and said, “You have to understand, being pregnant meant an end to the torture and rape for us. Some of us couldn’t bear to carry the child of our captor, but some saw it as a blessing, a gift. So long as we were pregnant or breast-feeding afterward, we held no interest for Leonius. So that baby was precious and we fed as often as they’d let us, desperate to consume enough blood to keep the pregnancy safe.”